GERMANY AND AUSTRIA

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LXII, Issue 18758, 15 July 1935, Page 4

GERMANY AND AUSTRIA

HERR HITLER’S POLICY WHERE IT MAY LEAD Armaments will not satisfy Germany indefinitely, nor will the cancellation of some of the meaningless paragraphs of the Versailles Treaty justify the effort and sacrifice which rearmament has imposed, slates Professor Lewis Namier, noted historian, of Manchester University, in the Manchester Guardian, examining Herr Hitler’s policy. Profc.sso.r Namier points out that Herr Hitler cannot -tight Russia, as the Ger-man-Polish alliance makes this impractical. and he would gain nothing from such a will*. The. writer says the talk of GermanPolish territorial rearrangements is moonshine, but Herr Hitler, himself an Austrian, and backed by a tradition of allying the policies of Austria and Germany, can never renounce • Austria any more than M. Poincare could have l£* noimeed Lorraine, his birthplace. Again. Vienna is a focal point on the Danube,’ and occupies an important strategic position in the politics of Central and Eastern Europe. Herr Hitler cannot leave Austria outside the framework. of his “Totalitarian State” because Austria is German. Indeed, Austrian policy, before the advent of the Nazis, was'union with Germany. Nevertheless, if the Nazis established themselves in Vienna, the whole of Central and South-east Europe would be aflame. This would destroy the political balance and threaten Czceho-Slovakia, Yugoslavia, and Rumania, who would be attacked by the surrounding Nazis, Magyars and Bulgars. Italy then would be forced to think of her own safety. The tension that Herr Hitler has worked up in Germany by enormous armaments, universal drilling, ami spiritual militarism, cannot unload itself in the mere expunging of the socalled “war guilt lie,” or the theoretical declaration that Germany is lit to hold colonies.

Professor Namier says a storm is brewing that threatens Austria. ‘‘lt will not be merely a local disturbance,” lie concludes.