THE ARCTIC AIRWAY

Evening Post, Volume CXI, Issue 71, 24 March 1926, Page 9

THE ARCTIC AIRWAY

STRATEGIC IMPORTANCE

OP NORTHERN ISLANDS.

(From Ow Own C«TMptMMt) VANCOUVER, 10th February. ' Dr. V. Stefansson, the Canadian ex;:; plorer, has almost filled the filet at Ottawa with requwta that Canada should take advantage of the immenie prospective value of these Polar lands,. especially as way-stations for trans* Polar flights. He hut consistently advocated that Canada should occupy, all the islands in the Arctic Mediterranean that separates Canada from Asia, before other . countries realise their strategic importance. It was onlyafter three years of failure to interest--the Canadian Government that Stefans.-,. eon began his propaganda bjr lectures;,, magazine articles, books, to get someri: nation or somebody to make a pioneer flight across the Arctic, to open up.aniT air highway, or to explore and study" the Arctic, to deprive it of its imagin : •; ary terrors and open it to commerce;^' and civilisation. :> In making this known just now| Stefansson says that he considers dirig-'" ibles superior to aeroplanes for non-t~ stop voyages, for instance,, in carrying mails from London to 'i'okio, by way " of the ocean west and north of Norway, or from New York to Pekin, by flight over Montreal, across Hudson^ { Bay, and thence across the Arctic and" north-eastern Asia. "I have also always argued," he said, "that flying conditions, both for aeroplanes and dirigibles, throughout the entire yeaij" _* would.be found better on the average in the Arctic than in almost any other - equally large area of the world. I feel, therefore, that Captain Wilkina would have had the same chance of roe% *- cegs in crossing the Arctic that AlcoclCfi and Brown had in crossing the Atlantic, :■ had he flown in 1919 as they did. But I consider that the improvements inaeroplanes have been ,so vast sinee- ,■- ---1919 that Captain Wilkins's chances of': ■access are now at least two er tan*:times greater than those of Aleock and Brown. They succeeded, and he may fail, but that is wholly within the domain of chance." , : MANY EXPEDITIONS THIS YEAB, v Stefansson says that there are about? • ten or a dozen expeditions plumed tor?) the Arctic this year. The one of great-.,,. est promise, next after Wilkini's, &"'•' the Amundson-EllßWorth dirigible flight from Spitsbergen to Alaska, that,v is the opposite itinerary to what Cap-/<L tain Wilkins proposes to take. ■; They~ are being financed on this tour by s£r._;; Ellsworth, an American citizen, who has agreed that the Norwegian and' not the United States flag, shall beTf planted on any land discovered. Two *' other American expeditions not yet. announced are planning to fly later if'/ Wilkins should fail. Then there is the;, French Government expedition, that,'_ will be jointly commanded by a Nojtf wegian, but, if they are successful, they '•••" will plant the tricolour. If there are - any British or Canadian plans for the Arctic discovery this year, they have not been in the Press and are not known to Stefansson. , -X "It looks for the moment as if Can- , ada and the British Umpire can hope \ for no further extension of their terri- ; tories of the Arctic Mediterranean,'* said Stefansson. "What the Empire can do, of course, and doubtless will do, is to hold fast to numerous and large •• islands that are ours by the enterprise of the past. This can be done under the Law of Nations, only by further exploratym of those lands and by administration of law in them. This the Canadian Government has taken adequate steps to do in Ellesmere Island, to which their title was insecure until, fpj few years ago, when they began to \ plant thero posts of the Royal Canadian^ Mounted Police. ..;; '