MENACE IN RUSSIA

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LII, Issue 201, 21 August 1918, Page 5

MENACE IN RUSSIA

ALLIES MUST ACT NOW.

A VAST ANJ} MALEVOLENT | MOVEMENT.

How lonig are the Allies to sit by and watch Germany win the war? For win the war she will if she establishes her domination of Russia. and the Allies are sitting by and watching her do it. How long are the Allies jto go on delivering the next generation, the future of the world, bound hand' an foot, into Germany's prison house? For if Germany controls Russia, then the future is hers. How long are the Allie s . to watch Germany making herself irresistible in that next war which she is. already arranging? For iresdstible she will be if the German Empire extends from the Baltic Sea to the Pacific 'Ocean. These were asked in am article in the New York Times of May 26th. The writer went on to say:—"The war will be won in the West." But if it i s won only in theWes€ it will be lost. If it is won only in the West we shall have done . nothing except to check temporarily, at a terrible price, Germany's movement agaimst France and Belgium, and we shall have handed over to her, with incredible generosity, +he means to make (certainly successful her next movement against France and Belgium—and 'England, and CanSada, and Brazil, and the United States. Two years and a half ago, Mr Lloyd George made that memorable complain* that in everything the Allies had done they had always been "too late." Are they to be too late again, and now fatally too late? Are they to be too late where tardiness is crucial and pivotal? Are they to wait while Germany swiftly moulds the pliable mass of Russia into the new German Empire? Why, if they let her do that, Germany could actually offord to admit defeat om the jWesern front, to let the Allies have nearly everything they wanted, AlsaceLorraine included —even the Trenitino: for in the next war she could take Al-sace-Lorraine and the Trentino back again with hardly an effort. Next war? There would not be a next war; it would not be a war but a promenade of the one great world empire over the bodies of the democratic niations.

j What does the rapidly progressing annexation of Russia mean to us? Is iit merely one more country swallowed in the German maw, merely a larger Roumania or Belgium ? No, it i s ' something of vastly greater meaning. Russia within the German Empire, Russia even dominated from' the outside, by the German Empire, means the mightiest military empire the world has ever seen, an empire besides which the present German Empire will seem small and not very powerful by comparison. To what ends will the strength of that vaster empire be directed? To the same ends as those for which the j strength of the present and lesser German) Empire ha s been directed, and jwe have learned what they are in a Iterribie school. FrJ>m Hamburg to I "Vladivostok the "HbhenzolAern mind' will direct energies and' powers fifty- ' fold what it has been able to direct in this war, direct them toward (the (conquest of the whole world from Hudf son's Bay to Cape Horn, from Norway ;to the Gape of Good Hope, from ManI churia to Australia.

The power of such an empire would be—will be, if we do not prevent itbeyond anything which hag ever been conceived in humand' history. We shall no longer be able then to talk of any na£ion being invincible, uncbniqureable. We shall see the nations of the world disappear, one after another. Japan is as much threatened as is (the TJnitedl States, perhaps more directly threatened- since the swift rush of the increasing eGrman Empire is now being aimed etraight ..across .the territory of. Japan's neighbour, and since the interests of the new German Empire might bring her into collision! with Japan first and before she had occasion to turn and strike a£ the American continent. . And what are we doing while this terrific prodigy, is being created under our eyes?. Why, we are debating whether Japan might or might not get some profit out of it if she. stopped the thing before it was too late. We are telling each other that we must not hurt the Bolshevik feelings. .■ We are concentrating our eyes on Flanders and Eicardy and saying that the "war will soon be won iro the West". And

what should ,we be doing ? We should be realising with all our might that we are looking upon one of the vastest and moat malevolent births in history, the birth of an empire beyond anything whi|?h the mind of man has ever conceived, and whose whole existence will be devoted 1 to; our destruction and (the destruction of everything that ie like us. And we should force our politicians to be statesmen and (to think of what this means. We can still- help Russia, and we should*; now the Bolsheviks who have delivered themselves to Germany, and are furthering with all their might the progress of "the Qerman .aim, put Russia, and we should not hesitate and palter over the question whether the Bolsheviks, who are our most nialignanjt enemies, will misinterpret pur help or not.. When have they, ever done anything else, and what reould we do that) they would misinterpret? We must help Russia—nofc the Bolsheviks —because , if w,e 'do,' not., help Russia., we, or at.any rate our children, will be lost. Andi to help her 'we must cease to suspect each other, cease'to say that we are the only oae of tbej Allies; whose motives are -pure, when in fact we know nothing of the kind. This great emergency of the world, *on wfcich the future of everything*, we hold dear depends, is one to be dealt with. . by the tools at hand, whether American, British, French, -Chinese, or Japanese, or all together.