TEACHING OF HISTORY

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LX, Issue 18190, 11 September 1933, Page 4

TEACHING OF HISTORY

OBJECTION TO BOOK CAUSES OF GREAT WAR The opinion that a wrong impression of the causes that led directly to the Great War was given in a history book used in primary schools by Standard V. classes and that too much stress was laid upon Germany’s guilt and on "the scrap of paper” incident, was expressed by Mr. R. M. Laing at the annual conference in Wellington of the League of Nations Union. Mr. Laing spoke in favor of a request from Christchurch that a sub-committee ba appointed to consider the question of .the teaching of history. The book that came in for special discussion was “Our Nation's Story,” and the council of the Christchurch branch was appointed a special committee to make a written report on the book and to bring the matter to the notice of the Government. Among the true causes of the war had been Russia’s desire to attain Constantinople and France’s determination to get back Alsace-Lorraine, '' said Mr. Laing. Other speakers agreed that the main aggressor was Russia, but the general agreement of the conference was that although Germany was the last of the Continental Powers to declare war, it did not thereby follow that a large measure of war guilt did not attach to her. The most important fact, however, was that the war had been made inevitable by the race in armaments prior to 1914: