Wairarapa Times-Age FRIDAY, AUGUST 25, 1939. IS NEGOTIATION POSSIBLE?

Wairarapa Times-Age, 25 August 1939, Page 4

Wairarapa Times-Age FRIDAY, AUGUST 25, 1939. IS NEGOTIATION POSSIBLE?

A<t moment when some of the most powerful nations in the world, along with smaller nations, are poised on the brink of war, the merits of the total position are summed up well and accurately by the great South .African statesman. General dan Smuts, in his appeal to Kurope not to commit suicide. Ihe King of the Belgians also has spoken timely and telling words in declaring that not a single nation wishes to send its children to death, but is he on equally firm ground in affirming that it is still possible to negotiate.' Account has to be taken here ol a strange helplessness on the part, of some of the people on whom horrors of suffering, death and devastation will lull most heavily if war occurs.

Given only a slight exercise of ordinary common sense, not to speak of good feeling, on. the part of. all concerned, the thought of war would be preposterous and there could be no question of settling differences between nations in any other way than by peaceful negotiation. In spite ol the overwhelming extent to which European and other nations—even poor States hardly able to feed and clothe their people—-have lavished their resources on building up armaments and military power, a. fair and open test of opinion .in Europe today undoubtedly would make war impossible.

AVith Herr Hitler exercising an unquestioned leadership over Germany, however, King Leopold's content ion that it is still possible to negotiate, calls at least, lor the qualification that it rests with the Buehrer to say whether negotiations shall or shall not be opened. This raises no hopeful prospect, lor Herr .Hitler’s only apparent idea in negotiation is to dictate terms, and bitter experience Ims demonstrated time and again that his promises are worthless, in an unfettered and genuine expression of opinion, the German people, like those of any other nation, would declare unhesitatingly for peace. In Nazi Germany, however, public opinion is stifled and suppressed under an elaborately organised tyranny. Therein lies the danger to Germany and to the world, and the reason, too, for doubting whether, as King Leopold Ims claimed, it is still possible to negotiate. The democracies are very willing to negotiate, but what Hitler demands is not negotiation, but submission.

War, if it occurs, will' bring disaster in greater or less degree to all the nations involved. On the other hand, there is no question raised in Europe today which might not be settled satisfactorily if it were dealt wilh in a spirit and from a standpoint of mutual accommodation. In the existing state of affairs, however, with the Nazi dictatorship and others relying on and paying regard only to brute force, reason appears for questioning the old saying that, it takes two io make a. quarrel. Whatever may be thought, of the conditions in which these dictatorships arose, there is no escape from flu* conclusion that their aggression must be withstood by nations which wish to preserve their freedom.

In this tragic dilemma it is painfully easy to perceive what civilised humanity has lost in allowing the League of Nations and the principles for 'which it stands to be derided and pushed into the background. Ahich as Hie constitution of the League has been criticised, not always and in all respects unjustly, there was- a. time when it offered at least the nucleus for an international peace organisation which might, have averted the terrible state of affairs which confronts the world today. There is no other way of maintaining peace than by building up an organisation of as many nations as are prepared to keep and uphold a common law for all nations. An organisation so established of course would derive its greatest strength from promoting a true fellowship between nations —an association in which opportunities and resources would be shared to the utmost extent possible. It seems only too probable that the nations may be doomed now to suffer heavily for their failure to pursue these aims -with energy and resolution while the opportunity to do so remained clearly open.