MURDER FROM THE AIR
THIS week all civilised men have once again been appalled at the massacre of defenceless civilians by attacks from the air ; but there is still no sign of any serious attempt to restrain those who are guilty of such crimes against humanity. In Canton alone between i,000 and 2,000 men and women have been killed in the course of three days, and a far greater number seriously wounded ; there is no evidence that any important military objective has been attained, or even aimed at. Well indeed, but with little hope, may China appeal to the judgement of the civilised Powers of Europe. There was a time when even war might claim to be a civilised pursuit ; by now it has come to include the purposeless and indiscriminate destruction of non- combatants as one of its essential activities. And it can safely be asserted that unless some check is placed on the developMent of air warfare, the worst is yet to come. Neither Japan nor General Franco possesses the overwhelming air strength of the European Great Powers ; and so far both of them have been able to bomb indiscriminately without fear of reprisals. The Republican Government in Spain has indeed bound itself not to reply to massacre with massacre ; but rather than watch the unceasing slaughter of the helpless it has had to threaten that it will meet murder with murder.
The disasters that have so far occurred in China and in Spain are but miniatures of what can be done by two modern nations of equal strength and equal ferocity. Any one so foolish as to think they are of little importance because China, and even Spain, is far away, should reflect that the fate of Chinese and Spaniards today may be, on a more horrible scale, his tomorrow. And if he thinks that at least it does not concern him as yet, he should realise that the air attacks on the cities of Spain and of China already mean that the science and material advances which have been Europe's gift to the world have degenerated into weapons of destruction. No good European can feel free of the shame implicit in the events of the last week. A civilisation, today common to the whole world, that allows such crimes to proceed unchecked deserves to perish, and inevitably will.
For there is not in fact much more inherent vice in the men who bomb innocent men, women and children than in those who accept such crimes with apathy or indifference. In the last two years some modern nations have used the war in Spain to test their latest bombers and high explosives on the bodies of the people of Spain ; the others have done no more than make formal protests. The British Government, for one, has denounced in unqualified terms the air attacks in China and Spain ; but, apparently, it has no power, short of going to war, to restrain the guilty rulers and Governments. Short of that it has to confess itself helpless to defend not only the civilian populations of Shanghai, Canton, Hankow, Madrid, Barcelona, Valencia, Alicante and all the other cities on which murder has fallen suddenly from the air ; it cannot even ensure the safety of the crews of British ships, sunk with impunity in the harbours of Government Spain.
To say this is merely to state a fact, not necessarily to condemn. It may be, indeed, that there are no means of checking the outbreak of savagery in Europe and the East. But is such helplessness inevitable ? The innumerable plans and proposals made at the abortive Disarmament Conference have, indeed, been lost with all the debris of fine schemes which never came to fruition ; but it would appear that the German Government, at least, has still not disowned the proposals for the abolition of bombing of open towns and villages, and the dropping of poison, gas, or incendiary bombs which Herr Hitler definitely proposed in 1936. It is, and always has been, assumed by the British Government that there is a possible basis for agreement between the Powers of Western Europe, including Germany ; and if there is, it is obvious that it had better be exploited at once before it disappears under the sheer weight of the armaments they are heaping up against each other. There could be no better proof that such a basis exists at the present time than agreement on this proposal by the four great Western Powers. It cannot be said that such a suggestion is impracticable because of mistrust of each other's intentions or unwillingness to keep obligations ; if that is true, then the whole of British policy, as expressed by the Government, is misconceived. If agreement cannot be reached on a proposal by which all must gain and no one lose, an accord on more contentious questions is beyond all hope.
But even if such a proposal proved in the end impracticable, mere indifference or apathy in the face of indiscriminate air bombing could never be justified. It cannot be pretended, either by the Government or its opponents, that Japan and insurgent Spain attach no value to the influence of Great Britain or the Dominions ; and it is necessary to show that such influence cannot ever be on the side of those who wilfully commit crimes that strike at the very basis of civilisation. It is not necessary, in this case, to speak of sanctions or reprisals or repeat ambitious phrases, long forgotten, of " steady resistance to unprovbked aggression " ; it is necessary only that Great Britain should speak with the voice that is really hers and let it be known that her diplomatic, financial and political influence can never be used on the side of those who are not merely aggressors but little short of wanton murderers. The effect of such a declaration will be all the greater, so long as it is sincerely meant, because the air raids in China and Spain have served no military purpose and, judged by purely military standards,
have recoiled on the heads of those who make them. Mr., Chamberlain has lately said that the horrors of indiscriminate bombing cannot be avoided by " crude and ill-thought-out proposals " ; it is for the Government to make proposals now which are neither crude not ill-thought-out ; plenty of them can be found in the Disarmament Conference archives ; if it does, it will command the support of every man and woman in this country and the approval of the whole civilised world.
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