STARK REALITIES

Dominion, Volume 38, Issue 20, 18 October 1944, Page 7

STARK REALITIES

Problems In France And Belgium

(By Telegraph.—Press Assn. —Copyright.) (Special Correspondent.) (Received October 17, 7 p.m.) LONDON, October 16.

Now that the natural celebrating of their liberation from German domination is subsiding, people in both France and Belgium have a growing realization of the difficulties facing them. General de Gaulle's recent speech summed up many details, and reports from correspondents emphasize the stark realities. A correspondent of the 'Observer, writing from Paris, says: “When the picture is finally complete France will be found to have -suffered from the ravages of war far more than at first appeared to be the case. The actual material damage from bombs and shellfire alone presents the French Government with a formidable problem. In general, the war damage in France is ‘patchy’ rather than concentrated as in Britain, but it is so widespread that the sum total is, great enough to constitute an almost impossible problem. ‘•The worst and most immediate aspect of this problem is transportation. The railways havo been very heavily hit. lipin is the only word to describe the effects of the Allied bombing on German communications in France. But now these communications have become Allied communications and lifelines for France itself, and the damage to them is great.” Mr. O. H. Brandon, in the “Sunday Times,” says that the two most pressing problems which the French Provisional Government is facing are a “purge” and the fusion of the regular army with the F.F.I. “There is no point,” he says, "in concealing the fact that considerable friction exists, that the Government is labouring in very difficult circumstances to preserve order and establish its own authority, that in several of the most isolated parts of the country it has failed so far to exercise authority, and that its desire for gradual evolution rather than revolution has caused strong polemics within the united front of the resistance movement.” Support of Government. There is strong support in many sections of Britain for the'view that General de Gaulle’s Provisional Government should be recognized. The “Daily Telegraph,” in a recent leader, firmly demanded that this should be done. This morning the “Manchester Guardian” declared: “If anything is clear it is that the Government, faced with such tasks [as told by General do Gaulle], deserved the fullest moral support of its allies.” The “Guardian” criticized “official minds in the United States” which had resolved that General de Gaulle was to be treated as “somebody out on ticket of leave,” and continued: “There are Frenchmen who have an interest in ‘disorder and incoherence.’ They are Frenchmen —the new feudal lords, as General de Gaulle calls them —who do not want to see anything great or durable built up in France because they want to keep their grip on French polities. They are Frenchmen who are grateful to the Allies for their slighting treatment of a Government that means to free France from their power.” Belgian Food Problem. The “Daily Mail” writer Alexander Clifford says Belgium is now trying to shake herself free from the inevitable hangover of her joyous orgy of liberation. Mr. Clifford expresses the opinion that the Allies have not told the liberated peoples of Europe what is going to happen to them and why “we failed to explain that things must inevitably get a little worse before they get better.” He says that in Belgium the black market which fed the country surprisingly well has now been smashed—before any alternative system of feeding has got going. Normal methods of transport broke down, as they always do when war sweeps across a country, with the result that life is more difficult now than it was under llie Germans. One of the consequences is that minors have refused to

go down the mines till they get meat, bread, and potatoes. Mr. Clifford declares I hat the people should be told just what the difficulties are and why the transport system has broken down.