The Evening Star TUESDAY, OCTOBER 20, 1942. THE REAL ISSUE.

Evening Star, Issue 24330, 20 October 1942, Page 2

The Evening Star TUESDAY, OCTOBER 20, 1942. THE REAL ISSUE.

At a meeting of Nazis in Munich in the last day or two an address was given by Goebbels, the chief of the party’s propagandists. It will be noted that the arrogance and boasting that have characterised his speeches in the past are not so conspicuous on this occasion. Significant remarks that he made were that the people would not be 'misled by ■grumbling, and that though the Allied terror raids could inflict “ painful damage ” they could not produce decisive results. Those comments suggest that the. Germans .are under heavy strain, and that at least there is an undercurrent of discontent at the inability of the Nazi chiefs, notwithstanding their successes in the past three years, to force the way to decisive vie tory. We have no complete understanding of the damage that has been inflicted on Germany’s great industrial cities by the Allied air raids, but it is undoubtedly enormous, and the loss of life very high. In addition, the Germans have to face a bleak winter prospect, with a probability of the Russian campaign being continued and an acute shortage of commodities on the home front. Jf grumbling,, the result of war weariness, is not prevalent, it will he a miracle. Goehbels’s address obviously bad as its chief aim the keeping up of the country’s morale, and the only crumb of comfort that he had to offer was in the matter of U-boat warfare. '' . The figures that he quoted under this head were no doubt grossly exaggerated, but the activities of tne enemy s underwater craft are still a decided hindrance to the operations of the •United Nations. In an address broadcast bv tile 8.8. C. in September Mr J. B. Priestley made interesting compansons between 1917 and now. There was then, he - said, in England, after three rears of war, a cynicism, a staleness, a feeling of disillusion, of grim weariness both among soldiers and civilians that has no parallel in Britain now, when the people are still zestful, eager, and ready to demand more sacrifices, and completely undivided —as they certainly -were not in 191 it —in their determination to rid the world of the Nazi madness. Mr Priestley went on to compare the position with that of Germany to-dav, and said: “Every account I have read bv neutral observers of the spirit of the Germans reminds me of their grim weariness of 1917, when all zest and resilience appeared to have gone.” It is not surprising that Goeb(nels should speak in a. more subdued vein than is his custom. And so we come to the real issue, ft is not just the - question of whether the Germans are to retain their- present tyrannical Nazi regime or whether they are to be beaten into freedom or democracy. The vital issue is .whether Europe is to *become German or whether Germany is to become European.