HITLER'S "GENIUS"

Auckland Star, Volume LXXIV, Issue 36, 12 February 1943, Page 2

HITLER'S "GENIUS"

TRAGIC SALIENTS

LIGHT ON AFRICAN DRIVE

(By-COLONEL FREDERICK PALMER). NEW YORK. Absolute unity on two subjects prevails in the army and the War Production Board, no matter how sharp their differences at times about the division of authority in production scheduling. Both hail any signs that Adolf Hitler is relying on his own Nazi genius in supreme command both as a soldier and industrialist. Again Hitler has been a victim in Russia of weakness for getting into salients against the judgment of his generals, for which he blames them, and then fires them. In the early German campaigns— in Poland, France and the Balkans— the wedge of the salient system of penetration by armoured columns was highly successful. But if you cannot spread the salient and the enemy presses in on both sides, he has you pocketed. That danger the expert commander would avoid through judgment of his strength and the enemy's, and his own and the enemy's tactical skill. If he cannot spread the salient, and he doubts his strength to hold it, then withdrawal in good order to rectify his line is better than to be thrown back in disorder with heavy losses. The Pincers Pinched Up to the fall weather the salient system worked well in the German campaign of 1941 in Russia. Then, contrary to the advice of his general, Hitler drove the salients around Moscow in the usual pincers fashion, into the jaws of Russian winter and Russian fire. The prongs of the pincer lent themselves to being pinched, and they were pinched. In the early stages of the offensive of 1942 the same wedge system was •successful,' but- with much smaller and much harder won gains than in '41'.'-"'-Again with the approach of Winter^the Germans were caught in ' salient's which they could not spread. And again Hitler refused to listen to his generals who favoured withdrawals to defensive positions less open to attack, and, in case of attack, the Nazis would make the Russians pay heavily for any ground won. Hitler pig-headedly continued pounding at Stalingrad with his flanks exposed, thus inviting a counter offensive. On the face of the situation oft the map, it 'did seem that the Russians had not the force available in thenown exhaustion to strike back, without a risk of a failure which would be disastrous. . . We know how Prime Minister Winston Churchill took the word in person to Premier Josef Stalin, which was confirmed by President Roosevelt of the planned joint AngloAmerican offensive east and west across North Africa. With that in mind, Premier • Stalin could time his own offensive, and whether he made it more than a gesture was bound to depend upon the results of the Anglo-American offensive. The results warranted the extensive Russian offensive which is now in progress. Stalin and the Darlan Expedient Hitler had to commit himself to the last resort defence of a Tunisia with his back to the sea. He was between two fires. The hotter both were for him the sooner the last Axis soldier was off the South Mediterranean shore. With the Nazis driven out of Africa aid would reach

Russia from the United States and Britain by the short Mediterranean lifeline instead of twice across the Equator around by the Cape of Good Hope or by the Arctic Ocean to Murmansk. This can be said for Admiral Darlan. He was guileful enough with the Nazi bayonet at his back, to retain the command of French armed forces, and, again, when it was a most telling blow against the Axis to turn both military and naval forces in the vast area of French Africa over to us. We were not only saved mopping up Algeria and French Morocco by force, but we had airfields, railroads and highways open to us which meant the W.P.B. had to send less material and, therefore, could send more arms to Africa. Not All Heroic Angels The Free French, gallant as they are, were not strong enough to take a single port which fell to us with little or no fighting. The Free French are not all heroic angels. Their mixture ' includes certain far from noble types who through luck of money were enabled to escape Nazi slavery in France. Certain of those who are now shouting loudest in condemnation of Lieutenant-General Dwight D. Eisenhower's expediency, once the way for them is cleared by British and American soldiers for their native land, will be met with: "So you were being cozened and well fed while we were on the point of starvation, bowing our knees and enduring hell as we bided our time." And the soldiers who deliver France from thralldom will have no interest in the perpetuation of old quarrels among French political factions. —Auckland Star and N.A.N.A.