THE "REQUIREMENTS OF THE SITUATION"

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LII, Issue 201, 21 August 1918, Page 4

THE "REQUIREMENTS OF THE SITUATION"

■ '"■■■. By Frank Fox, R.F.A., author of "The British Army at War. A homely proverb tells that tihe Devil's attitude on morals le ■ dictated. •uv the state of his health. 'When the Devil was ill, The Devil -a monk would be. When the Devil was well, The Devil a monk was he. (The article was written just prior to the C4erman reverses). The German military monster is Reeling robust just now and there disappears irom his'press and platform that apologetic note about atrocities which, was noticeable in 1917. The impudent fiction for instance, that it was the, British who first used poison gas in this campaign is now no more heard, and we nave a lecture by Professor riiaber of Berlin glorifying the use of poison gas as one of the triumphs <oi German' science. Ite use, he states, without any attempt at apology, "simply' arose out of the requirements of the situation." It was a German device to break up the trench warfare, and the Professor claims that it has historical warrant since "to smoke out an enemy'' has always been a proper military measure. The candour of Professor Haber i» in a way welcome, but his effrontery is surprising. It i& not necessary to go farther back than the sitting's of iix& if ague. Conference to find that the use of asphyxiating gases in war was ex-, pressly repudiated oy civilised nations. It was not\used in this war.until April, 22nd, 1915, \ when the struggle was / many month old. and when the Germans had been foiled in their rush on 1 Paris, foiled in their rush to the Channel ports, and* despairing of -victory by fair means adopted this expedient which they had pledged themselves never to use.

The Canadian troops in front of Ypres were the first victims. It was a, wholly unexpected outbreak of scientific murd-erousness, as the complete absence of all protective measures showed. Those first victims of the German gas> —and they were numbered by thousands—who- were choked to death in fearful agony were the victims not 01 war out. of murder.

"The requirements of the situation" have been since August 1914 Hhe sole German moral code. Those requirements dictated the breach of Belgian neutrality; When the heroic Belgian resistance embarrassed the German advance the same "requirements" 'prompted an organised campaign of outrage against the civilian population. I*ater the "requirements" called for . the use of poison gas; still lated for ruthless submarine attacks on shipping, on neutrals as well as belligerents, on merchant fillips- as well as war ships, attacks which involved the death of thousands of non-combatant men. women and children. ' , In r the German spoke of "necessity: knowing no law." In 1918 they speak of the "requirements of the situation." The phrase has varied -bub the spirit is still the same. It is /because the German military despots have set up. the "requirements" of the German military situation as the sole law in human relations that they have now the whole world in arms against them, determined that arms will not be set down until- civilisation is freed irom such a monstrous terror. .