Wairarapa Times-Age THURSDAY, JANUARY 4, 1940. NEW ZEALAND’S VANGUARD.

Wairarapa Times-Age, 4 January 1940, Page 4

Wairarapa Times-Age THURSDAY, JANUARY 4, 1940. NEW ZEALAND’S VANGUARD.

WHATEVER the duration of this war may be and whatever the course it is destined to follow, yesterday wi l be memorable in the history of the Dominion on account of e farewell given in three cities to the officers and meni ol th First Echelon of the Second New Zealand Expedition, it 1 on • Very definitely, though certainly with no heldtlemcnl ol gallant airmen, seamen and others already taking an ; n part in the war, the men of the First Echelon are heir conn ) vanguard—the spearhead of a general muster of the manhood of the Dominion.

For the people of New Zealand there is tragedy in the fact that the vear of their national centennial, which it had been hoped would be one of joyous celebration °P wav to new achievements in peaceful nationhood, has bee instead one in which the Dominion must defend its liberl ips in war. There is bitterness enough m the thought that opening days of our centennial year finds the flower ol our youthful manhood going overseas as an Expeditionary Force, but pride and admiration are awakened, too, in bv the response made by the men who were farewelled xes eiday, and by others who will, shortly be joining them, to the call to defend their country.

Yesterday, in Wellington and in other cities, veterans of the Great War and members of the First Echelon stood lace to face, living witness, extending over a quarter of a century of history, to the fact that the men of a Dominion which always has and'it may be hoped always will desire peace, are capable of responding right valiantly to every demand that war can raise.

To the men. who have responded and are responding now to the call to arms, as to those who answered the call a quarter of a century ago, this country is under a deep debt of gratitude —a debt which may be acknowledged and honoured better in deeds than in words. -In the fact that the returned soldiers of the last war are foremost in wishing the soldiers of today Godspeed, there is perhaps a sufficient answer to the despairing contention that war means only destruction and desolation, it is true that men of our own nation and others fought m the Great War in the belief that they were helping to lay the foundations of a better world order and that these hopes veie disappointed tragically. -But the spirit in which the peoples of liberty-loving nations fought the Great War is not quenched. It is alive today in the hearts of our returned soldiers and in those of the men who were farewelled yesterday.

The hope expressed by the Governor-General that hostilities in this war will not be drawn out, will be eehoed prayerfully throughout New Zealand and in Ihe countries with which it is associated. But there is a grim recognition also that no half-measures will, serve in dealing with what Lord Galway fairly called the gangster Government of Germany and that no other course is open to this country and the rest of the Empire than to defend the liberties which Germany, under her present dictatorship, is intent on. destroying. It must be hoped that the Government and people of this country will live up’to the assurance given yesterday by the Prime Minister (Mr Savage) to lhe men of the First Echelon—an assurance that those who stay at home will do theii pait and that equality of sacrifice is not. going to be an empty phrase. Every citizen of the Dominion has his or her individual responsibility in helping to carry out the promise made by the Prime Minister when he said: — I feel I am speaking for the nation, for the citizens of the Dominion, when I promise the men assembled here today that we are not going to let them down. We are going to see to it that when they return, as we hope they will, we will already have piepared places for them, so that they will be able to take a leal pail in the country they have made sacrifices to defend. That binding promise may 7 best be kept by bringing to bear on our national problems, whether of war organisation or of peaceful development, the spirit of loyal service and ol sacrifice for the common good by which our volunteer soldiers have shown and are showing themselves to be animated.