I
THE TREATY OF PEACE
63
We have to pay the United States about£35,000,000 a year, rising to £40,000,000.The Dawes Scheme will yield, if and when itis in full operation, and after allowing for variousprior charges, about £100,000,000 a year.France’ s share of this will be about ,£54,000,000,Italy’ s £10,000,000 (less at first), and ours£24,000,000. (I neglect the minor Allies be-cause they would complicate the calculation andhardly affect the result.) Thus the BalfourNote demands that France and Italy should payGreat Britain not less than £16,000,000 a year.Since the aggregate debts of these two Powersto ourselves and to the United States respect-ively are about equal (our share of Italy’ s totaldebt is greater, and of France’ s less), we mustassume that the United States will not settle fora smaller sum than what we receive. If thewhole of Italy’ s share of Reparations is devotedto her debts, France is left, on these assumptions,with ,£22,000,000 to pay. In this case the netresult of the Debt Settlements and the DawesScheme would be that the receipts from Ger-many would be distributed as follows:
Nil.
Nil.
£32,000,000
£58,000,000
Very improbable things are easier said thandone. Who believes that this will ever be done?But we have not yet reached the gravamen of
1 Including her own direct share.