DOMINIONS’ POSITION

Wairarapa Times-Age, 15 April 1939, Page 9

DOMINIONS’ POSITION

FRESH THINKING URGED DEFENCE OF THE PACIFIC. GREAT BRITAIN'S FOREIGN POLICY. “Some fresh thinking" by Australia and New Zealand was declared to be necessary, as a result of the September crisis, by Mr H. V. Hodson, editor of “The Round Table,” who recently visited New Zealand, in a broadcast talk in London. It was obvious, he said, that this thinking would have to be done about their foreign relations, not only toward Europe, but also toward the Pacific area. “That applies particularly to the New Zealand Government because collective security by itself is plainly not a sufficient basis for a small country’s foreign policy in the world of 1939, certainly not in the Pacific area,” said Mr Hodson.

“Actually, New Zealanders have been so keenly interested in their own problems of social reform, financial control, and economic change that they have given less thought even than the Australians to the details of foreign policy and of their position in the Pacific area. “In both Dominions there still remains in public thought fragments of the sense of security with which they grew up. That safety has enabled them to attend first to their economic problems which today may be summed up as social security, and how to maintain national prosperity through world, depression. “Both at home and abroad Australians and New Zealanders are typically British in preferring commonsense decisions when the time comes to general systems of policy worked out on paper before hand. “In relation to the Far East as elsewhere you will find these two Dominions anxious not to cross their bridges before they come td them, but to decide their policies according to the experience that they gather as they pass along. The danger, of course, is that the fruits of experience may prove to have grown bitter before they are plucked.” Commenting on the questions of a white Australia, Mr Hodson asked whether Britain would be prepared to go to that Dominion’s aid if this policy got Australia into trouble. “Let me say at once,” he added, “that I think the answer in practice is ‘Yes,’ but I do know that prominent British people have recently been asking whether it is fair or possible for Britain to be bound to go with all her strength to the aid of independent countries as Australia and New Zealand really are —at the other end of the world, when they, for their part, are not prepared to give her a similar unconditional pledge. “Although I think it is a question that ought to be asked in order to clear our political thinking, I believe it is an artificial one in practice. If Britain were defeated in a world war, Australia and New Zealand certainly could not fight successfully on their own, but would have to accept dictated terms for their future national life. “If on the other hand, ( Australia and New Zealand were defeated it would mean that the very heart of Imperial defence would be exposed naked and indefensible to a hostile power.” The real heart of Imperial defence was in the Indian Ocean. The great importance of British defences from Singapore to New Zealand was that they were a barrier between the Far East and the Indian Ocean. Referring to the differences between the Labour Parties in the two Dominions, Mr Hodson said the Australian Labour Party was strongly isolationist, whereas the New Zealand Labour Party was strongly internationalist and pro-League. “One can understand the Labour feeling in New Zealand, that only in a world of collective security can a small power like herself live in permanent peace. But successive Governments, have left New Zealand with only a very small defence force to put into .the pool of collective security—indeed many people would regard her as taking a lot more out in benefits than she has been able to contribute in premiums.”