The Waikato Times FRIDAY, MAY 18, 1945 GERMAN POLITICAL WILDERNESS

Waikato Times, Volume 106, Issue 22612, 18 May 1945, Page 2

The Waikato Times FRIDAY, MAY 18, 1945 GERMAN POLITICAL WILDERNESS

Evolving order out of the chaos of Europe, the Allied Military Government is facing a task of unprecedented magnitude. Germany is the core of the problem, and it is right that Germany should be compelled to make a major contribution, since she was the cause of the tragedy. In the meantime the Allies are concentrating upon placing the economy of production and distribution in order, and little progress has yet been made in the solution of the political problem.* German manpower and all the other facilities of production are at the command of the Allies. The first consideration will be to provide for the needs of the armies of occupation, so that Germans will be called upon to put their shoulders to the wheel and provide a surplus for their own requirements. The Allied aim is to supply the armies of occupation without heavy importation, for in many countries apart from Germany there is a most urgent need for supplies to relieve a disastrous famine.

Politically Germany is still deep in the wilderness. The organisation of which Doenitz is the head is not recognised as the government of Germany but is simply being used by the Allies to set the Germans to work. No decision has yet been made whether Doenitz himself will be brought to trial as an alleged war criminal. There is no clear indication yet from the Germans of a widespread desire to set up some democratic form of government. That is a revolution yet to come.* So overwhelming has been the defeat that apart from the Nazi leaders all national consciousness seems to have been knocked out of the German people. In any case they have been used to complete oppression for so long that they have almost lost the power to realise that they must eventually accept the responsibility of governing themselves. First, however, they must accept orders for the rebuilding of the economy which they wrecked. So thorough was the indoctrination of Nazi Germany that no revolution in the ordinary sense has yet occurred. In every other country “freedom movements” have taken the power out of the hands of the old and defeated regime at the earliest possible moment. It seemed certain that revolution in Germany would have ended the war. But it was not so. Millions of Germans simply gave up the struggle when they were thoroughly thrashed, but there was no clearcut break-away from Nazi-ism—no revolution against despotism to give the hope that at least some of the Germans dreamed of better things than Hitlerism. National Socialism was their all, and since that has been taken away they are lost. Here is a remarkable illustration of a nation that has ceased to think constructively in a political sense—which surrendered all its rights and privileges to fanatical party leaders. Germany has begun to pay the inevitable penalty.