PEACE

Taihape Daily Times, Volume 8, Issue 129, 2 June 1916, Page 4

PEACE

The urgers of a halting peace are busy in British House of Commons; th e Government is asked to let Germany know our terms of peace. If the vapourings of these questioners had the merest tinkling of earnestness in them they could be respected, but when they are known to be nothing more than political effort put forward regardless of whether they help or injure the Allies’ cause; whether they lead to increased destruction of British life or not, they are wicked and contemptible to an extreme. jWe all want peace just at the very earliest possible moment, but not that peace that takes our lives by strangling when the sword is laid down. ,We have been compelled to fight, to sacrifice hundreds of thousands of our best citizens that the Empire maycontinue to live The peace we want and must have will be that tvhich will ensure what we are now fighting for. A noted Frenchman has said, “What we fear is the politician; instead of turning to. commerce, art and literature, instead of developing our industries and devoting ourselves to the enriching of the individual and the nation, we may turn in a body to playing politics That may be a possible and dire result of victory; it would be the best and surest way of paralysing ourselves, to the advantage of our enemies. It is emphatically asserted that war cannot long preserve its present form. It is pointed out that massacres will cease before armies are disbanded, and battles will become less and less frequent. We have already seen two kinds of war;

*he was action in af-

ter the Marne, action in immobility—no great military movements. The third phase will be inaction in immobility, armies facing each other without disarming, while tedious peace ne- ' gotiations are spun out, while Germ- | any discusses in despair the hard conI ditions of peace the Allies will im- ■ pose. During this time there will be i reactions, collisions, reflecting the fits of German indignation at the Allies’ demands: the great beast will struggle, but the days of great slaughter will be over. This intermediary state may drag on indefinitely, shots fired from time to time. Germany will not wait to be crushed before treating for peace; it will be enough for her to realise her unavoidable, inevitable insufficiency for achieving victory. Then will come the vital, real moment for peace considerations There must be no half measures in the peace exacted; it must be a decisive peace, no matter what any neutral opinion may be Germans will either get all they want cr be forced to give what the Allies want. Anything but a peace of this character is simply inviting another war, which would not ho at all impossible in the lifetime of the present generation Germans will not sue for peace; it is contrary to their nature and temperament to expect anything of the kind from them, and cur Empire’s safety lies wholly in the kind of peace it exacts.