TOPICS OF THE DAY.

Waikato Times, Volume 121, Issue 20284, 28 August 1937, Page 6

TOPICS OF THE DAY.

The Outlook I view with revulsion, writes Mr J. M. Keynes in the New Statesman, the growing tendency to make of the struggle between the two ideologies (or would it be conceded that there are three?) another War of Religion, to believe that the issuo can or will be settled by force of arms, and to feel that it is our duty to hasten to anv quarter of the world where those of our faith are oppressed. It is only too easy for men to feel like this. The Crusades and the Thirty Years’ War actually occurred. But does it seem, looking back that it was a duty to join in them, or that they settled anything? Assume that the war occurs, and let us suppose, for the sake'’of argument, that we win. What then? Shall we ourselves be the better for it and for what it will have brought with it? What are wo going to do with the defeated? Are we to impose our favourite ideology on them (whatever, hv then. it. may bel in nn up-to-date Peace Treat}', or do we assume that they will adopt it with spontaneous enthusiasm? At best we should he back, it seems to me, exactly where we were. Defeat is complete disaster. Victory, as usual, would be useless, and probably pernicious. It is an illusion to believe that conscious acceptance of guilt in the necessary murder can settle what is mainly a moral issue.