VIOLENCE AS A POLITICAL WEAPON

"Brisbane - Victorian Labor MHR Dr. Moss Cass told Queensland University students yesterday to break the 'bloody' Crimes Act and not register for conscription. 'The Government has assured us time and time again that we are not at war so why have we got conscription', Dr. Cass said. 'In any case even in war time, presumably in a just war, then I don't think there would be a need for conscription anyway', he said," - The Age, Melbourne, July 14.

Dr. Cass's advocacy that young Australians should break the nation's laws is one more example of the growing pattern of a campaign of lawlessness, which if left unchecked, must inevitably lead to violence. And violence is what many of the Marxists want.

While spokesmen for the Gorton Government have paid some lip service to the necessity of upholding the Rule of Law, the Gorton Government must accept much of the responsibility for the growth of lawlessness throughout Australia. Its attitude has been weak. It has failed to give a firm lead.
But at last one Government Member, Mr. P. F. Lucock, Country Party representative for Lyne, N.S.W. has used some full-blooded language in commenting on what is happening. The Australian of July 14 quotes Mr. Lucock as charging in a prepared statement that Ministers of The Methodist Church had been "completely and absolutely dishonest" in urging youths to defy the National Service Act. Mr. Lucock said that recent statements by the Reverend Alan Walker, and the Reverend D. A, Trathen, headmaster of Newington College, Sydney, "could not be sustained in what they termed a Christian conscience." Mr. Lucock then went on to outline a fundamental truth, which Australians must heed if they wish to prevent their society from disintegrating into anarchy. "If you want to follow their line of reasoning to its logical conclusion, which is to say if you don't like a law then break it, this can lead to the situation where people feel it is legitimate to throw petrol bombs at the Prime Minister's office as happened in Melbourne recently."

Orderly Society, in which the rights and liberties of the individual are protected, is impossible without the Rule of Law. It is impossible to play games without the individual players accepting a Rule of Law, and the interpretation of rules by an impartial umpire. Young Australians are not taught to break the rules of the games they play simply because they do not like them. Striking or abusing umpires results in severe penalties. This does not mean that rules are something sacred, but it does mean that those who do not like certain rules should work to change them in an orderly and civilised manner.

Mr. Lucock correctly points out "It should be understood that when a youth registers for national service it does not then mean that he is committed to the armed forces or services overseas." Those who eventually find that they have been selected by the ballot system, and who claim to have strong conscientious objections to military service, may take their claims before the courts. Those who object to the serving in Vietnam have the alternative of serving with the Citizens' Military Forces.
In the face of the worsening international situation, we would suggest that National Service should be universal as it is in South Africa and Rhodesia.

It is true that large standing armies conscripted in peacetime, are contrary to the British and Australian tradition. But comparatively small professional forces are of little value in a crisis unless they can be quickly supported by civilians who have had sufficient basic training. If young Australians were being properly instructed in the Rule of Law, they would appreciate that if they wish to enjoy the benefits they do from the Society in which they live, they must also be prepared to accept their responsibilities to protect that society from threatened destruction. Freedom cannot be upheld without respect for proper authority and the acceptance of personal responsibility. Those who argue that they should not have to obey rules which they had no part in making might just as well argue that they should not obey the current road rules because they had no part in making them.

Society is an association of individuals, which has developed against a background of tradition, tradition being the accumulated experience of the past. Censorship and similar laws are not primarily concerned with the question of individual sin, but of the protection of Society. History teaches that a breakdown of sexual morality coincides with the breakdown of Society. Those with commercial or political motives for breaking down the Rule of Law concerning censorship advance the superficial argument that censorship laws foster greater interest in pornography. The logic of this argument is that the Rule of Law concerning private property rights, merely foster an urge to steal!

The attack on the Rule of Law is now worldwide, and there is irrefutable evidence that it is a major feature of the long-range Marxist revolutionary programme. But it is alarming to see politicians, pledged to uphold the Rule of Law, now in the forefront of the campaign to undermine it. Dr. Jim Cairns has become notorious for the manner in which he has taunted the Government to prosecute him for urging young Australians to break the law concerning registration for National Service. He now announces that he is going to have another mass march in Melbourne, on September 8, when he estimates that "about 100,000" will turn out. No doubt some of the marchers will once again carry Viet Cong flags and call for the Victory of the North Vietnamese.
Those concerned with the prevention of further lawlessness must ask where all this is going to end.

Because war has never been declared in Vietnam, Australians are free to protest publicly against Australian involvement in Vietnam. But what Australian worthy of the name would do anything to endanger the lives of Australian troops? At a December 1969 Melbourne meeting of trade unionists presided over by Labor Party State President, Mr. George Crawford, Australian troops in Vietnam were called upon to mutiny against their officers. Delegates to the Victorian State A.L.P. Conference last month put their signatures to a document inviting young Australians not to register under the National Service Act - to break the law. The State Labor leader, Mr. Holding, was one of those who signed the document.

