WAR LEADERS

Auckland Star, Volume LXXII, Issue 193, 16 August 1941, Page 7

WAR LEADERS

AT VITAL MEETING Dutch Welcome Constructive Plan For Nations Rec. 2 p.m. RUGBY. Aug. 15. It is now revealed that when President Roosevelt and Mr. Churchill met on board the battleship Prince of Wales at sea among those present were Admiral Dudley Pound, First Sea Lord; Sir John Dill, Chief of the Imperial General Staff; and Air Marshal Sir Wilfrid Freeman, Vice-Chief of the Air Stafi". The American representatives were: Admiral R. H. Stark, Chief of Naval Operations; Admiral liing. Com-mander-in-Chief of the Atlantic Fleet; General G. C. Marshall, Chief of Staff of the Army; and Mr. Harry Hopkins and Mr. Vcrill Harriman, supervisors of the Lease-or-Lcnd programme.

It is assumed that, the naval position in the Atlantic and the security of supplies from America to Britain was one of the first, if not the first, item on the agenda of the conference.

The eight-point declaration is still receiving the greatest attention, and it is being progressively realised in Britain that the two statesmen issued a realistic programme for the cooperation and development of the free peoples of the world. Emphasis is laid on the importance which the declaration gives to economic questions which usually have been sidetracked in former post-war settlements. That raw materials are recognised as of first importance is applauded, as is also insistence on the improvement of labour conditions.

In Dutch Government circles in London the announcement is greeted with considerable satisfaction. It has long been felt in these circles that some constructive plan should be held before the world, to which all nations and individuals cf goodwill could give their sincere support. Such a plan has now been drawn up in broad outline, and the two leading statesmen of Britain and the United States have announced their countries' intention to act upon it. It will find wide endorsement everywhere, except with those elements in the world which still stand for aggression and the law of sheer force.

Mr. James Maxtor), the well-known Independent Labour member of Parliament, speaking in the country to-day. said the meeting of Mr. Churchill and Mr. Roosevelt was the first time since the outbreak of war there had been any attempt to bring the voice of reason into the struggle.

Mr. Peter Fraser's Comment

The Prime Minister of New Zealand Mr. Fraser, who had an audience' with the King, said yesterday: "The joint declaration is a striking and most important document, and it will give great satisfacation to democratic and progressive people everywhere. "It embodies in brief form the principles for which the British Commonwealth and all our Allies are fighting, and to the triumph of which the United States is contributing so notably. In every respect it is worthy of the two great democracies which to-day stand on. common ground with a common cause—nothing less than the preservation and furtherance of freedom for all men in all lands—freedom based on the essential democratic rights of sell-govern-ment restoration of sovereignty to Sons temporarily dominated by Nazi and Fascist tyranny, access to raw materials for victors and vanauished, and the further objective of improved labour standards, economic advancement and social securuV without which the democracy foi which welre fighting would degenerate into a hollow sham. "Abandonment of the use of force as the aim of war and the disarmament of aggressor nations as a preUm"nary to the 'establishment of a wider permanent system of genera will have the support of that sreat bodv of public opinion. SESSt of mankind, whgh ! f „,. the future of the worm. mc declaration will he cordially welcomed in New Zealand.