NOIES'ON THE WAB NEWS

Evening Post, Volume CXXXV, Issue 19, 23 January 1943, Page 4

NOIES'ON THE WAB NEWS

GEOPOLITICS

THE BOOK OF ITS ORIGIN

The so-called science of geopolitics on which Hitler based his dreams of world conquest was the creation of a Briton, Sir Halford Mackinder, developed by a German, General Houshofer. Hitler seems to have as far outdone Haushofer as Houshofer outdid Mackinder, and in the application of the theory of geopolitics to have fabricated a Frankenstein monster likely to destroy him and Ger--1 many. Mackinder's book promulgating the theory, after being long out of print, has been republished in view of the interest in geopolitics. Reviewing the book in the "New York Times" of December 3, John Chamberlain writes: It is a strange thing to observe how ideas come home to roost. Sir Halford J. Mackinder's "Democratic Ideals and Reality" first appeared in 1919. It was written to warn the Allied statesmen of the importance of Russia, which Sir Halford called ''the heartland" of the "world-island" of Asia-Europe-Africa. Should the "world-island" ever come to be dominated by any single Power using the Russian "heartland" for its pivot, then the r oceans would be "outflanked," and sea power would be defeated. Sir Halford looked upon North America as part of an "outer crescent" of "insular" Powers which would never be able to stand up against a united "world-island." "Democratic Ideals and Reality" was not read by the citizens of Britain, Australia, and the United States. But it was read by General Karl Haushofer and his school of German "geopoliticians," who based their plans for world conquest and domination upon it. The so-called "science" of Nazi geopolitics suddenly became frontpage news in America and Britain after the signing of the Nazi-Soviet pact in 1939, which seemingly allied the Russian "heartland" with a western nation of great productive capacity and organising ability. Concurrently there was a burst of interest in Mackinder as Dorothy Thompson and others started to talk about him. But still nobody read the actual writings of the far-sighted British geographer. His book was not available. Mackinder's "Heartland." At long last, however, we have a reissue of "bDemocratic Ideals and Reality," which comes to us with an introduction by Edward Mead Earle and a foreword by Major George Fielding Eliot To read Sir Halford is a remarkably stimulating experience. He clothes the bare geometry of the continents, seas, and islands with the shining garments of poetry. Here is Wagnerian writing allied to Euclidean measurement, with Sir Halford first cutting up the map of the world into triangles, rectangles, and rhomboids, and then labelling the pieces with, his own glowing terminology. As Sir Halford develops the contrasting world-views of seafaring and landlocked peoples, the reader actually sees visions of great land masses rearing up to blot out England, Australia, South Africa, and the whole Western Hemisphere. He sees "heartland" swelling like the neck of a turkey gobbler until it is "worldisland" and then crashing with the inexorable speed of an avalanche on the islands and smaller continents of the "outer crescent." The whole thing is a subject for a phantasmagoria by Walt Disney. But what is Sir Halford's actual meaning? If you read him carefully, you are impressed not so much by his fears as by his British phlegm. He really doesn't believe wholeheartedly in the geopolitical hobgoblin which he has created. For his book is a paean to the ancient British concept of the balance of power; it is a plea for a preservation of the politics of Asquith, Delcasse, and Tsar Nicholas, all of whom saw the wisdom of balancing the west and the east against the centre of Europe. The hippogriff of the unified "world-island" might possibly become a real animal at some period in world history. But Sir Halford's eloquent pages on the meaning of the superiority of "outer-crescent" man-power tend to deny it. How Haushofer Took It. Sir Halford's book, then, is susceptible of two interpretations. The German General Haushofer, with his Teutonic imperviousness to imponderables, chose to make the easy one. But the more subtle interpretation will prevail. Russia may be the "heartland" of the "world-island," and hence the prime goal of the envious Germans. But not even the aeroplane, not even a triple-tracked trans-Siberian railroad, can weld and rivet the components of the "world-island" into a worlddevouring monster. For no conqueror can discover the secret of merging populations into super-units capable of waging war at the continually accelerating pace needed to capture and hold the world. A unified "world-island" could only be built on the basis of free loyalty, an£ free loyalties are not forged in the fires of subjection. Man-power, to Sir Halford, is not a simple matter of numbers. It also includes the power of invention, technology, organisation, and administration. A man with brains is worth any number of clod-men. A free man is worth any number of slaves. But Sir Halford, with his fears predominating, let geography conquer psychology in "Democratic Ideals and Reality." It is perfectly true, as he says, that the "world-island" of Europe-Asia-Africa is much more bulky space-wise than North America and South America. But simple acreage and simple vital statistics are misleading categories. The world's centre of power is North America. Why? Because in North America the ingenuity and energies of free men have been turned loose to operate on land and raw materials.' The aeroplane and submarine were invented here. Half the steel capacity of the world is here. Americans developed the oil industry, and they provided the theoretical underpinning for the chemistry upon which Germany's war industry rests. The "outer crescent" has always been able to fend off the barbarians from the recesses or the borders of "heartland" for a simple non-geographical reason: it has had "brainland" to fall back upon. Freedom v. Slavery. To become a real danger to North America, the "world-island" would first have to be organised by a group capable of bestowing freedom upon the conquered units. For even the instruments of military power develop only in an atmosphere of freedom. It is no accident that the Spitfire has outflown the Messerschmitt, or that the Flying Fortress is better than the Heinkel. But if we are to think of a "world-island" organised by a group interested in human freedom, our worries disappear. For free men -don't think in terms of military power. The geopolitical hobgoblin, then, must remain an unreal animal. But that does not mean that the German geopoliticians can go unopposed. For if freedom decamps, it is no longer freedom. And that is all that Sir Halford Mackinder is really trying to say. During the course of his address at Dunedin on Tuesday night on the "Closer Relations With Russia" move.ment, the Hon. W. E. Barnard, M.P., Speaker of the House of Representatives, said that he had been fortunate in meeting the officers and crew of five or six Soviet ships that had visited this country, reports the "Star." When one went to meet the crew," he said, "one did not go to the least comfortable part of the ship. Instead, to amidships, where officers and crew were together. There was no difference in accommodation. Comfortable bunks under ideal conditions, together with sheets and pillows, were provided for the ordinary sailors just as for officers." He detailed how, when the first' Soviet ship visited New Zealand, he had invited the captain and his officers to meet him officially, and along came the captain with two officers and rime members of the crew. "How many other nationalities, when the captain of a ship was invited to call on the Speaker of the House of Representatives, would bring their crew with them?" he asked. When off duty and off the ship, captain and crew mixed together as equals, but when on duty strict discipline was maintained.