DOUBT IN GERMANY

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume 76, 23 October 1941, Page 5

DOUBT IN GERMANY

OUTCOME OF THE WAR FALLING CONFIDENCE IN THE HEICIIMARK SPATE OF PEACE PROPOSALS London, Oct. 21. Disappointment at the slow progress of the Russian campaign and also doubt regarding the outcome are widely expressed in Germany in various ways, says the Stockholm correspondent of “The Times.” Falling confidence in the German currency is only one manifestation of the grow ing realisation that Germany may after all lose the war. Remembering the experience of the early ’twenties, people hasten to convert their money into tangible effects. The president of the Reiehbank j Herr Walther Funk, in an article in ■ the “Frankfurter Zeitung.” has given ’ a warning which, however, is more i likely to stimulate than cheek this ! dreaded phenomenon. He admits that i the tendency is found not merely | among individuals but also has taken hold of the German business world, which, “because goods are scarce, considers their money so worthless as not |to be worth keeping.” Herr Funk calls the culprits “State I criminals,” and adds that Germany . will punish people relentlessly if they j scatter their money as if it were | worthless, because at present such a ; tendency is more harmful in connection i with the war than at any other time. ADVANCES TO BRITONS ••The Times” correspondent adds that the word "peace" keeps cropping up among Germans inside and outside of Germany, and a spate of peace proposals which has been trickling from German and pro-German sources throughout the summer is swelling into a larger stream whose waters flow toward various persons or institutions possessing potentially or actually some influence with the British public or the British authorities. The latest proposal, which has been launched in Stockholm by an admittedly pro-German personage who “has personal friends at the tup in England.'’ envisages a bargain with Britain at the expense of France and Russia. —U.P.A. JAPANESE GOVERNMENT WILLING TO MEDIATE Tokio, Oct. 21. The “Japan Times and Advertiser ’ said the Tpjo Government was prepared to undertake mediation in the European war if the opportunity presented itself.