Manawatu Evening Standard. THURSDAY, JUNE 13, 1940. A STERN REPRISAL.

Manawatu Standard, Volume LX, Issue 166, 13 June 1940, Page 6

Manawatu Evening Standard. THURSDAY, JUNE 13, 1940. A STERN REPRISAL.

Fob the first time Berlin’s population have had. the war brought to their door. Several nights ago a squadron of French naval bombers raided war factories in the suburbs of Berlin’s capital and so far :Hitler has preferred not to tell the rest of Germany, or let the outside world know, the results of the bombing. That was a reprisal for the wilful attack on Paris earlier last week, when serious loss of life and injuries were cruelly inflicted on the civilian population by Germans who, claiming that they were destroying aerodromes, dropped their bombs within the city'and in the suburbs. In the last war Germany did not hesitate to attack French and Britis towns and cities. London itself knew the fell work of airmen who disregarded international law; on the other hand the Allies strictly observed the code that permits the destruction of military objectives. In this war the Nazis have followed the course of the Prussians of twentyfiVe years ago; the Allies again adhere to a regulated procedure though it may happen that civilians in the military areas bombed lose their lives or suffer injuries. But there is no deliberate attack such as the Nazis inflict on innocent women and children, or old people, or on the sick and wounded in hospitals and hospital ships. The barbarity of Nazism knows no bounds and it is being answered by the Allied attacks on military concentrations, factories that produce war material, enemy equipment, and facilities the Nazis use in their war against the Allies. ■ The effect of these attacks, particularly those made on German soil, must be startling. From Berlin recently American Press correspondents reported that the raids of the Royal Air Force over the Rhineland have caused fear and consternation among the civilian population throughout Germany. It is well that German people should know and feel something of the awful terror of aerial warfare. _ Too long has it been practised by the Nazis almost with impunity. The civilian populations of Poland, Norway, Holland, Belgium, and France have seen their towns and cities blasted from- the face of the eartli, picturesque places tranquil in the summer sun converted into charnel houses, and women and children who escape fleeing almost mad with horror from the awfulness of this instrument of war let loose by tyrants and bullies to strike, terror into the hearts of young and. old. What decent German people, if ’they ‘ do really exist, think of this torture none can say; as a population they have been led to believe that the Reich is invulnerable and any war of conquest would not be fought on German soil. The reconnaissance flights of French and British airmen, penetrating every distant part of

Greater Germany, without doubt must have had a disturbing effect upon the German people, and the nervousness then engendered will be many times increased by the Rhineland attacks and the raid on Berlin’s war factories. Nazi aeroplanes are continually making England their objective, but so far trifling damage lias been done. It is evident, however, that the war has entered the phase when Nazi raids will be met with reprisals. Never has the Allied Command sought this, but it will, not flinch from exacting retribution from its ruthless enemy.