THOUGHT FOR WAR RISKS

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXV, Issue 22983, 10 March 1938, Page 14

THOUGHT FOR WAR RISKS

It may be unusual but it is certainly interesting to find a Labour member with a thought for war risks. These were advanced in the House of Representatives yesterday by Mr. T. H. McCombs as one argument for the establishment of an iron and steel works in New Zealand. Mr. McCombs imagined the Dominion's plight if cut off in war from sources of supply. His imagination should have carried him a little further. New Zealand's main, nearest and cheapest source of supply is Australia. To be cut off from the Commonwealth would mean the naval domination of the Tasman Sea by an enemy. Can Mr. McCombs imagine New Zealand's plight then, left by the Labour Government without adequate land forces to repel an invader? Iron and steel works would not be of much avail; in fact they are more likely to prove a temptation to an aggressor and work against New Zealand in wartime, instead of for her. A better insurance against war risks would be to spend the £5,000,000 on training and equipping sufficient and efficient land and air forces that would make any raider think a long time before launching a large enough force over vast ocean distances to cope with the New Zealand defenders. But if the Dominion for defensive reasons must fabricate her own iron and steel, by argument she should also produce her own rubber, raised under glass. Rubber is as much a modern military necessity as steel. Nor is its production likely to prove much more uneconomic.