EXTENSION OF WAR

Evening Post, Volume CXXX, Issue 7, 8 July 1940, Page 8

EXTENSION OF WAR

GERMAN CHARGE

REFUTED BY THE FACTS

(British Official Wireless.) RUGBY, July 7. The German Press and wireless have been publishing a series of documents | which they say will form part of a new White Book. The documents, according to Germany, were found in a railway train in France, and deal with various subjects of consultation between the French and the British General Staffs regarding the prosecution of the war. I The text of the documents has not yet been received in London, and only the German versions are available. Informed London opinion, however, is that the German argument, now being faithfully echoed in Italy, that the documents proved a deal by Britain and France to extend the war is sufficiently answered by the facts.

Germany and Germany alone extended the war by wanton and unprovoked aggression on neutral countries, to whom she had given undertakings to respect their neutrality and independence, and it is only after having violated this pledged word that she discovers evidence which she alleges justifies retrospectively her aggressive action. At the time when the majority of the documents are stated to have been drawn up, namely, within the first three months of this year, Britain and France had to consider every possibility of German aggression and of aid to counter that aggression in various parts of the world, and it is upon such a hypothesis that certain plans would be agreed upon to be carried out if and when aggression took place. Either of the Governments concerned could have been charged with gross neglect had their advisers not taken into account all the possibilities of German aggression against the various small neutral States and taken steps to meet them. GERMAN ACTS OF AGGRESSION. Informed quarters in London state, however, that at no time was there any plan by the Allies of aggression. The Allied staffs were only concerned in problems of defence against German attacks, the probability of which had been only too emphatically demonstrated by a long series of German acts of aggression against her peaceful neighbours. The scepticism with which the new German "revelations" against Britain are being received wherever free comment is still permitted' is typified by a Gothenburg paper, which writes:

"The Germans have a marvellous capacity for finding compromising documents. In Norway papers were found showing that England intended to occupy Norway. This dreadful plan was, of course, destroyed through the Germans' gallant conduct. Like guardian angels, they took Norway under their protecting wings, saving it the grim fate of English occupation. The same occurred in Belgium and Holland.

"The disinterested observer cannot help asking why has one not seen practical signs of these intended plans. Nothing shows that England or France did take measures in accordance with the contents of the documents.

"The same reflections occur when the Germans now state that the Allies had plans to entangle neutrals, including Scandinavia, on their side. One has real difficulty in taking this German information seriously. Even if the Allies' strategy has hitherto not produced much admiration, one cannot think that they intended acting so idiotically. The fact is that Germany occupied these countries, and this weighs more heavily than the supposed plans of the other side."