NAZIS IN AUSTRIA.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume 58, Issue 41, 27 November 1937, Page 12

NAZIS IN AUSTRIA.

FRESH PROPAGANDA.

THE GOVERNMENT’S ACTIONS. It appears that the Austrian Government is at present dealirig more severely with the Austrian Nazis, who have been greatly encouraged by the lenient treatment of the past months and have rapidly gathered their forces (says the Vienna correspondent of the ‘‘Manchester Guardian”). The action against the Nazis now is directed less by police agents than by special formations of the Fatherland Front, tlips combating the Nazis with the very methods they employ in the Third Reich. I have reported demonstrations arranged by groups of the Fatherland Front against the too prominent exhibition of Herr Hitler’s “My Struggle” in Graz bookshops. Recently an excited crowd demanded the withdrawal of this book from one of the leading bookships of Innsbruck. In Maria Theresa Street the bookseller immediately yielded, but in Eerier Street a bookseller withstood the crowd and was insulted. The bookseller called the police, who restored order, but Hitler’s book ha.d to be withdrawn into a less prominent part of the window. The Nazis Attacked. 'ln Weis, where Nazi demonstrations took place on the occasion of a meeting of Austrian and German war veterans, the authorities are taking energetic > measures. Several Nazis were sentenced by the police for painting swastikas on the walls or for possessing Nazi propaganda material. Important railway officials in "Weis have been excluded from tlie Fatherland Front becn.use secret leanings to the Nazis were suspected. The Carinthian authorities closed the Stiegenbrau Inn in Villacli, a favourite meeting-place of the Nazis. On August 15, the newly-formed Storm Corps (the Austrian counterpart of the S.S. in Germany) placed a wreath on the Fallen Heroes’ Monument in Villach. The Nazis stole the wreath and carried it in triumph to their inn, where they were attacked by the Storm Troopers. The Nazis were handed over to the police, and the Storm Corps found that large quantities of propaganda material were stored in the place, including instructions for terroristic acts. The Catholic organ “Reichspost” writing about the Vih lich events, said that the incident in this Carinthian town showed that tho Storm Troopers were filled with tho spirit of initiative which was expected from them by tho patriotic population. This spirit, it said, was a guarantee that within a. short time the last centres of disorder would disappear. Resourceful Workers. Nevertheless, tho German Nazi propaganda is indefatigable in devising new means of permeating the Austrian people with its ideas. Just recently tho Austrian authorities had to cancel a.n international canoe-race beeauso they learned that, though Poles, Hungarians, and Czechs were also taking part in the race, the German Nazis intended to use the occasion for largescale demonstrations along the shores of the Danube.

Propaganda journeys to Germany are promoted under the disguise of “art excursions,” and the GermanAustrian Volksbund, which is one ot the camouflaged organisations working for the union of the two countries, announced a journey to Munich in the first week of September —that is to say, during the opening weekend of the Nuremberg party meeting. The journey was nominally to visit the German Art a.nd Degenerate Art exhibitions in Munich, but a stop was made for afternoon tea at Braunau-cn-the-Inn, the birthplace of Herr Hitler, and it was hinted that from Munich a cheap train can be caught to Nuremberg, stopping a.t Berchtesgaden, the Fuhrer’s country residence. The whole trip cost less than two pounds in English money.