TO PREVENT WAR

Hawke's Bay Tribune, Volume XXVI, Issue 158, 19 June 1936, Page 4

TO PREVENT WAR

International Body of Ex-Servicemen MOVE BEGUN IN 1920 Members of the Hastings Returned Soldiers’ Association passed a resolution at a recent meeting to the effect that the time had come for the establishment of an Imperial, and later, an international, organisation of ex-ser-vicemen, for the preservation of world peace. “Their voice should be heard in the Assembly of the League of Nations in a non-political advisory capacity,’’ stated the resolution. Just such an international body was formed in 1920, and held a three-day conference at Geneva in May of last year, states Mr. Alexander Scott, of Wellington, who was one of the two British delegates, and was elected trea-surer-general. Britain, France, Germany, Belgium, Italy, Alsace, Switzerland mil Austria were represented, and invitations were sent also to the United States and to tho British Dominions. The late M. Henri Barbusse was elected president. Tho Ex-Servicemen’s International, founded at this conference, was stated to represent more than a million organised ex-soldiers. The general principles were summarised by the president in a report published in “Tho New World,’’ a periodical published in Glasgow and edited by Mr. Scott. Among the aims were tho following:— To support a general strike in the event of mobilisation for war; to create an anti-war spirit by anti-mili-tarist and pacifist propaganda; to harmonise tho demands of ex-servicemen with the ultimate aims of the organised labour movement; and to study internationally questions of the reinstatement ot ex-servicemen in civil life. “The International, while declaring complete sympathy with Socialism, declared that it ought not be be affiliated with any party, but should act in independence side by side with all sections of the Labour and Socialist movement,” the report stated. “If the ex-servicemen of New Zealand revive this great movement, they will earn the gratitude of all those who are ashamed of war,” Mr. Scott said: “I believe now. as I did in 1918, that an international league of ex-service-men to abolish war is capable of more than a dozen Leagues of Nations, composed of civilian statesmen and diplomatic experts.”