Towards Fascism?

Auckland Star, Volume LXIX, Issue 280, 26 November 1938, Page 10 (Supplement)

Towards Fascism?

Is Britain Drifting

IS a Fascist regime in England imminent or possible? Has the last fight for British freedom already been fought and lost? Such are the questions asked in Mr. Geoffrey T. Garratt's new book, "The Shadow of the Swastika" (Hamish Hamilton). Mr. Garratt, whose "Mussolini's Roman Empire" was published in December last, uses again in his latest l>nnk tome considerable part of the mutter and argument which appeared in his earlier one, but his main thesis is now different. Ho begins with an inquiry into the essential quality of the traditional British freedom; it is (ho says) what the Dtike of Wellington called tlieir "you-be-damnednees," their insistence upon retaining their own idea* and standards in whatever country they are in that has caused the English to leave an indelible mark on civilisation. Is this state of affairs altering, aeks Mr. Garratt, and, if so, whyt

In the first place, freedom entaita responsibility. "The price of liberty is eternal vigilance," said J. P. Curran, and perhaps the sentry k now growing weary and 1* likely to fall asleep at hie post. "If Satan were to take the present-day Englishman up on to a high mountain it would not be to ehow him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time, but to point out some pleasant suburban retreat where he could live his private life free from worry ami politic*." Secure for centuries against governmental tyranny under such shield* as the Habeas Corpus Act, the Englishman to-day takes such protection entirely for granted and does

not realise, or want to realise, that what the law has given the law can (perha[>s) take away. Drift to One-party System The increase in bureaucratic control, the establishment of official and unofficial censorship, the aging population—all the#e, s«ys Mr. Garratt, arc minister signs of a predisposition towards an Authoritorian regime. On the other hand, he believe* tin party system of government is. breaking down in England, and England can look forward only to a lengthy (if not perpetual) Conservative regime. This has made it possible not only to ignore, but to hood-

wink and flout «uch expressions of public opinion as the protest against the Hoare-Laval peace plan. The success of propaganda during the war has not been lost sight of, and the Press is systematically roped in to help the Governmcnt's point of view. It is significant, lie says, that the two men in Fleet Street who have most truly displayed independence in recent years have been from the Dominions—David Low (whom, by the way, Mr. (Jarratt calls an Australian) and G. L. Steer.

Fascism then, according to tlie author, may easily come about gradually, while the sentry sleeps—but there are some groii[« in the nation to whom it is positively desirable, and he devotes some

time to considering them. And all sorts of argutncnts (notably efficient y) could be adduced to support them. All this, of course, may be true, but Mr. (larratt does not seem to realise that to show that there exist in Britain some conditions favourable to Fascism does not prove very much —certainly not as much sm he wants to prove.

Britain's Foreign Policy

The second part of the author's book is taken up with a review of the Abyssinian and Spanish wars, and is a telling indictment of the Government's foreign policy, which Mr. Garratt considers is and has been consistently directed to aiding the Fascist Powers. It seems that Britain "betrayed" both Spain and Abyssinia, and that Messrs. Baldwin. Eden and Chamberlain and Sir Samuel Hoare all followed one consistent policy, Mr. Eden simply carrying on where Sir Samuel Hoare left off, and Lord Halifax continuing the same policy when Mr. Eden resigned. Two criticisms of this seem obvious. In the first place it seems difficult to believe, even if Halifax is the logical successor of Hoare, that Eden was not an interlude with a difference. In the second place, Mr. Garratt's criticism does not leave his readers with much constructive suggestion towards an alternative policy. It is easy to say that Britain should have resisted Italy, Japan, or Germany; but the realities of military, naval and aerial strategy have to be considered. Where and when (except in the one case of a possible blockade of the Canal in the Abyssinian venture) could Britain have exerted a sufficient force at a critical point? This is the crux of the situation, considered from a realist point of view, and, however, bitterly, we may regret it from an idealistic point of view, Britain is now caught up irresistibly in the whirlpool of power politics. Perhaps Liddell Hart is right after all, and just as geologists believe we may still be in the ice age after all without realising it, so we may already be in the next war which started, so he said, without formal declaration in July, 1936.