U.S. CRITICISM.

Auckland Star, Volume LXXI, Issue 283, 28 November 1940, Page 7

U.S. CRITICISM.

ROUND UGLY CORNER.

BRITISH CENSORSHIP. Press Complaints Against Official Policy. United Press Association.—Copyright. LONDON, Nov. 27. Criticism of the British censorship, which has not been heard for many months, is increasingly evident in United States newspapers. The chief of the London bureau of the ''New York Times," referring to the censorship as "now in the full bloom of the silly season," says things have reached such a pass that British newspapers are printing German communiques to make a pretence of telling their readers what is going on in England. The censorship, he says., is becoming ominously as oppressive as that of France before the collapse. The London correspondent of the American Associated Press, Mr. Drew Middleton, says the British capacity for understatement is working overtime, partly through patriotism and partly as propaganda. "Complacency, distortion and reluctance to admit the truth are perhaps as dangerous to the British cause as the nightly bombings," says Mr. Middleton. "German night raiders have dropped tens of thousands of tons of bombs, yet one is asked to believe that no damage lias been done to military objectives. Are the bombers that hit Buckingham Palaoe unable to hit the sprawling factories of the Midlands t Believe it if you can. Morale Not Damaged. "The Germans have killed thousands' of civilians without damaging the country's morale. They have damaged shipping and railroads without demoralising the war effort. Londoners are cheerful and stubborn, but tired. Shelter conditions are still abominable, and are a menace to health, more dangerous potentially than German bombs.

"In other cities the people are less cheerful, and grumble that London ismore protected. They say the propaganda that says London is not hurt is causing the Germans to change their strategy and hammer Coventry, Liverpool, Birmingham, Bristol and Southampton. "The people are more ready to face the brutal truth than the newspapers or the British Broadcasting Corporation." The Associated Press in New York, commenting on these dispatches, says they are significant because they have passed the censorship, which previously frowned on such statements. 'l%is may mean that the British have changed their attitude, and l>elieve a dark picture of danger will arouse more sympathy in the United States than.the confident optimism displayed up to

Empire Now On The Way To Victory. SIR C. NEWALL'S VIEW. (Reed. 11 a.m.) LONDON, Nov. 27. Air Marshal Sir Cyril Newall, Gover-lior-General-designate of New Zealand, in a speech, said: "Not without a pang am I leaving my native land in this hour of danger. lam absolutely confident we have turned a very ugly corner and that with our forces and the output of our factories progressively increasing, and with further contributions from the Dominions, the Empire is on the way to victory.''

ARRESTS IN INDIA.

(Reed. 1 p.m.) BOMBAY, Nov. 27. Mavlankar, Speaker of the Bombay Assembly, and Mrishna Sinha, exPremier of Behar, iharve been-arrested.