AVOIDING ANOTHER WAR.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXIV, Issue 19792, 12 November 1927, Page 12

AVOIDING ANOTHER WAR.

value: of preparedness. WARNING FROM LAST CONFLICT. "Preparation for war is not provocation for war," said Mr. E. H. Northcroft in an address on Armistice Day broadcast from IYA last evening. That view might be unexpected or unpopular, he added, but it wa,s sincere. To avoid a repetition of the horrors of the last war he urgently suggested that, in the present condition of affairs*, the only course was be prepared. Recalling how Lord Roberts' warning prior to the last war had gone unheeded, Sir. Northcroft said it was not until after three years of wasteful sacrifice of noble lives thai Britain was at last mobilised and trained as a nation, so that its full strength could be put forward to over throw the enemy, which should have been overthrovrn at the beginning. "This suicidal weakness was defended on the stcore of expense, as well as of anti-militarism," said Mr. Northcroft. "At Messines alone the expenditure in shells fired by the artillery was £17.500,000, and so the drain of the war continued for four dreary years. A fraction of 'the cost of the war—probably thes expenditure of one normal day alone—would have sufficed as the annual cost of the necessary training of our manhood The nation has been brought to the verge of bankruptcy, and yet, with that dreadful lesson fresh before us, we hear serious resistance to territorial training, as if the world has been changed bv come miracle in the short period since 1914. "If this solemn day means anything to ns. if we are truly concerned to pay '.he debt we owe our comrades who died for us. then let ns take such measures now. while opportunity exists, so to arm and equip ourselves that their brothers and sons—aye. and their grandsons, too—may not be called upon to hi alee" the srlorions sacrifice we mourn this Armistice Dav."