WHY ITALY IS WAITING.

Oamaru Mail, Volume XL, Issue 12541, 12 May 1915, Page 3

WHY ITALY IS WAITING.

M. Jules Destree, a Socialist of international reputaiion, who lias for many years been one of the leading figures in the Belgian Chamber, contributes the following article to the "Daily Chronicle." Will Italy intervene in the present conflict ? That is a. question that cannot be answered offhand, for the situation is extremely complex. Before resolving on war it is necessary to be in a state of preparedness, military, financial, and moral. I leave it to others more competent than .myself to describe Italy's military and financial posiI tion.

It is no.light matter for a Goveriimen to o-o.to war. For so tremendous ;i deci sion the .moral preparation of the initio; is no less imperative than its materia preparation. The' whole people must rea liso the necessity for war, and must b drawn into it by the strength of thei own inner feelings. This condition 1 particularly indispensable in a democrati country where public opinion is a consid n-able power.. Now, opinion in Italy is very divided [f day by day the. number'of those ii avour of intervention seems to grow, tin irocess is slow. . First of all, there stil ■emain in Italy a certain number of par isans of the Alliance with Germany am Vustria. The Triple Alliance e.xistec ong enough to create ties that cannot h< mloosed in a day. No doubt after Sig lor Salandra's declaration in the Cham )er, no one believes or maintains an; that Italy was bound by her trea ies° to co-operate in the Austro-Germai iffort. , , r The arrangement was a purely tlelen live alliance, and. it was Austria whiol ittacked Serbia. When. Italy proclaims ler neutrality she cannot bo said to hav< ;one back on her word in any particular 3ut quite apart from' treaties, there ari hose who hold that Italy would filid it o \er interest to put herself alongside tin Central Empire's in a common.policy. The; nake no appeal to sentiments of sympa hy. but to self-interest and purely utili arian, prolit-seeking motives. They un lardly listened to, however, and even tin nost ardent partisans of the continuanci if the Triple Alliance, are perfectly awan hat military intervention in favour c Vustria is an utter impossibility. A Vovcrnment which tried to impose such ; nurse of action on the country would bi ,wept out of office in twenty-four hour: >y a Parliamenttary vote or a popuar re 'olution. This Germauohpil group, however, pru lently confines itself to a demand for tin uaintenance of Italy's present neutrality Naturally it has the support of all tin noney influences and propagandist agen ies that the Germans are maintain ng in this country. It is especially tmong the great business men of the mid lie cfass. the merchants and manufactnr irs, as well as among the Catholics, tha .hese more or less open partisans of tin ild alliance are to be found. The forme ook for financial advantages from neutral ty; the latter are alienated from Englauc ind Franco for the veiy reasons that re •ommend the cause of the Allies to tin lemocratic sections of the community. The. Catholics arc ill-disposed towards and Liberal England; and the 'Jay policv" of the French Republic has .{ten irritated thorn- They much prclor "atVlic Austria to these two impiw.

nations. And they show themselves strangely indifferent to the martyrdom of Belgium, albeit a Catholic nation, too—indifferent to the burning of churches, to the shooting of priests, to Iho eloquent and dignified exhortations of Caidinal Mercier!

On the other hand the .Socialists or rather the most important group; the official Socialist are for neutrality on principle as being systematic opponents of war itself. But they are far from being unanimous, and only quite recently the chief editor of their official journal, the "Avauti"—Citizen Mussolini—publicly dissociated himself from that paper in 'order to found another, the "I'opolo DTtalia." which is outright for war. The neutralists, however, do not all mean the same thing when they speak of '•neutrality. Some of them want an 'absolute neutrality: others a neutrally that will make what profit it can out of diplomacy; others, again, arc} for a rather brow-beating and menacing neutrality. Over against these arc the Interventionists, strongly entrenched in the Radical and Democratic parties, and backed up by the Irredentists and Nationalists. They constitute an ardent and energetic section in Parliament, and appear to have with them the mass of the people.