HARANGUE BY HITLER

Evening Post, Volume CXXXIX, Issue 14, 17 January 1945, Page 5

HARANGUE BY HITLER

SIMILE OF LIFEBOAT IN A STORM

Rec. 11.40 a.m. LONDON, January 16.

"I left Hitler's headquarters at 6 a.m., and I would much rather have fought in battle than have gone through what I did there." This story of a stormy interview with Hitler as late as September was told to the Moscow correspondent of the Associated Press of Great Britain today by Colonel-General Janos Veroes, until a few weeks ago Admiral Horthy's special envoy, and now Defence Minister of liberated Hungary.

General Veroes said that Hitler harangued for two hours. A disordered lock of grey-streaked hair hung across his sweaty forehead. Hitler shouted: "Now we are all sitting in a boat in a dreadful storm. He who jumps overboard—man or nation—will surely drown. It is possible that the boat will capsize, but it is likely that it will reach land. I will defend the Fatherland to the last man and the last drop of blood."

General Veroes said that never once during his harangue did Hitler use the word victory. His simile of Germany and Hungary as the last survivors of a shipwreck, trying to ride out the storm in a lifeboat that might overturn, was the nearest he came to predicting the success of his cause.

"Many of his enemies have said Hitler is mad," he continued. "I, for one, know it from the evidence of my own eyes and ears. Hitler looked like a pig which had been overfed. He was plainly sick in mind and body. I had previously seen him in May. I was convinced that his mental condition had deteriorated between May and September. Hitler shook hands with me with his right hand; his wound from the bomb explosion apparently had not been serious. He wore black trousers and a brown tunic, with a red, white, and black swastika brassard on the left arm. His hair was rumpled, his hand cold, his face puffy and unhealthy, and his voice hoarse."