The Northern Advocate Daily “NORTHLAND FIRST” FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 10, 1939. The Munich Sensation

Northern Advocate, 10 November 1939, Page 4

The Northern Advocate Daily “NORTHLAND FIRST”

FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 10, 1939. The Munich Sensation

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CABLE news printed yesterday reported a sensational incident at Munich, where an explosion occurred in a beer cellar in which Herr Hitler had been addressing” a big meeting of Nazis a few minutes previously. The meeting was held for the purpose of celebrating the anniversary of the Beer Hall Putsch which Hitler instigated in 1928. In view of this, the explosion is the more remarkable, for it may well be understood that the Nazi leaders would take special care to protect their Fuehrer.

However that may be, what was no doubt a time bomb exploded ten minutes after Herr Hitler left the cellar, the spot where he had been standing- being littered with wreckage to a depth of nine feet. The closeness of the call is therefore selfevident.

The question which is exercising public attention is the cause of the attempt on Herr Hitler’s life. Does it signify, as it may well do, a reaction against Herr Hitler and his regime, or is it a repetition of the dastardly crime committed by the Nazis when they set fire to the Reichstag in order to bolster their claim that Germany was in danger of overthrow by Communists, and therefore required the protection of National Socialists? A mpre abominable crime was never perpetrated, especially when the treatment of the semi-idiotic Dutch boy, Van Lubbe, executed for setting fire to the building, is recalled. It was worthy of the men who used such a lever to secure control of Germany.

While the possibility of Nazi tactics in order to secure popular sympathy for Herr Hitler is not to be ruled out, it is much more likely that the explosion indicates a growth of antiNazi sentiment, of which there has been evidence for some time past.

Herr Hitler has richly earned assassination, but he has so far led a charmed life. H,is escapes from death on at least two other occasions, apart from his close calls on the battlefields, have been claimed by him to be mystic evidence of his mission as liberator and builder of Germany. That claim, however, probably rpakes an impression on only a limited number of German people, but it nevertheless is good propaganda. Whether this latest attempt will strengthen or weaken Herr Hitler’s prestige remains to be seen.

Reports of the meeting in the Munich beer cellar indicate that Herr Hitler was nervous and hesitating in the opening stages of his speech, but, as he focussed attention upon the war situation, he became frantically denunciatory of Britain, who, he said, was about to learn what an angry Germany tvas capable of doing. This threat, coupled with silence regarding the mediation offer by the Queen of Holland and the King of the Belgians, has been interpreted as a pronouncement that Germany intends to fight to the bitter end. At the moment, German activity on the western front suggests the correctness of this interpretation.