The Times. PUBLISHED ON TUESDAY AND FRIDAY AFTERNOONS. "We nothing extenuate, nor set down aught in malice." TUESDAY, MARCH 5. 1918 ENEMY ALIENS AND THEIR DESCENDANTS

Pukekohe & Waiuku Times, Volume 7, Issue 357, 5 March 1918, Page 2

The Times. PUBLISHED ON TUESDAY AND FRIDAY AFTERNOONS. "We nothing extenuate, nor set down aught in malice." TUESDAY, MARCH 5. 1918 ENEMY ALIENS AND THEIR DESCENDANTS

The National Government cannot but by this time be aware of the very strong feelings of indignation felt by the public nt the tenderness with which our Germans and their descendants are treated. Unfortunately we have not yet, as a community, learned, iu the way the people of the Home-land have learned, how to make and unmake Ministers by the breath or blast of public opinion, or the matter would have been settled long ago as it was in the case of the principal members of the British Government in the early days of the war. From the beginning the English public were determined that no chances should be taken to allow the German spy to play his game under the fostering care of a Cabinet that appeared to value the comfort of these people more highly than the lives of our soldiers and sailors, and when Mr McKenua released some thousands of them that had been apprehended by the military authorities he sealed his doom.

But we are a tame and .spiritless people, and acquiesce growlingly but submissively in the dictum of our governors that aliens, many of doubtful character, should be at large and even in Government employ, though we know it is wroug, impolitic, nnd terribly dangerous Let us, however, qualify b\ exempting the women of \'e\v Zealand from tiic erithets tame and spiritless, for they have come out into the open and fearlessly petitioned for the removal and internment of Germans. Are the men of the Domhiioti to lag behind them in courage and honc-ly of conviction ' We take no account ot natural ration. The German, by their Dilhruck law, have shown ns that they onl\ regard it as another ' scrap of paper." And those amor.» us who ruiundur the paving hi' the GUI S?i- Pensions Act will also remetnb r the rush tin to wa ■ among 111 < - aliens to naturalise though :;i ; ..ars ot le-ideiuv the\ had never felt any dr>ire Id assuiu I i:! A\ < iti/i n ship until il be-■'inv a pecuniary advantag l A i;(! i. w, those Im. mi in i lie Kuipiiv we ffrsc I

them as soldiers because we believe that the son of a German is not to be trusted. But we leave them free with opportunities to work incredible mischief and to amass fortunes at the expense of our absent soldier boys. We have no doubt that many untoward happenings have resulted from leaving these gentry at large. It seems established beyond a doubt that in the early days of the war information was conveyed to the Scharhorst and Gnsisenau by Morse flashes from the West Coast. Since the war began there have been a very large number of fires of extremely suspicious origin. The mines in Cook Strait may not have been put there by any New Zealand German, but who knows what assistance or connivance the actual mine-layers may not have had from some of our fostered aliens ?

There is one phase of the matter which we must confess has worried us more than a little. The report of the court-martial upon the officer in command of Motuihi Island was given by the daily papers and read with intense interest by the public, but it was clearly understood from the first that the Press was only to publish what the Defence Department thought it good tor the people to know. Yet somethings of extraordinary interest did come out. Here is one of them. Mr Superintendent Klely, the chief of the Auckland police, said he had re-

ceived information to the effect that a scow or schooner was being fitted up for the purpose of assisting some of the German prisoners on Motuihi to escape, the idea being that the Germans should escape by a yacht or a launch and be picked up at sea by a vessel which would leave Auckland. This was communicated to the military authorities, and its authenticity was clearly believed as a close motor-launch patrol of the island was kept up for a long time. Common-sense would have counselled the laying by the heels of every German, whether whole or half-bred, in the neighbourhood of Auckland, but it did not even result in the removal of the launch kept at the Island and the escapade cost us ,£IO,OOO, to sav nothing of the worry and the ridicule to which we were exposed.

Is anyone being shielded ? It seems a cruel suspicion to have, and yet since the war commenced we have seen so much mischief from a misplaced lenity towards our ruthless and implacable enemies, whom we ought to treat as so many snakes to be caged if not killed outright, that we cannot avoid a feeling of uneasiness about the connection of the Motuihi prisoners and some person or persons on the mainland.

We must not for a moment run away with the idea that the German considers it a base or despicable thing to play the spy or work an injury to the country that has sheltered him, or the citizenship of which he has embraced. A few days ago a German in Switzerland, named Adolf Friedman, unbosomed himself very candidly. lie said that every German in ueutral couutries is required by ihe German Government to work as a spy or propagandist and added that all Germans in Switzerland have fulhlled their obligations loyally and patriotically. If Germans do this in friendly countries that shelter them what will they do in countries their beloved Fatherland is at war with. The only difference is that in the latter case they will endeavour to mix mischief with their espionage and their misdeeds, being driven underground, aix- more difficult of detection. The only place tor them, whether whole or half-bred, born in the Colony or in Germany, is behind twenty strands of barbed wire and a double row of sentries. Will not the men of New Zealand join the women in insisting that it shall be so ?