NEVER AGAIN.

Taranaki Daily News, 12 March 1918, Page 6

NEVER AGAIN.

GERMANS IN THE PACIFIC. THE FUTURE MENACE (By Thomas 11. Wilford, Minister of Justice). Just as Servia is the German route to the East, and just, as it is necessary for t!ie Allies to see that the Southern Slavs are permanently appointed the "Holders of the Gate,'' so the .Pacific Islands will be seen to be the vulnerable points in the armor of Australia and New Zealand in after-war days. Here in loyal little New Zealand we wonder if such a fact is thoroughly understood and appreciated by those* who will represent the Empire when peace terms are settled by the coming victory of the Allies. We know that the war is won, but that the knock-out blow is not yet, and while we realise that 1918 is the test year in which determination and unity may give us all we have sacrificed our manhood for, still we are afraid of those whose business" it will be to conclude peace. _ We know from the utterances of publie men in high places at Home in England that, though we will retain our present territory intact, we have no guarantee that the Germans will be prevented from obtaining future domination in New Guinea and Samoa. It is impossible for us to discuss a; Pacific thrown back into the old con'ditions. We wish to say, and say emphatically, Never" again! The Australian Commonwealth InterState Commission has recently held an inquiry into the trade of_±hc Pacific; .and German shares in "Australian and New Zealand companies have in many cases been forcibly transferred to the Public Trustee to be held till the war is over; but this is not enough. The series of articles published in the Sydney Morning Herald in 1910 should 1 be learned by heart by our statesmen at Home before considering the Pacific Islands as a subject for barter. When the Island of Lissa, in the Adriatic, was given to Austria in years gone by, we little appreciated the value it possessed as the key to the Curzola Group of islands there, nor did we understand that in this war it would stand as a watch-tower for Sebenica, a harbor capable of sheltering the fleets of Europe. Does Great Britain understand what Guinea and Samoa, let alone the other small groups of islancs, mean to Australia and New Zealand, and to the Empire, and thus the world?

_ I doubt her understanding of the position, and I believe that her knowledge of Samoa is culled principally from writings of Robert Louis Stevenson, and not from a study of the strategical and economical positions of the islands with relation to Empire trade, which relation has been considerably altered through the opening of the .Panama Canal. Viscount Bryte gets nearest to our views in his article on the New Pacific, but most of the British statesmen either slur the subject or ignore it. We claim the right to make our voic» heard.

We claim that right as partners, not poor relations, in a great Empire, and we have made good that claim by virtue of the blood of our virile young manhood which has stained the rugged shores of Gallipoli, the ariiTdeserts "round Gaza and Marsa Matruh, the rank and foetid swamps of Mesopotamia, the mud of Flandere, and the shell-devastated lands of the Western-front from Piers to Gravenstafel. Have we any, justice in our claim for consideration? It will be, I am afraid, for men who little understand the position to decide. Von Kuhlman recently said in reference to French re-occupation of Alsaceand Lorraine—never again. We have a much better right to say "never again" to German occupancy of New Guinea and Samoa, and the other islands of the Pacific. Bismarck about 50 years ago, through the agency of Theodor Weber, secured a large part of New Guinea and all Samoa —except one small isle, Tutuila, which fell to the United States—its only possession in the Southern Pacific. "Small as these islands are," said Viscount Bryce, "they raise problems of the utmost complexity, which need much wisdom for their solution."

We New Zealanders bolieve ( in reference to the future occupancy of these islands by Germany, "that their room is better than their company." Will Great Britain help ua, I wonder? W. M. Hughes, in speaking of the Pacific and the Islands, says: "Germany has been brewing her devil' 3 broth for the benefit of civilisation in an ocean which sooner or later must become the balancing centre of the world's trade and development." This is quite true. German plans were laid, as Mr. Hughes says, against Australia, and I add, against New Zealand, as carefully as they were laid against Servia, France, or Belgium. I wonder whether British statesmen remember the speech of Herr Dernburg in the Reichstag when introducing a measure called "An Act of Colonial Policy." He said:—

"Australian competition in the Southern Seas is very keen, and this competition will have to be driven off the field, since it will seriously restrict the market for German goods unless large and fast steamers are available to maintain communication with the German colonies. The Nord Deutscher Lloyd has succeeded in driving from the field v<3ry keen rivals for the trade between New Guinea and Australia—rivals who made it very difficult for Germans to place their wares, and who gave preference to English and Austra. lian goods." The Reichstag passed the measure, a subsidy was granted, and the Australian firm specially aimed at (Messrs. Burns, Philp and Co.) were blackmailed with special tariffs.

