Wairarapa Times-Age THURSDAY, DECEMBER 14, 1939. “A GIGANTIC SHADOW.”

Wairarapa Times-Age, 14 December 1939, Page 6

Wairarapa Times-Age THURSDAY, DECEMBER 14, 1939. “A GIGANTIC SHADOW.”

PEIUND all the present stir of discussion and intrigue at Geneva, one commentator was quoted in a radio message yesterday as stating “looms the gigantic shadow of the United States It would be possible to look to the immediate future with considerably increased confidence il the United States were bringing to bear upon the course of events ni Europe something more than the influence of even a gigantic shadow. Hope for the future, in Europe and throughout the world, is in the re-establishment of law. At anything but the most linnted view, if even in that, it is not more in the interests oi the United States than in those of any other country that the wealthiest and most powerful democracy in Ihe world should continue to play as detached and feeble a part as it is playing today in assisting that re-establishment. Events at Geneva, it is stated, are being followed closely in the United States, where popular feeling against Russia is risiim'. American money is pouring into the Finnish lund and it is being urged that Finland should be offered every facility in raising loans and purchasing weapons. This is well enough as far as it goes, but if the United States wishes 1o acquit itseli worthily as a leading member of the comity ol peacelul nations it must do much more than minister kindly to the victims ol aggression and enable them, on favourable terms, lo add lo their defensive armament. There would be little enough law and order even in modern civilised communities if public action against criminal aggressors were confined to the granting of charitable and other aid to their victims. It is by much more positive action that the law is upheld and security established in cities and countrysides throughout the happier regions of the world. In internalional life, as in the life of individual, communities, the broad underlying condition of security is a united association of those who are prepared to uphold the law. In Europe today, even with a war in progress which threatens to develop into a world war, it is coining to fie perceived ever more (dearly that a permanent organisation of nations —the League reinvigorated and stiengthened, or something better than the League—is indispensable if peace is to be re-established, and on being re-established is to be maintained. Writing on this subject recently in “The Times, Air Wickham Steed observed that, in 1914-18, the British and French were allied, not always harmoniously. From 1920 onward (he added) we were often at cross purposes. Today we are not so much allied as united. In this union lies our strength, for Great Britain is now, irrevocably, part of Europe. The Oslo neutrals are striving toward closer co-operation, if not actual union. Is it Utopian to see in these things the beginnings of a movement toward a greater unity, in which unlimited national sovereignty will be subordinated to common needs? If not, this war should help to foster the international solidarity in withstanding war and creating peace that may. one day, give the German people a chance to enter, as equals, a union of nations democratically self-governed and banded together not only against lawless violence, but for the mutual helpfulness which is peace. I submit that British policy should aim at these things. These dawning aspirations are menaced in the first place by Nazi Germany and to an uncertain extent by Italy (whose newspapers are reported to be celebrating with jeers the lormal termination of their country’s League membership). Il seems highly probable, 100, that not only Ihe League, but every aspiration for the united co-operation ol peacelul nations, must now be regarded as menaced also by Soviet Russia, so long at least as Al. Stalin and those wlio think with him remain at the head of affairs in that country. There is to be set on the other side of the account, however, not only the determination of the Allied Powers to re-establish liberty and justice in the world, but an increasing perception in both Allied'ami neutral countries that the brotherhood of men ami nations is lhe supreme reality of life. The future ol humanity is being determined, not only on the bat I lelields ol Europe, but in the shaping ol national policy Ihrmighoiit lhe world, ami until the greatest of the American republics shapes a policy worthy of the place it occupies in. tin* democratic firmament, lhe balance will continue lo be lipped ueedlessly and heavily against those who stand for liberty and justice. So long as it is confined to giving kindly sympathy and a little assistance to the victims of aggression. American foreign policy will continue lo be a byword in lhe minds of many thoughtfid people in and beyond lhe borders of the I’niled Stales. It is not necessarily implied that the I’niled States should go to war with European aggressors. But is it 100 much to ask that lhe I’niled Stales should take up an attitude towards aggressor nations comparable with that takmi up by any good (dlizen towards aggressors in Hie community in which he lives.’ Doing that, she would not only impose a ban of moral outlawry mi an'’ airgressor nation but wcmld exclude it from commercial ami oilier dealings of every kind. The alternative, for the United States, is to remain, as at present, a rather helpless spectator of events in which her own destiny as a nation very plainly involved.