INDUSTRIAL AREAS OF RUHR RELATIVELY FREE OF COMMUNIST EFFORTS TO CAUSE LABOUR TROUBLE

Bay of Plenty Beacon, Volume 12, Issue 90, 3 September 1948, Page 5

INDUSTRIAL AREAS OF RUHR RELATIVELY FREE OF COMMUNIST EFFORTS TO CAUSE LABOUR TROUBLE

(By Reece Smith, New Zealand Kemsley Empire Journalist)

» Dusseldorf, July 22. As Russia puts the. screws on the Western powers in Berlin it might be expected she should also thrust at them in the Ruhr, industrial heart of Germany, and at first sight receptive ground for anti-British propaganda.

The workers of the Ruhr have seen their factories and homes flattened by Bomber Command, are still living in stark monuments to those nights, and are only slowly finding something more in life than, bleak existence. Three days in the Ruhr showed me a body of hopeless, comfortless workers to whom Communist propaganda could easily appeal, if only because any change could not be for the worse. Reds Quiescent This conclusion was false. According to the occupation authorities, who are by no means unaware of the dangers .which would rise from labour troubles yn the Ruhr when the valley is keeping Germany alive, the Communists are quiescent. There is no Russian activity in parallel with the Berlin effort. Not that there are no Communists among the coal and steel workers. The complete absence of avowed Communists would be regarded gravely, as the presumption would be that they were anonymous for some suspicious purpose. The strongest block against which the Ruhr Communists have always dashed their efforts is the Roman Catholic Church. The Ruhr is a traditionally strong ■ Catholic area, thus nullifying much of the usual advantage of an industrial zone from the Communist point of view. Rations A Safeguard The second safeguard, according to the acting Regional Commissioner for North Rhine and Westphalia, Major General W. H. A. Bishop, is that'the miners, as heavy, industry workers, get special rations. The better fed and housed people wore, he said, the less chance of their be-

ing incited. The 'feeding of the min,ers is steadily improving, and with this improvement recedes the possibility of externally inspired unrest in the* mines. " Repatriated prisoners of war and other persons from the Eastern Zone of Germany have returned home to the Ruhr thoroughly indoctrinated in some cases, but not in numbers which worry the authorities. Stories circulate of indoctrination- courses in the Eastern Zone to which Germans—even some former strong Nazis—are recruited for a threeweek course before coming back to the mines, or other key industries. Indoctrination—Two Ways No doubt there is such high power indoctrination, but the principle can hardly be questioned in face of British and American attempts to indoctrinate Germans in western democracy. Those who have fallen under the Russian spell are easy to pick, according to officers who. sort out Germans arriving from the east, and they are directed to employment where their efforts will be of greater benefit to Germany than to Russia. • « British security forces have their eye on the mines, and it Is doubtful whether any big industrial surprises can be sprung by the Communists. A third factor working against the Russians in the Ruhr are the tales returning. Germans bring from the other’ side of the Iron Curtain. Bludgeoned with propaganda for years, the Germans might look sideways at the British decrying of the Russians, hut when their own relatives and neighbours return to tell the tale, they listen. Admiration for the Soviet way does not grow apace as a result. i,