GERMANY NEAR STARVATION.

These are the big problems that lie ahead. But meanwhile the Army problems of the moment are sufficiently vast. So are the Estimates themselves – £440,000,000 gross. They are strictly conditioned by events; not till next year will they be conditioned by policy. We have to maintain a great army on the Rhine, to make sure that we shall not be cheated of the fruits of victory. It is not enough, Mr. Churchill said, to see that Germany signs the Peace Treaty; we have to see that she carries out its terms. He, therefore, made an eloquent appeal to the country to maintain ungrudgingly a strong British Army on the Rhine. At present, as he told the House, the blockade is being rigorously observed; Germany is very near the starvation point, and there is danger of a collapse of the whole German structure. Therefore, said he, we must make peace quickly, and see that Germany accepts it before she sinks into Bolshevism. And now as to the Army itself. It was encouraging to hear what Mr. Churchill said about the way that the new proposals of the Government with respect to demobilisation had been received. The Army understood them, he said and recognised their fairness. “The bonds of discipline,” he said, “are subtle and sensitive. They may be tense as steel or brittle as glass.” It all depends whether the Army’s sense of justice is satisfied. Mr. Churchill assured the House that it was. Then he gave the following facts: 1,800.000 officers and men have already been demobilised. 25,000 a day more are now being released. 100,000 Canadians and Australians have already gone home. The men with the colours not in the retained classes, but waiting to be demobilised, do not number more than 500,000. The rough-and-ready principle now in operation is to free three men out of four, and pay the fourth man double to finish the job. The men in the retained classes, i.e., those under 37 years of age, and who joined the Army after Jan. 1, 1916, are to form the Army of Occupation.