BLOCKADE MAY DECIDE THE WAR

Press, Volume LXXVII, Issue 23446, 29 September 1941, Page 4

BLOCKADE MAY DECIDE THE WAR

INSIDE GERMANY

NEW YORK, September 22. A German with American business connexions who left Germany m August to take up permanent residence in the United States, has given me what appears to be a well-balanced and accurate account of present conditions in his native land. Although strongly opposed to the Nazi regime, he seemed exceptionally objective in his observa. tions. I asked my informant nine questions, covering a wide purview of the national and individual life. He was frank to admit a lack of knowledge or to hesitate to express an opinion unless he felt full certainty. Perhaps the readiest way of presenting the interview would be to indicate each question and follow it with the reply (1) What is the morale of the German people—good, bad, or indifferent? An extremely difficult question to answer. It is doubtful if Hitler knows. Nazi Party officials and those who profit by the regime, as well as those who “run along” with it, seem confident of victory. The general public doesn’t express itself very often on the question of defeat. A number of people, however, still small, although a growing group, fear that Germany’s defeat will be more decisive and the after-effects more telling than in the last war. It must bo remembered, however, that more individuals than in any government since the unification of Germany by Bismarck have a personal stake in the present German regime. Compare, for instance, the number of army officers with the rank of marshal in Germany in this war as against the last, not to mention the hundreds of thousands of other factotums and directive heads. These persons must have confidence, the total percentage of confidence in Germany may, therefore, he high. That is perhaps one of the tokens of successful management of the nation by the Nazis. Defeat By Blockade A general collapse of public morale is not readily foreseeable. It is known, however, that there have been sabotage-remonstrances, particularly against the false promises of immunity from enemy air raids of metropolitan Germany. It is known that bombs have been thrown at, and damage done to, the Air Ministry buildings. (2) Have Germans any fear of losing the war by a military defeat, say, in the next two years? You, as a German, do you think that in the. end Germany will be undone in the field? The answer to both these questions is—No. Germans, including myself, do not see how a sufficiently large expeditionary force can ever be landed by Great Britaih and the United States on the Continent of Europe to defeat the German Army. (.3) Then do you think that Germany can ever be defeated? Certainly. She will be defeated as she was in the last war, by the British blockade. Contrary to the reassurances by German officials as to the ineffectiveness of the blockade and the scepticism apparently current in the Allied countries themselves as to its value, the blockade is producing the steady pressure that is undermining German strength. There is a general feeling in Germany that after Christmas there will be an extreme food shortage in the country. It is true that Germany is still getting some foodstuffs and raw materials from the occupied countries and neutral contiguous nations, but it is a steadily diminishing supply, certainly not enough of a supplement of domestic production to give the civilian population or the military machine the necessities to maintain the present war economy. Nor do Germans seem to feel that foreseeable further conquests will augment supplies to the point where Germany can hold a continent or continents against world opposition. The blockade, in my opinion, is Britain's major positive victory in the war thus far—and the instrument that will give it ultimately complete victory. Russia and Air Raids (4) What about Germany’s further conquests—Russia? Portugal? The Mediterranean? An invasion of Great Britain? The German people were overwhelmed by the sudden attack on Russia. It was a bigger sensation to the Germans than the outbreak of the war in September, 1939. People even to-day neither comprehend the aim of the, Nazis in Russia, nor the exact character of the military plans against her. They are asking more and more what exactly is the purpose of the war on Russia. Portugal seems next on the list of German conquests. The German newspapers are maintaining a campaign of insistence that Portugal will soon join the war on Germany’s side. After all, Portugal is another nation with much consumers’ goods and raw materials of every kind ready for “mining” by Germany to keep the insatiably maw of the military machine full. The Mediterranean? An invasion of Britain? Who knows?

[By the New York Correspondent of the “Sydney Morning Herald. ’[ (Published by Arrangement.)

