The Auckland Star: WITH WHICH ARE INCORPORATED The Evening News, Morning News The Echo and The Sun MONDAY, AUGUST 21, 1939. TOWARDS A CLIMAX.

Auckland Star, Volume LXX, Issue 196, 21 August 1939, Page 6

The Auckland Star: WITH WHICH ARE INCORPORATED The Evening News, Morning News The Echo and The Sun

MONDAY, AUGUST 21, 1939. TOWARDS A CLIMAX.

For the causc that lacks assistance, For the icrong that reeds resistance, For the future in ihe distance, And the good that we can do.

If the German leaders hoped to attract the anxious attention of the world this month, and to make people in every country wonder whether, and where, Herr Hitler would .strike again, they have succeeded. There are ample indications that the existing tension in Europe will continue, and rise, in the next ten days. The soothsayers have long predicted trouble "after the harvest is in." German harvesting began about July 16, was expected to last about one month, and now presumably has been completed. The Fuehrer is to speak at Tannenberg early next week, and almost immediately afterwards will go to Nuremberg for the annual congress'of the Nazi party, which opens on September 2. By then, if he means to attain his objective before the winter, he will have made final preparations aqd be able to present Poland and the Powers supporting her with the choice of peace or war. These preparations are going on fast. Poland now has German, or German-controlled, troops on her southern border. At the same time the German propaganda factory, working at full blast, is making all Germans angrily aware of the plight of the German minority in Poland and of the cruelty of the Poles, though presumably the Poles have not changed their nature in the few months since Herr Hitler denounced the

non-aggression treaty.

These* tactics are familiar and were foreseen, but it would be short-sighted to minimise their efficacy. The Polish State is not so well designed or securely established that it could resist indefinitely the forms of attack to which it is now being subjected. Ostensibly the immediate problem is the future of Danzig, which the Poles have detilared is vital to them. But if German demands are increased, and grow more menacing, if the Germans are successful in creating a situation in which it will seem to the Poles that their allies are far distant, while their enemies are very near, then the Poles may be willing to make concessions at Danzig. And with the whole world desperately anxious to "keep out of war," any nation urging Poland to stand fast might easily be represented as a war-maker. Such a situation could aid only Germany, and any settlement in such circumstances could only be a respite. But it is still doubtful whether, in the crisis which apparently lies ahead, both the Governments and the peoples on Poland's side would not gladly take the respite, and, forgetting what happened last March, hope that German ambitions were at length satisfied. The Germans are probably thoroughly well aware that any overt attack on Poland would start a war, but fairly obviously they hope that the Polish will to resist can be reduced by other means.