SIEGE OF GERMANY

King Country Chronicle, Volume XXVIII, Issue 4605, 4 October 1934, Page 7

SIEGE OF GERMANY

A NEW ONE OPERATES. EUROPE'S FEAR OF HITLER. NO AID TILL HE GOES. The twentieth anniversary of the Battle of the Marne has special significance because Germany finds herself in substantially the same situation she was in after her defeat twenty years ago. With that defeat began a siege of the Reich that lasted four years and was marked by a series of spectacular sorties, but which terminated —as sieges must—by surrender to exhaustion when no relieving force arrived, writes Frank Simonds in the San Francisco Chronicle.

The present siege of Germany dates from the blood bath of June 30, which definitely abolished all hope of outside material aid. The investment of the Reich became complete when the murder of Dollfuss finally removed the possibility of financial aid. After the June massacre British public opinion became crystallised. After the July crime Mussolini decided that it was impossible to do business with Hitler. Since France has taken her stand as far back as the Disarmament 'OonfeTenfce's early stages and the Soviet Union on the morrow of the Hitler victory, the circle about the Reich was closed.

In looking at a siege two questions are to be considered —the ability of the garrison to hold out and the possibility of the arrival of a relieving army. No relieving army is to be counted upon. Germany is therefore thrown back upon her own resources. To be sure, the contest will be waged not by arms, but by financial and economic weapons, but this does not change its character. It is now the conviction of the Governments and peoples of Britain, France, Italy, and the Soviet Union that there can be no peace in Europe and no concerted international effort to arrest the progress of economic decay in Central Europe while the Hitler regime is in control of the Reich. This means that Hitler can hope for no political help from abroad that would enable him to gain prestige at home.

Germany's Policy Regarding Debts. It is also the conviction of the business and financial elements in all the more important countries —in practice this means Britain, the United States, and France—that any money lent or credits given to Germany must only lead to new losses. The conduct of German policy in the matter of debts has demonstrated this, and, alike in London and New York, the decision has been reached to take no more risks. German Economics* Political and financial aid are thus unavailable. What is the economic situation? In normal times the Germans can furnish about 80 per cent, of their own food, although they are short in fats. But this year there has been a partial crop failure due to a drought. Already there is a pinch in potatoes—one of the principal articles of diet—and grains have also failed. The drought has also affected the meat situation, for cattle have suffered from lack of fodder.

Germany must then buy abroad considerable amounts of food in excess of the usual purchases. In addition, she is without nearly all of the essential raw materials of industry. She has coal i'n exportable quantities, she has potash and chemicals; but coal is a drug on the market, potash an insignificant detail; and since the war the competition in chemicals has largely reduced her once huge trade. In practise, therefore, to get what she needs abroad Germany must sell what she makes in her factories and foundries. But she must import all her cotton, copper, wool, rubber, most of her iron, her nickel, and other only slightly less necessary articles. How is she to pay for these things? During the last few years she has paid for them by an excess of the sales 1 of her manufactured goods over the purchase of raw materials. This year l the surplus of her purchases over her I sales is mounting with ominous rapidity.

The last few months have seen a rapid extension of the system of rationing foreign purchases. The Government is in effect regulating the amount of various things that Germany buys abroad. That means that the total bought is being reduced and that purchases are being restricted to esse'ntials. But this does not affect the basic situation, for most of what Germany purchases anyway is essential. Heavily in Debt. Germany's situation is further complicated by the double fact that she has no liquid capital and is heavily in debt to investors in Britain, the United States, Holland, and Switzerland for sums already advanced. To get more loans she would have to

display capacity and willingness to pay what she has already borrowed, and no such ability or readiness is discoverable.

France and Great Britain, both of which are to-day buying much more abroad than they sell, are able to bridge the gap between imports and export by the return on their foreign investments and by commercial borrowing, when necessary, for the credit of both is commercially good. Germany has no foreign investments and no credit. The United States is even better situated, for it continues to sell abroad more than it buys.

Like Great Britain and the United States, Germany is an industrial nation. More than half of her people live by their labour in factories and mines. In order to meet the present depression the German Government, like the British and the American, is driven to increase its public works. But the two Anglo-Saxon countries have within their frontiers —or obtainable through purchases easily made —all the essentials to keep their plants running. They will be run at a loss, not impossibly, but that loss will be represented by an increase in the Public Debt.

The Germans cannot keep their plants and factories running because they cannot get the raw materials. And their problem is complicated by the fact that the necessary of importing food reduces their resources for importing materials for their factories. Thus slowly, the German machine is running down, and progressively the standard of living is declining. Work and bread are becoming less and less.

The parallel of Germany's situation now to that during the war is clear. To win the war the Germans had to break the circle around them. They had to get raw materials and food, but the British blockade—despite the many holes in it—closed German access to the things without which she could not get on. The power of resistance of the people was sapped, the will to carry on broken. Almost overnight the war ended in a mad forward sweep of the allied armies. No Help While Hitler Rules. Now, as far as it is humanly possible to foretell, that is what seems likely to occur again. No one of the great Powers is going to aid Germany because German policy as directed by Hitler and his associates constitutes a direct menace for all. Mr. Stanley Baldwin has announced to the world that the British frontier is at the Rhine. Mussolini's mobilised forces watch the Austrian frontier. French policy is irreconcilable. The United States is lending neither money nor goods in Europe. No one is going to employ military force against Germany in any war of prevention. For that there is no longer any temptation. On the contrary every country interested is now waiting until the will of the German people to resist is exhausted. When that time comes Hitler will have to go as the Kaiser went in November, 1918.

Hitler's chance was not inconsiderable when he came to power. The Italians were eager to join the Germans in breaking up French domination. The British were angry with the French for actions they believed were responsible for the coming of the Nazis. The people of the United States were angry with the French over the debt and disarmament issues and ready to give moral support at Geneva to Germany's claim for equality in means of self-defence. France was isolated and suffered from a realisation of that fact.

Eighteen months after Hitler came to power, however, all has changed. British and French military men hold public conference. Italy with the approval of London and Paris has mobilised and prepared to throw her troops against Germany's if they enter Austria, The Soviet Union has renewed the partnership of Russia with France. Pogroms and blood baths have eliminated all chance of fresh credits from this side of the Atlantic.

The Germany of August, 1934, is thus in the situation of the Germany of the same month in 1918 when, on what Ludendorff afterwards described as "the black day," the British attack crashed through the Kaiser's armies in Picardy and began the advance that in less than a hundred days was to lead to the Armistice. As yet, of course, the decisive step has not come. Hitler's lines, at this moment, are intact. They are exposed to no foreign offensive; but the seige will continue until the moment when Hitler becomes at home the symbol and the sign of the misery that has already become general with the coming of winter is bound to be acute. Until the end comes all further progress towards international co-opera-tion economically, financially, or politically must be postponed, for no real progress in that direction can be made without Germany, and with the present German Government, no form of co-operation is possible.