ITALY'S CONQUEST

Evening Post, Volume CXXII, Issue 13, 15 July 1936, Page 18

ITALY'S CONQUEST

CHANGED SITUATION

FACING THE CONSEQUENCES

FUTURE OF SECURITY

To those members of Parliament,

supporters of the National Government, who, like myself, appealed lor, and no doubt obtained, the votes o£ electors of all parties for the principles enunciated by Sir Samuel Hoare at Geneva in September, recent events have been a painful experience, writes Brigadier-General E. L. Spears, M.P., in the "Daily Telegraph."

Many of us felt it our duty to oppose the Hoare-Laval proposals. Was this a wise step in view of what has happened since?

Had those proposals been acted upon a portion of Abyssinia might have survived as a vassal Italian Stale, and above all many lives might have been spared. But the Hoare-Laval plan would not have been accepted by Abyssinia; it would have had to be imposed upon her. She believed then in her power of resistance, and hoped, as we did, that sanctions would in time prove effective.

I do not think we were wrong to refuse to join in imposing upon her. in violation of every League principle so recently proclaimed by our Government and endorsed by our electorate, terms that she considered unacceptable.

Today we are faced with a situation that is the complete negation of our hopes. The most barefaced aggression, carried out in violation of the most solemn treaties with complete ruthlessness, has resulted in the destruction of the victim, under the eyes of some j ,fif ty States members of the League, none of them completely helpless or I quite unarmed, and all pledged to sup- j port each other if attacked. A CANNIBAL FEAST. "We are now mvited to watch the process of one member of the League calmly digesting another one, and growing fat and strong on the meal. It seems to .me very much like assisting at a cannibal feast. The League has failed. It is essential to ascertain the cause of its failure. Some of them are obvious enough. The root trouble has been that the democracies forming part of it were quite unprepared to run the risk of war for a principle, however vital. In this they differ from countries governed by dictators, who, as we have seen in the case of both Italy and Germany, are quite prepared to run that risk. Unless this fact is faced and met, collective security must be consigned to the lumber-room of history, where good ideas that were never carried out are relegated, and where are stored the schemes humanity was too weak, too short-sighted, or too selfish to apply. That most of the nations members of the League were materially unprepared for an armed struggle with Italy is true, but this is mainly due to the fact that, excepting for those who felt armaments to be necessary for their own safety, they one and all found it cheaper to protest their will to peace rather than make sacrifices to enforce it. ■ Today, when we are contemplating the dashing of the hopes we had based ; on the League, how ridiculous and blind appear in restrospect those who for years gladdened their hearts with the' sweet sounds of their own peaceful pipings, and refused to believe that force was necessary to maintain brder. They, together with those who indulged in false sentimentality, must bear a heavy share of responsibility for the fact that the League seems to be on the verge of collapsing under the blows of a dictator. RISE OF THE "REALISTS." Their place on the public rostrums has been taken by the so-called realists, who say to us: "Face the f™+<;. Unpleasant though they are, accept them. There are more tnais u,i__j. . You will need Italy in" Europe, do not quarrel with her over an episode that is closed." To them I would answer: Your "realism" is short-sighted. You only see facts, and not the moral values underlying them. To deny the immense yearning of mankind for peace founded on justice is folly. Christianity won its way through greater trials than the League has had to face. Fundamentally, the "realist," adopting the French thesis, is ready to forget Italy's crime out of fear of Germany. He feels Europe may not be able to deal with Germany without Italian co-operation. .He may be right, but the dangers Europe may have to face will not be solved by a bogus League, nor if, in the future, Germany were to do what Italy has done would our people accept that she should be arraigned before a tribunal of which Italy was a member. They are a simple, straight-dealing, and honest commerical nation, and; have little use for elastic yard meas-' ures either for selling goods over a counter or measuring moral values. Th3ir feelings will be: If the League is a sham, then let it go, but do not let us attempt to maintain it on a basis: of humbug. You cannot build a security system on the destruction of Abyssina, nor a code of international conduct on Italy's broken pledges.

It seems to me that to adopt the 'realist's" point of view would be to

fling away the one asset numanity has gained from this lamentable adventure, namely, the fact that 50 nations had the courage to condemn Italy's action.

A STEP FORWARD.

That surely is a great thing, a step forward, the effect of which will be lost entirely if we take the aggressor back into the fold just because he has been successful.

I believe it to be too early yet to accept dictatorships as permanently successful forms of government. The world has seen Attila, Genghis Khan, Tamerlane, great rulers who organised empires and commanded irresistible hosts, yet they have passed, casting no more than a deep shadow across the face of time. It" would be as unwise to bow to the modern dictators as it would be foolish to deny that they have the full strength of their nations behind them.

