DETESTS WAR

Hokitika Guardian, 16 April 1932, Page 6

DETESTS WAR

SIR lAN HAMILTON. CONFESSION OF GREAT SOLDIER Why do I, who have spent so much of my life as a professional soldier, detest war? What are the things that have made me hate it? These are questions I have asked myself on the eve of the Disarmament Conference.

L can imagine what most people expect me to reply. They naturally imagine that my pen would dwell on th e tragical battlefield panoramas I have seen, the snapshots oi the filth and misery of daily lile in dugouts and trenches—the sort of grim pictures that gave “All Quiet on the Western Front” its fascination or horror. Only my pictures would be on a vaster scale and observed from G.H.Q. instead of from a trench. Well, in some aw,vs, lam none too badly equipped for such a task. Ah' mind is only too well stocked with terrifying phantoms. .Hut the honest truth is 1 simply dare not revive them. 1 dare not mingle those terrible scenes of the past with the living realities of the present— the crowded streets of London with, say, the vision of a solid wall of dead I urks a l' ne stretching from Buckingham Pahide to Whitehall—mown down in the pride of their assault. Could f only fill the nostrils of the warmongers with that loathsome stench and blast their eves with all those grimacing corpses—that would put fear of death into the lot of them for some time to come. But, no! 1 have buried these awful memories deep down in my o "’' mind where they are prevented from festering by being thickly sprinkled over with recollections of friendships and loyalties which hdd through thick and thin,

Old Soldiers Try to Forget. Therefore, to represent war with a hell as its unalleviated background is beyond my power, for it. would not be true to facts as they represent themselves. Besides, is this sort of propaganda that consists of telling half the truth so that it shall get across to the world as the whole truth, really of any lasting value? 1 have my doubts. Old soldiers, in any case, tend to forget the sorrows of war and to remember its heroisms. Their inevitable tendency is to give their friends an extra dose of adventure and glory when they relate their own experiences.

Thus we find, always, a new generation growing up which begins to think that it would rather like a little of the excitement of these adventures for itself. Too much insistence on the horrors of the battlefield can breed in couple of > „dgofyjes. s gp,.atmosphere favourable to war.

In no other way can we explain the planning of future grand campaigns which is now coing on among all tho General Staffs in the world. I firmly believe the schoolboys of Great Britain are already in ected by the perilous virus. Hardly one in a hundred would willingly go ten yards to be preached to about peace, whereas they are to he seen following with rapture the description of a picture of a baronet charge.

Therefore, l say that to paint war with an unalleviated background of horror is not only beyond my power, hut also that it has hitherto notably failed as a method of scotching the war spirit. The more we pile on the danger and agony of those who fought, the more the normal young Englishman becomes fascinated. Only by exhibiting to him |lie many living proofs of ihe miserable results of all these highly coloured and resounding fonts of arms—only by showing him the human wreckage, the maimed, the blind, the broken in mind as well as in body—can we hope to bring home to him the stark truth about war in a way that he will not easily forget. As for me, I make it my constant duty to beg the British Legion, for their children's sakes. to treat thenwar memories as a heaven-sent warning, and to cling to them as closely as they can. T do not wish them to celebrate anniversaries of resounding victories, been use flag waving over an enemy’s defeat must carry with it a sting to the self-esteem of that enemy which may engender a longing for revenge No, rather would 1 suggest that w celebrate sheer feats of arms, like those achieved on the beaches ol the Dardanelles, as conquests by our soldiers and sailors over every mail’s enemy—" The Impossible !” CciEainly the nation which has in its recent history such sacrifices as th'se should •))(> free For a generation or two from one of the deadliest incentives to war the lenr ot bring thought afraid. And now, lest, someone may still take me for a Jingo in disguise, let me | relate a personal incident in my own career, linen upon a /time I made a speech and pointed out a truth—namely, that the customs of war bad steadily been degenerating since the days ol the siege of Troy iAs a. result of pointing out this obvious truth, I got a wigging troin a big-wig who had been told of my speech by a brother General. In the course of bis remarks the alorcsaid big-wig informed me— I suppose 'from his personal knowledge ot the oratory of tho late Mr A. Cook- that my ■speech had been more subversive than anything over said ill public by di d fiery miners’ loader.

What, he desired to know, could hi my object?

‘T wanted to stop the war by showing it was getting more mechanical, and less human." I replied. ■‘But war has made you what you are ” he rejoined. "So how can you, of all men, feel justified in laughing at Commanders-in-Ohief ?’’ “I feel I must try everything 1 can fairly try to lower the prestige of military glory,” I replied, "because the thought of the crowds of widows, the orphans, the blind, the disabled, and the Catoers and mothers who have lost their sons, and who flock to "-ho war memorials whenever I unveil one, imperatively urges me on to do it.

Battlefield Hardships. I saw his face change. He. thought it over for a moment, and then said : "I understand. Let this conversation be as if it had never taken place.” And jt did remain as if it had never taken place, Iso long as he was alive. Yes, it is in the aftermath of war that its real poignancy lies and Horn which its .greatest and most lasting lessons can be learned. The number of dead and wounded lying on a battlefield does not maintain that shocked grip on the mind that mllliv' elvilians imagine.

On the battlefield, too, one shares the miseries and hardships with thousands of others. It is harder very often to bear the tragedies of peace-time, most of which have to he shouldered alone or only wi!:h the aid of a .small circle of friends.

Lpt me draw a little picture for yon. 'Sitting in the cabin of a foreign liner which is voyaging across the Indian Ocean are a young Glasgow mechanic and his girl wife. They are staring white-faced al the body of their tiny baby boy—their firstborn. Then; it lies, lovely iu doi.'.h, as if moulded in translucent .wax, with a little artificial •forget-me-not in its hand. The father and mother dare not speak: t.ieii hearts arc breaking. The hour is at hand—the greant engines of the liner stop. A strange silence falls over nil . . . and then there is a knock at the cabin door.

T was present on board this ship, the only other English-speaking person on board, and nothing 1 have ever experienced iu war has ever wrung my heart mure deeply tdiau the tragedy of that cabin, and the solitary grief of those young parents.

No. it is not battlefield sights, nor war debts, which make me leel mod keenly -that it is absolutely up to everyone to try Itn create a peace atmosphere throughout the world.

It is the tragic aftermath ol wai which each ol us can see ior himself in the desperate plight, of so many exServire men.

Thank God, the people keep a warm place in their hearts for them—especially 'the women-as they slmw on Poppy Day. Butt there are num ill power! ill places who forget the past honors th" irildier has been through to 'serve them. Some ol these are showing an inclination to tamper with "disability pensions.” Under cloak of the "mint"lcm" these vampires want |o suck one more drop of blood out ol Ihe old wounds.

Let the voting genera I ion take mile of this, and then, when in due enurre they gy. a chance ol 'easting their vote for peace or war, tliev will know which 1 1 > choose.