INTERNATIONAL HARMONY

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXII, Issue 22098, 2 May 1935, Page 10

INTERNATIONAL HARMONY

A well-deserved reproof has been administered by the President of the United States to the chairman of the Military Affairs Committee for permitting the publication of the evidence of an officer who said that in the event of war it might be necessary to seize British and French islands to prevent an enemy using them as air bases. This is the sort of idea that is proclaimed by Professor Banse, the German who would give scant consideration to the rights of neutrals if the war effort of his country was to be served. The significance of the American episode does not lie in the fact that a prominent officer spoke in this strain or that his argument was made public. It lies in the fact that because of the goodwill existing between the United States and Britain and the United States and France there is no likelihood of any official umbrage being taken over it. Mr. Roosevelt doubtICS's felt bound to repudiate the statement, but, thanks to the friendship existing between the United States and the countries named, there was no risk of the harmonious relationships being disturbed. The average Briton,, having read it, was inclined to smile and perhaps remark that the general apparently was a "fireeater" whose military advice to his country was of no consequence. Frenchmen, similarly, could not have taken him seriously. And here in a nutshell is revealed the spirit that keeps the peace, the spirit of whole peoples that refuses to contemplate war. It should be an object lesson for the rest of the world. Mr. Boosevelt's timely reference to the "peace conditions: cemented by many generations of friendship between the Canadian and American peoples" and to the agreement for permanent disarmament of the boundary between the two countries, may also by contrast help to inspire enlightened opinion in Europe. For more than 100 years the AmericanCanadian frontier has not seen a fort or an armed establishment on either side. The first step was to abandon the maintenance of guarding forces on the Great Lakes and it naturally followed that this evidence of mutual trust and goodwill removed the necessity of defence on either side of the long boundary line. Not only has this sense of security prevailed. Upon it has been built a clear-cut system of co-operation over the use of boundary waters, a joint commission dealing with all questions that arise. It might be called an international board of directors who can meet as freely as a Parliamentary committee of either Government. It is an example that might have great value for the world at the present time.