Doc-s that story speak eloquently enough for British statesmen as to Ger,man and German belief ii* ,the value of the islands I write of? Will British statesmen even bother about the matter? I have my doubts. "The cruelty, abu&es, and exactions carried out by Germany in these islands. when enforcing discipline in connection with native labor have been forgotten," aays Brunsdon Fletcher, "when seeing the large plantations, well paved roads, fine residences, and all the organisation of German municipal and social machinery." The native population fear the Germans, but were indisputably under their sway when war broke out. Some references has been made at Home as to the taking of a plebiscite of ihe residents (including natives) of

Samoa and New Guinea after the war, and before the final destination of those pliices is settled. I can understand llic Germans asking for a plesbiscite in Conrland. Such a process of settlement, of such a vital question to us is, to say the least of it, doubtful, especially if Germans are given the opportunities of Bernsdorf, Boy Ed, and Von Papen in America, Zimmerman in Mexico, and Luxburg in the Argentine. Our methods of diplomacy —God save the mark!—are hardly up to the German methods, thank Heaven, Poultnoy Itigelow in 1900 visited New Guinea, and his revelations as to German methods there tend to make us wonder whether the Allies should permit the Germans ever to rule over native races; while the stories of East Africa and the indictment of Cardinal Mercer on German rule in Belgium furnish reasons for considering Germany unfit to be trusted with any dominance or control of any native population. To contrast the rule of a man like Sir George Grey over the Maoris in New Zealand with that of Theodore Weber, the German Consul in the Pacific is to prove the unfitness of Germany to be trusted with the care of any human be, ings other than Germans, and even in that respect the world to-day recognises that Hohenzollern or Junker rule of the German people is intolerable, and cannot be permitted for the sake of the peac» of the world. If this viewpoint is admitted, does it not furnish an eloquent argument against German rule in the Pacific, for that rule has consisted in dragooning the native population and taking as much of their land as was required—on German terms. Let me now refer to the Pacific Islands "scrap of paper" —a treaty signed between Germany and Great Britain in 1886, when provision was made and "guaranteed" by these Powers for equal trading rights in the islands of the Pacific, "apportioned," says Brunsdon Fletcher, "after the surprises of 1884, .when the remainder of New Guinea, the Bismarck, the Solomons, the Marslialls, and the Carolines were settled under the two flags." How did Germany carry out her signed and pledged word? My answer to that query is—in the German way:—

She began immediately to scheme to drive her partner from the territory which was to' be equally controlled. It is the story of Bosnia and Herzegovina of 1908 over again—it is another example of the doctrine that "necessity knows no law," so forcibly fathered by Bernhardi, Naumann, Delbruch, and the War Lords of Germany.

The Marshall Islands were put under the German Jaluit Company, registered in Hamburg, which company administered the islands and collected rates and taxes. Fletcher, in his admirable work "The New Pacific,' says "that when the Jaluit Company started to check Australian trade and eliminate competition, three firms shared the trade of the islands, one from Hamburg, which was taken over, another from San Francisco, and a third from Auckland, New Zealand." The San Francisco firm saw it was time to quit, arid sold to the Jaluit Company, the New Zealand company sold to a Sydney company which sold to the I T iluit Company, which then controlled the whole trade.

Burns, Philp and Co., backed by the Commonwealth, made a brave fight for the trade, but the German Colonial Office, with heavy subsidies, won, as might be expected—and this, says Brunsdon Fletcher, was how it won. "A tax of £SO per voyage was payable by every vessel trading to the Marshall Islands when the treaty was entered into. This tax the Jaluit Company immediately raised to £225 per month in all cases where the owners of vessels trading to the Marshall Islands were not established on these islands." As this tax did not stop Burns, Philip and Co., it was raised to £450 per month. "Determined to obtain justice through Great Britain," says Brunsdon Fletcher, "the firm still kept going, though, with the export tax placed upon copra, the levies of the Jaluit Company then reached £9OO a month" An appeal was made to London, which Vas as usual slow to grasp the situation. Australia, through the Commonwealth, under Sir George Beid and Mr. Deakin, threatened reprisals, and Germany at last consented to some appearance of fair play. Burns, Philp, and Co. demanded £IO,OOO compensation, and, after many years, viz., in 1907, £4OOO was paid. Stewart's Handbook of the Pacific Islands quoted by Brunsdon Fletcher states that in 1904 alone, while this game was going on, the German company netted £40,000 from the 'Marshall Islands trade. Is the British Government proposing to allow this state of things to occur again we New Zealanders want to know ? I have read carefully the utterances of Lloyd George since 1914, and I do not believe that—great man as he undoubtedly is, and I write as a, sincere admirer of him—he realises the possibilities for the Empire of the Pacific free from German domination. In a recent utterance he made reference to an understanding with the colonial Premirs and Viscount Grey. The inclusion of the last mentioned name shows me that he has had no recent consultation with Australian and New Zealand statesmen, and this is vitally necessary for us. If after the war Germany is allowed to occupy Samoa or New Guinea, New Zealand and Australia will be in the jposition of a man occupying his house with an enemy at his door-step with a J machine-gun. As a submarine and wireless base either New Guinea or Samoa would be worth to Germany an army corps, while trade and economic development would be at her mercy.

We can ill spare our leading men today from New Zealand, but the gain to us of proper representation before the War Council, of our aims in regard to the Pacific, is more than balanced by their absence from New Zealand at the present time. Let us hope that Great Britain will, with its powerful Allies, understand the measure of importance we attach to the exclusion of German control from these economic and strategic vantage points in the future, and in the final "throw down" may we be relieved by finding that even if France, Italy, or the United States have a status here Germany will be unanimously voted "outside the pale.'" I write from an imperialistic point of view and with the hope that my desires, which are the desires of all New Zcai landers, may find expression in the permanent exclusion of the Germans from any dominance or control in the Pacific.