The Wanganui Chronicle. FRIDAY, JANUARY 19, 1940. THE GERMAN PEOPLE

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 84, Issue 16, 19 January 1940, Page 4

The Wanganui Chronicle. FRIDAY, JANUARY 19, 1940. THE GERMAN PEOPLE

PRESCRIBING the German people to-day, Mr. Ronald Cross used an apt phrase: he said that the “whole German people had been niouklei and hammered into a vast militarised economic machine deliberately prepared for the waging of war. That fact made Germany technically stronger than in the last war, but it also made her more brittle than before.’’ Solid but brittle is his description of the German people to-day, and it fits’. The complex of the German people must be studied if they are to be understood. The background of the German is to be found in his country and in his history. The Germans are a mixture of the old Teutonic tribes, of Norse and Slav infusions, living in the centre of Europe. Because it was the centre of Europe the rising nations went to war with each other, and very often met in what came to be termed the Cockpit of Europe. War is dysgenic, it destroys the cultural growth as well as the accumulated wealth of a country; consequently, the German people came to see at close hand the hard side of war because it left them spiritually and materially poorer. They saw, too, over a long period, that the rights and wrongs of the contestants did not concern them overmuch, but that it was healthy for them, as the residents of the cockpit, to be on the winning side of the contest if at all possible: for it was only by so doing that they could hope to minimise their losses, and might, possibly, come by some gains. Further. Germany was, up to 1870, a collection or Federation of States, each with its own Duke. Rule, therefore, was personal, and alterations were given as concessions from the Prince or ruler above to subjects, and not as the result of parliamentary deliberations by elected representatives. Germany, therefore, developed with a great respect for authority, no matter how it. was constituted nor what its title was. The people, poor tlii’ojflgh constant wars, were compelled to give their time and thought to the problem of making a living, leaving matters of statecraft to those whom it most nearly concerned. The German people, therefore, have had very little experience in the practice of polities. When Bismarck established the German Empire the army represented the one unifying influence; it was, indeed, the one empire institution, and it guarded the national territory well. The German people, by prior experience, had been moulded to support its army, and although the regime might be strict it was much better so than having the country overrun by warring armies of other countries. When the army engaged in three lightning wars, displacing Austria from the head of the Germanic League, taking the provinces of Schleswig and Holstein from Denmark, and Alsace and Lorraine from France, the German people came to believe in the invincibility of that army. Its organisation and display, coupled with its might, made the citizen proud to be a German. Looking eastward, the German saw a people which he considered his inferiors, and he asked himself why should he not push these inferior peoples back. Looking southward down the course of the Danube, he saw in Austria, in Hungary and in the Slav lands of the Balkans, German colonists who were revealing qualities of orderliness, organisation ability, and industry far superior to those of the people among whom they dwelt. They looked southward to the Tyrol, and saw again the superior German colonist who were Herrenvolk, that is superior people. It is not surprising that with their lack of political experience, their superiority in education and endeavour, combined with their tenacity of purpose and the feats of their army, that they •should begin Io see visions and to dream dreams of the Deutsch land l lier Alles kind. It is .true that within Germany a Liberal movement has been steadily growing, wherein the main kernel or generic idea was that the Stale existed for the protection of the individual, ami not. the individual for the preservation and advancement of the State, but against the material progress of the Empire, upon the basis of the Zolverein established by Bismarck, backed up by the army, and served by a diplomacy which was, in the words of Sir Edward Grey, always ready to show “its rough side” when occasion offered, the Liberal movement gained in numbers, but not in power. The majority of Germans did not think along democratic lines. Standing over against this newcomer on the world stage, was France, whom Germany had twice vanquished, and whom the latter considered to be a decadent people, and Great Britain, rich in money and in undeveloped foreign lands, high in the estimation of the world, and seemingly so self-poised as to be indifferent to criticism. In the presence of the French the Germans could boast, but in the presence of the English they could only feel uncomfortable. Their attitude toward England consequently fluctuated between respect and envy. After the war of 1914-1918 the German Republic was set up under the Weimar Constitution (actually the Republic, was proclaimed to forestall Bolshevism), but the Liberal elements were inexperienced and the Administration remained manned by members of the old regime, who were not well disposed to the Republic, and the country was faced with problems which would have put a severe strain upon a people experienced in selfgovernment. It is not correct to say that the Republic did not fit the psychology of the German people, for it never had a chance. The German people again felt their impotence under the Republic, and they naturally turned to Hitler, who raised the standard of revolt against the Treaty of Versailles. Having nothing, and with a hopeless future confronting them, the German people had nothing to lose by treading desperate paths. Hitler re-established Germany’s might, he enlarged its borders, he consolidated the Reich itself, and he won bloodless victory after bloodless victory. Hitler gained a large and genuine following in Germany in consequence of his achievements. The present war is presented to the German people as a war of attrition, an effort to again fasten chains on the German people; and they are fighting for their existence. Hence they are a solid block of resistance to the Allies, and will remain so until the nation disintegrates. The German people know that the nation is being kept together by the present regime, but that when that regime is dissolved there will be no alternative organisation to take its place. The German people, intensely patriotic as they should be, prefer to be misgoverned by Hitler than defeated by foreigners. When, however, they are convinced that Hitler is fighting a losing battle, the disintegration will oceur quickly, but it will take the German people a long time to come to realise that they are losing the battle and that they are fighting for other than a just cause.