DEFENCE OF N.Z.

Press, Volume LXXVII, Issue 23351, 10 June 1941, Page 8

DEFENCE OF N.Z.

ADVISER LENT BY BRITAIN ►“CONTINUOUS TRAINING ESSENTIAL ” • (P.A.) AUCKLAND. June 9. . Until recently General Officer Com-manding-in-Chief, Eastern Command, Lieutenant-General Sir Guy Williams, KC B. C.8., C.M.G., D.5.0., arrived in Auckland to-day. He has been placed by the British Government at the disposal of the New Zealand Government to advise it on problems relating to the organisation and training of the New Zealand military forces. General Williams was asked if there was any intention that he should become Chief of the General Staff, in succession to Major-General Sir John Duigan, who recently retired. He said there was no such intention. He would be in New Zealand for only a few months in an advisory capacity. Commenting upon what he thought should be the amount of training given home defence troops, General Williams said there was only one standard of training for both overseas and home

defence soldiers. Bath had to be trained to the same standard. For home defence personnel, he continued, and so far as equipment would allow it, continuous training was essential in war time. This meant, he agreed to a question, that men would leave their civilian employment and be returned to it only after the war was over. New Zealand, he said, had done quite the right thing up to now in turning men over in batches.. The training programme had had to be regulated by the equipment available. “Equipment has been the main trouble with us all,’ ’ continued General Williams. “However, it is coming along well now, and training must keep step with it.” Training was of the utmost importance. In Britain, he said, they had been turning winter into summer, and training their men all the time. He had had men out through the winter without bothering about the weather. Efficiency had to be achieved, and there was only one way to do it. General Williams was asked how large a home defence force he thought New Zealand would need. In answer, he said understood the general probleihs of the Dominion, but had yet to obtain a first-hand knowledge bf de. tailed'requirements. He therefore could not answer the question. , On his way to New Zealand, said General Williams, he had seen New Zealand troops training in Egypt. “They are grand.” he said. He also met the Prime Minister (the Rt. -Hon. P. Fraser), whom he described as being “in good form.” General Williams was accompanied by Brigadier C. A. West, D.5.0., M.C., who, in 1938, was appointed DeputyMilitary Secretary to the Secretary of State for War, and assistant-secretary of the Selection Board. He entered the Army in 1912 and served in France and Belgium in the Great War. He later served in India, and was awarded the D.5.0., and was mentioned in dispatches during Operations on the North-West Frontier, The InspectorGeneral of the New Zealand Military Forces, Major-General Sir Andrew Russell, welcomed General Williams and Brigadier West on their arrival. Two more staff officers have yet to arrive.