TOPICS OF THE DAY

Waikato Times, Volume 124, Issue 20738, 23 February 1939, Page 8

TOPICS OF THE DAY

Economic Strength

“Italy’s financial, commercial and industrial future seems to depend largely on her success in exploiting North Africa and Abyssinia, says the Birmingham Post. “If Japan pushes her war in China and still fails, then the reaction which ‘dogs the steps of all extremes will produce a Red Japan. If Italy pushes her Mediterranean ambitions too far, her foreign policy will fail —and her industrial and commercial setback may easily create an anli-Faseist revolution. Nobody wants either of these crises to arise. The difficulty. for foreign nations with broader-based policies and more solid foundations economically, is to decide just bow far economic and social stability in Japan and stability in Italy depend on success in political ventures and aims most of these foreign nations deplore and sometimes resenl: and just how much is worth paying, politically, for this economic and social stability. . . . Surely the non-aggressor Powers, Great Britain and the I nited States leading, may reasonably consider use of their present economic strength as a political asset to be used actively instead of a liability to be defended passively.”