The New Zealand Times. FRIDAY, AUGUST 4, 1911. GERMANY AND TAHITI

New Zealand Times, Volume XXXIII, Issue 7870, 4 August 1911, Page 4

The New Zealand Times. FRIDAY, AUGUST 4, 1911. GERMANY AND TAHITI

New Zealanders have not had to wait ■ long after the debate at the Imperial Conference upon colonial interest in foreign policy for a specific instance in international dealing that is of immediate concern to their country. ■ The reference here is to the cable message | published this morning in regard to proposals for tho cession of Tahiti to Germany. It may seem strange that the squabble in Morocco between France and Germany should so closely affect us at tho other end of the world, but tho news now to hand shifts the storm centre to onr very doors. Every j British colony at this end of tho world would ho affected in some degree by the strengthening of Germany’s hold on tho islands of tho Pacific, New Zealand most of all. The suspicion grows that Germany is once more practising her old tactics of laying hands upon territory to which she has not the slightest right for the express purpose of levying what is really blackmail on a colossal scale. Germany’s price for releasing her grip upon Morocco is not merely tho one island, Tahiti. Tahiti is the headquarters of French Oceania, comprising four largo and fertile archipelagoes in the .Eastern Pacific—tho Society Islands, the Marquesas, the Paumotus, and tho Gambler (or Mangareva) Group. There can he no doubt that under the name “Tahiti” used in the cablegram the whole of this Oceanic territory is meant. These island groups, containing many scores, in fact hundreds, of islands, large and small, are rich in copra, pearl shell, fruits, cotton, and other tropical productions. Though under the French flag they were first made known to tho world by British navigators, British missionaries first civilised the Tahitians and their neighbours, and a large British trade is carried on with Tahiti, almost exclusively through New Zealand. Papeete, the port of Tahiti, is only a little over a week’s steam by mail liners from "Wellington, and this port and Auckland regularly dispatch steamers there hy way of Rarotonga. Anything that would damage British trade with Tahiti would affect New Zealand seriously, quite apart from any broader questions of Empire in the Pacific.

There is probably much more in this item of cable news than is apparent on the surface. People conversant with the trend of affairs in the South Sea Islands know that France as a coloniser has been a lamentable failure in Oceania. French statesmen have frequently complained that the Eastern Pacific colonies were a burden and that they did not pay, and it has been seriously suggested that they should be bartered to England, or to anyone else who would give some concession nearer home in their stead. The most energetic and successful colonists in Tahiti have been Britishers and Americans. Trade does not prosper as it should, for it is stifled by officialdom. The native population’, in unhappy contrast to that of Samoa and Tonga, is demoralised and dying out. The twin curses of Opium and Chinese have fastened upon the Polynesians of these beautiful islands, and the French policy of neglect has hastened the ruin of the native people. The French are good neighbours as far as we are concerned; they like trading -with us, and many of them would just as soon bo under our flag as their own, for British energy would give fresh life to the island groups. 1 But they are wretched colonisers. It is in this apathy and ineffectiveness on the part of the French in Oceania that danger lies, French national pride may prevent the deal Germany now wishes, but the very fact that such a proposal has been made should set us on our guard. Ever since the days when the Goddefrois, the groat Hamburg firm, set up their trading establishments in the Pacific, with their headquarters in Samoa, the Germans have pursued a steady policy of aggrandisement in these seas. Bismarck backed up the Goddefroi firm, which hqd stations all over the Pacific Ocean from Tahiti away up to the Carolines, The successor of the Goddefroi firm is the big German company known briefly by the initials D.H. and P.G., whose business interests to-day extend over many groups, and in. whose interests wars have been fomented in Samoa again and again. Thanks to British supineness, the Germans—in spite of Now Zealand’s protests—have now got the best part of the Samoan group (America has the rest), and they very nearly got Tonga also. The Tongan archipelago is now fortunately under a British protectorate, and it is not at all unlikely that it may pass under the blue ensign of New Zealand before very long. But Samoa, the finest group in the Central Pacific, is under the German Eagle, and that fact and the fact that British interests have been practically shouldered out of the group, without the British Government raising a hand in protection, will be a perpetual reproach against British statesmanship of a decade ago. Germany has very good reasons of

her own, no doubt, for desiring Tahiti. For one thing, Papeete is a good, safe harbour, unlike Apia, in Samoa, and German warships could safely lie there during tho hurricane season. It would make an excellent naval headquarters and coaling depot. Under Germany’s energetic rule the productiveness of tho islands, right up to the almost depopulated Marquesas, would ho immensely increased, and trade would follow. But we may depend on it the Germans wouldn't build up the trade for Now Zealand's profit. In Samoa and in German New Guinea, and, in fact, in all the German possessions in or bordering on the Pacific, the work of colonisation and of industrial development is carried out upon excellent lines. In Samoa, especially, the Governors appointed have carried out their duties with great wisdom and success, and that group is now a busy, prosperous colony, growing more German every year. It is, therefore, plain that tho planting of another strong German colony close to our doors, with the added advantage of a suitable naval rendezvous, would be fraught with grave issues to New Zealand as well as to the rest of Australasia, and even to the South American States. Fortunately, though, we now occupy a vastly different position in the imperial Confederation to what wo occupied ten or eleven years ago, when Samoa was basely allowed to slip into German hands. Tho Australasian States are recognised co-partners with the Old Land now. Here is an opportunity for tho Imperial Government to exhibit practical proof of its protestations of confidence and consideration for its colonial cousins. The New Zealand Government should not delay a moment in taking up a decisive attitude on tho subject of Tahiti, and in making that attitude known to the Imperial authorities. It may come about that the British flag will fly over these Eastern Pacific Islands —tho earliest desire of the native inhabitants and the traders, even back in the “forties,” was annexation to Britain—but in the meantime it should be sufficient for Sir Edward Grey to suggest to M. Delcasse that “Hands off Tahiti!”_ would ho tho best reply to the suggestion made from Berlin.