THE DEFENCE OF THE EMPIRE.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXXVII, Issue 11366, 8 May 1900, Page 4

THE DEFENCE OF THE EMPIRE.

It. is morally certain that one of the first questions which will engage the attention of British statesmen when the present war is brought to a victorious conclusion will be that connected with the defence of the Empire. '.'iTJm' problem' be * solved is one surrounded with many difficulties, but it is capable of a satisfactory solution," It is, to use the language- of •Captain Mahan, U.S.N., "to induce such measures of organisation and defence" as shall be felt by all parts of the Empire to be a fair distribution 1 of a burden of which each' reaps the benefit." In this connection.- the Defence Committee of the Imperial Federation have submitted the following proposals to Lord Salisbury, who has promised that they, shall receive the serious consideration of Her Majesty's Government "(a) That an Imperial Council be established, as proposed by Mr. Chamberlain in 1897, and as recommended to a former Government in 1893 by the Imperial Federation League; (b) that an Imperial fund be established to which all moneys voted by the Parliaments of the self-governinj' countries for the general defence of the Empire, for such term of years as may be agreed upon, should be paid; (c) that the administration of this fund should be vested in the Imperial Council; (d) that the Council should be cognisant of all matters of foreign policy necessary to enable it to deal adequately with questions of defence ; (c) that the Royal Navy, to be maintained at the cost of all the selfgoverning countries of the Empire, be the' only navy in the Empire, and that it be administered by the Board of Admiralty under the supervision of the Imperial Council; (f) that the military forces'" of the Empire be organised upon the following basis as vapidly as circumstances will permit:—A territorial force for local defence shall be maintained by each country of the Empire. In all things essential to their combination in war, uniformity shall be observed by these forces. Arms and stores shall be, wherever possible, of uniform pattern and interchangeable between different parts of the Empire. A fully organised, generalservice army, drawn from all parts of the Empire, shall be maintained by the combined resources of all the countries of the Empire." The system at present in vogue is both faulty and anomalous. Apart from their contributions to the Australasian auxiliary squadron, and their expenditure upon local defences, these colonies bear no share of the cost of Imperial defence. Though they are absolutely dependent for the protection of their commerce and J largely for the protection of their shores upon the British navy and' army, they contribute nothing to the support of either. This system, however, is now doomed, we believe, to give place to an Imperial Kriegsverein with its essential corollary of representation in a Central Council of the Empire. ' Thus welded to-gether-one in heart and one in mind—possessing a vast and uniform system of defence supported by the loyalty and military ardour of the race, it is no idle dream to regard such a blessed consummation as constituting the British Empire one of the most powerful factors of peace in the whole world,