COLLECTIVE SECURITY

Wairarapa Times-Age, 26 April 1938, Page 2

COLLECTIVE SECURITY

LEAGUE OF NATIONS’ ROLE If collective security is ever io be more than a treacherous phrase, the League must be put on the sure foundation of justice and equality between nations says “Scrutator,” writing in the “Sunday Times.” It is in that high hope that Mr Chamberlain will negotiate. To refuse to negotiate until others do something is to drift on their will; to meet in frank discussion is to take the strategic initiative that is no less necessary for peace than in war. It is something to be proud of that Britain is strong enough and her Prime Minister brave enough to do it. One of the commonest of political errors is to regard the policy of nations as something fixed and immovable. Nations are not, any more than human being, a mechanical force, but a complex of every human passion and sentiment, never still, always changing in response to external action or internal ferment. Diplomacy is not like dropping a letter in a pil-lar-box; it is a frank interchange of ideas between friends and equals in which the better reason and the appeal to the higher instinct usually.has the best chance of success. That it will succeed now no one can guarantee; human nature is never exactly calculable. Much has been heard lately of the phrase “now or never.” As a threat it is negligible; if we think it true, it is an exhortation to courage. Certainly it is better now than never.