FIGHTING ALONE

Wairarapa Times-Age, 9 May 1941, Page 8

FIGHTING ALONE

“ALL 500,000,000 OF US.” There is more to Britain than a brave and fighting island, writes Mr Gordon Walker in the “Christian Science Monitor.” It is the “Aussies” who have reinforced Singapore—who stormed Bardia. Canadians guard Iceland. Hindu Jats, too. fortify Singapore, and Rhodesian pilots defend the skies of London. New Zealanders stand guard in Egypt. Uganda tribesmen swell the forces opposing the Italians in East Africa. They, like the Englishman who looked eastward from the Cliffs of Dover on the day of the fall of France, can say: “We light alone —all 500,000,000 of us.” Theirs are the Canadian transport trucks which carried British troops across Africa, the 125,000,000 pairs of Indian-made boots on which Empire troops are marching. Theirs is the gold from South Africa, tin from Malaya, wheat from Australia, and a gift of 50,000 dollars from the tiny speck of an island called Banaba. This is Britain today. This is the Empire which in the past few months has taken on a new vigour and unity. Paced by Canada, India, Australia, and New Zealand, it is funneling into the common war chest an ever-broadening stream of guns and butter, men and materials, which is giving the British struggle a new momentum.