WAR IN EUROPE.

Waikato Independent, Volume XXXIII, Issue 3046, 31 August 1933, Page 2

WAR IN EUROPE.

“NOT FOR MANY YEARS.” General Sir Archibald MontgomeryMassingberd, Chief of the Imperial General Staff, replied to critics of the War Office when he presided at the annual Haldane Memorial lecture at Birkbeck College. “Our critics are fond of telling us,” he is reported by the Morning Post as saying, “that we ought to organise the army for a big war in Europe. But I would venture to say that a big war in Eux*ope is not likely to be fought by our army for many years. “What we are responsible for is the policing of the British Empire. That is a big enough task in itself. Any ideal of turning the whole of the army into a large mechanised force is not practical politics. We have to hold infantry and cavalry scattered all over the world, in countries where mechanised forces would be unsuitable. “We could not have a big army for Europe unless we had two separate armies—one for the Empire and the other for Europe. It would be a dangerous policy,” he concluded, “to concentrate only on a big army for a war on the Continent.”