The Guardian And Evening Star, with Which is incorporated the West Coast Times. WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 12, 1927. CATCHING THEM'YOUNG.

Hokitika Guardian, 12 October 1927, Page 2

The Guardian And Evening Star, with Which is incorporated the West Coast Times. WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 12, 1927. CATCHING THEM'YOUNG.

The propaganda work of the Bolshevik organisation would be hard to - eel Three months ago six children the sons and daughters of British workers—were sent to Russia by the British Communist party “to study the conditions of children under the rule of the Soviet.” They have now returned and have expressed their views on the state of Russia through the medium of the public press. Clifford Roberts, aged 12, records his admiration for the Soviet schools, where “no canes were used.” Billy Baker, also of tender years, remarks that in England children are taught “history about dead kings,” while in Russia they are taught “working-class history,” with the addition of the interesting fact they “they are descended from monkeys.” But the most striking contribution to tliis curious symposium is the conviction of Norman Patou, aged 12, that “a revolution is the only hope for this world” Of course, if this sort of thing were not so preposterously absurd, it would be, says a northern writer, pitiably tragic. No sane human being can believe that half-a-dozen children, 12 years of age, in a foreign country, could ever see anything but what they were intended to see or understand, or think anything but what their guides and friends wished them to believe. And yet their opinions on the problems of the age are trumpeted to tlie world at large in the interests of Communist propaganda. Poor little marionettes I—with1—with the Bolsheviks standing so plainly in the background behind them, pulling the strings. Yet while it is easy to laugh at the grotesque crudity of Bolshevik methods, there is unfortunately no doubt that they produce some effect, if only through the sheer unscrupulousness and the tireless persistency of these heralds of revolution. During tins current month the tenth anniversary of the foundation of the Bolshevik State is to be celebrated not only in Russia, but throughout the world. “Large sums of money,” we are told, “have been allotted to agitations and demonstrations abroad,” especially in Asia and America. Travelling exhibitions are to visit Angora and Tokyo and Teheran. Chicago and New York, and the chief European cities, and “experienced agitators” are to expound Bolshevism at all these centres. And with what object? To preach the gospel of the class war and to intil into the mind of the masses the most demoralising and degrading doctrines ever yet converted into a religious faith —the duty of hating and, if necessary, robbing and murdering one’s richer neighbours, and the obligation to overthrow everything in the way of civilisation and culture that the world has yet produced or devised. Unfortunately, it seems that a great many people in responsible positions in various countries have so far failed to realise the true nature of this menace and the urgent need for combating it. In France, however, M. Millerand, an ex-Presi-

dent of the Republic, and in his earlier days sympathetic towards Socialism, has hotly denounced the Bolsheviks as the enemies not only of his country, but of the civilised world. At the same time M. Hanotaux, once French Minister of Foreign Affairs, lias publicly asserted that unless the Powers take action quickly against Bolshevism “civilisation is threatened in its moral foundations.” Even more emphatically, 51. Fullop-Miller, in a recent study of Bolshevism, declaims against it as a “debasing of infinite truth,” and charges it with attempting tlie destruction of human freedom, the degradation of man to the level of a machine, and “the eradication of the smd” But will the world be warned in time?