SWISS NOT IMPRESSED

Greymouth Evening Star, 13 October 1939, Page 8

SWISS NOT IMPRESSED

NAZI PROPAGANDA FAILS. Nowhere has the rise of the Third Reich produced a reaction more incisive than in Switzerland. Not a. country .in Europe has remained unaffected, but in Switzerland the popular rally in defence of the national frontiers and of the national heritage has been more rapid, comprehensive, and resolute than anywhere else (says a special correspondent of the “Manchester Guardian”). All the countries menaced by the “German danger” have found or are finding a new unity, but in all of them, Switzerland alone excepted, the process has been marked by doubts and fluctuations that have onlj r been brought to an end by. the physical immediacy of that danger. In other countries the “new Germany” has had friends, whoi were attracted by the apparently youthful vigour of the National Socialist Revolution and by Hitler’s hostility towards “Bolshevism,” and it is true that in the first few years of his rule there were “proNazis” in Switzerland also, but they have undergone a thorough progressive elimination. Switzerland is a country where the Third Reich and all it stands for are consciously rejected by the whole nation, both as a spiritual an'd as a physical menace. This is all the more surprising since a large part of Switzerland is German-speaking and shares the German cultural heritage. Moreover, the Swiss are deeply hostile to “Bolshevism,” and have' in the past reacted to the alleged “Bolshevist” danger in ways that seemed to indicate strong Fascist tendencies. But these tendencies have not matured. The fundamentally democratic spirit of the Swiss people has prevailed—and nowhere is the repudiation of the Third Reich stronger than in the Ger-man-speaking cantons. According to Nazi doctrine, no ground would seem more suitable for the revolutionary and disintegrating tactics used by the Nazis. The German-speaking population is, according to Nazi doctrine, of German race. Theoretically, at least, the Nazis could establish their “Stutzpunkte,” or centres of agitation, amongst this population, and so promote Swiss disunity.

It was'in this light that the Nazi leaders regarded Switzerland long before Hitler came into power. In the years that followed, they paid more attention to Switzerland than to any other country, excepting Austria and the Sudetenland. Nazi societies were founded in the Swiss cities, a Nazi .Press was organised, a network of Nazi agents was created; propaganda, money, and every kind of political and economic pressure and blandishment were used to divide, disintegrate, and proselytise. (The task of subjecting Switzerland to constant wireless propaganda was entrusted to the Stuttgart station). All these efforts failed completely. The Swiss rally against the Third Reich is, above all, popular. Swiss public opinion is fervently anti-Nazi, even when it is anti-Communist. The Swiss people recognise the absolute incompatibility between the spirit of the Third Reich and of the Swiss Federation as clearly as thej’ recognise the mortal danger to their physical existence as a nation.