The Price of Peace.

Kaipara and Waitemata Echo, 30 October 1914, Page 2

The Price of Peace.

It costs this world far more to keep the peace than to be engaged in active conflict. More money is ' spent by the combined Powers and outside nations on the maintenance of their armies and navies than the ' ordinary civilian would care to think1 about. j To Russia falls the distinction of j spending the most on its army, j The latest estimate of their expen- | (iiture works out roughly to £GG,- j '1.10,.">00. Germany comes next, I spending something like £.r>0,98 l,r>oo ■ on its army. England, of course, : leads the way in naval expenditure, ' spending on its fleet almost as much as Germany on her army. Turkey found to her cost that ten j and a half millions was too little' to spend on her army. Ycf Spain I spends si ill less, but makes up fur this by spending double as much on her navy. France expends far more on its army than the navy, devoting £16,800,000 to the former' and about half that amount to the latter. The United States' combined total I for their land and sea defence is ! said to be £70,070,500, but this must I.c considerably over-estimat-ed to the tune of something like twelve million pounds. Austria-Hungary disburses about six times more on its army than navy, eighteen and a half millions representing the amount. The total annual expenditure of the following ten nations — Great Britain, U.S.A., Germany, France, Italy, Spain, Austria-Hungary, Turkey, Russia, and Japan for the upkeep of their military establishment on land and sea aggregates approximately £4-83,500,000.