NAZIS ON DEFENSIVE

Evening Star, Issue 24325, 14 October 1942, Page 3

NAZIS ON DEFENSIVE

BERLIN SPOKESMAN'S ADMISSION CONFIDENT OF HOLDING GAINS LONDON, October 12. The speeches of the Fuhrcr and Goering express a transition in the military situation, said a German military spokesman broadcasting from Berlin. There was a formula for it—from the offensive to the defensive. A wrong picture was gained if the formula was used to indicate a weakening of the position of Germany and her allies. “ However, the transition cannot be doubted any more,” the spokesman said, “ and the slogan, ‘ From the offensive to the defensive,’ is not wholly misleading. The Tripartite Powers in three years of offensive have achieved such successes that they cannot lose the war, even if they limit their actions to the defence of the conquered territories. This should not be understood as an announcement of our future war programme. It means only that Germany and her allies have won a completely unassailable position, from which they can expect, with composed calm and in the full certainty of victory, all developments to come. “ The end of the war cannot yet bo forced,” the commentator said, “ but the Tripartite Powers have Joined forces with time and space, and can now cope with all military demands for any defensive or offensive necessties. “ The discussion of a second front is in full swing in the enemy camp. If they would only listen to reason they would admit their impotence, but M. Stalin urges them to go on. Thus far all their plans and assumptions are i based on the assumption that Russia can carry the main burden and weaken Germany’s capacity to defend the Continent. This assumption will sooner or later cease to exist. It will then be proved that Britain and America have missed the bus. The United States has embarked on a vast armament drive, but it is beyond its strength to reconquer Europe, Africa, and Asia.” GERMANY'S NEW TANK IMPROVEMENTS CLAIMED LONDON, October 13. Major-general Koch, armament chief of the High Command, declared over the Berlin radio that the new German tank would beat the General Grant and Voroshilov tanks. “We studied the Churchill tank at Dieppe,” he said, “ and our new type will beat it. The German soldiers of 1943 will have better weapons than they Have now.” REMARKABLE PRESS COMMENT (Rec. 11.30 a.m.) LONDON, Oct. 13. “ Most of our hopes are now centred on how the United Nations will lose the war, not on how Germany will win it,” says the ‘ Frankfurter Zeitung ’ in a remarkable article. “ Only the destruction of the European fortress and the total defeat of the Axis can change England’s situation. A war which was not lost would for the Axis he a war won, because the Axis holds the whole of Europe and its external approaches. However, for-the English a war not totally won is a war lost, because, apart from some points in the Mediterranean, they have nothing in their hands which would be of interest to us or he decisive for future relations between England and Europe.”