ENTERPRISE. PROPAGANDA

Bay of Plenty Beacon, Volume 2, Issue 248, 11 December 1940, Page 2

ENTERPRISE. PROPAGANDA

NEED FOR GREATER BRITISH ACTIVITY OUR CASK IS A GOOD ONE Stressing the need for greater enterprise in British propaganda, a writer in the Spectator says: "British propaganda starts with immense advantages, which are no! sufficiently appreciated. It is the one offensive in which the Nazis cannot effectively retaliate. Democracies do not fear criticism, or even abuse. Dictators arc morbidly sensitive to unpalatable facts and ideas, antidread the power of public opinion. Our leaflets have to be carefully collected and destroyed; Hitler's leaflets can be sold to buy Spitfires. British propaganda can afford to be consistent, for our case is a good one. Goebbels is led from a campaign to prove democracies decadent to the inconsistent arguments that poor little Germany was encircled and forced into war by warlike democracies. Commander KingHall had only to present Goebbels-' own arguments in the London Daily Telegraph, three weeks before war began., to turn them into a perfect boomerang. Again, Nazi propaganda, both internally and externally, began with a crescendo, and everything since has necessarily savoured of anticlimax. To have used up already all the words of hatred and anger in one's vocabulary is a weakness rather than an advantage. It leads to incredulity abroad and disillusionment at home,"

BOMBERS DIDN'T WORRY BRITISH SEA-DOG At the age of 85, Capt. J. M, Caulfield, retired British naval officer, now in Sydnej'. defied the bombs of Nazi raiders over London. "If the Germans wanted to get me they could get me in bed," lie said. "I wasn't going to get out for them''' Short, stocky, with a tanned complexion and a jaw like granite, Cap tain Caulfield brought his lecturing gear and a bundle of textbooks with him, as well as his special "lecturing map" of the Avor'jd. He is a hardy old seadog. Dining the voyage out, he paced the decks of the ship while it was pound ing in a heavy gale, and most of the otheir passengers were too ill la leave their cabins. "As soon as war broke ou,t„ I offered my services to the Navy," lie said. "Do you believe it, they to|d me I was too old? Wei],, I am 85, rising 86. But I thought I could be useful to them as a French in-/ terpreter. "I came out to Sydney in HM.S. Inconstant in 1881 with King George V. before he became King,, and I have paid many visits to Australia since. Captain Caulfield. waited in London for a long time, and then decided that he might be able to assist boys wanting to go to sea, by lecturing in Sydney.