WORLD CRISIS

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LXIII, Issue 18975, 27 March 1936, Page 2

WORLD CRISIS

DRIFTING TOWARDS WAR LEAGUE ONION SPEAKERS ETHICS AND ECONOMICS V latge. attendance was registered last evening at a meeting convened by the League of Nations Union and the Gisbome branch of the New Zealand Labour Party conjointly, for the discussion of the current crisis in international affairs, 'three speakers for the League of Nations Union discussed various aspects o the crisis, and later there was a general discussion, in the corns,- of which it was claimed that the moving spirit, of the J eaglie of Nations was identical With that on which the Labour Party is founded. Mr. E. Harris presided over the gathering. v The first speaker was Canon A. J • Hall, who expressed appreciation of the Labour party's action in arranging) tor the exposition of the League of Nations i:„i„ns view.. Canoh Hall said that there seemed to him a very real connection between the Labour Party and the League of Nations, because both knew definitely what they were aiming at, and their tjoals were obviously not far apart Superficial things occupied too much o the world's time, he considered, and indeed filled the horizon of a large proportion of humanity. WAR CONTRARY TO COD'S WILL Belie vim; that the shoemaker should stick to' his last, Canon Hall continued, he would deal with the present crisis us it appealed to him as a clergyman. War seemed imminent, and war was contrary to the will of Cod, who had ,„ a de one blood of all nations of men, so that they might live together in brotherhood. Believing in the Fatherhood of Cod and the brotherhood of man, the equal value of every soul in God s eyes, they could not condone war. the League of Nations was an expression of men's will that Cod's will he done, that war and slavery should cease, and that nations should live together without strife The speaker concluded by slating thai Ihe Labour Party and the League of .Nations were at one in their deepest convictions. The economic aspects of war were dealt with by the Rev. H. Daniel, who pointed out that the League of Natrons was'the one refuge in a world which appeared to have gone insane. The loss of 10.000,000 lives in the Great vVar and the'ruination of millions more had not taugbt the world a lasting lesson; the indications to-dav were more ominous than they had been prior to the last great conflict. '..; BARRIERS TO TRADE

International barriers to trade and the free movement of goods were among the influences which were leading to a danger of war. These trade barriers had arisen out of nationalism, promoted by the. Great War, said Mr. Daniel, and though no one wanted war, the building up-ot preparations for war must eventually lead to an outbreak, unless the world took a turn back towards sanity. Conscientious objectors to war had numbered 2500 in the Empire between 1911 and 1918. but to-day there would be that many in New Zealand alone. The League was the only body, it seemed, that could exercise any restraining influence upon militancy in the nations, and through the channel of eco- | nornie amelioration, he felt, the world could be brought back to safety. ''.We are again drifting; .towards war. The Disarmament Co'raerSnce lias faded away and after years ojf unilateral disarmament we are rearming. Our cable hews tells us of proposals to spend from two to three hundred millions on rearmament and that is probably far too little if we want to keep even .With (Ifiuianv," said Mr. Todd. '•But "even if we build as many aeroplanes as-we can afford and Germany as many as she tan pay for, how will that protect us? It will only bring war nearer. At the end of the last war we realised that the [ire-war competition in armaments bad made war inevitable and in the Versailles Treaty we admitted that peace was impossible, without disarmament. Why re-arm then? "We are told that for years we have been starving the defence forces and that now we really must make good the deficiencies. Were"we wrong to disarm? Most certainly one-sided disarmament is childish folly. It is not safe. Look at China and Abyssinia and remember last December and" the scare we had about what the Italians might do to Malta or even to our fleet in the Mediterranean. Who then was to blame? We maintained that disarmament all round would give us all security. The French, ever since the war, have said: 'No. Give us security first; give the League strength enough to protect the innocent victim of aggression and we'll disarm to the last carbine.' " THE LEAGUE'S POWERS "Accordingly, in 1924, an attempt. was made. In that year the assembly agreed to the Geneva protocol which was to strengthen the League by closing the loop-holes in the covenant, but in March, 1925. Sir Austen Chamberlain, at Geneva, declared against the protocol and maintained that the League must rely on moral force and for the. next 10 years the policy of the British Government was that, outside of Locarno, we would take no part in sanctions. We are now re-armiiig. We explain that by blaming the others for not following our lead, but would our position bo better to-day if France had followed our example and German re-armament had caught us all napping? "The French were right. Moral force is not enough. The League needs more than that if it, is to protect us all against aggression. Events have proved that we were wrong. What then would be the logical and sensible thing to do now? Why, to admit that we have been wrong, re-establish the Covenant of tlie League, especially Article XVI, and make a fresh start.' There is some hope that that is exactly what we are doing. •Collective .security on a precise, effective basis is exactly what France has been demanding ever since the war and what we have been persistently evading. As Sir Austen Chamberlain said in 1925, •It has been our practice lo eschew these large declarations of general principle, to avoid attempting to define exactly what should be done and how it should be done in every possiblecontingency. . . .' That is bur policy in a nutshell, and that has been one of the great causes of the failure of the League. France has always insisted on and Will bo content with nothing less than a definite and binding guarantee from us. U!FFKUE'NOESJ IN TREATMENT "The Covenant of the League was originally definite and precise on most points. ' We watered it down till it -night mean, much or little, just as we decided when the time came. Look at the differences in the treatment of Japan, Italy and Germany. No wonder Italy complained of two weights and two measures, and asked why wo had not treated Japan as we were treating her. If this proposed conference is to have any result at all, it must produce a definite binding agreement. We will be bound to a considerable measure of disarmament and to prompt and effec-

live action against, any aggressor. We won't like ii, but our choice a between that and an armaments race.

"Looking back, we cnn see thai France didi not and could not trust the League to protect her. Consequently she Ini'ill. up her armaments and endeavoured to keep Germany down una out. Tlie natural result was tliat the Hitler Government and the re-armament "1 Germany, which is forcing us to reconsider the whole position. In fact, wo now propose to hold a pence conference to prevent the next war. instead of at the end of it. an exceedingly sensible proposal. But the choice before us is grim and hard. We must cither strengthen the League or prepare for war." At the close of Mr. Todd's address, the chairman expressed the thanks of the meeting to the three speakers, and remarked that the Labour Party stood for economic security and international brotherhood, and supported the League of Nations as an institution designed to bring about those ideals. War was not waged by tho'people of one country against the people of another. Mr. Harris added. When war came it was not by tho wish of the people. Several questions were put to the speakers, and a general discussion was followed bv a vote of thanks to Canon Hall, the Rev. H. Daniel, and Mr. Todd, , the motion being carried by acclamation.