THE EUROPEAN CRISIS

Press, Volume LXXIV, Issue 22515, 24 September 1938, Page 24

THE EUROPEAN CRISIS

TO THR EDITOR OF IHE PHES"*. Sir,—This morning, one of my clients asked me, apropos of nothing in par-' ticular, ‘‘Aren’t you proud to be British?” Having read my paper, I gave him a negative assurance. I wonder if one-tenth of your readers realise what we are heading for as the result of the Anglo-French (mainly Anglo), climb-down in respect of Czechoslovakia? We—“the people who fought to make the world safe for democracy”—guaranteed the integrity of the States partitioned, rightly or wrongly., at Versailles: we still have a -profound'and sincere interest in maintaining the principles of democracy, notwithstanding the many chinks - in their■ armour: we have an inherited aversion 'to every form of dictatorship and regimentation, and we have a sincere desire for any measures that will preserve world peace, even if, in preserving that ideal,- we resort to arms. Any man in the street, in Britain, Canada, Australia, or New Zealand, would subscribe to these guarantees, endorse these principles, and express these desires: and the man in the street has been let down. Whether due to unpreparedness or the inertia of senility, the leaders of the erstwhile leading world-power have renounced every guarantee, every principle, and every legitimate interest, in bowing, the knee to a power-mad megalomaniac who is far more dangerous to the modern democracies than any Kaiser. Hitler’s confessed aims are Austria (already in the net), Czechoslovakia, Rumania, and the Ukraine. Unopposed, he will achieve these aims, and the resources that go with this achievement. Then, when it is too late, and the Reich is a firmly welded and enormously powerful engine of destruction, the British Empire will suffer the fate of effete peoples and negative policies. We are afflicted with rulers who content themselves with the easy way and present'respite; we need a Disraeli or a Palmerston to maintain, notwithstanding their personal views, the eternal principles that forged their Empire. To-day. there is time to main-,

tain those principles; in one decade, the goose-step. I wonder if there is time, and I wonder if we have the courage?— Yours, etc., NUMANA. September 22, 1938. TO THB BDITOB OT THB PBESS. Sir,—What an Empire! We, as Britishers, hava failed to fight Italy and save Abyssinia. We have not lifted a finger to stop the Japanese rape of China. We have ignominiously betrayed Czechoslovakia. In the light of presentday criticism. Great Britain is the butt for every pen. Our American cousins, whose paramount commercial interests in China and the Japanese bombing of their gunboats failed to stir, criticise us because Britain or somebody else has not pulled their chestnuts out of the fire. There are some Americans who would have us defend the Philippines against the Japanese, while they skim the cream off the trade. In not becoming the world’s policeman, gladiator, bully, or whatever it is our neighbours desire us to be, we have truly proved our decadence. — Yours, etc., DISILLUSIONED. September 23, IC3B.