MASS DEPORTATION

Grey River Argus, 23 July 1942, Page 5

MASS DEPORTATION

German Soldiers Executed I lAust. & N.Z. Cable Assu.j (Rec. 11.30.) LONDON. Julv 21. “The Times’s” correspondent on the French frontier states:—Almost all the inmates of the three largest camps for Jews and Communists in the Paris area, totalling: over seven thousand persons have suddenly been deported ito Poland. The occupation authorities casually notified the French through,-Count De Bnnon. The deportees are not to return to France. The deportees’ families received notification and were permitted to visit the camp at a specified time. Womenfolk and children, instead of an expected joyful 'reunion, only saw their menfolk handcuffed in pairs, marching to the train between files of German soldiers with fixed bayonets. When some men instinctively moved for a farewell, the soldiers drove them back with rifle butts. Then, spontaneously, men, women, and children defiantly sang the “Marseillaise.” “The Times’s’’ correspondent on the French frontier says that posters on walls of a town on the Island of Sylt name thirty-four German noncommissioned officers and privates who were executed last month for insubordination or cowardice in the face of the enemy. The real crime in everv case is unmistakably open denunciation of the war. One noncommissioned officer is stated to have declared: “If the British came to Sylt, I for one would not shoot.” The Berlin radio says That the German Court at Nancy sentenced to death, after a week’s trial. 15 to 38 Communists, including- eight women, for sabotage in the Meurthe-Moselle Department of occupied France. The following decree was issued bv the German military command for Belgium: “Persons who make false statements, calculated to injure the prestige of the Occupation Authorities. or who foment disturbances, will be sentenced to imprisonment or fine, or both. In serious cases, the death penalty .will be imposed.*' The Swiss radio declared that an order forbade the celebration of Belgium’s Independence Day. and banned button holes, laving wreaths on memorials, or holidays. Brussels was patrolled from an earlv hour in thp morning. All the monuments were guarded.

Polish Guerrillas GERMANS ATTACKED

(Rec. 11.30.) LONDON. July 21. Moscow radio says that .the Commandant of the German garrison has forbidden German soldiers to visit Levdon unaccompanied after 5 p.m., following the disappearance of eighteen German soldiers in the last fortnight, only two bodies of whom have been recovered. It is added that Polish guerrillas at Teschen killed sixty German soldiers as a result of a night attack on barracks. The Poles hurled in grenades and shot the Germans when they rushed to the doors.

SABOTAGE IN BERLIN?

(Rec. 11.3.) STOCKHOLM. Julv 21.

The “Aftonbladet” Berlin correspondent says that there have been five large fires in the same area of Berlin in the last few days. Sabotage is suspected.

GERMAN DISCIPLINE QUESTIONED LONDON, J’uly 20. There is denfiite evidence says the “Daily Mail’s” Cairo correspondent that the discipline of some units of the crack Afrika Corps is being maintained by harsh measures. Court martial sentences provide a valuable index of an army’s discipline. A German corporal, recently convicted of drunkenness, at Barce, was sentenced to 18 months in gaol. A private found guilty of a breach of guard duty to 18 months’ hard labour, and a private guilty of “conduct likely to affect military discipline” to five years’ hard labour. These heavy sentences are apparently not exceptional. They infer real preoccupation concerning discipline in what is supposedly one of the ' best disciplined armies in the world. It is likely that German desert troops are suffering from morbid melancholy, traditionally associated with members of the Foreign Legion. Another cause is believed to be the introduction of inferior material, to the German Army.

Escaped British prisoners tell how enemy lorry drivers are apt to stampede under attack. It must be emphasised that there is never the slightest sign of this demoralisation among our fighting troops. The Italians are basically still unstable soldiers, hovering between flashes of extravagant bravery and abject inefficiency. The Ariete fought well but the Sabratha is thoroughly in disgrace, even among the Italian divisions. The Sabratha is blamed on al], sides for abysmally feeble behaviour when the Australians forced its salient westwards of Alamein. A Bersagliere officer described the Sabratha as “a bunch of ignorant peasants whose only aim was to give themselves up.” Large numbers are using considerably ingenuity to succeed in doing this.