The Southland Times. PUBLISHED EVERY MORNING. Luceo Non Uro. TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 22, 1916. REPRISALS.

Southland Times, Issue 17663, 22 February 1916, Page 4

The Southland Times. PUBLISHED EVERY MORNING. Luceo Non Uro. TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 22, 1916. REPRISALS.

The war has produced many difficult problems jn ethics, and one of the most difficult is that involved in the question of reprisals. Almost unanimously the English Bishops have declared against the proposal that the British aid service should make reprisals against the enemy for the Zeppelin raids. The matter has been hotly debated, but it appears to us that it is a matter of plain commonsense. We may presume, though it is a large concession to the enemy, that when the Zeppelins appear over England they aim their bombs at some mark of military significance. They may believe Unit their target is an arsenal, or a dock, or the wharves of a port, or a munitions factory, or some other object v/hich is part of the great organisation with which Britain is carrying on the war, aud therefore a fair mark for shell and bombs. But even if it is their intention to attain results of purely military importance, experience has shown that Zeppelin commanders have but a very hazy notion of their whereabouts, aud that their bombs chiefly destroy civilian property and the lives of non-com-batants, and cause damage that is of no military significance. Even if we give the enemy the benefit of the

doubt so far as Zeppelins are concerned, there can be no question whatever, but that the sacrifice of life and the destruction of property caused by the cruiser raids on the East Coast of England were deliberate and wanton. The enemy’s cruisers opened fire upon Scarborough and other seaside places knowing that no military end would be served and that civilians would certainly be killed. When it is suggested that for every such act the Allies’ aerial service should inflict substantial penalties ,;by an organised raid upon some selected German town, the objection is raised that it is of no advantage to an English woman who has been killed to kill a German woman. The answer to that objection, however, is that it is not merely revenge that is sought. The civilians who are killed in the Zeppelin raids are gone past recall and nothing can be done for them. But can something not be done to protect civilians who are still alive, but who may loose their lives if the Zeppelin raids are repeated? How far would reprisals act as a deterrent? That is the real question, and it appears to us that in so far as reprisals in any form are a measure of protection for the community they are amply justified. Apart from the question whether the Allies are entitled to fight the enemy with his own weapons, they are certainly entitled to take all possible measures for the safety of their non-combatants. The enemy has used his Zeppelins and his submarines not only for purely military purposes, but for the general purpose of making war “frightful" to the nations opposed to him. If this “frightfulness” continues hundreds of innocent and helpless people will suffer severely. The Allies have the means of protecting them in their air squadrons. Every time the Zeppelins raid England the Allies’ airmen can make an expedition into the interior of Germany, and if these air reprisals are carried out on a sufficiently large scale and made sufficiently destructive the enemy will probably ask himself whether his game is worth his candle. Reprisals have a recognised place in Germany’s military code, and there is no reason why we should be mealymouthed in such matters. Apart from that aspect, however, there is a logical defence for reprisals, and if it is within their power to make reprisals we doubt very much whether the military authorities of Britain and France will be defected from their course by the verdict of a whole bench of Bishops.