Wairarapa Times-Age WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 15, 1943. getting on with the war.

Wairarapa Times-Age, 15 September 1943, Page 2

Wairarapa Times-Age WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 15, 1943. getting on with the war.

— +■ IT is not surprising', and certainly is not a matter for regret, that in view of the frank disapproval with which it has been received in Christchurch, Auckland, Wellington, Dunedin and elsewhere, the proposal to hold victory parades on a big scale next Saturday has been dropped. As the Prime Minister (Mr Fraser) has pointed out, the news of Italy’s surrender was received throughout the Dominion with natural and spontaneous enthusiasm and the reasons it gives for gratitude to our fighting forces and those of our Allies was recognised in church services and in other ways. It would be another matter, however, to organise an elaborate national celebration on an occasion of this kind. . . It has been made manifest that a great majority ot the ■people of New Zealand feel that by getting on with the war—that is to say by an uninterrupted continuation of normal activity of every useful kind—we shall better honour the achievements and sacrifices of our fighting men and the cause to which the United Nations are dedicated, than by calling a halt and expending time, energy and material in celebrating the attaim ment of a signal but incomplete stage of victory. It greatly affects the position that although Italy has surrendered, her.territory is far from having been occupied completely by the Allies and that battles on a major scale, the end of which is not yet in sight, are at present being fought upon it. As President Roosevelt said on receiving the news of the Italian surrender, the time has not yet come to celebrate. The event has been accepted by the armed forces whose achievements brought it to pass as a spur to additional and intensified effoit. The same standpoint should commend itself equally to civilians in this and all other lands of the United Nations. Incidentally, the suggestion of the Mayor and Mayoress of Masterton (Mr and Mrs Jordan) that thanksgiving for the victory over Italy should be expressed by completing the-district quota of the Patriotic Fund is practical and eminently appropriate. It is certainly much better that resources should be utilised in this way than that they should be expended in demonstration and display, with a vista of war, and the sacrifices and demands it entails, still stretching into the distance.