The New Zealand Herald AUCKLAND, MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 18, 1944 CHARLEMAGNE OF AACHEN

New Zealand Herald, Volume 81, Issue 25001, 18 September 1944, Page 4

The New Zealand Herald AUCKLAND, MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 18, 1944 CHARLEMAGNE OF AACHEN

The sound of hostile guns has at last brought the bad news from Ghent to Aix. The folk of German Aachen are no longer free, like Browning's burgesses, to "vote by common consent," but the course of events must have had significance for the dullest Nazi among them. From the moment the Belgian defences crumbled and the Wehrmacht rallied to defend the frontier of Holland, it seemed that the strategy of Caen was to be attempted again on a wider battlefield. The British wing engaged the enemy and pinned him against his waterways. The American wing drove east in a bid for a breakthrough. Aachen, planted squarely where three countries meet, lay directly in the path. Out from Aachen, German armies have marched against their neighbours for eleven hundred years. In 1914 Aachen Avas the mustering place of von Bulow and von Kluck. In 1944, history, in poetic mood since Stalingrad, has made Aachen the gateway of invasion. German sentiment will see a deeper meaning, for it was at Aachen that the first pan-German Fuehrer was buried in 814. The ancient town was a convenient vantage point, whence Charlemagne, builder of the First Reich, could watch the Slavs along the Elbe and the long roadways of his conquests which ran to the Ebro, the Tiber and the Danube.

Charlemagne is a remarkable figure. Touched by the civilisation of Rome and to some extent tamed by the Christian faith which he professed, he displayed nevertheless all the Frankish passion for war, all the old Teutonic lust for conquest, all the ruthlessness in battle of his race. By a strange and deplorable combination of war and l'eligion, he spread Christianity from the Elbe to the Oder, among the Bohemian Czechs and the Slovenes of Croatia and Dalmatia. First of the Crusaders and truer to the manner of Mahomet than of Christ, he attacked the Moslem Moors of Spain, and filled the Pyrenees with legends of his Roland and his Oliver. He never paused in his career of aggression. Every year in early spring Aachen saw the assembly of his peers, not to decide on war or peace, but to choose, as Caesar said of more ancient Germans, the object of attack. Charlemagne, seizing on that nostalgia for peace and unity which the four Roman centuries had ingrained in European thought, had himself crowned Roman emperor, and under that fictitious title laid claim to the wide domains once ruled by the western Caesars. Such was the first attempt, after the passing of Rome, to give Europe unity. It was a unity, however, wrought by tireless vigour and the sword, out of a tormented and disorganised continent, a mighty structure built of sand. No strong cementing idea held it together, and n6 sooner was the strong hand removed than the irreconcilable components fell apart, and Charlemagne's Europe remained the memory which inspired the conception of the "Holy Roman Empire." In theory, this conception was not without sublimity. As the secular counterpart of a universal Church, it claimed jurisdiction over Christian men everywhere, and certainly possessed that binding idea, that basic singleness of thought which Charlemagne's Reich lacked. It was wrecked on human nature. Had the empire been truly .holy, it might also have achieved a Roman strength, a Roman unity. The ancient enemies of peace and justice, ambition and jealousy, made the great idea a hissing and a curse. The Roman Empire united Europe in loyalty and prosperity. In the western half of those dominions Charlemagne of Aachen imposed the brief unity of conquest. Rome's spiritual successor remained for a span of eight centuries a name rather than a fact, an aspiration which lacked fulfilment in a disunited continent. Is the stage set afresh? Is it possible for wisdom to build upon democracy a unity for which Europe has always craved, and which under this or that domination she has always lacked? Such a unity cannot arise under stern tutelage, either from east or west. It must be broad enough to allow a debauched Italy and a stricken France to find their souls again, and again contribute to the common stock of spiritual treasure th6se gifts which have shaped the Continent. It must be wise enough, humane enough, to seek and bring to rebirth the qualities which a former Germany had shown. It must be tolerant enough to seek to weld in one the contribution of England, of Russia and of Scandinavia. It must provide a climate for the thinking of the colder north and the warmer south. The weak must find no fear in it, the strong no temptation. Charlemagne, whose bones tremble under the cannonade at Aachen, attempted the right thing in the wrong way. Can this century solve the problem?

FAIR SHARE REQUIRED

The Mayor's disclosure that the Auckland district has been given a relatively small allocation of timber for house-building this month must raise grave doubts in many minds whether Auckland is getting its fair share of goods and services that are in short supply. Mr Allum points out that since 1940 the population of the district has increased by over 25,000, whereas in the same period Wellington and Blenheim have shown very small increases and in the rest of the Dominion the population has actually shrunk—no doubt partly through servicemen going overseas—by nearly as much as the Auckland increase. Yet Auckland is allowed only one-ninth more timber than Wellington, and the two areas together get almost exactly half the aggregate. To take another obvious case, Auckland has been short of coal for gas-making since April of last year, with acute crises at intervals. Wellington and Dunedin have reported similar iroubles, but less.

•severe and of much shorter duration. Christchurch, however, seems to have got through without any restrictions. Again, visitors returning from the South Island report that many kinds of goods, both New Zea-land-made and imported, including some textiles, are much more readily obtainable in the shops there than here. All these things are allocated by bureaucratic control, and since the fairness of the allocations now much more than doubtful, it is necessary that Auckland take steps to safeguard its just rights against the aspirations of places nearer to the nerve-centre of bureaucracy and to sources of comtnpdities that are needed here. The Mayor is making "the strongest representations" about timber. His disclosure is a clear call to Auckland members of Parliament to be up and doing. AN EXPLANATION WANTED For two days last week the House of Representatives strained at a gnat and swallowed a camel. Had the Opposition been aware of the full history of the methods of disposing of surplus Army motor vehicles, it would not have worried unduly about allegations that certain officers had managed to secure a few bargains. There was a much larger matter which should have had their attention. What was the story behind the setting up of the Vehicles Disposal Board on April 27 last year and its disbandment within a month before it had disposed of a single vehicle? Mr Sullivan, as Minister of Supply, showed signs of annoyance in the House as members continued to press him for details of the comparatively small items then under review. On the larger issue the Minister's mind will be refreshed by the details published in another column and by the questions demanding answer. If he wishes to disabuse the public mind of the impression that the business savours of hole-and-corner methods, a frank statement should be made immediately. The Minister need not restrict himself to the disposal of motor vehicles. He could well go back to 1941 when the first impressment was being made 30 that the Territorial Force could carry out extensive manoeuvres. Then a perfectly good scheme devised by local authorities was wrecked by high-handed interference from Wellington. That is the starting point of the tale of requisition and disposal. However good the Government's intentions may have been, the motor vehicles story is not a happy one.