(5) What has been the extent of damage by Royal Air Force raids? The percentage of destruction ig small, probably still considerably less than that committed by Germany in the British Isles, but individual cities have suffered heavy damage. The hardest hit areas have been in the •west the north-west, and the southwest. The following cities have been ■ extremely hard hit: Mannheim, Boschum, Dusseldorf, Frankfurt-on-Main, Muenster, Bielefeld, Aachen, Cologne, Bremen, Emden, Kiel, and Hamburg, The damage in Berlin has been relatively smaller. Siemenstadt. the great industrial suburb of Berlin, and the newspaper centre, the Fleet Street of Berlin have suffered heavily. The publication of casualty lists shows that many have been killed or injured. The question is often asked why the British have inflicted virtually no damage on the great Government centre of Berlin. The answer is that the Nazis have spent millions of marks in camouflaging this area, and have moved public monuments, such as the Victory Column, which has been shifted from near the Kroll Opera House to the Grosser Stern in the vicinity of the Tiergarten, to outwit Royal Air Force bombers. The most extraordinary piece of successful camouflage has been over the eastwest Axis, the arterial road through Berlin. From the air it now looks like an extended section of parklands. Food Situation As to whether British bombing is destroying any considerable military objectives. there is now current, in Germany a very illustrative joke. People say that the Government has ordered the installation of a parrot in every important industrial plant with an air raid shelter, which bird, after the destruction of that plant by Royal Air Force bombers, is released to perch on the ruins and cry out: “No military damage done! No military damage done! Only civilian property de. stroyedl” (6) Can the German people "take" . the air raids with the heroism of th* British? . Heroism in the terms you infer is a quality discernible in direct ratio to the mass and extent of the air raids. Whether or not people are heroic under aerial bombardment when such bombardment is relatively small is insignificant. The greater portions of Germany have not yet been smashed. When that occurs, one will be better able to say whether the Germans can (7) How bad is the food situation in Germany? You will not misunderstand me when I say that it is bad, but also mixed. The bread, for instance, is still good. The day that it becomes as bad as I knew it in the World War will mark the collapse of Germany. My feeling is that the management of the food supply has not been good. The ersatz is greater than it ever was, its skill more noticeable, and the satisfaction it gives less than ever. The , Nazis are having a bad time of it in cutting the cloth to fit the garment, so to speak. When potatoes were a short crop, more fresh vegetables were made available. Last Christmas we were given a treat, all the carp we wanted. I do not overstate when I say that carp is the best-liked fish in Germany. But as a consequence, the ponds of Germany were completely strained. It will be a long time before Germans will be able to have another . unlimited carp treat. Meat, butter, fruits, and all the better health-building foods are available in only minute quantities, and the pros* pects of an increase in the supply are small. A rock melon, for instance, costs 2.60 dollars. Not that rock melons are an essential of diet, but it is an indication of the state of things. One cannot say that malnutrition exists on any considerable scale. But that malnutrition will occur widely if present minimal food supplies still further diminish, as seems clear they will, then we’ll have a repetition of the state of affairs of the last war. I am convinced that the people are growing hungrier from month to month. Demand for Labour (8) Has Germany solved its labour shortage problem by impressed labour —from the occupied areas or from among prisoners of war? I never before in my life heard so many foreign languages spoken on Berlin streets as recently. But foreign labour whether impressed or voluntary—as such, ostensibly the Italian—does not seem to provide a stable solution of the problem. How otherwise explain the interdiction of further Jewish immigration and the inclusion of Jews of both sexes over a wide age range in forced labour battalions? The war machine’s demand" for men is disproportionate to the available labour supply that Germany seems able to tap. (9) Do thinking Germans, those op* posed to the Nazi regime, have any confidence in the regeneration of their nation after the extirpation of Nazism by an' Allied victory? Yes. They feel that harsh peace terms after a German defeat would alone produce the seed-bed for future Nazism.