GERMANY’S MISTAKE

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 83, Issue 290, 8 December 1939, Page 7

GERMANY’S MISTAKE

BRITISH EMPIRE ATTITUDE TO WAR [ British Official Wireless | RUGBY, Dec. 6. German miscalculations of the Commonwealth attitude to war are the subject of comment by the Manchester Guardian. After signing the Statute of Westminster in 1931, under which in all hut common allegiance to the Crown the Dominions were separate peoples, it was supposed, says the Guardiap, that “it needed only a situation in which on an issue vital to the Commonwealth the King was given conflicting advice in different Dominions for the whole illogical system to fall to bits. That the situation, it was, moreover, asserted, would arise as soon as Britain with her European entanglements became involved in a war in which her sister nations could disinterest themselves. “Canada would naturally embrace the neutrality of her great neighbour. Australia, with her eye on lhe Pacific, would make no effort that lessened her capacity to deal with her own problems. South Africa, with her own difficulties of race and colour, would withhold her aid. “At best it would be a peaceful parting. At the woxxt, as conjured by the wishful thinking of Nazi prophecy, revolt would be rife from the Indian Ocean to the Irish shores and our hands would be crippled by the need for dealing with our own disorders. To Restore Freedom “In the upshot the full freedom of the Dominions themselves has proved the surest guarantee of their comradeship in the fight to restore freedom. In nothing has the German calculation been more signally stultified than in the belief that the nations of the British Commonwealth, which more perhaps than any peoples hold free institutions dear, would be moved by selfishness to apathy if the challenge to freedom had to be met in arms. “The sum total of the answer to that challenge is not yet to be measured but several wise and concerted steps have been taken.” Meeting in London The Guardian says that the speedy meeting in London of the Commonwealth representatives made it possible to envisage the part each can play, and reviewing the contribution of the Dominions it notes that victory will not come from mere concentration of power. While assuring the heartiest welcome to Canadian and Australian troops who before long will join the Western Front, the Guardian emphasises the importance of the Dominions’ agricultural products and mineral wealth and says that the selection of Canada as an air training ground with an estimated alternate capacity for training 25,000 men annually may prove a decisive factor in the war. The full value of the Dominions’ help will be felt only with lhe passage of time, but it is better organised now than in 1914.