NO BRAVADO

Auckland Star, Volume LXXII, Issue 138, 13 June 1941, Page 2

NO BRAVADO

MR. FRASER'S WORDS CAMPAIGN IN GREECE (By Telegraph.—Parliamentary Reporter.) WELLINGTON, this day. There was no bravado in the statement of the Prime Minister, Mr. Eraser, that the New Zealand Government would send the New Zealand Division into the Grecian campaign again if such a course were necessary, the acting-Prime Minister, Mr. Nash, declared when speaking in the Imprest Supply debate in the House of Representatives yesterday. Anyone who wanted to show that a blunder had been made should take into account all of the facts.

Mr. Nash said that he did not suggest that there should not be criticism. If they shut off criticism they would be allowing "muddlehead" things to go through and to go on. He hoped the Government would never shirk criticism, but criticism that gave the enemy an opportunity to say the country was discontented and had a tendency to pull out of the war was harmful and should be shut out. If criticism was going to help to win the war they should haveiit to the full, but if it were going * L o tell against the war effort it should not be allowed, because »he Commonwealth had got to win the conflict if the things enjoyed in the past were to be retained. Mr. Nash said he hoped every voice in New Zealand would be raised in criticism if criticism were necessary to help the troops, and there would never be any embargo from the Government benches under such circumstances. Would Want To Go He believed that the. Greek and Cretan campaigns were essential to the Commonwealth's war plan, and he also believed that if the men were asked to go again they would go and would want to go. (Hear, hear). The New Zealanders had grumbled about being kept out of the Egyptian campaign, Mr. Nash said, and they knew they were going into difficulties and dangers in' Greece, but they had gone and had performed magnificent feats. Their task there might have been successful if the Yugoslavs and Greeks had been better armed and able to hold on. If the British troops could have held the enemy there, who would have said they should not have been there? There was a possibility that they could hold on and if they had done so they would have held the Dardanelles and so would have cut off Black Sea oil from Italy. Who would have criticised if they had done that? Mr. Lee (Democratic Labour, Grey Lynn): There i.s onlv one test. Did they succeed! Was the sacrifice justified? The campaign in Greece had succeeded. Mr. Nash said, because the strategy had had splendid results. Those results were not as good ns they could have been, but thev justified the sacrifice. Mr. Lee: New Zealand soldiers will go wherever you ask them. Where Hazards Are Great Mr. Nash: They will go where the hazards are great. Mr. Lee: All the more reason thai they should be cared for. Mr. Nosh said that the men had gone into Greece to fight for traditions alone. Everything had been weighed up and they had gone wi:h a possible objective which!" if it had !>< en gained under happier circumstances, might have shortened the war by a year or two. .Mr. Nash added that he would like to 'ell the whole story of why the division had gone to Greece, but all he inuld do was to assure the House and the country that no action had been taken by the Government that was not. fully justified by the facts. Mr. Frost 'Government. New Plymouth''' Why not publish a White I 'aper? Mr. .\a.-h said that a White Paper could not be published at present because no one could in- certain that it did not go our of the countrv It might, he possible to do something in that way late-