VICTORY SYRUP!

Auckland Star, Volume LXXI, Issue 215, 10 September 1940, Page 5

VICTORY SYRUP!

( NAZI PROPAGANDA. f ALL OVER BY AUTUMN. LONDON, August 17. I see everyone says it was crass Stupidity for the Germans to drop bales of Hitler's last "appeal to reason" into British sewage ponds. I am not quite so sure. I think those leaflets were not dropped as an appeal to the British. They were dropped to encourage the Germans, says an official Writer in the "Daily Express." "Ha," says Fritz, hearing from his airmen friends that they have been sprinkling Hitler's speech over Britain. "Ha! Ha! You see, Karl, it is true that the British are ripe for conquest, as the Fuehrer says. Morale is so low in Britain that they have had to suppress the Fuehrer's speech for fear of its effect. So we just dropped it to them from our bombers. Wonderful! The war will soon be over." Yes, I believe that these leaflet raids are part of Goebbels' new campaign of action propaganda with which —at the moment—he is trying to purge from the Germans their fear of another war winter by demonstrating to them the confidence of the German Government that victory will be theirs by the autumn. Money Well Spent; Under Goebbels' orders workmen have started hammering, sawing and painting in the Nuremberg Stadium, getting it ready, so the whisper campaign tells seekers of the low-down, for the victory rally of the National Socialist party. "See," says Fritz to Karl, "they're so sure that war will be over in time for the Partei Tag, they're getting the stadium ready now." Big export firms are ordered to arrange contracts for delivery of goods to South America in October. They are authorised to agree to pay a forfeit if the deliveries do not take place.

"Whaddyasay to that, Karl?" says Fritz. "They're actually willing to bet! big money that they'll be ready to sendj

German goods to South America by October. That means they're absolutely certain of victory. They wouldn't risk it otherwise. By Christmas our overseas trade will be back to normal." Fritz and Karl do not know that at the same time as he put out this cheerful bit of business news Dr. Goebbels was arranging for the purchase in the United States of the products 'which the Germans arc to deliver in order that they may not need to pay that forfeit. The propaganda effect of the forfeit story at home and in America is well worth the dollars. (And in any case the Germans cannot spend their dollars more profitably. The seas are closed to them and they cannot get goods from America, which is also a reason why the Germans spend ten million pounds on propaganda in the United States). Another Goebbels Stunt. As a final triumph of action propaganda, Dr. Goebbels has arranged a special increase in food rations. And this is not only due to the imports of food from the conquered countries, Belgium, Holland, Denmark, Norway and France, where food rations have been imposed by the Germans, allowing the conquered population* even less than the Germans got 'before the present increase in rations. No, this increase, economists assure me, is entirely unsound and artificial. It will have to be paid for with increased famine as the war goes on. But it has been put across by Goebbels as an action propaganda stunt to prove to sceptical Germans that Hitler was right when he said that Germany's food reserves were so great that they need fear no shortages for the future. What is the result of all this? For the moment the Germans, stimulated by the sight of their soldiers returning laden with the loot of conquered countries, the reappearance of tinned foods, of bottled sauces, pate de foie graa, chickens in the shops—taken from the shops of the occupied countries—are so •pleased and proud of tlioinsclves that, as the American correspondent in Berlin put it, "They need shoehorn* to put on their hats." Disillusionment Ahead. But it is a very dangerous propaganda, this. For the war is going on a long time yet. And soon the loot will be consumed. There will bo no more

chickens to come from Denmark. No more milk from Holland. The cattle slaughtered now for lack of cattle feed, which i.s giving a false, impression of plenty in the butchers' shops, will have no young. And there will be lees meat than ever. That victory rally will not be held, despite all the hammering in Nuremberg. And the export trade will not be able •to send its ships across the Atlantic this October carrying the promised German products. Bremen and Hamburg will have no trade revival, but will continue to be blockaded and bombed. The German people will be disappointed and embittered. And perhaps they will learn to look on every bit of silver lining in their sky with "the suspicion that may-be this, too, is just another piece of Dr. Goebbels' action propaganda.