The Daily News MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 16. NEW ZEALAND'S VULNERABILITY.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume L, Issue 60, 16 September 1907, Page 2

The Daily News MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 16. NEW ZEALAND'S VULNERABILITY.

The National League ol' New Zealand is discharging a truiy national .service in bunging before !iii- public the weaknesses of our condition in regard to matters of defence. Away as we are from the theatre of things military and naval, and looking to Britain's navy for our sole protection, we have troubled very little about 'qualifying ourselves to any extent for the defence of the country. The serenity into which we have lulled ourselves may never lie disturbed; but it may be. It is hard to say what difference in the world's composition may be made in the course of a decade or "two. Twenty years ago no person would have conceived it possible that Japan would attain the status it has since attained. Twenty years_ ago the German nation was scarcely a force amongst the great nations, whilst its navy was insignificant. To-day Germany is one of the leading countries of the "world, with a large and powerful navy. New Zealand is, for its size, one of the richest countries in the world, and would be a tempting bait to a foreign Power if ever one were embroiled in a war with Britain; and there's no guarantee that Britain, with so many vast interests, conflicting, as they do, with those of plher nations, will st-cr any clearer of trouble in the future than she has been able to do in the past. But were New Zealand thoroughly prepared to resist invasion by having the guns and the efficient men, and enough of both, a foreign Power would pause before crossing swords with us. To be thoroughly prepared is our greatest guarantee of |x>ace and safety.

In the current number of the League's organ, "Defence," is a pertinent article on the proposals of the new Defence Council. It is well worth reproduction. "The Council of Defence tells the public of New Zealand that volunteering is liaving 'its last chance,' and that unless sufficient enlistment takes place the colony will have to adopt universal training," says the writer of the article. "But this is only one of the mild statements to which '{hose ill official positions must confine themselves. It is not really volunteering which is having 'its last chance.' It is die Britishism of New Zealand which is having 'its last chance.' Volunteering is as dead as a doornail, as far as "effective defence, goes, and none know that belter than the volu-i----t-ers themselves and the Defence Coun : i-il. Volunteering is all very well when the fighting is to be in the enemy's country, but volunteering is the very rottenest of systems wheu the lighting is to be within our own coasts and shores. A ship's captain may well call for volunteers to man a .small boat in a bad sea, but is he to call for volunteers to do their duty when the ship itself is in danger, and to allow those who like to skulk below? For us to go on as we are going, in the matter of Defence, is to invite disaster supposing invasion takes'place; the great reward of having volunteered and drilled will then be that, of iieing able to die for rne's country as n man mijuVi be able to die, and never to be kicked contemptuously aside as a poor thing not even worth killing. The number of males in the colony between the. ages of 15 and 30, the period which may be coa6idered covered by the defence cadets and volunteering systems, is 142,910. Many of our volunteers, particularly in the riile clubs, are over 30, which offsets those under 30 who have served in the volunteers and have retired. We are therefore confronted by the following alarming and dangerous national position;—

Of training age (15 to 30) .. 142,910 In training ('all arms and cadets) 20,033 Untrained 122,877

"If we take another point of view and compare the number ol men in the colony of what we may call 'effective' age—2o to 45—we find that there are 193,250. Think what that means! Close upon 200,000 men, in the prime and flower of life, averagely stronger, taller, keener, and more self-reliant thin most nations, every man of them the beit sort of patriot because every man oi them has everything to lose and nothing to gain by going under to the foreigner and the alien! Conceive what might be done with such men, in such number), and with our 10,000 lads swelling their ranks every year! New Zealand would be impregnable, unassailable, such a sea hornet's nest that it would be let anxiously alone. And what do we do with our defensive possibilities under the present unfair and inequitable system, which appeals to patriotism and allows the mort patriotic to stagger under a burden which would be lightly borne by all? Look at the figures!— Priine-of-life New Zealand.-rs .. 193,250 Number trained (say) .. .. 50,000

Untrained (say) 143,250 Many of our experts will deny that there are 50,000 trained men all told in the country, and claim that many of them have had no efficient training and have lost what little they ever had. But taking the figures for which the Defence Council arc trying to have rifles available—so,ooo—including all arms, as indicating the number available, what does it show';

"Does it not show that volunteering has hopelessly failed to train our citizens as a nation to self-defence, and that the almost three-fourths of our New Zealand manhood has no power to defend the State in case of emergency! Is this not shameful? Is it not enough to make every untrained New Zealander blush every lime he sees a volunteer in uniform? Volunteering is to have 'a last chance,' we are told. But thai is only a phrase. It is New Zealand that is having 'a last chance' to set its house in order and to be ready for the time of trouble—a last chance to get riilcs and guns; a last chance to train every youpg man to patriotic duty, the old being beyond reach and too stiff in the joints any way. Drilling and training are only part of the defence business, only an essential base from which is built that power- of striking straight and sure at any enemy that ventured to assail us. And of the striking organisation, that most wonderful of manmade organisations by means of which at a word hundreds of thousands, moving as one man, become a deadly weapon in the hand of the captain, "we have nothing. We have exactly the organisation to be expected in a country the great majority of whose citizens know nothing of defence, and where the laws allow a Jad to choose for himself whether he will learn how to defend his country or to play pitch-aud-toss.

"When we leave to voluntary decision the payment or non-payment of taxes; when we make voluntary the support of one's family and the upholding of the King's writ; when we allow any of the obligations of social life to be" ignored at pleasure and without penalty; then we can justify leaving to volunteering the defence of the nation. Which most sacred duty; which in the last resort is more binding than any other human obligation and precedes in the heart of all but slaves and cowards, duty to those nearest and dearest to us; beside which every true man counts his own life as worth only the service it may render and the lives of others as so much dust whirled by the wind; the abiding by which gives freedom and hope of progress and the failing in which brings servitude and the despairing that is worse than death; wc have left in New Zealand at the mercy of the thoughtless, the careless, and the supine. If auy man opposes universal training after reading between the lines <>f the Defence Report he must be more than usually dense to the signs of the times."