IMPRESSIONS OF EUROPE

Opotiki News, Volume II, Issue 135, 18 January 1939, Page 4

IMPRESSIONS OF EUROPE

TRAGEDY OF IGNORANCE / WAR NOT WANTED NO FREEDOM OF SPEECH “Freedom of speech and thought is. an unknown quantity in Germany and all the workings of the British Government to avoid war are kept from the people. They know nothing of President Roosevelt’s letter to HenHitler and of Hitler’s reply, nor do they know anything of Miy Chamberlain’s now famous -speech. Theirs is a tragedy of ignorance • their newspapers are allowed to publish only news approved by Hitler.” These are a few of the ■ observations of Miss - May Busby, a. well-known English operatic singer, contained in a letter to relations in Palmerston North. Miss Blusby was a member of the Carl Rosa Opera Company and lias visited the Continent extensively, her most recent visit to Germany being at the time of the European crisis. Being a. fluent German linguist, she was able to become acquainted with the mind of the average German. She had. tea in Petersberg, where Mr. Chamberlain stayed on bis first visit to Germany to confer with Herr Hitler, and had lunch at. the Dresden Hotel in Godesberg, where Herr Hitler and Mr. Chamberlain held their momentous meeting. “Hitler Will Have to be Smashed” “The people of Germany do not want war any more than we do, but they are led by the nose as to what they shall doi.” .Miss Busby’s letter states. “1 don’t think there will be a European war now, but at the same time 1 cannot help thinking that it is only postponed. We in England are all prepared for it. Reserves are ready and we have our gas masks. I envy you, so far away from the seething cauldron of unrest, and I wish I was in peaceful New Zealand. Hitler and his party are so dominant that they will have to be. smashed sooner or later.”

Xiiss Busby spent some time in Vienna, where she wrote that the Austrians were not at all happy under Nazi rule. “They would give anything now to undo) what has been done, but it is too late. They will have to put up with it. There is a great deal of unrest and poverty among the people and the treatment meted out to those who are not Nazis is appalling.” Writing- of the recent Czechoslovakian crisis, Miss _ Bushy says: “AVe would have been mad to go> to war for this race. Hitler was right about the Sudetans, but it is thei brutal, forceful way lie desires to; do things that is tvroug.” The Hungarians were Nazis to a man. The country, however, was in a very bad way' economically. Though living costs were cheap they were nevertheless out of the reach of the people. “You can buy a chicken for sixpence.” she said, “but the people just haven’t got sixpence to huv it with. Fruit and vegetables are rotting. yet people are in want. “You can be glad that you in New Zealand arc away from all this trouble.”