AVERTING A WAR.

Evening Star, Issue 23100, 28 October 1938, Page 11

AVERTING A WAR.

IO THE EDITOR Sir, —-Mr Chamberlain’s policy of what he calls appeasement is just about the most ghastly farce that this century has yet produced. Under Mr Hamilton’s beneficent administration, when I was compelled to default on my mortgage, would the public have acclaimed me as a hero had I given my neighbour’s motor car in payment to the mortgagee? What a vista this “appeasement” opens out! If we would only apply it to burglars and gangsters it would save a lot of expense. We should have no need of policemen, magistrates, or judges, and we should be able to put a great many lawyers on to what is so dear to capitalism, real “ productive ” work. Anybody of average intelligence could appease a man-eating tiger by constantly supplying enough human victims. Of course, it goes without saying that only neighbours should be sacrificed, and not the members of one’s own family. What, a pity that Mr Chamberlain did not produce his formula before the intervention in support of corrupt Tsarism, and later on in Amritsar, in India. What a lot of human suffering would have been saved. Surely the time has arrived when those who have still a sense of honour and integrity should also be “ appeased.” when our ships should be allowed to proceed on their lawful business and not just looked on as convenient targets for bombing practice for the Fuhrers of the Berlin-Rome-Tokio-Burgos axis. For the real “ appeasement ” of genuine British people the best procedure would be for Mr Chamberlain to tako out a first class single ticket to Bertchesgaden, and once more we would become a democracy, and there would be no need of Lady Austen Chamberlain as unofficial Ambassador to Mussolini and Franco. 1 have yet to learn where under the League of Nations we have any mandate to collaborate in the handing* of God’s chosen race and Social Democrats to the torture chambers and concentration camps of Herr Hitler. —1 am, etc., C. S. MacAktiick October 27.

to rttK (SUITOR Sir.—l note by your issue of the 2Gth instant that at the monthly meeting of the Hillside branch of the Amalgamated Society of Railway Servants a motion was passed unanimously desiring to express feelings of solidarity with the peo-ple of Czechoslovakia in their struggle for peace and democracy, and urging the Government to protest to the Chamberlain Government against further concessions , to Herr Hitler. Methinks it would assist the Chamberlain Government to assess this motion at its full value if our own Government, when forwarding this resolution (as no doubt it obediently will) to Mr Chamberlain, would explain that it was passed by an assembly the members of which, in the true spirit of British democracy, had a short time previously refused a hearing to the National Party’s candidate for Dunedin South. —I am. etc.. True Toiler. October 27. TO THE EDITOR Sir, —One may explain the rottenness of present world politics by a series of short-term blunders on the part of the English Nationalist Government—Sir John Simon’s advocacy of Japan’s case in Manchuria, the blocking of oil sanctions against Italy, the backhand blockade of Spain, the recent supplying of credits to Japan that has played a big part in enabling the fall of Canton and Hankow, and the three capitulations to _ German self-aggrandisement. But the facts are better explained, and

the consistent aid to Fascism made more significant, if we realise to what an extent class motives dominate Mr Chamberlain, and if we accept not the “ blunder ” theory, but, on the contrary, a deep-laid and skilful long-term policy that would be consummated by the fascising of England. Admit this, and the anomaly of this matter of air raid precaution is resolved—namely, that the Ministry, which annually has added hundreds of millions to the armament budget, has not, in the words of your sub-leader, “ sought to hide from the public the gravity of the situation ’’ for which it alone is responsible. Lab; our has for months begged the English Government to rectify the scandal of inadequate air raid precautions. That practical body the English Left Rook Club has sponsored a comprehensive work on the subject by Professor .1. B. S. Haldane. But the Government did not lift a hand until after the crisis was over and Czechoslovakia surrendered. The reason is that without the argument of a defenceless England the Government could not have given Hitler a free hand in Eastern Europe. You may recall that this argument was also used to justify the non-application of oil sanctions_ and the simultaneous move for more intensive rearmament. The stage is set for further crises of this nature, and no doubt the argument will be used again. In the meantime social services will be cut to make room for still more armaments, hut concerning air raid precautions there will be more speech-making than effective tunnel-building. The English public, as the latest mails' show, was mentally paralysed by the war scare, and that is the right frame of mind for the cutting of hard-won liberties mid the overthrowing of democratic procedures. One thinks little in such crises. These considerations may help to explain this sudden zeal for air raid precaution after a crisis so long foreseen. —I am. etc., O’R. October 27.

[We would ask our correspondent what party began, and has always been loudest for British disarmament, which has given the Fascist Powers their chief advantage. “ O’R.’s ” present position appears to he that he still hates armaments, but wants protection from air raids, presumably of a passive kind. The Chamberlain Government did not take office until May 28, 1937. We would ask him to particularise his reference to “ credits to Japan.”—Ed. E.S.]