Lake Wakatip Mail QUEENSTOWN, TUESDAY SEPTEMBER 3 1940. THE FALLIBLE FOE.

Lake Wakatip Mail, Issue 4483, 3 September 1940, Page 2

Lake Wakatip Mail QUEENSTOWN, TUESDAY SEPTEMBER 3 1940. THE FALLIBLE FOE.

| AIR raids have grown hj intensity during the last few days upon the British Isles, I at Britain has been bitting back ha I in bombing military objectives in Germany and Italy. Synchronisation of Italian and German action in the Axis offensive against the British Empire will probably be the enemy’s strategy. It seems clear that the enemy will employ his ontiro resources 5 1 the battle, and that battle will extend from Iceland to the Arabian Sea and from the north of Norway to Gibraltar, While tthe full force of Germany’s arms is developed against Britain herself, with a possible diversion against Gibraltar, the main attack in 'the Mediterranean is being left to Hitler’s junior partner, and is being directed towards 1 the Levant, in exactly the opposite direction from that of the German main effort. The Nazi’s objective is a knockout bio v against the Empire’s heart; the Tta’ian objective is primani’y to break a close blockade, which must threaten eventually to throttle Italian initiative and destroy the Italian for: es in Africa, unless the British hold upon the south-east-ern Mediterranean can be broken. The first lungs in this terrific conflict are now beginning with the air raids on Britain. The offensives arc doubtless designed to accumulate momentum within, a certain’ time limit, and the signs of increasing revolutions in the Axis war machi: e are clearly discernible. Hitler and Mussolini are driven on by sheer ,nc ossify. Plans which i already they have had to postpone they dare postpone no longer. Control of Greece is obviously desirable for the support of the Italian outposts in the Dodecanese, and for the attainment of the Italian aim to command 1 tie outlet from the Dardanelles'. Possession of the southern Greek coast would bring the Italians nearly halfway to Alexandria, and almost as near to the Suez Canal as they arc in eastern Libya. The temptation thereafter to stretch out a strong hand into Ere nth -surrendered Syria, would bo irresistible. The snatching of Greece in the very teeth of the British guarantee to that country would strike, a resounding blow against British prestige t i Turkey and elsewhere. From every point of view the compulsion of Greece to join the Ax's cause—expressed in the Italian Press as driving the British Navy out of Greek ports—is clearly part of the essential canipaicn to which Mussolini is committed; and, since exact synchronisation is obviously be- | ing aimed at, the reason for the de- j lay in the attack-from Libya against Egypt seems- obvious. The laud stroke towards Salonica must also be made ' readv. The combined movement

would aim at depriving tire British I fleet of all bases in the Levant outside Palestine itself, while the Bratish reserve army in Palestine would be compelled to meet simultaneous attacks:. Since the British Government has been free to develop its own plans, unhampered by the ineptitude of an ally that first proved weak and then faithless, the British forces' have shown a virility which has both astonished and delighted that part of the civilised world which realises that the fate of civilisation itself is dependent on the success of British arms. British bombing planes have rained destruction upon the elaborate preparations of the enemy for invadi ig Britain. British aerial and land defenders have dealt effectively with the German raiders. British warships have frustrated German plans for using the French fleet against Britain’s shores. The Nazi fighting machine was successful so long as. it had to deal with nations which either could not or would amt fight, and then only by the full use of Hitler’s “secret” weapon, the socalled fifth columns). It is of prime importance to note that Germany® indirect gains, such as her access to further sources of supply, her com maud of more favourably situated bases, and her acquisition of a shamefully opportunist ally, were at 11 attributable to her victories by those methods. They are tributes to her mthlo.SiSness and cunning rather than to her valour. It is. quite on the cards that she may yet engineer another bloodless triumph by cajoling or bullying Spain into acquiescence in her schemes.; hut Britain will remain unconquered. Britain cannot be conquered by lightning land offensives or by the corruption of traitors' within. Her Navy and Air Force will cut. a fearful swath in any invading flotilla that essays the perilous passage to Britain’s shores, and any remnant which effects a landing wil find waiting for it laud forces that will not “retreat according to plan’'—|a plan agreed upon with Hitler beforehand. -It would be folly to hold the enemy lightly. Germany is a tough foe —perhaps the toughest that Bri--1 tain has ever encountered —but the British tradition has ever been that any foe is beatable. This time Britain is not relying on the tradition ■.that she can muddle through. The whole British people has been organised to produce modern equipment and munitions in prodigious quantities, and on land, seas, and in the air, to use equipment and munitions to best advantage. ' Germany can be beaten; Germany WILL he beaten.