Following the example of other Labor leaders, and clergy, the Labor Premier of South Australia, Mr. Don Dunstan, a lawyer by profession, said on June 27 that if he were a young man liable for national service, "I would not register and I would be prepared to take the consequences." When sworn in as Premier, Mr. Dunstan said: "I do swear that I will well and truly serve Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II, her heirs and successors according to law in the office of Premier. So help me God." But shortly after swearing an oath to uphold the law, the Premier of a State invites young people to break a law, which he does not like. We have seen no evidence that the Federal Government intends to do anything about upholding the Rule of Law, thus inviting still more lawlessness.

If the Gorton Government does not intend to uphold its own laws, then it should immediately change them. The present worsening situation cannot be permitted to continue indefinitely. If nothing is done, then the truth must be faced that the threat of violence as a political weapon has been successful introduced into Australia, and that parliamentary democracy is a dangerous farce.

WASHINGTON'S DISASTROUS AFRICAN POLICY

"There is no doubt in the minds of the British Prime Minister, Mr. Heath, and his ministers that the Nixon Administration does not approve of Britain's plan to resume arms sales to South Africa...it is clear that the American Assessment of how to resist communism in southern Africa, failed to get across to Sir Alec (Douglas-Hume). Mr. Rogers completed a tour of a dozen African capitals last spring, pointedly ignoring the white minority States south of the Zambesi, and reported his impressions to Mr. Heath yesterday. The Washington line is that concessions to South Africa will have the effect of presenting China and the Soviet Union with a ready-made diplomatic opening in the 41 states of black Africa. "- London Correspondent Patrick Keatley in The Australian, July 14.

As Southern Africa is of the greatest importance to a Western Europe hard pressed by Moscow, it is not surprising that Soviet strategy has been directed at isolating the South Africans, Rhodesians and Portuguese internationally. Mr. Rogers not only ignored Rhodesia and South Africa during his African tour last year, but also did not feel it necessary to visit Dr. Hastings Banda in Malawi. He was much more interested in Kenneth Kaunda of Zambia, the man who has been encouraging Communist-trained and Communist-equipped terrorists to attack Rhodesia and South Africa and who is inviting the Red Chinese in for the building of the railway line between Dar-es-Salaam and Lusaka.

The frightening truth appears to be that Secretary of State Rogers is almost completely ignorant concerning International Marxism. Appearing on an American TV "Face the Nation" programme on June 7, Rogers declared that the Nixon Administration would not use American troops to support the Cambodian Government. While admitting that it would be an "unfavourable development" if the Communists took over Cambodia," it would not be "unacceptable in the sense that we would use force to support the Government..." Asked about U. S. relations with the Soviet Union, which is the main supporter of the Communist war against South-East Asia, Mr. Rogers replied that, "on the whole, our relations with the Soviet are quite good." He admitted that the massive Soviet build up in the Middle East is of "concern to our Government", but then expressed the hope that the Soviet Union would "respond favourably to discussions we have had."

Any man who can talk such dangerous nonsense about the Soviet is obviously quite capable of believing that military support for South Africa, guarding one of the most vital international waterways in the whole world, would assist the Soviet and Red China. The Australian Government should be requested to give every possible encouragement to the British Government to implement its declared policy of providing the South Africans with the means to defend the Cape route.

THE INTERNATIONAL CHESS BOARD

by Eric D, Butler.

No one should be surprised that the Soviet Strategists have taken another major step forward with their Indian Ocean policy, through their latest agreement with the Government of Mauritius. The Soviet now has greater freedom to use Port Louis for its "fishing" fleets, and can also bring Soviet planes in to the Island. If British Prime Minister Heath can force his way into the European Economic Community, the sugar industry of Mauritius will suffer badly. No doubt the Soviet is looking ahead to the time when it will be able to step in to offer economic "aid". A similar situation could develop in Fiji.

The next move by the Soviet strategists concerning the Indian Ocean is now starting to take shape; an attempt will be made to re-open the Suez Canal to permit Soviet naval forces to move more freely from the Black Sea, to the Mediterranean, and then into the Indian Ocean. The Soviet military build up in Egypt is clearly designed to assist the Egyptians to push the Israelis back from the Canal. The landing barges now being provided by the Soviet indicate that the initial groundwork for this move is being under-taken. The Israelis are desperately seeking an increase of American military aid in an endeavour to prevent the balance of military power turning against them along the Suez.

Developments continue to prove the more widely publicised "experts" wrong, and the real experts like Sir John Glubb correct. Sir John stresses the obvious. Soviet Middle East strategy is directed primarily against Western Europe, not against Israel. It is difficult to see how the United States can now dislodge the Soviet in the Middle East - unless President Nixon is prepared to press for a removal of the Arab grievances. The Egyptians are just as entitled to have Soviet equipment and Soviet support based on their territory, as the South Vietnamese are entitled to have American equipment and troops based on their territory. Egyptian moves across the Suez are not moves against Israeli territory, but moves to recover Egyptian territory taken by the Israelis in the 1967 war.

The recent statements by Arabs leaders in the Persian Gulf region, opposing the Heath Government's policy of continuing to maintain British forces in this region, reflect the growing anti-Western sentiments of the whole Moslem world. The Soviet look ahead to the day when they control the source of most of Western Europe's oil supplies. The Soviet's Indian Ocean policy demands that the Australian Government does everything possible to encourage the new British Government to implement its stated East of Suez policy. It has an opportunity for doing something much more positive than it has to date.