The Auckland Star: WITH WHICH ARE INCORPORATED The Evening News, Morning News and The Echo. SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 24, 1927. A NEW PROTOCOL.

Auckland Star, Volume LVIII, Issue 226, 24 September 1927, Page 8

The Auckland Star: WITH WHICH ARE INCORPORATED The Evening News, Morning News and The Echo.

SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 24, 1927. A NEW PROTOCOL.

For ths cauae that lack* aeaiatantH, For the wrong that needs resit tanetj For the future in the dittance, And the good that %oe can da,

■ _ I

It is now three years since the failure of the Geneva Protocol to gain general acceptance disheartened the supporters of the League of Nations, and seemed to preclude for the moment further efforts to ensure the maintenance of the world's peace by specific agreement between the Powers. The difficulties in the way of the Protocol were twofold—the reluctance of independent sovereign States to submit themselves more or less unconditionally to the authority of the League, an<! the virtually unlimited responsibilities that might be incurred by the contracting parties when they had once bound themselves to do the League's bidding. These were the principal reasons for the rejection of the Protocol by Britain, speaking for herself and the Dominions, and it was Britain's refusal to accept the Protocol that ruined its prospects of success. The current session of the Assembly of the League at Geneva has seen the Protocol revived in another form. Naturally enough, the whole question of the maintenance of world peace by the authority of the League has been raised again by some of the smaller States whose existence depends upon the protection of their frontiers against possible attack. So far the information available as to the precise character of the proposals now before the League is neither copious nor satisfying. Our readers will have observed with interest that New Zealand's representative on the Assembly, Sir James Parr, has accepted on our behalf the scheme submitted by the special committee set up to devise a substitute for the discarded Protocol. In view of the clearlyexpressed determination of New Zealand and the other Dominions to hold aloof from any such project of unlimited intervention as was suggested in the first Protocol, we may reasonably infer that, in Sir James Parr's opinion, the proposals now before the Assembly entail no serious responsibilities upon us. Indeed, we may go so far as to say that the new scheme apparently amounts to little more than a "pious aspiration" toward universal peace, which is to be secured by general disarmament and universal arbitration. As to the reduction of armaments, most nations and most Governments hold that this policy is desirable. But the recent failure of Britain, France and the United States to reach unanimity on this question has shaken the confidence of even the most ardent pacifists in this method of procedure. There is, therefore, a natural tendency to explore other possibilities, and so we find that in the readjusted scheme now under consideration at Geneva more stress is laid on arbitration as a means of minimising friction between sovereign States, and thus averting war. We believe that the members of the League will be well advised to adopt this course. For it is only by mutual consent that the Powers will ever be able to obviate war completely, and the wonderfully rapid extension of the arbitration system between the principal civilised nations since this century opened suggests limitless possibilities for the future.