STRAIN TELLING

Evening Post, Volume CXXIX, Issue 136, 10 June 1940, Page 9

STRAIN TELLING

ECONOMIC BLOCKADE

EFFECTS IN GERMANY

DWINDLING SUPPLIES

(British Official Wireless.)

RUGBY, June 8.

Stating that the struggle was literally one of life or death, the Minister of Economic Warfare, Dr. Hugh Dalton, in a broadcast,•said that victory was sure, though perhaps distant. He explained that the object of his Ministry was to prevent the Germans obtaining from outside coifimodities necessary for the prosecution of the war.

He said he did not think the Nazis had gained materially from the conquest of Denmark, Holland, and Belgium, and he pointed out that these countries depended to a very large extent upon imports for their livelihood, having to obtain from abroad both feeding stuffs for cattle and raw materials for industry.

Neither had the Nazis obtained much %£ toe stocks of these countries, for

they had mostly been destroyed before they could fall into German hands. Hitler might have obtained temporary help in certain directions, but this would not extend beyond the present summer. The Nazis could not afford a long war. They had amassed huge stocks of necessary supplies, upon which they were already drawing. When these were exhausted Germany had no chance of replenishing them, and such supplies as she could get from Russia and the Balkans would not help her. For her vast expenditure of oil Germany had to rely upon domestic production and supplies from Russia and Rumania, and these latter supplies had proved so far to be smaller than had been expected.

The magnificent work of the R.A.F. was greatly aiding him in his task of starving Hitler of oil, Dr. Dalton added. The glow of vast conflagrations of burning oil could be seen 100 miles away not only by the British airmen but by the German people as well.

Already the strain was beginning to tell in Germany. The German workers were being sacrificed as ruthlessly as the German soldiers. Their standard of life was declining, and the cost of living rising higher and hours of work lengthening, and over all brooded the darkening shadow of inflation.

All this was tolerated only because "it was accompanied by rosy promises of a quick victory to be followed by an orgy of unlimited plunder and prosperity and of brutal German domination over the whole world."

An immediate and total victory was necessary for Hitler, and this, Dr. Dalton said, in conclusion, he would never achieve, because in wartime "defeat" was a word unknown to British folk,