ISSUES OF WAR

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXVII, Issue 20151, 22 January 1940, Page 7

ISSUES OF WAR

EMPIRE FREEDOM EUROPE’S LIBERTY REAL GERMAN AIMS DOMINATION SOUGHT VITAL ALLIED FACTORS SURVEY BY HALIFAX (Elec. Tel. Copyright—United Press Assn.) (British Official Wireless.) Reed. 9 a.m. RUGBY, Jan. 20. Speaking at Leeds, the Foreign Secretary, Viscount Halifax, defined the issues of the war as the liberty and independence of the British Empire and all the European States, in a speech given at the continuation of the series of meetings at which members of the War Cabinet are rendering an account directly to the public on the war. Viscount Halifax declared that the British did not under-rate the strength of the enemy or the sternness of the struggle ahead. A dictator could lay his preparations for war in complete secrecy, whereas a Government in a democracy where there was nosurrenaerofprivate judgmentand no sinister secret police, was at an initial disadvantage when it became the victim of a dictator’s aggression, but that initial disadvantage was more than made up by the fact that the defence measures, when taken, had behind them the overwhelming force of the people’s opproval and their united will

The Foreign Secretary reviewed the diplomatic history of recent years, more particularly the post-Munich period. Despite ever contentious point of the Munich agreement being settled in Herr Hitler’s favour, he said, it was soon clear that he was profoundly dissatisfied. Privately, he inveighed against the agreement and those of his advisers who had stood on the side of peace. Publicly, he began within a few days to attack Britain and a campaign of vilification had been launched in the German press. Hitler Disillusioned It became rapidly evident, Viscount Halifax said, that Herr Hitler actually objected to settlement by negotiation and resented having been baulked of war. Lord Halifax went on to reveal that during the discussions preceding Munich, Herr Hitler made it quite clear to those taking part that he was anticipating with relish the opportunity of chastising Czechoslovakia. “I have no doubt he was also disillusioned because he hoped after Munich that we would be lulled into security and close down on rearmament, leaving the Germans in undisputed possession of what Herr Hitler himself called the mightiest armaments the world had even known so that the Nazis would become the dictators not only of Germany but of Europe. “When, within six months of Munich Herr Hitler annexed the rest of Czechoslovakia, that act, involving the forceful incorporation in the Reich of millions of men and women of another race, revealed to the world the real Nazi purpose—German domination — and aroused a very deep instinct in the British people which, throughout history, has always led them to resist the attempts of any nation to make itself master of Europe.” Nazi Fear and Coercion After contrasting the different use to which British and German strength was put—one to spreading liberty and the other spreading fear and coercion —Viscount Halifax turned to examine the reality behind the proffers of friendship to Britain Herr Hitler was always claiming to have made. In a recent speech at Danzig, Herr Hitler complained because he had been accused of breaking his word, and declared that in all he had done he had merely kept his word to the German people. “Thus,” Viscount Halifax said, “any breach of trust is justifiable if it helps him to. realise his ambition, and if Britain had shaped her policy on Herr Hitler’s assurances, she would have been told, after he had broken faith and reduced the Empire to his will, that he had merely carried out his proclaimed aims in ‘Mein Kamp.’ ”

Viscount Halifax cited Finland as an example of the Nazi lack of scruples in abandoning her erstwhile friends. Tlie real issue' in the present struggle was that the basis of Nazi policy was plainly force. Herr Hitler had frankly confessed, that, in his view, the weak had no right to live. Against that conception, the British commonwealth of nations stood. Responsibility for War The results of the two conceptions of society and Government were vividly contrasted by Viscount Halifax when he pictured, on one hand, the divisions of German troops drained from her reserves'moving into Austria, Bohemia, Moravia and Poland to hold down those territories by force and, on the other hand, divisions of free men building up the British reserves, moving from free British Dominions overseas and moving, of their own free will, towards the tiring line to uphold Britain’s cause. Lord Halifax recalled how, in the preface to the German war documents, the Foreign Minister, Herr von Ribbentrop “on whose shoulders before the tribunal of history will rest the heavy responsibility for this war,” had defined the German war aim to be the military destruction of Britain. With this military destruction would come the defeat of all things for which Britain stood—standards of decency, fairness in international relations, the ideal of justice between man and man. “I have no hesitation in saying,” declared Viscount Halifax vehemently, “that I would 100 times sooner be dead than live in a world under the heel of Nazi dominance.”