PEACE TERMS

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXV, Issue 23162, 7 October 1938, Page 11

PEACE TERMS

.VIGOROUS CRITICISM GOVERNMENT ASSAILED MR. CHURCHILL'S OUTBURST GLOOMY VIEW TAKEN By Telegraph—Press Association—Copyright British Wireless RUGBY. Oct. 5 Speaking in the course of the debate in the House of Commons on the motion proposed by Sir John Simon, Mr. Winston Churchill said that Britain had sustained a total, unmitigated defeat, and France an even worse one.

"The utmost the Prime Minister has been able to secure has been that Herr Hitler, instead of snatching victuals from the table, was content to have them served to him course by course," said Mr. Churchill. "We are in the presence of a disaster of the first magnitude for Britain and France. We cannot consider Czechoslovakia's abandonment after what happened last month. It is the most grevious consequence we have yet experienced of what we have done and left undone in the past five years—five years of futile good intentions." Prance and Britain Compromised

The question of Czechoslovakia Mr. Churchill considered as past and done with, and he concerned himself chiefly with the future as it affected the Western democracies—a future which he depicted in most gloomy characters. The whole equilibrium of Europe had been deranged. It must be expected that all the countries of Central and Eastern Europe would make the best terms they could with the triumphant Nazi Power, which could now bo extended quite smoothly and swiftly without firing a single shot.

Mr. Churchill calculated the enormous strategic gains for Germany, and said that in one or two years' time a situation might easily arise in which they would have bitterly to recognise that by tho recent policy of safety even the independence of France and Britain had been deeply, perhaps fatally, compromised. Situation Regarded as Calamitous

Mr. Churchill said he considered it was a fraud and a farce to invoke the name of self-determination in connection with the British and French proposals. Recalling his demand in the spring for a British guarantee of Czechoslovakia, he said the Government had refused, when it would probably have saved the situation, and in the end had given it when it was too late, and now proposed to renew it when it had no longer power to make it good. Tho situation, in his estimation, was so grave, and even calamitous, and had only arisen through the neglect of his repeated advocacy in recent years, that the Government and country should look to its defences. Further Rearmament Advocated

Tho position could only be retrieved at this late hour by an effort at rearmament the like of which never had been seen before. Mr. Churchill made a strong appeal for supreme national resolution to recover moral health and martial vigour so that Britain should take Jicr stand again for freedom as in tho olden times.

Sir Henry Page Croft (Conservative —Bournemouth) said ho found himself in complete disagreement with Mr. Churchill. The escutcheons of Britain and France were absolutely without a speck of dust and Britain was hailed throughout tho world as the maker of peace.