PEACE—WITH RESERVATIONS.

Auckland Star, Volume LIX, Issue 119, 22 May 1928, Page 6

PEACE—WITH RESERVATIONS.

In some respects the most interesting part of the British reply to the American Peace Note is the reference to certain exceptional cases in which "the renunciation of war as an instrument of national policy" cannot be held to apply. Britain insists that "there are certain regions of the world the welfare and integrity of which constitute a special and vital interest for Britain's peace and safety." The British Note refers to the "comparable interests" of the United States, which the Americans axe prepared to defend against all-comers; and Britain thus bases upon the, Monroe Doctrine her right to independent action in Egypt if the necessity should arise.

At first sight Britain's appeal to the Monroe Doctrine may appear to be based on an entirely false analogy. For the Monroe Message of 1823 purported to be a warning to the European Powers not to interfere in the internal affairs of the Latin American republics. But Britain has based on the Monroe Doctrine a claim to freedom of action in regard to Egypt, and this has already been used to justify internal intervention there. Is there no inconsistency here? The answer is that the American Government, by its prac tical application of the Monroe Doctrine, has already supplied all the justification that Britain needs. For the United States has intervened in Panama and Nicaragua, and has frequently threatened to interfere in Mexico; and when at the recent Pan-American Congress tho minor States tried to force through a resolution condemning all such intervention, it was blocked ~by the American d-legates. Britain's appeal to the Monroe Doctrine therefore holds good.