VISIONS OF CONQUEST

Dominion, Volume 33, Issue 118, 12 February 1940, Page 8

VISIONS OF CONQUEST

At the commencement of the war the utmost efforts of Nazi diplomacy and propaganda were exerted in attempts towlrivc a n cage between Britain and France. The French people were told t.'iat Germany had no enmity for France; that Britain was simply using France as a tool for the furtherance of her own selfish interest*-. And so on. This clumsy manoeuvre was ridiculed in Prance. Ihe French people arc realists, and are under no illusions concerning die origins of the war, or what would happen to them if their territory were invaded. The Nazis have now changed their tunc. Prance, declared Dr. Frick in an address to a gathering oi officials, is now. with Britain, the hated enemy of Germany. Both must be conquered. . | ■ Much more interesting than the immediate objects oi the Nazi hate campaign, however, is Hitler’s vision of conquest as revea.cd by Dr. Hermann Ranschning, former Nazi President ol Danzig m Hie London Sunday Times. The writer had a conversation with Hen Hitler in 1934. in which the Fuehrer, declaring that he would not shrink- from war with Britain il necessary, went on to say. We need space to make us independent of every possible polilieal grouping and alliance. In the east we must, have Hie mastery as far as the Caucasus and Iran. In Hie 'vest we need the rrench coast. We need Flanders and Holland. Above all. we need Sweden. We must become a colonial Bower. We must have a sea power equal to that of Britain. “I make no distinction between triends and enemies, lie added. 1 shall have a Western Union of Holland. Flanders, Northern Prance, and a Northern Union ol Denmark. Sweden, and Norway, li they don't like it they can drive me out.' 1 his outburst a.most sounds like maniacal raving. Yet is shows the trend ol Hitlers thinking. It demonstrates very clearly the danger to which the whole of I'.mopc would be exposed if the system he has created for the. lurtlieiauce of his schemes is not completely overthrown and crushed.