LECTURE ON THE WAR.

Taranaki Herald, Volume LXIII, Issue 144712, 22 June 1915, Page 7

LECTURE ON THE WAR.

SOME INTERESTING POINTS.

In a lecture on the war delivered in London at the end ot April, .Mr. John Buchan, a well-known author, said there had been 'enough unforeseen events in the war to make one chary of forecasts. Still, we now had knowledge to enable us to disentangle some-' thing of ihe strength and weakness of tho different combatants, and to say that it was very difficult for Germany to win. She had completely Jailed in her main purpose, and if this had been an ordinary- war that would have meant that peace was very near. But this war was utterly different from all other wars, except, perhaps, tho struggle with Napoleon. Germany embarked on it with a purpose, in which she must succeed or disappear. The world must be Germanised, or a dangerous lunacy crushed for over. Before peace could come Germany must accept complete defeat, tho utter destruction of her whole racial ideal, and submit to be put in the tightest of leading strings. The Germans wore a proud nation, and would not accept tho position until beaten to the ground. Wo were not fighting, as we were in the case of Napoleon, against a great genius, hut against organised stupidity—the halfbaked, immature conceptions of a people completely lacking for the moment in political imagination and understanding, however great its ability in certain other matters. With genius something might bo done. With stupidity there was nothing but a slow hammering into sense, Wo should have sacrificed before wo had done, several thousands of million pounds and several millions of lives. An inconclusive peace was unthinkable; it would mean that after an interval tho whole thing would start again. At the' beginning of the war Germany had advantages of equipment, position, numbers, and moral; but this was now no longer the case. Having seen a good deal of the new British battalions ho was amazed at their high quality. By our war of attrition wo wore wearing down the German strength till in a few months tho point would be reached when the gaps could not be filled. In addition, all the Allies had new armies which, when the time camo could bo used not to wear down the German line, but to crash through it, GERMAN NEUROTIC TENDENCIES Wo used to imagine the ordinary Teuton as stolid, unemotional, unshakable. In point of fact scarcely any nation suffered so much as tho Germans from nervous ailments. In his own way tho German was as excitable as the Latin, and ho had not the Latin’s saving quality of hardshell worldly wisdom. He was of the stuff of which idealists were made—also neurotics. The Hymn of Hato was not thopoetry of sane men, but the scream of jangled nerves. Such a temper might give courage, but it would not give fortitude. Amid the war the French remained normal, wholesome human bohoings. The professional British soldier was shy of heroics. When he sang it was some music-hall composition or doggerel. He had found that the best receipt for keeping the nerves steady in war was to pretend that tho whole affair was nothing out of tho common. He was nothing if not a sportsman, and ho had none ot tho childish hate of the German. A wounded Scot had said to him: ‘ ‘They were a respectable lot and grand ,feditors.” It was no uso deluding ourselves with the notion that we could settle this struggle by such means as starving Germany out. She would not recognise that she was beaten unless she were decisively beaten in tho field. Incidentally, he said ho did not think the recent activity in FTandors was part of any groat new German offensive. Referring to tho view that wo must not humiliate Germany, _ho insisted that it was our main business to humiliate Germany as she existed today.