" Answer to Poincare"

"Answer to Poincare"

On June 7 last Chancellor Cuno made the following offer to the Allies:

Total "indemnity " of $7,500,000,000; annual payments of $265,600,000 beginning 1928 if an international loan were not immediately available; guarantees pledging Federal railway system; capitalized at $2,380,000,000 and a like sum guaranteed by a gold 5% mortgage on business, industry, banking, trade, traffic, agriculture.

The Allies never replied. France and Belgium refused to do so until the Germans ceased passive resistance in the Ruhr. Britain has been engaged in the interval in persuading France and Belgium to evacuate the Ruhr, with no success.

Last week Chancellor Stresemann addressed the National Association of German Chambers of Commerce at a luncheon given in his honor at Berlin. In his speech the Chancellor reneved his predecessor's offer to the Allies, reaffirmed Germany's determination to guard her sovereignty, avoided reference to passive resistance.

Said he:

"Even a temporary pledging of the Ruhr region or transfer of the Rhenish railroads or of individual mines and properties on the Rhine and Ruhr, as suggested in the 'Documents 23 and 25' of the French Yellow Book*, cannot be regarded by us as a basis for a solution of the reparation question. For us in Germany there is no Rhineland question to be solved internationally. The Rhinelanders have the right to decide for themselves, within the framework of the German republican constitution, in what form they want to live within the German Reich."

*French Yellow Book--official Government report.