The Franklin Times FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 10, 1939. EVERY HOUR A GAIN

Franklin Times, Volume XXVIII, Issue 15, 10 February 1939, Page 4

The Franklin Times

FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 10, 1939. EVERY HOUR A GAIN

PUBLISHED EVERY MONDAY, WEDNESDAY AND FRIDAY AFTERNOON. Office and Works: ROULSTON STREET, PUKEKOHE. ’Phone No. 2. P.O. Box 14.

“We nothing extenuate nor aught set down in malice.”

TIME and distance are prime factors in the world crisis. “Every hour,’’ stated Early Beatty on Friday night, “is a-gain to the democracies.” Why? Because a dictatorship makes up its mind more quickly than a democracy, takes less time to act, and is therefore at its selected moment more

ready. The superior readiness of dictatorship, as compared with democracy, is an element inherent in the nature of the two systems; in other words, comparative slowness to act in military matters is the price which democracy incurs for its personal liberties. If the price is allowed to accumulate in arrears of debt that are too heavy to be liquidated at the moment selected by dictatorship, then democracy fails —fails because it has left so many things undone that the doing of them in a hurry, to meet a crisis, is impossible. Now, it is not a fact that democracy is so far in arrears of military necessities as to be in a hopeless position. But democracy is sufficiently in arrears to make it of vast importance to gain a little more time. Or, as Earl Beatty put it, “every hour is a gain.”

When Munich arrived, the American public had hardly begun to make up its mind as to how much it owes to the cause of European settlement. Even today the American public is still making up its mind —but at least has made some progress. Herein, said Lord Beatty, lies part of the timesaving gain. And there is also some miking-up-of-mind still to be done in New Zealand. Earl Beatty stated: “I believe that in spite of the speed of news and the speed of travel in these days distance still counts, and that you here have not quite fully yet realised the real issue which lies between the democracies and the totalitarian Slates. Inevitably a democratic Government must have the will of its people behind it before it can move rapidly. In England we have been rudely awakened, and the nation has been made alive to its weakness.” To secure “full realisation" of the issue in New Zealand, “every hour is a gain”; and New Zealand is perhaps not the only country in winch realisation is blurred because of distance irom the heatspots. Distance was once a shield. Today it is far less a shield, because of modern speed, but it, tends to delay j realisation of a crisis: and to cure thai j defect every hour is a gain.

Replying to the welcome statement or the Minister of Defence (Mr F. .tones) that a further programme of defence has been authorised, Earl Beatty congratulated the New Zealand Government on what it had done amt was now about to do, but com-

bined with 1 1 is congratulations the

caution that “there is more, much more, to he done, and done rapidly.”

War could strike our national security

as rapidly and as fiercely as fire struck the skeleton structure of the Social Security buildingv Fire cannot destroy Social Security; war could. Unpreparedness against fire is dangerous, but unpreparedness against an international tire could be fatal. Every pour gained is a gain according to the degree to which it is used.