AIM APPROVED

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXVI, Issue 20073, 20 October 1939, Page 7

AIM APPROVED

AVOIDING DISTORTION CLAIMS TO SUCCESS GERMAN COMPARISON VAINGLORIOUS BOASTS (Klee. Tel. Copyright—United Press Assn.) (British Official Wireless.) Reed. 11.30 a.m. RUGBY. Oct. 19. The deliberate under-statement which marked the speech of the Prime Minister. Mr. Neville Chamberlain, in the House of Commons yesterday dealing with the enemy air attacks on the fleet bases is welcomed by the press, and attention is drawn to his observation: “The extent of the enemy’s disappointment at the failure of their attack to inflict any serious injury on our ships may be measured by the fantastic nature of the claims they felt obliged to invent.”

The Daily Telegraph says: “It is clear that our Government is determined the world shall be given no reason to judge Britain by similar standards. The advantages to be got by lying are short-lived. If our communiques are to win implicit belief, which alone has lasting value, they must not lay claim to successes which are not thoroughly established. Adhering strictly to these principles, the Prime Minister took the highest estimate of the number of German bombers concerned in the recent raids and reckoned only eight machines, actually seen to have been brought down, in arriving at his statement that the casualties inflicted on the enemy exceeded 25 per cent. In the circumstances, his dry admission that they may have been higher sets the mind speculating as to how very much higher the Nazi methods of computation would have made them.”

The Manchester. Guardian says: ‘‘A reputation for frankness and truthfulness is one of the greatest assets we can have. German propaganda must always beat us in volume and unscrupulousness. But in a long war its very extravagances must defeat its ends. The more vigorous the lying, the worse the personal abuse. The more vainglorious the boasts in these early months of the war, the sooner will Germany bring herself into universal discredit.”