Books & Writers

Waikato Times, Volume 127, Issue 21192, 15 August 1940, Page 12

Books & Writers

COMMENTS AND EXTRACTS j ~|

IF GERMANY INVADES PROFESSOR BANSE’S PLAN DELIGHT IN DESTRUCTION Never has Great Britain had an j enemy who has told her so plainly • and in so much detail as Herr Hitler.! what he ini ends to do to her. It is, j however, his faithful henchman Pro- j fessor Ew aid Banse, in his “ Raum und Volk im V eh.kriege,” translated ! into English under the title, “ Ger- ! many, prepare for War! ” who gives ; fullest particulars of the projected conquest < f the island. i First, he examines the causes of Germany’s del eat in the last War. , They irxlude her failure to occupy ; Holland as well as Belgium at the ! outbreak of the struggle; her neglect, to seize the rtench Channel ports, when the:- lsy undefended at her mercy; her ill of her formidable fleet, and her consequent postponement ot the essential invasion of England until die f< ’ n.-ation of Kitchener’s Army made it too risky to attempt. Secondly, Banse shows how in the “ next war ” —that is, the war now raging—the German mistakes in the last must be obviated:— (1) Holland, Belgium, and the north-east French coast must be occupied at once. Then “to get an army across the Channel to the Kent coast should prove a relatively simple business, particularly if the attacker is in possession of the French Channel ports of Dunkirk, Calais, and Boulogne, from which he can clear the Channel of English ships with artillery.” (2) A second and even more important region to be occupied is East Anglia, for “ the Great Ouse, which flows into the Wash, and a number of streams flowing into the Blackwater Estuary which are separated from the sources of the Ouse by a few miles only make the peninsula into a regular island which provides an invading army with safe and roomy quarters, from which it can threaten London (which is quite close, and without natural defences on that side), and also the industrial Midlands not far away.” (3) The conquest of the Midland region—whose industries make it even more vitally important than London itself—can be rendered sure by a supplementary invasion from Ireland, and “if this, the most densely populated and highly industrialised part of England, were once gripped as a with a forceps from the west and from the south-east, England would be pretty well finished.” And the prospect of finishing England fills Professor Banse with delight;—“ We confess that it gives us pleasure to mediate on the destruction that must sooner or later overtake this proud and seemingly invincible nation, and to think that this country, which was last conquered in 1066, will once more obey a foreign master.”

SERVICE TO WORLD WHAT BRITAIN HAS DONE NEW ZEALANDER’S BOOK From Shakespeare to television, Parliamentary government to Dominion status, shirts to animal research, longbow to tank, garden city to the sporting spirit, the British people have made their world contribution. It is the subject of analysis in a new work, “ The British Contribution,” by the former New Zealander, Donald Cowie. The book details what Great Britain has done for the world in terms of the present day. The conclusion reached is a very hopeful one. Great Britain’s outstanding contribution, Mr Cowie declares, is the policital system of the overseas Commonwealth; and he relates this directly to the idea of European Federation. PITHY EXTRACTS FROM THE NEW BOOKS A pleasant face, an attractive figure makes life damnably complicated.” From “ The Love Story of Gilbert Bright.” “ One dame ain’t no more’n another.”—From “ Let Me Breathe Thunder.”

“ Why are some men good and some bad? ” —From “ Sink and Be Damned.”

“ A man could no more exist without Jupiter than he could exist without a liver.”—From “ Astrology In Everyday Life.”