Letters to the Editor

Hawke's Bay Herald-Tribune, Issue 210, 21 September 1937, Page 3

Letters to the Editor

. "AGFR".

Germany and Colonies Sir, — It has ofteu been noticed that the psychological effect of contihually making a false statement is that the person making it not only himself comes to beheve it to be true, but many of his less discriminating hearers also do so. This is evidently what is now happening as a result of Germany' s reiterated claims to colonies as sources oi raw material necessary for her welfare. for in Friday's Herald-Tribune, we read of Mr C. T. te Water expressing his belief that South Africa would be willing .to participate in a conference to examine Germany's claim for colonies. It has lnore than once been pointed out in the Horald-Tribune, that as sources of raw materials, v«erxna!ny's pre-war colonies were of. very littD value to lier, and would be no greater at the present >time even if returned to her.

However, the writer does not desire to touch on that aspect of the matter, bnt once again to emphasize the fact, that the question of returning Germany her colonies, is not one of politics but it is a question of ethics. Have we any moral right to witbdraw our protection from the native races in those colonies who have been committed to our care, merely becanse by retaining them we are supposed to be running the risk -of another war? Could a peace obtained by such a hetrayal of our trust, be a lasting one ? Would not such a course be a most dishonourable display of weakness if nothing worse? Have we forgotten that the reai test of the worth of a nation, as of an individual, is its" capacity for accepting perilous responsibilities, and that hitlierto the Britishi Empire has triumphantly endured this test ■ _ A nation should be judged by its history, and that of modern Germany is the history of its most dominant state which is Prussia, the most truculent, the most militarist and the most unscrupulous of them all. Hitler's Germany is to-day -what France was under Napoleon, "a military despotism -as fatal to liberty within its own borders as it was hostile to peace everywhero else." Germany's colonial reoord is a black one. Dr A. 0. Butcher has told us that "in a period of only three years slie had reduced the native population of South West- Africa. from 200,000 to 82,000." and he adds, "nothing could justify handing the natives • back to such a fate." Let those who tliink peace is worth preserving by restoring Germanv her lost possessions, ponder that fact and tliink again. Contrast that bloodstained record witlx the increase of Fgypt's population. Under British administration it rose from about 8,000,000 to double- that number. Think also of the Sudan being almost depopulated by the Mhadi,' and now restored to 7,000,000 at the present timo. No other nation, except perhaps the Netherlands, has ever shown ' any real sense of responsibility for the welfare of the natives in her colonies, and it is doubtful jf even the D'ltch would have found £20,000,000 to buy the freedom of its slaves, as did England when she bought them from the planters in the West Indies and set them at liberty, Let ns stand fast by our possessions ; arm adequately; refuse to be intimidatedj and if it does come to the arbitranient of war, we shall smash the despotism of Messrs Hitler and Mussolini as our forefatbers did that of Napoleon and Louis XIV, and as we did the late Kaiser's attempt. - "Come the three eorners of the world in arms. And we shall shock them. Nought shall make Us rue, If Eugland to itself do rest but true." Yours, etc.,

Waipawa, H.B., Sept. 18, 1937.