NO PEACE TALK.

Lyttelton Times, Volume CXVII, Issue 17287, 30 September 1916, Page 8

NO PEACE TALK.

It has been tolerably evident that a pronounced effort was being made in some quarters to promote a peace movement'in Europe, but until the last few days the rumours were cfjiite indefinite and untrustworthy and the direction from which the agitation was to come , was nbt indicated. That the inspirs- - tion was German might be inferred, because ever since the Central Powers reached! high tide in their military progress Berlin has been very ready to ■promote peace talk. At least 'one abortive attempt to secure the intervention of neutrals has been recorded, and indeed no effort was made to conceal, the purpose of the German misr eion to Switzerland earlier in the year, and for all wo know there may have been other incidents of the same kind. But a few days ago a cablo message gavo the substanco' of a .dispatch distributed by ah American agency from ' Hs Londom.office, in which the rumours wero given definite shape. It was there stated that a peace kite might bo fcokedvfor during October, that Berlin was hoping to persuade either Spain or the United States to take the initiative, 'find that as Spain had shown no inclination to movo the Germans mis^t

•be expected to open negotiations with Washington. Tho attitude of the Allies was stated quite accurately, so clearly, indeed, that we may bo pardoned, for supposing that- the correspondent had official warrant for his message. Then camo tho report that Mr Gerard; the American Ambassador in Berlin, would shortly return to- Washington on a special mission, and tho American newspapers, dotting the i’s apd crossing the‘t’s, declared that he would- carrj Germany’s appeal.,.to,President .Wilson to intervene with the offer of mediation. • Mr Gerard, according to a message we publish this morning, has now left Germany; Already,f however, it is mado clear that if his mission is to suggest the offer of 'American mediation he might just as well have remained in Berlin. The Allies have not waited for President Wilson to “sound” them on tho subject of peace, and it has fallen to the lot of the peace-loving British Minister of War to define their position. Mr Lloyd > George!s statement, which is cabled in full, lacks nothing in directness and clarity. ' He leaves no room for misunderstanding. The friends of tho enemy will consider it even truculent as well, as undignified, but it has the supreme merit of expressing the Allied determination to fight to*a decision in language that tho least educated of the hyphenated Americans will bo able to road. He says simply that so far as Britain is concerned the two dreadful years of suffering are nos going to bo wasted, that the Allies have set their hand to the plough and have no intention of turning back, and tnat well-meaning humanitarians and highsouled neutrals must stand aside and allow the struggle to continue. little while ago General Botha, in one of his fare references to the general position, declared his own that it would be better to fight for another two or three yenrs and roach a decision than to patch ‘up a peace and have to fight qgain in' ten years time, aifd in those plain words he expressed unquestionably the feeling of tho mass of tho British people; Wo know what France would say to a suggestion of peaco now, ,with the enemy still in occupation of the north, and what the Russians would- say if they were asked to negotiate witlv the Germans on thO /Dvina. Wo have seen what our own British Socialists regard as the only thinkable course for the Allies, and every, scrap of evidence available to show that the. peace parties in all the Allied countries .are of the same mind. They are'anxious indeed for peace, but they will not see tiro blood of tlioir peoplo spent' in vain, and they .will not tolerate the patching up of a truce that would leave the war lords of Prussia freo to renew thoir effort to establish a Teutonic domination of Europe. Mr Lloyd George is speaking for all the people of all the Allied countries, therefore, when he .declares that no intervention of neutrals 'will bo tolerated until Germany, is brought ,to her knees, and until the possibility of a revival of the war of aggression is ended. Poland, Belgium, Serbia and Montenegro are almost wholly in the occupation of' the enemy and- the Allies wifi not bo ready to discuss the terms of peace uhtil those countries aro once more free; 1 The intention of the interview that tho War' Minister has given to the journalists in London is plainly , to warn the Americans that a suggestion of mediation at this stago would Ho resented. The tone* is firm and confident, as it should be, but wc 'must guard against reading into the interview a suggestibn that tho Allies are counting on an early victory. -u took twenty years to defeat Napoleon, Mr Lloyd George declares, and if need be Britain will fight for twenty , years to' defeat Germany; and though the Minister expresses liis conviction tnat victory will bo achieved in less than twenty years be is under ho delusion as to the nature of the task ahead. The war is turning in our favour, but we are as . yet only beginning-to win. His point, however, is that we aro determined to- -win. however long the labour may prove to be, and determined that the labour shall not end until the aggressors are crashed and the recrudescence of the. ghastly uar is rendered for ever impossible.