DISARMAMENT & AFTER

Hawke's Bay Herald-Tribune, Volume 81, Issue 4, 28 September 1937, Page 14

DISARMAMENT & AFTER

Geneva Regarded as a Joke ITALIANS DERIDE BRITAIN After having toured in Europe and Britain, where he met a number of lcading men, a Wellington resident expresses the opinion in a letter to a friend in Wellington' that disarmament by Britain was a big mistake. He . contends that Britain rnust re-arm, and that until she does and is fully equipped and prepared, she cannot and will not have the same , power aud authority in international affairs enjoyed by her previously. "I am now absolutely convineed/' Ihe Wellingtonian writes, "that the policy of disarmament is hopelessly wrong. England must re-arm or we will be wiped out, The Italians aad the Japanese have been, and are still, deriding us, and it will take two years before we can safely open our mouths. Geneva to-day is a joke, and will remain a joke until England re-arms. Thcn England can act and then Geneva will be merely an ornament. At present it provides splendid jobs for bureaucrats. Of course, if you thought aloud and said so you would raise a hornets' nest. "Japan is attacking China now because she is no longer afraid of Russia. Stalin's purge, which consists of murdering all army oflficials and officers of ability, has paralysed the Kussian army. Every eflB.cient officer is dead — and many had sprung up even under Bolshevism — so Japan thinka that now is the time to strike, and all Britain can do is to protfist politcly. "The Labour Party is quite riglit Britain ought to enforce its poliey by war, but sbe is disamod and lielpless and the Labour Party '» policy has brought this state of affairs to pass. "If the British Navy did not protect the Mediterranean by its presence our ships would not bfi allowed by the Italians to pass through. This is known to every politieian in the British Empijre, but any politieian who said it in New Zealand would, commit political , tauk-l&b'1