VICHY BARGAIN WITH GERMANS

Southland Times, Issue 24882, 23 October 1942, Page 5

VICHY BARGAIN WITH GERMANS

Prisoners’ Wives To Go To Germany

(Rec. 7 p.m.) LONDON, October 21. “Every factory in France . will be levied to provide workers for Germany,” the Vichy Prime Minister, Pierre Laval, revealed in his latest appeal to French workers to volunteer for work in German war factories. Laval said he had made an agreement with Germany to provide 100,000 workers, in addition to the 50,000 who had already volunteered. If these 100,000 workers were obtained the wives ot French prisoners in Germany would be allowed to join their husbands and work beside them. Generals Frere and Picquendar have been dismissed because they opposed Laval’s desire that the French Army should be ready to oppose an AngloAmerican landing in France or Frenc Africa. The British United Press correspondent on the French frontier, reporting this, added that General Freie and General Picquendar are reported to have told Laval that he could not rely on generals.

“WHINING AND CRAWLING” COMMENT ON LAVAL’S SPEECH (Special Correspondent, N.Z.P.A.) (Rec. 7 pan.) LONDON, October 21. London comment on Laval s speech is scathing. “Whining and crawling are typical adjectives. The Evening Standard comments. “Laval’s statement that French wives who are willing to go to Germany may work near their imprisoned menfolk is an incident without parallel in the history of great nations. It belongs to the record of the dope pedlar and the promoter of white slave traffic. . . Pointing out that Germany s principal import at present is not food or arms, but human beings, The Financial News asks: “Can Germany solve the problem of making slave labour pay? No other nation in history has ever been able to solve it, but no other slave-owning state has combined so high a degree of ruthlessness with extreme efficiency. The results of this gigantic experiment will determine to a large degree the result of the race now going on between the Allies and the Axis production machines to secure the lead in arms output. Thus it will have a vitally important influence on the war.” DEMANDS ON OTHER STATES The paper adds that the fact that the demands on Vichy and Denmark have received much publicity, while little or nothing has been heard of similar demands on other continental countries does not mean that none has been made. Nor does it mean that German claims on their industrial man-power are more moderate. “It is certain that the German Government will have its way and the next few months will see an exodus of hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of • workmen from German-controlled Europe to Reich territory,” says The Financial News. “There are already ‘ millions of foreign workmen in Ger- ■ many, apart from prisoners who are 1 used for industrial and agricultural labour” ’ The Financial News expresses the opinion that this demand for labour is one outcome of the Russian campaign, 1 which has caused unexpected heavy casualties, for which reason, to mainj tain the attacking forces’ strength, it has been necessai-y for Germany to ‘ draw on a large proportion of her in- . dustrial workmen. The resultant gaps ' in the machine are being filled by i securing workmen from the controlled countries.

The Financial News adds pertinently: “What result is this forced migration of workmen likely to produce on Germany’s war economy? The chances are that there will be increased sabotage in German industries, notwithstanding the intensified precaution and draconian penalties adopte.d against it.”