TERRITORIALS ON PARADE

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXVII, Issue 23774, 30 September 1940, Page 6

TERRITORIALS ON PARADE

At the end of three months' intensive training, with the benefit of the experience clearly visible, the First Battalion, Auckland Regiment, marched through the City on Saturday. The steadiness, march discipline and precision of the battalion impressed the watching citizens in whom experience is beginning to develop a critical sense. Such attributes combine to make an impressive spectacle of a march, but they have a deeper value than that of merely creating a fine show. To those responsible for training a unit its bearing on these occasions is taken as a test of success in welding it into an organic whole, as evidence of those many intangible things summed up in the phrase esprit de corps. The conditions of modern warfare, making heavy demands on the individuality and initiative of the soldier, have not lessened but increased the need for such a spirit. With a unit dispersed, perhaps widely, with many groups carrying out specialised tasks, it still needs to be one body, just as when men marched into battle shoulder to shoulder. So the testimony of the parade, proving how the components of the battalion have been welded into one, is valuable. It is the result of the men having lived, worked and played together continuously for these months. There is no other way of attaining it. Addressing the men yesterday, Colonel Weir said there lay ahead the harder task of retaining the efficiency gained in the past three months. That is true and while, as he suggested, all ranks can help toward the desired end, the authorities should consider offering wider opportunities and better facilities than the programme of parades followed before the training period.