"WE SHALL NOT FAIL" FRENCH INTERPRETATION

Evening Post, Volume CXXIX, Issue 77, 1 April 1940, Page 7

"WE SHALL NOT FAIL"

FRENCH INTERPRETATION

Allied War Effort

INTENSIFICATION TO BE EXPECTED

(British Official Wireless.) RUGBY, March 30. The First Lord of the Admiralty, Mr. Winston Churchill, in a broadcast address, recalled that six months ago he had said that if the Allies reached the spring without any great event occurring they should in fact have gained an important success, and he commented that he still felt that this additional period of preparation had been an invaluable help to the Allies. •-" "Peaceful Parliamentary nations have more difficulties in transforming themselves into the east of a war-making organisation than the dictator States who glorify war and feed their young on dreams of conquest," he said; "The British Empire and the French Republic have now goined together in an indis- ' soluble union so that their big purposes may be accomplished, and immense progress has been made in almost every direction in strengthening their forces, improving their defences, and adapting their whole economy^and way of life to the service of the common cause. "Up to the present, time has been on our side, but time is a changeable ally; he may be with,you in one period and against you in another, and then, if you come through that other, he may return again more faithful than before. It seems to me that an intensification of the struggle is to be expected, and we are certainly by no means inclined to shrink from it. "God forbid that we should boast or speak in terms of vain conceit and over-confidence. We have never underrated the terrible nature of what we undertook when, after striving so long for peace, we set ourselves the task of dealing with the Nazi and German menace in such a fashion as would clear the path of human progress.and enable all countries, great and small, old and new, to breathe freely for a long time to conic.

"We do not minimise our task, but re can now measure it in its'enormjus magnitude more exactly than we could before we came into contact with out adversary on the sea and in the air. We do not conceal from ourselves what trials and tribulations lie before us—far beyond anything we*have so far undergone— and we know that supreme exertions will.be required from the British and French nations, but we are entitled to recognise basic facts. ENEMY RESOURCES EXCEEDED. "Our resources and our man-power, once they' are developed, massively exceed those of the enemy. The British and French races together amount to 110,000,000, against less than 70,000,000 Germans, for you cannot count the 16,000,000 they are holding down by brute force. Through the command of the sea, which is becoming continually more complete, the resources of the world are to i. very large extent open ' to us, and, surveying the whole scene, we may rightly feel good assurance that if we do bur best we shall not fail. "People often ask me: 'Will the war be long or short?'" It might have been very short—perhaps, indeed, there might have been no war—if all the neutral. States who share our convictions upon, fundamental matters and openly or secretly sympathise with us had stood together at c»e signal and in one. line. "We did not count on this, and therefore we are not dismayed. "We trust in God and in'our arms uplifted in a cause which we devoutly feel carries with it the larger hopes of mankind. But the fact that many . of the smaller States in Europe are terrorised by Nazi violence and bru- i tality into supplying Germany with materials of modern war may condemn the whole world to a prolonged ordeal, with grievous consequences in many lands. NOT AN EASY WAR. "Therefore, I cannot assure you that the war will be short, and still less that it will be easy. It is our duty to try not only to win the war, but also to curtail as far as possible its devouring course. "Some few weeks ago I spoke about the action of i-eutral States which have the misfortune to be Germany's neighbours. We have the greatest sympathy for these forlorn countries, and .we understand their dangers \ and their point of v view, but it would not be right or in the general interest that their weakness should feed the' aggressor's strength and fill to overflowing the, cup of human woe. There could be no justice if, in the life and death struggle, he tramples down every sentiment of humanity and those wlio resist him remain entangled in the tatters of violated legal conventions. "Hardly a day passes without fresh outrages of a cruel and barbarous character being inflicted upon the shipping arid sailors of all the European countries. Their, ships are sunk by mine ■or torpedo or by bombs from the air and their crews murdered or left to perish unless we are able to rescue them. Swedes,. Norwegians, Danes, even Italians, and many more I could mention, have been victims of Hitler's murderous deeds. In his frenzy this wicked man and the criminal regime which he has conceived and erected increasingly turn their malice upon the weak and lonely and, above all, the unarmed vessels of countries with which Germany is still supposed to have friendly relations. THE RETURN OF PIRACY. "In the British and French convoys there is safety. Only one in the 800 - neutral ships which have resorted to our protection has been sunk. But outside the shelter of the Allied navies a merciless, baffled, pent-up spite is wreaked upon all who come within the Nazi clutch. Nearly 200 neutral ships have been destroyed, and nearly' 1000 neutral seamen have been slaughtered in Hitler's frantic endeavour to terrorise all who seek to trade with the