But how to answer the question: If you condemn the realist for shortsightedness, in what does true realism consist?

To this I would answer: Our experience, the slap across the face the Duce has administered to .us, shows that in future force must be immediately available at me back of any sanctions that may be applied by the League. We must be ready at any time to apply force, together with other nations, against an aggressor.

This presupposes two conditions. The first, as we all see now, is that we and all other members of the League must be sufficiently armed to carry out our pirt in the common defence. .e other it, that as, no nation can incur obligations greater than its people would accept, it is essential to divide Europe, if not the world, into zones of interest.

Each country would have a zone of first and second interest. It would be bound to come to the help with armed force of those countries within its first zone—that is, its neighbours and States whose interests were closely akin to

its own—but would only be called upon to carry out rigoroi economic action »g;iinst an aggressor within its second zone. But these are matters to be dealt with by a reorganised League. DIFFICULT QUESTIONS. McanwhJe our Government has to face excruciatingly difficult questions. It has to deal not only with Germany, but with the fear Germany inspires in her neighbours—a fear which warps judgment and paralyses constructive action. The nations inspired by that fear will clamour for Italian co-operation , and support. For instance, the French General Stair will say: Can the English make good the 15 divisions that are needed to guard the Alps if Italian co-operation cannot bo relied upon? 'And as tho answer is in the negative, even the best-intentioned French Government, the most devoted to League principles, will shuttle and seek to comnromise. | But even taking into account all these /actors, and in no way underestimating tho danger Germany may present in the near or distant future, |1 would answer the question, "What should our attitude to Italy be?" by saying: "Whatever tho risk and however tempting compromise may be. I would not condone Italian actiu " ' As for sanctions, I see no great purpose in maintaining them indefinitely. It is hardly creditable that they will be so ..'(rc'cUve as to cause Italj to evacuato Abyssinia; it is more probable they will be used as a face-saving device to attempt to hide the defeat of the League. Pusillanimous to the last, the nations may rather let them gradually . die than, have the courage to confess their failure or take the initiative in abolishing them. My own feeling is that, having done our best to give the nations a lead and having failed in our object, there is but one thing we can do, and that is 1- ask for Italy's expulsion from the League. Better a small, clean League than to take our place in a school of sharks where the rule is that the greater swallows the lesser. France will object, but if faced with the choice of ourselves or Italy she will choose us. She cannot afford to let the League die, as it would assuredly do if we left it. Meanwhile the complete, if temporary, collapse of the collective system forces us to face a serious situation in Africa. The interest of our people in Abyssinia was quite unselfish and was dictated by their desire to make the League effective, but now that the Abyssinian Empire has been replaced bj the strong, aggressive, military power of Italy, we have - perforce to consider how the situation affects us. THREAT TO COMMUNICATIONS. In the first place it is obvious that the vast area in East Africa now held by Italy makes it possible for her to threaten by air our vital communications with India. Further, she will dispose in future of enormous reservoirs of native. man-power, and can in a.few years' time, if she be so minded, raise a formidable black army composed of first-class-fighting material and running into hundreds of thousands of men. - Such' a force could easily sever our communications between North and South Africa, and Kenya, Uganda, and Tanganyika would be at its mercy. It would not be impossible for her- to accumulate very large supplies in East Africa, enabling a stronger force than any we can keep there in present circumstances to operate for a long time even if cut off from its home base. Let us not forget the fight put up by the Germans in East Africa even., when totally unprepared for war in that 1 quarter. . • | It would not seem impossible, whatever may be said today, that in due course the Italian Dictator might be tempted to join his Northern with his East African colonies and absorb Egypt. These po-sibilties cannot be ruled out. as fantastic. To met,. them only one policy is practicable, and that is to be so strong in the Mediterranean that Italy, whose cities are in the main on or near the coast, would not dare to challenge the guns of our fleet or our seaborne aeroplanes. To insure complete safety co-operation with France is essential, since she is by far the strongest Mediterranean Power. We shall have to tell her that we are more interested in our Airican pc essions and in the white peoples settled there than in even the most deserving nations in South or Southeastern Europe, and that consequently our power to act in Europe must be a function of our freedom from anxiety in Africa. Such considerations make It evident enough that even what we may hope is only a temporary weakening of the League must have the effect of driving u back on to our old Imperial positions, which we shall be compelled to maintain until such time as an effective collective system can be built up. That this will be possible must be our fervent hope, for otherwise . the dream of safety a- " fustice for all, great and small alike, will be as dead as the soldiers who gave their lives in the Great War.