The Thronicle PUBLISHED DAILY. LEVIN. MONDAY, NOVEMBER 15, 1915. FINANCIAL ASPECT OF THE WAR.

Horowhenua Chronicle, 15 November 1915, Page 2

The Thronicle PUBLISHED DAILY. LEVIN. MONDAY, NOVEMBER 15, 1915. FINANCIAL ASPECT OF THE WAR.

11 Germany and her Allies succumbed to-morrow to the attacks of the Triple .Entente, and agreed to pay the heaviest indemnity that threat Britain a'"j 1,.„. AtlJnc nrnnt- 4-l,«

lier Allies could exact, tho financial burden remaining upon the victors would .bo gigantic. If the war spread over a number of years, without expansion of its present great radius, the result undoubtedly ivill be a sweeping away of finance in its present form, a. quincimation ot the combatants, and a hopeless burden of debt to hamper the endeavours of tho next six generations. War, to put the case bluntly, has reached a Stage at which it becomes impracticable in the beet judgment of sane men; and th<s quite apart from the grievojis reason that the bravest and best of all the races lay down their lives it the call of duty apparently without a/lvancing thoir countries' causes to a j decisive point. Financially the burden of the war is intolerable already; tactically, ive seo the area of strife enlarged so much that every diocision through clash of arms becomes ineffective ; on tho sea the groat navies of the Triple Eniente are ' unable come to clofie quarters with the main vessels of the wily enemy. Tn all previous campaigns tho combatants have been merely a representative handful of soldiery; but to-day we seo ilie flower of the manhood ot aI 1 tho nations ranged in their millions drawn from every rank of life, and using arms and methods coßtlior (and yet relatively much less effective.) by twenty times or, more than the oldstyle weapons and methods were. Tn these circumstances it is tho duty of al! men of proper balance—whether in Great Britain or Europe, in Australia or New Zealand—to put their true patriotic influence into their own particular spheres of life, and so help to mould the opinions of those around them that when tho opportune time for peace proposals comes there will be no great volume of protest From the always numerous section that reasons only with its heart, and emotionally stands firm for preconceived principles that may prove utterly imjyacticablo when tested in the fire of war's developments. Otherwise we may see the tabric of our empire's national prosperity (and even our power as a country that stands against all the forces of oppression) cast down for ever at the instance of those amongst our fellow Britons who temporarily pose as Samsons amongst us, determined in the last event to pull down the columns of our national e'difice provided that the German Philistines perish in the ruins along with the stalwarts. Such a spirit as this ha 6 won battles for the British Empire aforetime; but those battles, and the campaigns of ' which they formed a part, were sporadic disturbances,, affecting nol one man in every hundred of the population, and waged at a cost of one"'favthing By comparison with every pound sterling of' expenditure necessary under the present It is in nndimniished belief of tho seriousness of the aspects of tlie war that T.'m Chronicle persists in its seeming obsession in favour o? peace on honorable terms that yafc may contain a yielding principle on certain points.