LEAVE FOR DEFAULTERS

Otago Daily Times, Issue 25136, 29 January 1943, Page 4

LEAVE FOR DEFAULTERS

Sir, Your correspondent “Tolerance ” says he doubts if I saw much service in the last war. My letter of January 23 should convince him that he is very much mistaken. I may say that I would not have had the nerve to discuss this subject through your columns if I did not feel sure I were treading on firm ground. By this I mean I would neither condemn nor defepd a defaulter had I not served my country overseas, and once “T°] eranc €” has had his baptism of shell-fire and dive-bombing I am certain he will change his opinion as regards favours for these persons. The letter written by “First Echelon” should also convince him in the same ;direction. Until such time as “Tolerance ” has served his country overseas I do not think he has the justification for stating that men of the 2nd N. would seem to share the opinions adopted by myself. Now, I would like to answer the question put to me by your correspondent “Adelphos.” He asks me whatever do I mean by "loyalty.” I had a shrewd suspicion that he did :not know what the word meant. Otherwise he would not be writing in defence of the defaulter, for I would defy anyone to say that a person who refuses to fight for his country, mother, sisters, or wife is a loyal subject. “Adelphos ” thinks it is quite in order to have two different laws, one for the loyal man and another for the “conchie.” May I be permitted to ask where we would all be today if the brave men and boys who have been overseas fighting for us had decided to adopt a new and hurried so-called religious faith and became defaulters. Let me remind “Adelphos ” that if we had men running the affairs of this country who had served their country when they - had the opportunity during the last war we would not have such a large army of defaulters to-day. “Adelphos” goes on to state that I lack that fine quality of tolerance which is one object for which we are fighting to-day. What balderdash! We in New Zealand are not fighting; we are only looking on, for who can deny that it is the men overseas who are fighting? And those of us who are here to-day and should be overseas are purely and simply shirking, or, in plain language, we are defaulters. In conclusion, I must say that when I refer to a returned man I mean a man who has actually returned from the desert or “ blue,” and has had actual experience of- what war really means, and I do not mean a “ base wallah,” whom I guess is the type of returned man that has contacted “Adelphos,” for I would say without the slightest hesitation that not one man in a hundred who has been in “ the dinkum stuff ” would come back home and side with a “ conchie.”—l am, etc., Ist N.Z.E.F. Dunedin, January 27. (.This correspondence is closed—Ed. O.