GERMAN SOLDIERS WEARING GLASSES

Southland Times, Issue 23676, 26 November 1938, Page 8

GERMAN SOLDIERS WEARING GLASSES

PHYSIQUE CONSIDERED DISAPPOINTING t (Special to The Times) AUCKLAND, November 25. “I have never been more surprised than I was when I saw the physique of the average German soldier,” said Mr J. Green, a Dunedin business man who arrived at Auckland by the Mariposa from San Francisco after spending several months touring Europe. Mr Green said he had been led to believe that the German soldier was war material of the highest type, but although he had seen innumerable trainloads of them during the recent concentration on the Czechoslovakian border, he had formed the opinion that they were generally flattered by what had been said of them.

An astonishing number of them, he said, were short-sighted. He had seen more German soldiers wearing glasses than without them and the majority could not compare in any way with the finely-trained and exceptionally fit Czechoslovakian soldiers he had seen. The Nazis he had seen who really evoked his admiration for their physique were young members of the Hitler Youth Movement.

Mr Green, who is a member of the territorial forces, said he had tried to find out while he was in Great Britain how the Gemam air force was regarded and the general opinion was that it was one of the finest in the world.