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Show FRANCE APPEAES FOR ASSISTANCE Men, Money and Ships Needed to Reconstruct Devastated j Country and Aid People. NEW YORK, Nov. S. An appeal to, America to assist France in her reconstruction re-construction with men, money, materials mat-erials and ships was made here tonight to-night by Andre Tardieu, general commissioner com-missioner for France-American war affairs Declaring that the war has reduced by one fifteenth and effective population popu-lation of the republic, that 350.000 homes have been destroyed; that agriculture, agri-culture, commerce and Industry in ,the invaded regions virtually have been wiped out, that French shipping and foreign trade have been reduced almost to non-existence, M. Tardieu said that approximately 60,000,000,000 francfe ($10,000,000,000) will be required requir-ed to finance the process of restoration. restora-tion. While France, "for many months tho main battle field of liberty and right" will draw upon her every resource re-source and those of her colonies to mobilize this vast sum, the commissioner commis-sioner slated, she confidently looks for assistance from the allies. From America, M. Tardieu continued, contin-ued, making public, as he said, representations rep-resentations which he had presented to the administration at Washington, France asks for a contribution of labor by American troops now on her soil; for credits to tho extent of 50 per cent of her reconstruction purchases in this country for raw materials, railroad rail-road rolling stock and agricultural and Industrial tools, and for diversion of part of the emergency lleet to the uses of French commerce. In explaining these needs to. the American government, govern-ment, the commissioner says, he was given a "welcome by which I was deeply moved." While France will exact restitution ' for German depredations, M. Tardieu asserted, speed In tho reconstruction I is Imperative and "America, on ac- ' count of her immense capability for production, ought to give us the first help." The French commissioner's appeal to Americans was made in an addross beforo the Association of Foreign Press Correspondents. Introduced by Frank Dllnot of London, president of the organization, M. Tardieu attributed the allied victory to "the work of our soldiers and civilian populations" and 'to the "loyal, wise and skilful policy by means of which President Wilson enabled the allies and America, In answer to the German request, to determine de-termine in full liberty our conditions of armistice." "France has lost 2,500,000 men," ho continued "some aro dead, some aro maimed; some have returned sick and incapacitated from German prisons. Whether thoy be lost altogether, or whether their working capacity be permanently reduced, they will not participate in this reconstruction. "The industrial disaster is complete. The districts occupied by the Germans and whose machinery has been methodically meth-odically destroyed or taken away by the enemy, were, industrially speaking, speak-ing, tho very heart of France. They were the verv backbone of our production. produc-tion. "Plants, machinery, mines nothing is left. Everything has been carried away or destroyed by the enemy. So complete is the destruction that, in the case of our great coal mines in the north, two.yoars of work will bo needed need-ed before a single ton of coal can bo extracted and ten 3'eare beforo the output out-put is brought back to the figures of 1913. "To you Americans let me say that we want first immediate assistance In the matter of labor. We hope that, during the preparation and the carrying car-rying out of the transportati'W of your troops back to America, y-vL'r technical techni-cal as well as other omits with their equipment, will be able to co-operale In that effort. "We soon will have to carry out a colossal work of transportation in view of tho supplying of the regions evacuated by tho enemy, of, the recov-' recov-' ering of the railroads in northern and eastern France and In Alsace-Lorraine. "We will hae to clear tho reconquered recon-quered ground of the ruins accumulated accumu-lated by the German hordes. Your array will help us in this work while our population will restore her cities and villages." Speaking "to America-M. Tardieu; said: "For more than 100 years our liberties liber-ties and yours have developed fraternally frater-nally and today we, united, offer to the world the startling lesson of victory vic-tory and democracy. "Today I have told you where we i are standing; I have told you of our will to live again; I have told you of our needs and of our wounds, I have told you of what we intend to do and what we will do, and I need not wait for your answer. I know it because I know you."' ! 00 |