Evening Post. MONDAY, MAY 10, 1909.

Evening Post, Volume LXXVII, Issue 109, 10 May 1909, Page 6

Evening Post. MONDAY, MAY 10, 1909.

THE DEFENCE CONFERENCE. « The suggestion tentatively put forward at first by Mr. Asquith on his own responsibility has now become the decision of the British Cabinet, and invitations have been issued for an Imperial Conference to be held in July to consider the question of the naval and military defence of the Empire. Considering how long such proposals usually take to ripen, and that the British Liberals are usually very chary in making them, the speed with which Mr. Asquith's idea has taken practical shape is remarkable. Why this extraordinary hurry? Why should the representatives of the different parts of the Empire, which extends all 'round the world, be expected to attend in July a conference of the very first importance which was only suggested in April, and invitations for which were not issued till May? The procedure certainly seems to suggest that there are graver reasons for regarding the business as urgent than have yet been disclosed The admissions of British Ministers, in the Naval Debate two months ago, that Germany had caught them napping, and the fact that oai- own Ministers, before offering New Zealand's Dreadnought to the Admiralty, had confidential information before them which has not been made public, seem to give a special significance to the urgency with which this conference is being summoned. The desire of tne British Government, to keep the proceedings private, notwithstanding the Colonial protests against the exclusion of the press from the Imperial Conference of 1907, also points in the same direction. If our theory is incorrect, then the British Government is surely rather entitled to blame for its precipitance than to ciedit for its promptitude. It is clear, however, that whatever may be the reason for summoning the conference at such express speed, the British Government is not going to make the fatal error of endeavouring to hurry ii. to a premature and imperfectly considered conclusion. Without any prompting from the colonies, this point was emphasised with his usual felicity by Lord Crewe in his address to" the Liberal Colonial Club, which was reported by cable on Saturday. The Secietary of State for the Colonies stated that he vras "not prsp^red £q

believe that the time was absolutely ' ripe for a full and complete discussion of the whole question of Imperial defence." He mentioned particularly that South Africa could not speak with certainty on the subject until the scheme of union was an accomplished fact. Though since Natal'-s change of attitude to the scheme, and the approval of it by her Legislature, the accomplishment o£ this great work may l>e regarded as practically assured, invitations have necessarily been sent to the South African colonies to individually discuss a '•matter upon which the decisive action ''must be reserved for the union when "consummated. Here, by the way, is another indication of the urgency which 'the matter presents to Mr. Asquith and his colleagues. A little delay would have enabled the authoritative voice of a United South Africa to be heard at the conference, but the British Government regard the question as so urgent that instead of waiting it has sent its invitations to the moribund units of the State that is to be, and that will take sole charge of all branches of defence as soon as it is called into being. "On the other hand," said Lord Crewe, "there had been so many incidents of importjince^the fine, soul-stir-ring offers of New Zealand and Australia, and the not less hearty movements in Canada towards the improvement of Imperial Defence — that entirely justified an endeavour to arrive at some, at any rate, provisional conclusions after talking the matter over in a friendly way." When he adds that the sooner we can approach towards a common organisation of defence the better it will b» for ths Empire, he almost seems to be lapsing into a truism, yet it_ is a- truism to which ' little practical homage has y-et beep paid. The suggestions submitted by Mr. Haldane to the Imperial Conference, and elaborated in General Nicholson's memorandum two or three months ago, are certainly deserving of a clpser and prompter attention than they can receive if reserved to form one item in the general programme of the conference which will meet,' in ordinary course, two years | hence. The creation of an* Imperial general staff, the assimilation of organisation and equipment, and the interchange of officers and ideas — these are some of the points to be carefully considered and to be realised after due consideration and with a due regard, as Lord Crewe himself insists, for "local elasticity." It is, of course, a necessary pre-supposi-tion of any general programme of thiskind that each of the various self-go-verning units of the Empire shall havea local defence system worthy of the name. We must defend ourselves before we can defend the Empire; or, rather, not only can we not defend the Empire, but we cannot be anything but a drag upon it until we have put our own local defences in order. An Imperial Defence organisation cannot supersede local defence organisations, it can only link them up and build upon them. What will New Zealand's representative at the conference be able, to say of our own defences if the matter is to be left where it was left by the Premier's Invercargill speech ? In that speech Sir Joseph Ward spoke of giving the Empire a lead, and he can do it by making New Zealand the first State of the Empire to put into operation the scheme of universal military training which Mi*. Deakin propounded for Australia, and Mr. Fisher hopes to carry through. New Zealand will do it if he says the word, and by the time she has done it she will have something much more lasting to her credit in the Imperial ledger than the praiseworthy but sp&smodic offer of a Dreadnought.