CURRENT TOPICS.

Taranaki Daily News, 25 January 1918, Page 4

CURRENT TOPICS.

THE BASIS OF PEACE. Discussing the guarantees for the future peace of the world, Mr. Asquith recently wrote in the London Observer as follows:—"The first thing needed is, without doubt, not a re-esta'blishment of the balance of power, but a removal of one of the chief of the chronic causes of unsettlement by the emancipation and regrouping of subject peoples in accordance with their aspirations and interests. This would go a long way to heal the festering sores which Europe has inherited from dynastic ambitions, from diplomatic chicarie, from military rapacity. But it is clear that if the peace which has become the first interest of a bleeding and devastated world is to be something more than a breathing space or a passing interlude, we cannot be content with a mere repainting of the map. We must aim at petting up a world-wide peace partnership, of which all the civilised communities will be members on a level footing, with equal rights and recir procal duties. These charges, which involve the 'definite repudiation of militarism as the governing factor in the relation of States,' will not be brought about by a stroke of the pen or by an avalanche of rhetoric. They must aim from the beginning at something more than the negative function of policing the world and 'preventing breaches of the peace; at nothing less than a 'partnership of the nations in the joint pursuit of a freer and fuller life for the countless millions who, by their own efforts and their sacrifices, generation after generation, maintain the progress and enrich the inheritance of humanity!'"