British Isles. During the last fortnight 14 neutral ships have- been sunk and only qne British ship. After all, it is we who are his foes. Such a form of warfare has never before been practised since the effectual suppression of piracy on the high seas. "And this is the monstrous . Power which even those very neutrals who have suffered and are suffering most are forced to supply with the msans of future aggression. This is the Power before whom, even while they

writhe in anger, they are forced _to

bow and whose victory they are comj>elied to aid even though, as they well

No Wish to Broaden Area of Conflict

know, that victory would mean their own enslavement. S THE DUTCH CRITICISED. "Why, only yesterday, while sailors from a British submarine were carrying" ashore on stretchers eight emaciated Dutchmen whom they had rescued from sixdays of exposure in an open boat, Dutch aviators, in the name of strict neutrality and impartial orthodoxy, were . shooting down a British aircraft which had lost its way. "I do not reproach. the Dutch, our \'aliant allies of former days. My heart goes but to them in'their peril and distress, dwelling as they do in a cage with a tiger. But, when we are asked to take as a matter of course interpretations of neutrality which give all the advantages to the aggressor and inflict all the disadvantages upon the defenders of freedom, I recall a saying of the late Lord Balfour: This is a singularly ill-contrived world, but not so ill-contrived as that.' "But all these outrages upon the sea, which are so clearly visible, pale before the villainous deeds wrought upon the helpless Czechs and Austrians, and sink into insignificance before the hideous agony of Poland. "Here was a community of nearly 35,000,000 people with all the organisation of a modern Government and all the traditions of an ancient State which in a-few weeks was dashed out of civilised existence to become an incoherent multitude of tortured and starving men, women, and children, ground beneath the heel of two rival forms of withering and blasting tyranny., " THE ALLIED CAUSE. "The other day in a well-known British harbour I* inspected the crew of a Polish destroyer. I have rarely seen a finer body of. men. I was stirred by their discipline and bearing. Yet how tragic their plight! Their ship was. afloat, but their country had foundered. ■. " , "But, as I looked around upon all the, great ships of war which lay at anchor and at all the preparations which are .being made on every side to carry this war forward at all costs for as long as may be necessary, I comforted myself- with the thought/that when these Polish sailors have finished their work with the British Navy j we will take particular care that they once more have a home to go to. "Thoughtless dilettantes or purblind worldlings,' though the fate of Poland stares them in the face, sometimes ask us: 'What is it that England and France are fighting for?' To this I answer: 'If we left off fighting you would soon find out.' We shall follow this war wherever it leads, but we have no wish to broaden the area of conflict. "At the outbreak of the war we did not know that Italy would not be our enemy. We could not be sure that Japan would not be our enemy. Many people had hopes that Russia would re-enter the comity of nations and help to shield working folk all over the world from Nazi aggression. But none of these things, bad or good, has happened. . "We have no quarrel with the Italian or Japanese peoples. We have tried and shall try to live on good terms with them. It is not part of our policy to seek war with Russia. RAVAGES OF COMMUNISM. "The Soviet Government, in its onslaught upon the heroic Finns, has exposed to the whole world the ravages which Communism makes upon the fibre of any nation which falls a victim to that deadly mental and moral disease. This exposure of the Russian army and the Russian air force has astonished the world. "There is no need for Russia to be drawn into this struggle unless, upon the promptings of obsolete imperialist ambition, she wishes to do so of her own violence and of malice prepense. Our affair is with Hitler and the Nazi German power. There is the head and forefront of the offending, and it is there and there alone that we seek to strike. :

"All's quiet on the Western Front, and today, so far, nothing has happened on the sea or in the air- But more than a million German soldiers are drawn up ready to strike at a few hours' notice all along the frontiers of Luxemburg, Belgium, and Holland. At any moment these neutral countries may. be subjected to an avalanche of steel and fire, and the decision rests in the hands of the haunted, morbid being who, to their eternal shame, the German peoples in their bewilderment have worshipped as a god.

"SOMBRE, RIGHTEOUS WORK."

"That is, the situation in Europe tonight, and can anyone wonder' that we are determined to bring such a hideous state; of alarm and menace \to an end

as soon as may be and once and for all?

"Few there are tonight who, looking back on these last seven months, would doubt that the British and French peoples were right to draw the sword of justice and of retribution. Fewer still there are who would wish to sheath it till its sombre, righteous work is done."

PARIS, March 30,

Mi*. Churchill's forecast of intensification of the war is interpreted as, first, a decisive tightening up of the blockade, and, secondly, a. British and French diplomatic counter-offensive throughout lth£, Balkan*.. , ; V