The New Zealand Times. FRIDAY, AUGUST 30, 1918. ITALY

New Zealand Times, Volume XLIII, Issue 10063, 30 August 1918, Page 4

The New Zealand Times. FRIDAY, AUGUST 30, 1918. ITALY

The movement for helping the Italian Red Cross is for a cause of which the appeal is irresistible. If it were only the fact that Italy had the moral courage to keep out of the war, when the Triple Alliance was claiming her cooperation, the case for gratitude would be complete. Those of us who followed the great retreat of the armies of Jeff re and French from the Meuse and the Sambro in 1914 require no reminder of the anxiety caused us by the uncertainty of the Italian decision. Would the French general, when he reached his mas s of manoeuvre, be able to use that force, or would he be compelled to keep half of it to repel an invasion of Italian troops from the south? Moreover, at that time grea French forces were hurrying across the Mediterranean from Algiers, Morocco, and the French Soudan. They weie under convoy of the French Fleet, but what if the Italian Fleet were to dispute the passage ? The s tory -of the great battle of the Marne makes it Juito clear that if Italy had intervened L either or both of these ways, that battle could not have been won, and the Allies would have lost the war the outset. It is now an open secre that during the above retreat of his ■ + u„ French general received an non-intervention and was therefore enabled to use every tho : Mar£ Tnd all it implies to the firmness and of that day would probably have sent the armies to fight for the Central Powers. But the public opinion of Italy had to be reckoned with. The Italian people would never have endured the sight of Italian soldiers fighting against the men of Magenta and Solfonno. The memories of 1859 were too sacred to permit such gross ingratitude. In that campaign Italy was reborn a nation; completeness of freedom from the hated “Tedeschi” did not come tor a decade thereafter. Bvit the groat blow had been struck, and the work had been well begun. This was the priceless service of France to the Italian cause. It recalled the exploits of another and greater Napoleon who had united the Italian nation and prepared it for democratic freedom, restoring its self-respect and reviving the traditions of its great past. It was hut a brief gleam of sunshine, but its memory never faded, and when the second Napoleon rolled hack the clouds of Austrian dominion which had obscured it by wicked compacts against national right, the memory shone forth

brighter than ever; shone forth with the virtue of prediction of completeness to ho fulfilled in a brief decade. Britain never helped in tho wholehearted French way. There was much sympathy and a deal of private assistance. But we may doubt whether tho memory of that would have of itself been enough to influence Italian action. But with Solfcrino and Magenta beside, it prevailed.

Consider, moreover, the awful history of Italy of only tho last hundred years. After Waterloo the Austrian despotism descended and worked its wicked will. Freedom of speech vanished, freedom of action was crushed under the military heel, freedom of thought was under tho ban of tho worst censorship tho world has ever seen. Repression at every turn, imprisonment rigorous and frequent, executions punctuating tho brutal Austrian rule. No people ever had such cause for ’ revolt. The pity of their story is that they never won out completely. First they won hack the Milanese, then Venctia fell to them, thanks to tho Austrian defeat by Prussia iu 1866. But Trent and Trieste remain to this clay out of tho fold. It is for the return of the men of their own blood, their own speech, and their own traditions that our brave Allies are fighting. They have Sustained a tremendous campaign of which tho difficulty is due to tho treachery and double dealing of the. enetny. When Austria, was compelled to the last surrender she took care, at the suggestion of Bismarck, who presided over tho transaction, to so arrange the mountain boundaries as to favour the invasion of tho country from the German side. It may well be doubted whether any other people would have made a better campaign in tho face of those great difficulties. One grave misfortune of war they have suffered in consequence, and with the prompt help of their Allies they have recovered from it. They are fighting bravely shoulder to shoulder with our troops. They want comforts for their wounded. The want is sustained by tho memory of tho Marne, the priceless service of the war, the greatest service that one nation ev or did to another. Let us not forget.