IF GERMANY WINS.

Auckland Star, Volume LXXI, Issue 13, 16 January 1940, Page 8

IF GERMANY WINS.

DOMINION'S FATE.

BECOME VASSAL STATE.

" WORSE THAN POLAND."

"To face facts calmly and without fear i* to realise what would be the fate of New Zealand if we lost the war," said the Hon. Pe.ter Eraser in his address at the civic reception at the Concert Chamber this afternoon. It meant, he said, that the Dominion would become a vassal state, and its people would be worse off than tHe Poles.

"I pass ove-r the fact that our principal market for commodities, Great Britain, would be lost to us;" he said. "It would be worse than that. With Britain defeated the enemy would take possession of New Zealand; we would be lucky indeed if we were given the opportunity of going somewhere else, as were some of the Polee.

"All that we have worked for in the past 100 years woukl crumble into dust; the work of the pioneers would be in vain. The social structures which we have built up, and which is the best in the world, would go. We would tbecome a vassal State, perhaps of Germany, perhaps of other countries.

"I am not saying this to frighten people, but we must face facts as they lire," continued Mr. Fraser. "We are up against forces that, with our ideas of what is right morally and spiritually, we cannot lAiderstand. We cannot grasp that the men who are opposing us do not value those principles. Neither in Berlin nor in Moscow are there men in charge who value human life. They are prepared to sacrifice millions to gratify their own dreams of merciless aggression.

"Our enemies are out for domination; all we can say—and this applies to New Zealand as to other parts of the Empire —is that when the enemy is ready to discuss peace on a democratic basis we too will be ready," concluded Mr. Fraser. "Victory will not mean a victory for the Allies but for humanity and mankind, and will make the world a worthy place for the generations of the future to live in."