The Struggle For Peace

active policy of peacemaking, which involves searching out
and removing causes of suspicion and antagonism wherever
they exist, I attempted soon after I hecame Prime Minister
to improve our relations with Italy, and last April we were
able to make an agreement with^the Italian Government.
Although that agreement did not immediately come into full
operation, yet it was at once followed hy a return of the old
feelings of cordiality and friendship between our two peoples*
And subsequently this change for the better had the happiest
result in enlisting the powerful aid of Signor Mussolini for
a peaceful solution of the Czechoslovak question. Now,
since we need no longer regard the Spanish conflict as a
menace to the peace of Europe, that agreement will soon be
coming into force, and I am confident that it will be found to
be a further advance towards that general appeasement of
Europe at which we are aiming,
" My Lord Mayor, to some people this policy of concilia-
tion and appeasement which I have been describing may seem
to forbid that at the same time we should be completing and
accelerating the programme of rearmament to which we are
simultaneously devoting ourselves, but there is really no
inconsistency between the two. Ultimately, if we can get
rid of suspicion, and if we can enter upon a new era of con-
fidence, we shall all be ready to disarm together; and the
sooner that time comes the better. But meantime we should
not be serving the cause of peace by unilateral disarmament.
On the contrary, we must maintain our forces at a level
commensurate with our responsibilities and with the part
we want to play in maintaining peace. The British
Commonwealth of Nations has traditions of freedom which
make it a steadying factor in a world which has not yet
regained its former stability* We in this country are vitally
interested in preserving it, and we must be ready to play our
part in its military protection. That is a fact which always
comes to the front in the reviews which are made from time
to time of our Defence requirements by our Service advisers*
I myself for a number of years have been concerned directly
or indirectly in these reviews, and I cannot remember any
paper of major importance coming to us from the Chiefs of
Staffs which did not direct our attention to our oversea