Evening star., 1940-01-05
all the frenzied energy of Nad

Germany now has over 10000 900
of her own citizens, 10000 900 helots
and the factories of Poland and
Czecho- -Slovakia as well as her own
factories to put to work, and for the
present only the western front to
worry about. So long as she thinks
there is chance of wrestling sea
power from Britain either by direct
attack or through France, she will
not think of peace-except the kind
of peace which will only make it
easy for her to renew the attack
under more favorable conditions in
q short while.
Now word about peace. OF
course, all our ideas are based on
the assumption that Hitler loses the
war. If Hitler wins, all the many
societies in Europe which are trying
to think out how the present catas-
trophe can be prevented from recur-
ring and the world healed when the
fighting Is over, can shut up shop
at once. The pattern of the. post
war world will be determined by him
and not by us, and we have as yet
no clear indication of what that
pattern will be like, except that it
certainly will not correspond with
our ideas of freedom.
Dream Was Not False.
Even assuming victory, it is not
easy to talk about peace with this
tremendous threat hanging over us,
but the general British view is clear.
The kind of world of which the de-
mocracies dreamed 20 years ago was
not q false dream. We think it was
right dream and that in some
form it must be realized because in
substance it Is the only way forward
for those who believe in liberty and
the freedom of the human spirit
But it is now clear that in 1919 none
of us understood what it was neces-
sary to do if our hopes were to be
fulfilled. The ideals which lay be-
hind the League of Nations can only
succeed if all its members are de-
mocracies. The covenant of the
League was too rigid. 1t had no
effective machinery for making
changes peacefully. The principle
of universal national self f-determi-
nation was incompatible with the
unity recently given to the world by
mechanical invention and economic
progress, and made both peace and
prosperity impossible. Yet if any
form of world organization is to
work Europe must be equipped to
manage its own internal affairs by
some system of federalism.
The greatest of our mistakes were
economic. What did more to wreck
civiliza ton than anything else was
the belief that a war-stricken world
could recover by system which
combined immense international in
debtedness with unrestrained tariff
protectionism. That was probably
the major cause of the world de-
preston of 1929.
After reviewing the progress Of
democracy in the Victorian age, he
went on:
THE 10Th century system can
not now be restored in its old form.
In the first place, economically the
world has advanced beyond laissez-
faire, whether in trade or migration.
In the second place, by itself Brit
ain neither can nor ought to play by
herself the dominant role she
played in the last century. The
rights of new naval nations and the
rise of air power makes that impos-
sible. And sea power should be in
the hands of the democracies, and
not of one power. Even ut this mo-
ment, If we face honestly the facts,
cur present safety today rests upon
the fact that we control the Atlantic
and you control the Pacific. Neither
we nor you nor the overseas repub-
lies and dominions would be so Sc
cure if either of us was left to act
alone.
1.-THE 18th century system, of
course, was by no means perfect.
But can any fair-minded person
doubt that on the whole 1t promoted
freedom, prosperity and peace better
than any system which preceded it
in modern times? And can any fair
minded person doubt that If Herr
Hitler and his friends were to win
the war and seize its sea power and
sea bases from Britain, that the
world would get any equivalent pros
perity or freedom? It might get
peace. but it would be q peace with
the light Of liberty gone out. That
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