EXTENT OF AID

New Zealand Herald, Volume 78, Issue 24083, 30 September 1941, Page 7

EXTENT OF AID

LONDON PRESS UNEASY BOMBING OF FRANCE CRITICISM OF POLICY (Reed. 5.5 p.m.) LONDON, Sept. 28 The chief subject for discussion and comment in the Sunday press, as it has been recently in the daily newspapers, is the question of British help for Russia. Mr. John Gordon, in tho Sunday Express, says Britain should send Russia as many bombers as she can fly there, and adds: "Surely the place for our bombers is where they can kill tho most Germans, create the greatest chaos and cause the most devastation. That place is now the Russian front. Why we keep bombers here sinking an odd ship in the Channel, making holes in French airfields which can be refdled in a few hours, and taking potshots at empty bathing huts on the Channel beaches is beyond me." "Mooning About Victory" Mr. J. L. Garvin, writing in the Observer, says: "The depth and weight of the German mechanised invasion in the Ukraine now constitute the worst danger to the life and soul of the Russian people. Tho British and American peoples must expect an even more formidable struggle. "Let them put their backs into it and quit mooning about an 'automatic victory some fine time in the remote future.' Before victory can be won they j must earn it. They must sweat for it, | just as Russia is shedding blood for it. They must grapple as never before with the magnitude of their industrial task —the giant job of out-producing Hitler in this machine-power war." "Doing What We Can" A distinguished writer in the Sunday Times says: "What we can do we are doing to prevent Russia from being conquered—to enable her to hold out and to turn defeat into ultimate victory. Besides blockading her enemies by sea and bombing them from the air, and apart from some Royal Air Force co-operation on Russian soil, this involves three main things: (1) Keeping the sea open so that supplies, equipment and other necessities may reach her; (2) ourselves manufacturing for her part ol what she needs; (3) guarding, or opening up by military action or engineering, or both, avenues along which supplies may reach her.

Strain to Limit "The first means that the gigantic task of our Navy is shared in now by our Air Force. The second means that whereas we had strained every nerve to make aircraft and tanks for our own forces, we now have to make them in vast numbers for Russia as well —a tax on our strength which we cannot dream of refusing, but which nevertheless inevitably must strain us to the limit. The third may be illustrated by what wo have done and shall do in Iran and Irak —military steps which we have taken and engineering steps which we are going to take —to open up an avenue of supply to Russia from the Persian Gulf. "Over and above these direct aids to Russia come our direct blows against Russia's enemy. These take two main forms —a blockade by sea and a bombing offensive by air. The blockade is, of course, complemented by Russia's land blockade on the east."

WISHFUL THINKING GERMANS' EMPTY BOASTS UNFULFILLED PROMISES LONDON, Sept. 2S The German spokesman's statement that capture of Leningrad is expected }, y the end of next week is regarded in London as a piece of wishful thinking, calculated to impress the German piihlic with the precision of the victorious advance of the German armies. The Manchester Guardian summarised earlier promises concerning the attack on Russia, and says: "We are now nearing the end of September, and if we go back to the first three weeks of July we shall find that most of what the Germans were claiming then is not true yet. At the beginning of July, before' the battle had been won, the German High Command announced, 'The power of resistance of the Soviet Army seems to have been broken.' On July 2 Swedish newspapers reported from Berlin that Murmansk had been captured. On July 12 the Germans issued a report that the routes to Moscow, Leningrad and Kiev lay open. On July 15 the Berlin correspondent of the Stockholm Tidsningen reported that it was expected the eastern campaign would be essentially completed by August 15. Every one of these claims was false, except the one about Kiev, which was absurdly premature." PRODUCTION OF TANKS LONDON, Sept. 2tf British tank production during tlu* Tanks for Russia Week was 20 per cent more than during the previous week, it is now disclosed. The output on Saturday was the highest ever achieved.