“YOUR COUNTRY NEEDS YOU.”

Woodville Examiner, Volume XXVIII, Issue 4627, 14 May 1915, Page 2 (Supplement)

“YOUR COUNTRY NEEDS YOU.”

For centuries British wars have been expeditionary.' Our men have gone abroad to light for this or that, otten for causes in, which the mass of our people took but little interest, and the main current of civil life has gone on, scarcely affected or affected only indirectly by the distant adventure. And so there has grown up in our national mind a feeling that a soldier is a sort of specialist, that war-making and war-settling is a business done lor us by experts, that the ordinary man is free to go on seeking his private ends regardless of those troublesome but interesting disturbances, and that an attitude of detached and rather hostile criticism towards this national business is not simply justifiable but,.on the whole, rather more admirable than enthusiasm. This long-established habit of mind, this specialisation of war, was manifest not only among ordinary civilians, but also at the War Office during the earlier stages of this present struggle. Whenever possible civilian offers of assistance were snubbed and rejected; the would-be volunteer was told to enlist in the Regular Army or run away home and mind his own business, and the vast first wave of patriotic entluu siasm was very successfully damped and destroyed. THE NATION’S WAR. It was to ho an army war -like any other war. With a bigger army. Civil life was to take care of itself in the usual way. It is only very slowly that onr authorities have begun to realise the real magnitude of their task and the impossibility of carrying this war through to its 'end as if it wore the work of a special profession and the privilege of a special caste. But this is no war like any of our other wars. It is a war for the existence of our entire state; it is a war iu which the whole nation must take part; and slowly and reluctantly our rulers adapt themselves to the new conditions. But they do adapt themselves, and under our eyes we can see the Army change its character, and the lax, undisciplined civil life of the community

Every Man’s War Private Profit a Disgrace to Men Who Take it Plain Words on Peace By H. G. AVELLS in the “Illustrated Sunday Herald.”

his nerves while the purveyors of questionable food to our soldiers may aeculate the price of a peerage. Everybody takes up these ideas now as though no one had ever doubted them. You find them in the Tory papers, which would have screamed “Socialist!” at anyone who demanded nobility and self-sacrifice from a business man a year ago. i “PRIVATE PROFIT A DISGRACE.” ! It is only too manifest that attempts I have been made by the employers of : labour in several industries to exploit the stresses and generosities of this time ! of effort to the permanent disadvantage ! of the workers. We see now that it is a 1 thing on all fours with a general stealj ing Ids men’s pay. The full story of the I Clyde employers has still to be told, hut , it is clear that they are practically in , the position of a commander whose incompetent and irritating handling has ; destroyed the discipline nnd spirit of his ' troops. They complain of Trade Union . obstruction. That would once have been | answer enough to make. Now they arc asked : But why did you ever get your , selves at loggerheads with the men it ; was your duty to control and satisfy? That was your primary duty, not to make profits. Belatedly, it would seem, the Government is to thrust these profiteers aside, and the less we hear of compensation, in the circumstances, the better for the j temper of the country. | For when n nation fights as we j are fighting now, every decent man ; in it must realise that, formally or j informally, he, too, is under discip- | line and on his honour. In the I spirit we are all enrolled. Private profit now is a disgrace to everyone • who makes it. It honours a man i as little to come out of this war onj riched as it would to he caught in j Ypves with a score of watches in his i pocket. i It is with an interest that I hone , may never become incredulous that the ! working men will watch the attempt of s the Government to deal with the j wcalihv looter. The new posters must j say ; “ Your country needs you, body, j brains and nroperty.” There is no oxi curse for private prouerty when it hc-