GERMANY’S PLAN FOR 1939

Southland Times, Issue 23932, 26 September 1939, Page 3

GERMANY’S PLAN FOR 1939

Reichwehr Officer’s Statement RIGHT OF PEOPLES TO CHOOSE An article by Georges Oudard which appeared in the French publication L’lllustration on February 11 last, purports to give the German'plans for this year, as unfolded by one of the foremost chiefs of the Reichwehr to the officers of his staff. It reads as follows:—

“Starting from sub-Carpathian Russia, we will excite all the Polish Ukraine to independence, that it to say Eastern Galicia, Volkynia, and Polesia, grounding our action upon the right of people to dispose of themselves. “At the moment when the agitation is at its height a German ultimatum to Warsaw will surprisedly proclaim the handing back of the Corridor and of Upper Silesia. In regard to this, we have right now promised the Czechs to give them back the region of Teschen if we can count upon their support against Poland. Poland will have to yield in the same way as Czechoslovakia in September, for, in spite of all the solemn agreements, no one will be wishful to risk themselves, on behalf of Poland.' There will be very probably, therefore, no war on this occasion,' for Poland would be obliged to fight on three fronts. Poland will then be transformed into a union of three federated states comprising Poles, White Russians and Ukranians, unless the Ukranian parties are immediately erected into a completely independent State. Poland will have to give up the Corridor and Upper Silesia. Posnania will be left to herself.

“In consequence of such a transformation, Poland will have lost all value as far as anti-German military power is concerned, and it will then depend only on the German will alone to determine in what direction the Reich will set its ulterior expansion; against France or against Russia. “The existence of an independent or autonomous Polish Ukraine will be serviceable in organising a revolutionary agitation in Russia upon the basis of the right of peoples to dispose of themselves. - “Russian Ukraine and Polish Ukraine will one day form a State of at least 40,000,000 souls. The Fuhfer has decided to create this State not as a German colony, but as an ally of Germany, without reckoning on the economic and political advantages that will immediately be obtained by the Reich.

“But the real purpose of the Reich is to make usd of the Ukraine as a base towards the Causasus and its riches. Get this, gentlemen, well into your heads: What Germany wants after Poland and Czechoslovakia, is to upset the Union of the Soviets by making use of the principle of the right of people to dispose of themselves. All the peoples so liberated will then be organized into a grand society of nations directed by Berlin. And why should that not succeed? Because France and England would put an obstacle in the way? “In its projects Germany counts evidently upon the support of Italy, although Italy knows that it would be eliminated from the -Eastern combinations, properly so called. What does Italy expect in exchange? She expects Tunisia as a point of departure for a wider extension in North Africa and in the Mediterranean. It is evident that Italy cannot intervene in Tunisia before Germany can concentrate all its army on the French frontier. It is a thing which is almost possible right now (after the Czech capitulation), and which will certainly become possible after the degradation of Poland. Neither Germany nor Italy thinks of war against France, but only of a military blackmail, which would oblige France to give up Tunisia in virtue of the right of peoples to dispose of themselves. What Will be the means of demanding this' blackmail? The superiority of German-Italian aviation in comparison with French-English aviation and the more crushing superiority of the Ger-man-Italian armies in comparison with the French army, once the latter ally (England) is eliminated. “Mussolini will very probably ask the Fuhrer that the Tunisian affair should be undertaken, as from the spring of 1939 to exploit the superiority of the Axis from the point of view of aviation. Mussolini will refer to the support that he gave to Germany at the time of the Austrian affair and the Czech affair. But the Fuhrer will demand before any German-Italian action against France with a view to the cession of Tunisia that the case of Poland be settled. As in the case of Austria and of Czechoslovakia, and as quite recently in the affair of the common frontier Mussolini will be forced to give way for Italy cannot dream of “blackmailing” France before the' whole German army and aviation are ready to be concentrated against France. If, then, the Polish question is the European order of the day in the spring of 1939 (this will probably be settled before the Hungarian and the Rumanian questions)—it must be admitted that the Tunisian question will be set down for the summer or autumn of 1939.

“If Italy limits its claims to Tunisia it is almost certain that it will obtain satisfaction. I do not doubt that England and France will mobilize, but after the mobilization, England will give good advice to France to yield a part of it to save peace.