£150,000,000 LOAN.

New Zealand Herald, Volume L, Issue 15234, 22 February 1913, Page 5 (Supplement)

£150,000,000 LOAN.

. MR. .F. HARRISON, ON ARMY AND NAVY NEEDS. THE COMING CBT'-'S. "A xr.EMKXDous crisis is before us. And tbey who are blind to it or refuse to meet it- may be guilty of one c,i' the most awful catastrophes in history, The violent destruction of our Empire by enemies implies the destruction of our wholefinancial and industrial system. That moans ruin to commence,, trade, manufactures: starvation, want, and chaos to our whole labour world. All my life I have fought for labour causes, and I hold fast still to all measures of social . reform. May 1 not live to see labour and reform in sheer ignorance and class-egotism bring about Its own irrevocable ruin." With these words Mr. Frederic Harrison concludes a remarkable article entitled "1913." in the English Review for January, in the course of which he advocates a " war loan of at least £150,000,000, to bo spent freely at once, say 100 millions on the navy and 50 millions on the army." There are the inevitable references to Germany, after a statement of the possibilities of international complications over the Balkan settlement. "We ail know that fur some years yet £eaco is almost a condition of German development both military and commercial, and especially in the marine. We concede all this as proved, axiomatic, common ground. Ninety per cent, of the German people ardently desire to be at p&a-ce—so long .13 Gorman interests are not affected. Germany's Inevitable Demand. "The whole Government machine works tor peace present. The Kaiser is honestly doing his best to remove all apprehension from his neighbours' minds * -■-until some crisis compels him to speak. And all the while the. predominant -. ten per cent, of. tha nation are pushing on Their countrymen to take a course of which war is the almost inevitable conseoito'nce. ...... "This collapse of Turkey, this aggrandisement of the Balkan kingdoms, is a rude disillusion and a fatal set back to Par-German ideals, whether in Austria or in the Reich. Nothing outside Europe is now open to them. Asia, India, China, Australasia, Africa,, America—North and , South—all are closed, practically inaccessible and impregnable. And now the Bosphorus, the iEgean, and Asia Minor. ore equally clewed. - " But. alas! Europe is open—and within touch — even if occupied, offers magnificent fields for enterprise of all kinds. It is therefore inevitable that the mighty German Empire, swollen perhaps l)v°the German part of Austria, will seek 'compensation' for its exclusion from places '• in the sun'—within Europe itself. .-Problem One of Money. "A predominant fleet, the largest that we can man, is the condition of existence of the Empire," says Mr. Harrison later. "An immense and continuous increase to our navy for some ;ears to come is a matter of life and 'eath to our people. . . . What we want now is' a fully trained, fully equipped expeditionary force .to support our friends across the Channel, and prevent the shores of it beincr held by an enemy." - He predicts that at least by the year 1020 ths great stress will come, and says we" want a European army of at least 250.000 lonq-service men, and about twice that number of reserves and territorials. He therefore calls for the huge loan referred to. " The problem is really one of money. And I quite agree that even the heroic methods of our Chancellor could not raise such a sum to be spent in. five or seven years. Why stick at a war loan any more" than our fathers did in Napoleon's time ? ; : " ' < ~ "The mere offer of such a loan would fee covered five times over; and would make even the Bernhardis bite their moustaches. Lord Haldane, who, as all agree, has done all that man could do with the limits and conditions imposed on' his party, lias told us - that it is a matter of money, that he could not better the army.without taking money from the navy, and vice versa. - . • "That is quite true, with our aciual taxation: Our fathers had a 10 per cent.' income tax ail round. If we cannot stand that, the answer is: resort as they diu i also, to a big war loan." )v~