GERMANY’S OIL

Evening Star, Issue 23702, 9 October 1940, Page 8

GERMANY’S OIL

ACCESSION OF RUMANIA'S SUPPLY STILL SHORT OF MINIMUM NEEDS In a long war the shortage of food would bring Hitler to his knees; in a shorter one, his lack of sufficient oil would have the same effect (says ‘ Our Empire,’ the official journal of the British Empire Service League). His conquests have certainly increased his stocks, but by seizing the French and Dutch reserves he has killed the goose that laid the golden eggs, and even if he could secure the full output of Rumania he would still be short of his minimum needs for “ total ” war.

According to ‘ British Survey,’ the organ of the British Association for International Understanding, the Reich must import from 3,000,000 tons to 4.000. tons every year, assuming that present consumption cannot be less than before the war. Her external sources of supply are now Rumania and Russia only. Rumania’s total output in 1939 was 6,240,000 tons, and cannot quickly be increased. Whatever the degree of Germany's control of Rumania, transport remains a problem. Tho total fleet of Danube tankers numbers 300 barges, with a capacity of 220,000 tons. Each barge can make seyen round trips a year, so that even if Germany could commandeer the lot she would get only 1.500.000 tons this way, and she must leave some barges for other countries on whose industries she relies. At the end of April, 25,000 tons a month was reaching _ Germany from Rumania by rail. This amount might be doubled, but that would only give her 600,000 tons a year, or a total of 2.100.000 tons a year as the maximum obtainable from that country. Russia’s export surplus was last year less than 1.000. tons, and it is all now believed to be absorbed by her new military requirements. The nightly raids of the R.A.F. upon enemy ou tanks are complicating Hitler’s problems. But, in our appreciation of the fine work of our airmen, let us not forget the quiet, persistent, implacable pressure of the blockade. It is still the Royal Navy which causes Hitler’s biggest headache. American economists predict that Europe will be in the grip of famine this winter—that is, Europe outside Britain, whose sea power still brings her abundance of all necessities. For this calamity Hitler’s victims must hlame their conqueror. As long as they refused to act as middlemen for the enemy, neutral countries were not affected hy the blockade, which did not interrupt their normal imports. Now that they are being used by the Nazis as bases for operations against us they must become subject to the full blockade, which will not he lifted while they remain under the Nazi heel. The sooner they help us to kick Hitler back into Germany _. the sooner will the sea once again bring them food.