The Domnion TUESDAY, APRIL 30, 1940. FALSIFICATION EXPOSED

Dominion, Volume 33, Issue 183, 30 April 1940, Page 6

The Domnion TUESDAY, APRIL 30, 1940. FALSIFICATION EXPOSED

The formal statement made by the Nazi Foreign Minister on the subject of Germany’s invasion of Norway was another attempt to convince the world that black is white. No doubt Ribbentrop believed that the preparation of the statement as a White Paper would assist the illusion, but this subterfuge, as well as the veneer of cloaking the meeting to which neutral diplomats andmess dents were summoned at the weekend, was very thin. Thestatement revealed itself simply as propaganda of a familiar kind. Ribbentrop was playing the Goebbels role, and doing so with a clumsiness by no means complimentary to the intelligence of his audience. It may be assumed that the great majority of thinking people outside Germany have long since ceased to give credence to such Nazi utterances. Nevertheless, each one requires to be taken seriously and refuted, for there is a gullible minority to whom any fantastic sto y may make some sort of appeal. In addition there are, throughout the world, groups of Nazi sympathizers and political opponents of the Allied cans! who are only too ready to seize upon any evidencel,o„ever flimsy, calculated to excuse Germany s conduct. For these reasons the prompt British analysis and denials of Ribbentrop s charge are justified. In normal circumstances this farrago of misrepresenta tion from Berlin would not have been worth the trouble of a reply. The principal point the Nazi White Paper sought to make was that Germany, in launching an attack on Norway, merely forestalled a similar Allied move. Such an excuse, even if it were real, would have no moral value. But it is demonstrably unreal, because it is based on the fac.t that the British Navy laid a great minefield in Scandinavian waters in the first week of April. This action, Ribbentrop contended, made clear the intentions of the Allies, whereupon Germany acted ahead of them. But it has since been shown—and the fact has been boasted about by the Nazis themselves—that the minefield was laid too late. Its purpose, which was to prevent German ships reaching Norway, was partly defeated by the fact that many ships, containing troops and materials of war, were already on the move and had slipped inside the new barrier. The argument of Ribbentrop s “White Paper,” therefore, collapses at its beginning. The rest of the story which diplomats and newspaper men were asked to believe descended to a still lower level. Plans for the Allied occupation of Norway were said to have been “found in the possession of a British brigade staff captured at Hamar, and other documents taken from a captured British officer were alleged to have referred to embarkation orders to “the Fifth Battalion of the Rochester.” No British brigade staff has been captured at Hamar or anywhere else, and there is no such regiment as the “Rochester. It is understandable that in the face of such a statement the Air Minister, Sir Samuel Hoare, when mentioning Ribbentrop s White Paper should say: “Let me leave this man to his lies.” The attitude of the British official spokesmen, however, was the more prudent one. Every lie, however blatant, must be nailed down if the Nazi propaganda offensive is to be thoroughly countered. Every falsity and absurdity must be revealed. As time goes on German propaganda may be expected to defeat itself, but the safe course is to hasten that end by exposure of even the most obvious falsities.