Mr Gotz’s Warning On Communism In Pacific

Press, Volume CI, Issue 29801, 18 April 1962, Page 16

Mr Gotz’s Warning On Communism In Pacific

The influence of returned soldiers, who would do anything to avoid the repetition of war, should be exerted on people who doubted the need for defence against Communism, said the Minister of Internal Affairs (Mr Gotz) last evening.

Mr Gotz told a meeting of the Tin Hat Club of the Christchurch Returned Services’ Association of “the evil which is in our midst, an incipient, small evil which in other countries grows and grows." He deplored opposition to nuclear testing which “is forced upon us” and the spread of “evil doctrine” among natives of the Pacific islands. Stern measures must be taken to halt the advance of Communist influence across the stepping stones from South-east Asia, he said.

The responsibility for defending New Zealand, among those with the Anzac traditions of loyalty, comradeship, courage, and the defence of freedom, was to see that their influence bore on those who would destroy humanity and New Zealand with it, said Mr Gotz. In his recent visit to the Cook Islands he had come on the statement that, evil persons were trying to frighten simple natives into the belief that nuclear tests in the Pacific would destroy their foodstuffs and, more important to them, their procreative ability. “All of us have suffered from the effects of war. There isn’t among us one single person who, having gone through the mill, would not do anything to prevent us going through it again,” said Mr Gotz.

“There are in the northern Cook Islands some very beautiful coral atolls. People have lived there in happiness for many years on simple lines, untramelled by the trappings of civilisation,’’ he said. Some hankered for some of the trappings, a torch to see in the dark, or a wrist-watch. “Evil People” “Yet there are evil people who proclaim that we should do more for them. Ten years ago, infant mortality was 300 to 400 a 1000 Now it is slightly lower than it is in New Zealand—that is 20 a 1000. We have done what humanity would demand of us in extending their lives and saving their children, and giving them an education to the point where some of them, at least, have the capacity to teach their own people. We look after them in the case of hurricanes. Should we go further and introduce the benefits of civilisation as seen in Western eyes?” He had asked an island youth: “What do you want us to do for you? Put a residential agent on your island? Electric light? A Customs officer or a few extra policemen?” The youth had replied: “Mr Gotz, leave us alone. We ain’t got no ulcers.”

“Among these people there have been a few evil ones We know them. They live •there. They spread the doctrine of the evil Western civilisation,” said Mr Gotz. “Some evil influences in the Cook Islands are spreading subversive literature, and an evil doctrine. And they are working here right in our midst. All are impelled by one, pernicious doctrine of world revolution and the domination of the world by

the Communist philosophy. “I don’t know that they will make much headway. The average New Zealander has enough common sense, enough education, and reads enough to avoid having anything foisted on him,” But in tours of the Pacific Islands and Australian and Dutch New Guinea he had always been faced with the story of the “Marching Rule,” a corruption of “Marxian Rule,” Mr Gotz said. In the Solomon Islands, the British High Commissioner for the Western Pacific (Sir John Gutch) had told him at Honiara that there was a “Marching Rule.” They could not find the people who spread the word of Moscow.

Last year he came across it in Australian and Dutch New Guinea. When Western missionaries tried to operate, the opposition to their entry came from the ' Marching Rule. “I know from my own knowledge it is in Western Samoa, the Cook Islands, and Niue Island. We cannot take action. They have a right to be there.

“These people are backed up by people in New Zealand who say we should not carry out nuclear tests because it is against humanity.

On Penrhyn Island people had been made frightened of the effects of nuclear bombs but the United States was not moving people from islands much closer to the nuclear tests because they were confident that they were safe. “We are going to test nuclear bombs because it is forced on us,” said Mr Gotz. Former soldiers must surely approve the testing of nuclear weapons which, in the end, were the only deterrent to the threat against the spirit celebrated in Anzac, said Mr Gotz. No-one in public office would stop testing. “No Alternative”

“While the evil is among us, while we are kept in a state of jitters, while we use our substance on useless things, we have no alternative.” he said. “Each of us comes in contact with many people. Surely we, in a spirit of loyalty cah exert our influence in that circle to the one common aim. We must make ourselves clear to those who might be doubting the need to defend ourselves,” said Mr Gotz. “Are we so certain that the nuclear deterrent is going to keep us at peace? Do we really believe that we can halt communism? I personally doubt it. We have seen its encroachment in Europe, in Tibet, and in South-east Asia. Between South-east Asia and New Zealand we just have a series of stepping stones. Any giant can bestride them.

“I believe that our security cannot last for ever if we do not take stern measures to see there is no further advance of that influence. Any advance of communism is a threat to us.” There must be revolution ot free people who could not tolerate intrusions from men like Castro who held the world to ransom for a few invaders they had captured, said Mr Gotz. An effect in any part of the world’s economy had an effect on New Zealand.