NEWSPAPER OPINION.

Colonist, Volume LI, Issue 12502, 1 April 1909, Page 3

NEWSPAPER OPINION.

THE PREMIER ASTRAY ONDE- ; v • FENCE; AUSTRALIA'S REAL DUTY; Sydney, March 31. The " Sydney Morning Herald " declares that Mr Fisher is entirely astray on the naval defence question. He merely commits Australia to enormous expense in construction and maintenance without' even gaining local immunity. At the same timo he fails most shamefully to play a part in the Empire defence events which so loudly call upon Australia to undertake. The paper adds that Mr Fisher had strongly misread the signs of. the times if he thought that now was the appropriate time to appeal to purely local patriotism. His plain duty was to stand by tho Empire, and he must be left under no illusion that he was helping the Empire with a destroyer, fleet. The "Telegraph" points out that destroyers -would be useless unless attached to a doep sea squadron, and says: <c Our deep interest and,manifest duty is to strengthen the fleet, which, while it holds the seas, makes invasion impossible. . _ Any defence scheme ignoring that is a fraudulent delusion, and it is just there where the incurably weak points in Mr Fisher's policy protrudes.- --■