STATE LUNCHEON

Evening Post, Volume CXXXII, Issue 126, 24 November 1941, Page 8

STATE LUNCHEON

DEMOCRACY'S FIGHT

ISSUE IN PACIFIC

HONOUR ABOVE ALL

"Today in the Pacific we don't want war," said the Prime Minister (Mr. Fraser) in extending the Government's welcome to Mr. Cooper at a State luncheon at Parliament House. "The British nation did not want war anywhere. We wanted to live in peace with humanity. We are suffering for the honest fulfilment of our wishes and desires in that direction and through being too trusting. However that may be, today in the Pacific we don't want any extension of the war zone. We want to live in peace with every nation."

DEMOCRATIC GAME

Mr. Fraser went on to welcome the representatives of other nations and particularly the representatives of the democratic Pacific nations, and said that New Zealand accepted in its entirety the Declaration of the Atlantic, which stood for freedom for all nations and access to the raw materials of the world for all nations.

But before that could be brought about all nations must agree to play the jarac, and the game was the democratic, game, and no other. There must be a dignified and creditable understanding' on the basis of freedom for all the nations concerned.

Mr. Cooper came to New Zealand at a critical time, when the outcome might be for good or ill. for peace or war in tho Pacific. They profoundly hoped and prayed it would be for peace, but however the 'die was cast, one thing was certain; there would be no sacrifice of any nation, no sacrifice of principle, wherever the buttle was joined. They all believed it was better to go down, if need be, in honour than to live in dishonour and betray mankind.

A YEAR OF VICTORY

Mr. Cooper said, in opening, that he regretted he had not seen more of New Zealand in the short time he had so far been here.

"I have seen enough to satisfy me that the people of New Zealand are 100 per cent, in the war; (applause) that their, determination to win this war is not less than that of the people of Great Britain; that they realise as plainly as we do that their whole future —no, their very existence;—depends upon victory; that unless Hitler is defeated there will be no British New Zealand any more, and that, therefore, they are bending all their activity towards his defeat.

"This year, this past year, has been, upon the whole, a year of victory; we are now entering upon the third year of the war. The first year was one of unforeseen disasters; the defeat of all European nations who dared raise themselves against Hitler; the loss of our great ally France; these were terrible blows.

"I sometimes think that we insufficiently realise the numb.er of victories

we have achieved since the defeats:of the summer of a year ago."

First of all, said Mr. Cooper, there was the attempt at invasion, heralded as it was bound to be, by an attempt to destroy our Air Force and a series of great daylight attacks upon England.

In the daytime in the air the Royal Air Force showed itself to have better men, better pilots, better machines, with higher courage and more skill than those of Germany. They drove them from the shores of England, in such a. way that for more than twelve months the Germans had not attempted to attack the country. Mr. Cooper said he thought New Zealand .should be very glad to have as GovernorGeneral today the man who was com-mander-in-chief.'

Having failed by dayli^.it. the German air force tried in darkness to work their will. The Nazis thought io break the spirit of the English people by attacking them in thou* homes, by attacking women and children. For night after night the attack went, on, but now it seemed as though, they had at least temporarily abandoned it. Why? " Because it was a failure. They had wrought no change in the British mind except to instil a greater determination for victory. (Applause.) That was the second victory of the I year that had just passed. In the summer of 1940, when things were at their worst in England, it would be remembered that the war-like Italians considered it the right moment to intervene. (Laughter.) AN ENORMOUS VICTORY. The destruction of the Italian armies in Africa had been an enormous victory because since then Italy had played no part in the war. The people of Britain depended on overseas supplies and the Germans had tried to starve them. However, losses at sea had shrunk to a great" extent and that was a tremendous victory. There had been seven great Powers on whom the future of the world depended, but today there were only five. France and Italy had ceased to remain great Powers and Britain had alongside her Russia and the United States. Therefore there were three of the five great Powers ranged on one side, one was against them, and one was wavering. That last great Power was a Pacific Power, more closely concerned than any other, perhaps, with the future of Australia and New Zealand. What, to Britain, was the Far East, was to New Zealand the too-near north. The world of the Pacific was going to play.a far more important part in the future than it had in the past. Instead of talking about the Old World and the New, they should consider the Atlantic world and the Pacific world. The Pacific world was the larger of the two, and the greater population lived on the shores of the Pacific. He could see in the future the Pacific looming on the horizon, and he hoped that the small British nations of the Pacific would play a great part in that future.