Cocks letter diary, 1916-1919 / Verner Cocks - Page 477
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[Page 477]
Memorandum
by Chaplain the Right Rev. Bishop G. M. LONG, D.D.,
on Educational Organization for the A.I.F.
The organizataion is designed to render service to the Army, to Australia, to the men of the A.I.F.
It is essential during a protracted war to have agencies for keeping the men mentally alert and eager so as to prevent war weariness and consequent decline of moral.
Interesting courses of study concurrent with the routine of Military duties are very helpful indirectly in making good soldiers and maintaining discipline, breaches of which not infrequently have their origin in sheer boredom. Sufficiently strong reasons exist for the establishment of such an organization during the continuance of actual warfare, but the most powerful reasons are to be found in contemplating the period when hostilities cease.
It is wise to prepare for a condition of affairs when agreement has been made to suspend warfare upon International conditions, which of necessity would be general in their statement. International Conferences may then be called to discuss and to find the greatest settlement in history of national boundaries and aspirations, disposition of colonial possessions, commercial treaties and many other vast and intricate subjects.
During the greater part of such a possible Conference it may be impossible to withdraw men or guns from the Field. Armies may have to be maintained for a very considerable period in the Field with little or no military functions to perform.
This period would be anterior to the period of demobil-