The Bay Of Plenty Beacon Published Tuesdays and Fridays. TUESDAY, NOV. 21, 1944 HITLER... HIMMLER... GERMANY!

Bay of Plenty Beacon, Volume 8, Issue 26, 21 November 1944, Page 4

The Bay Of Plenty Beacon Published Tuesdays and Fridays. TUESDAY, NOV. 21, 1944 HITLER... HIMMLER... GERMANY!

THE mass of rumour now escaping through neutral sources regarding the internal state of Germany, particularly with regard to the conduct of the war by the infamous heads of the Nazi regime, has led to widespread conjecture as to just what has happened to the German Dictator since his non-appearance at the usual anniversary of the Munich beer-celler 'putsh' of twenty-seven years ago. Out of the speculation arises the sinister figure of Himmler, now named as the Fuehrer's successor. The overlord of the dread Gestapo, can be expected to intensify the nations war effort to the utmost limit of its strength. Himmler's methods of dealing with his own countrymen in their extremity can be expected to be as merciless as those he invented to deal with the Jews and the malcontents when Naziism was climbing to its zenith. Nothing will be spared by this desperate and cold-blooded criminal in his greatest extreme. Already he has organised the 'suicide corps' for poor misguided, patriotic-blinded cripples, and incurables. The scheme is worthy of the brain which gave it a name and hatched the idea of sacrificing what the German papers blatantly refer to as 'useless lives being turned to good account by sacrificing themselves in the interests of healthy German citizens and soldiers.' Is Hitler cle.ad ? Is he crazed ? Has he been deposed or 'liquidated ?' All these surmises are quite possible inside the inner ring of the coldly calculating Nazi war council. But the fact remains that the startled world has seen the reins of government and war control slip quietly from the strangely silent Fuehrer, into the firm and brutal hands of the Chief of the most dreaded secret police of all time. Early in the present year, before Hitler announced that a coup d'etat had been attempted in Germany, it was asked 'where will Germany crack' ? It was generally supposed that under,the ever-growing pressure of the Allied air offensive and with the 'Battle of Europe' in the offing that Germany would be broken up by internal clissentions, but it would now be both foolish and dangerous to underrate the success of the Nazis in immobilising any and every source of resistance. For all practical purposes that success has been decisive. Accordingly, when Hitler claimed that 1944 cannot be compared with 1918, he was for once at least, speaking the truth. So far as is known, labour unrest has not hampered war production; and in recalling that when Hitler became Chancellor in 1933 there were up to 12,000,000 professing Social Democrats and Communists, we find the discipline of German labour the more remarkable. Outward opposition cannot be expected to show itself formidably among this dissident minority. A more definite source of weakness, however, is the presence of the 12,000,000 war prisoners and labour conscripts inside the country; but the: most rigorous measures have been taken to segregate the foreign from the native population. A revolt of the peasants, who have done fairly well out of the war and, more important, have not been exposed to concentrated bombing, is again a more distant possibility. With Himmler now at the helm, the chances of a revolution inside the Reich are more distant than ever—for Himmler has specialised in the art of controlling the masses by sheer terror. All that it is safe to assume is that whatever changes are brought about in Germany in the coming months will be a direct outcome of Allied military operations. The crack will come from without, not from within. Moreover, the Allies' task will be harder than it was in 1918. Then the mood of trie German soldier gradually reacted to that of the citizen. Today the citizen has no voice. The taunt that the only people in Europe to be cowed by the Gestapo is the Geri man may be cynical, but it is not without truth. General Eisenhower says much the same in the statement: "We are still a long way from the Rhine. ... If the Germans knew they were beaten they would not be fighting so desperately. The whole German nation is in the grasp of a group which has nothing to lose if it fights to the. last man."