Hokitika Guardian & Evening Star TUESDAY,FEBRUARY 17, 1920. THE BOLSHEVIK MENACE.

Hokitika Guardian, 17 February 1920, Page 2

Hokitika Guardian & Evening Star TUESDAY,FEBRUARY 17, 1920. THE BOLSHEVIK MENACE.

Apart from Mr Winston Churchill’s warning the average reader can glean much from the daily cable new s as to the Bolshevik menace to Europe, and afterwards to other continents. The details of the Odessa flight suggest what a rabble the anti-Bolsheviks have developed into, The blame for this lies with those who began but failed to continue support in the field. There is, however, a ray of hope in the outlook on the Polish frontier where the Poles, much inferior in numbers are preparing to meet the ravaging foe, But on top of this is the report of the secret conference financed by the Russian Soviet money, and there is the suggestion that, Germany at no distant time, pwing to tbe luiyden of the after war conditions, may fall a victim to Bolshevism also. The menace is so vast and so overshadowing in Europe that it is now a super-human tas]t to attempt to stem the onrush, The Allies puce find it in their power fo crush Bolshevism in Russia and restore the country to safe and sound government, hiit that chance was missed pwijig to the clamour of the pcace-at-any-price people, 4 For that U’eakpess the world will pay in much bloodshed misery and disaster. Had the Allies held on then way to Petrograd and established them. seii'ps there the Odessa horror and many another black page of history would not have h«en added to the awful story of the war's, aftermath- As a result of the menace Turkey must be handled very circumspectly in the pence arrangements. To secure the Near Fast it is conceivable that it will he necessary even to prop . I'p Turkey and utilise its territory as a barrier to the purther progress of Bolshevism in that region. Certainly very little by way of penalty for the offends during the war can lie extracted from Turkey for it too is a ruined country in common with the other enemy territories drown into the war. The disaster of the war grows more and more appalling and the only consolation is that victory saved the world from a worse disaster; for had the tables been turned probably the defeated countries would have been reduced to a state of serfdom worse than even Bolshevism entails and enforced with a rigor amt a vigor also in advance of that loose form of overmastering. Having escaped from iso dire a: disaster there is at least something to be thankful for and the Allies should have Hie courage to tackle the fresh problem with a vigor no less determined than that which animated them in the great war. Issues no less Important are at stake and the organised forces for right and liberty should be used now as before to establish a reign of sanity and reason in the place of the disrule and worse which Bolshevism carries in its train.