ADDRESS BY MR E. BAUME

Te Awamutu Courier, Volume 81, Issue 7273, 6 November 1950, Page 4

ADDRESS BY MR E. BAUME

NEW ZEALANDERS INDICTED “MUST SHED COMLACENCY” One of the most hard-hitting and impressive addresses on world affairs given to members of the Cambridge Rotary Club in its few years of existence was that from Mr. Eric Baume, the noted novelist, war correspondent and editor of several Australian newspapers, at the weekly meeting of the club. Mr. Baume was revisiting New Zealand after an absence of 31 years. Most people are conversant with Mr. Baume’s war service and of his peculiar qualifications to speak on the present-day .serious situation as applied to world affairs. He charged New Zealanders with being far too complacent as regards their responsibility as a unit of the Commonwealth and particularly as one of the democratic world. He warned that the days were gone when we could claim safety .through isolation. So changed were the conditions of the world to-day and so determined and callous were the opponents of the Christian peoples that a couple of million people did not matter at all in their sphere of things remarked Mr. Baume. He went on to remind hi.s audience that the people of other countries were little different in their minds to us. In their hearts they had somewhat similar ideals and ambitions; their skies were no different to ours, neither were their homes and their buildings; but over the long years of two world wars there had been driven into many of the people a fear complex. One could readily appreciate all this after visiting their countries; of recognising that in two wars many of them had been bombed, murdered; their homes and all they held dear destroyed; living under conditions when each feared even the other’s neighbour. Was it any wonder that these people to-day were without hope and were ready material for the opponents of our way of civilisation? The speaker went on to express the view that we can go on living all our lives in a “hot” or “cold” war with Russia; but the fact needed to be more generally and more vigorously recognised that the Communists are pledged in a “cold” war to break down all our ideals of Christian civilisation. Mr. Baume .said New Zealanders had no right to regard their past immunity from most of the horrors of two world wars as some God-given privilege which had been denied the people of Europe or elsewhere. He went on to relate his own experiences of association with many of the people of Europe; of many splendid people of the Low Countries of Europe and how they had been left without hope; with lesions deep into their souls. Because of their brutal experiences under Hitler’s regime, perhaps one could understand their fear for the future.

The opinion was voiced by the speaker that in 1939-40 the British Commonwealth was better prepared to fight Nazism than they are to-day to oppose Russia and her Communistic followers. On the other hand the Soviet was a far greater military power to-day than when she opposed Hitler. With the exception of atomic weapons Russia had everything that the United Nations had to-day and it was his considered view that Russia had sufficient military strength at present to break through to the Atlantic Coast. She also has submarines carrying rocket-firing guns.

“Don’t think for a moment I am a warmonger,” said Mr. Baume, “but I am trying to give a picture of the situation in Europe as I saw it.” It must be realised that to-day Auckland is as near to the seat of world troubles a.s Australia or London. There is no more hope in isolation for it doesn’t exist to-day. Mr. Baume expressed the opinion that it was high time New Zealanders stepped out of their general complacency and also toned down some of their arrogance towards other people, especially towards the United States of America. It was not fair to expect the United States troops to do all the dirty work in Korea and ju.st because they were two or three years late for the first two world wars, was no reason for us to be late for the next. It was time we stopped believing in miracles in wars, such as were claimed at Mons, at Gallipoli and with Hitler and the Channel crossing. It was well to remember that in Europe to-day there is a channel even more narrow than the English one and well to realise that we are just as much bound up with affairs in Europe as anywhere else. The preservation of Western Europe, of the Western world, with its Christian faith, was dependent upon the preparedness of the United Nations and New Zealand was required to do her part. New Zealanders had got to realise that isolation was no longer, that we can no longer rely upon being sheltered by Britain. The experiences in Korea and further south should surely be sufficient warning and yet such was our complacency that the New Zealand Navy was finding it difficult to fill its required strength. “The time has ended for anything in nature of commercial or other suspicions of Australia. Our whole parochial attitude should change for New Zealand and Australians are bound up with the future of the Pacific and with the progress of affairs in Asia. In the matter of defence our link is no longer with Britain, but with the United States, Canada and Australia. The best way for us to help Britain is for Australia and New Zealand to become as strong in their own defence as possible. If we had been stronger in the last war we might have saved Britain some of her suffering. No Room for Complacency

“There is no room to-day for complacency,” said Mr. Baume. “In the United States there has been a resurgence in the direction of preparedness to meet any danger of the future. It was stronger than he had noticed in Australia since his return from overseas, but to-day there were many signs that the Australians had war brought home to them with the bombing of the Northern territory by the Japanese. The United States is determined that our way of life must continue and we must be with them,” he said. The speaker went on to emphasise that we must prepare; that we must be prepared to see to and meet the costs of our own defence. In Australia and New Zealand some of

the luxuries we have been used to must go. In Australia there was a tightening up in the matter of military policy and even with conscription, "and the speaker reminded his audience that the Australians liked conscription of anything as much a.s they liked Hell; but it would have to be done if we were to keep the countries we live in.

In concluding, Mr. Baume said: “We have a heritage in being British and we should speak of it in no terms of false pride. It is based on British justice and remembering this we have a responsibility to prove ourselves in our capacity for duty to preserve the heritage we have so long enjoyed and for the untold generations to come.” (Applau.se).