AXIS WITHIN

Grey River Argus, 8 July 1943, Page 8

AXIS WITHIN

DARK PICTURES MAY BE OVERDONE. LONDON, June 28. Most competent observers in London deprecate the present strong tendency to interpret the fears and warnings in Axis countries as defeatism. The observers believe that only when propaganda in the war of nerves which has been in full blast since the fall of Tunisia gives way to a clash of arms on the Continent will the time come for the Allies to appraise the conditions of the Axis peoples. The present propaganda and comment from Berlin and Rome are too often depicted as expressing hopelessness. Instead, all the power of the Axis press and radio as being marshalled to screw up the Germans and Italians and their satellites to a supreme effort of defence. The London observers say that the most exaggeration comes from correspondents in neutral capitals whose interpretations of the heavily censored despatches from inside Germany and Italv are valuable in many respects, but invariable are on the side of painting Axis pictures in colours darker than is warranted. Newspaper have reached London from Belgium reporting three Belgians and one Frenchmen executed for blowing uo colliery buildings at Lambusart in Hainaut. The explos on put the colliery out of action. A new wave of unrest is sweeping across Axis-occupied Europe. The Vichy Premier, M. Laval, is reporte to be growing increasingly nervous of French resistance. The Vichy radio said that special tribunals are being set up to deal with “terrorists.” The/ Paris radio blamed the terrorists for a fire which destroyed a big store containing food supplies. In another area, the Fascist militia leader was attacked with a tommy-gun. Fritz Schmidt, German Commissioner for Holland, and one of Hitlers’ Partv bosses, was killed this week in France. In Denmark, saboteurs set fire to a big clothing factory last night. Stocks of wool and other materials were lost, and the factory burnt to the ground.