Rangitikei Advocate. TWO EDITIONS DAILY. TUESDAY, AUGUST 22, 1916. GERMANY’S WAY.

Rangitikei Advocate and Manawatu Argus, Volume XLI, Issue 11652, 22 August 1916, Page 4

Rangitikei Advocate. TWO EDITIONS DAILY. TUESDAY, AUGUST 22, 1916. GERMANY’S WAY.

IT has been reported of the commander of a German submarine, about to sink a passenger ship without regard to the safety of the people on board, that he had remarked, as if to jnstifyphe act. “It is war,” Strange to say there are people amongst us to-day, though extremely few, who, if they'do not excuse, are ready to palliate German atrocities by the same remark. In no recent period of the world’s history would the invasion of a friendly country and the massacre of the people, the [killing of noncombatants on sea and land, including those of neutral countries, be considered as permissable acts of war, and they are all the more condemnable now because they are wholly opposed to the conventions adopted by all the great nations during recent times. That being so only ignorance or disloyalty can account for the use of such a term as we have referred to, by any British 1 subject.

At .The Hague conference of 1899 resolutions were adopted for the prohibition of the launching of projectiles and explosives from balloons or by other similar new methods. The Germans commenced to contravene this regulation at the outset of the war by the murder of civiliaus from Zeppelius. At the conference of 1906 it was resolved that ‘‘officers and so'.diers and other persons officially attached to armies shall be taken care of as prisoners of war without distinction of nationality.” Proof is available that Germany has barbarously treated her prisoners of war, starved, beaten them compelled them to Jive under unhealthy conditions and compelled a large number to work practically as slaves. Of the 56 articles of which the war regulations are composed two-thirds relate to the [protection of the individual-soldier or civilian, and in order to cover all possible cases it was declared that in matters not included in the regulations adopted by the conference of representatives of nations, “populations and belligerents remain under the protection and empire of the principles of international law as they result from the usages established between civilised nations from the laws of humanity and the requirements of the public conscience.” In the preambles to the convention adopted—and Sir Thomas Barclay, formerly president of the Institute of International Law, says the preamble of a declaration is as binding on tne contracting parties as the declaration itself—it was stated: ‘‘The Powers are alike animated by the desire to diminish, as far as depends on them, the evils inseparable from warfare; that the Governments represented considered that the progress of civilisation should have the effect of.alleviating as much as possible the calamities of war; that the only legitimate objfect which States should endeavour to accomplish during war is to weaken the military forces of the ®uemy.” 'Germany was a party to these declarations, andjjyet in the war book issued to its army it is declared that humane considerations—the,sparing of, life and property—“can only come intc play in so far as the nature and objects of war permits,” and that a warring State may employ all methods which promote the attainment of its object, subject only to such restraints as it imposes on itself in its own interest.” Satan himself could not have drawn up a more inhuman, a more heartless direction for an invading army, aud the reader can judge for himself how directly it is opposed to the humane declarations of the Conference. Following its own belief that a policy of frightfulness would hasten victory, and certain of its strength to resist any retributive measures, Germany sowed the seas with Coating miner, after agreeing to the principle of the freedom of sea routes for all nations, bombarded open to wns from the sea, such act being expressly forbidden, dropped bombs from airships over unfortified towns and villages, first used asphyxiating gases, also expressly forbidden by the Hague Conventions; enslaved women aud girls of captured towns, drowned many thousands of sea travellers and generally has rendered war as far as she has been able more frightful and more inhumane than ever before.

SIR J. G. WARD has very godd reason to be proud The Loan. of the result of his

appeal to the country lYr funds to enable us to carry on our share of the war, without having to appeal to Mother Country. Tho satisfaction of the British Government will also be great at the realisation of the fact that we are at last fnlly.recoguisiug our moral and financial responsibilities. The misconception which so widely existed that the war was not directly onf business and that in what we were doing we were generously helping the Mother Country has now fortunately disappeax-ed. We know that it is our war just as much as it is thatrof any belligerent now in the melee, and that our responsibilities are just as great in proportion to our means. ,It would very likely be cherishing a too flattering illusion to imagine that the whole of the sum of nine and a quarter millions has been contributed by New Zealand. When details are available we shall probably find that a fairly large proportion has been applied for in other parts of t he Empire. But the opportunities still .exist. We are pleased to see that Sir Joseph Ward has extended the period for the sale of bonds to the end of the month and that certificates are still available in any amount to the tardy investor.