Wairarapa Times-Age THURSDAY, DECEMBER 22, 1938. REPORTED NAZI DIVISIONS.

Wairarapa Times-Age, 22 December 1938, Page 6

Wairarapa Times-Age THURSDAY, DECEMBER 22, 1938. REPORTED NAZI DIVISIONS.

JT would be a pleasure to give credence to the report, transmitted from London yesterday, of an increasingly acute conflict between extremists and moderates among the German Nazis and particularly to the statement that “the world-wide indignation at the pogrom against the Jews has resulted in a strong movement by powerful interests for the removal of the worst fanatics.” Not many people know what is really going on, or is likely to occur, in the inner circles of the Nazi Party and admittedly there is plenty of room for such a revulsion from barbarism as the London message describes. Apart, however, from its being as a whole rather obviously speculative, the message has internal weaknesses which make it unconvincing. The most obvious of these weaknesses is in the statement that “Herr Hitler is not aware of the extent to which Dr Goebbels and his confederates have carried the anti-Jewish measures,” and that “the Fuehrer was deliberately misled.” Whatever else may be in doubt, it is a fact established finally on respectable evidence that’no man in Germany has a more insane hatred of the Jews, or has done more to give expression and effect to that hatred, than Herr Hitler. On this subject, Mr John Gunther wrote in “Inside Europe”:-— No one can properly conceive the basic depth and breadth of Hitler’s anti-Semitism who has not carefully read “Mein Kampf.” : This book was written ten years ago (in 1926). ‘He has changed it as edition has followed' edition, in minor particulars, and refuses to allow its publication—unexpui'gated—abroad. Recently :he sued a French publisher who tried to bring out an unabridged transla-" lation. In all editions the implacability of his anti-Jewish prejudice remains. From the outset, the Jew had an essentially important place, as a target for vilification, in the campaign by which Hitler worked his way to the position of power he now occupies. The Nazis, as Mr Gunther observes, invented the legend of having been stabbed in the back by the Jews, socialists, pacifists—to excuse defeat. And the recurrent theme of Hitler’s early speeches was: “Those who stabbed you in the back, the Jews and the Marxists, are ruling you today.” The evidence mentioned above, in regard to the treatment of the subject in successive editions of “Mein Kampf” demonstrates that there has been no abatement of Hitler’s frantic and furious hatred of the Jewish race. Nothing, therefore, could (veil be less convincing than the suggestion, embodied in the cablegram from London yesterday which has been quoted, that Dr Goebbels and others have hoodwinked the Fuehrer and outpaced his desires in their maltreatment and persecution of the Jews. If there-is to be any honest and powerful movement of revulsion and revolt in Germany against the outrageous and abominable treatment of Ihe Jews, then it would appear that the first target of that movement must be Herr Hitler himself. While it need not be doubted that the policy of the pogrom has filled many Germans with disgust and shame, it seems most improbable that this will result in a reorganisation of the Nazi dictatorship by “the removal of the ■worst fanatics.” A precedent for action that would Yneet the present case is hardly to be found in the purge of June, 1934, in which scores, if not some hundreds, of Nazis were butchered at Hitler’s behest. The clash, on that occasion, was between- one clique of the , party and another. On that narrow front, Hitler and his supporters pursued their aim and achieved their purpose conclusively. It may be doubted whether an equally effective concentration of force could result from even a widespread development of popular indignation at the martyrdom of the Jews. If there is to be conflict on that issue, however, there does not seem to be any doubt about the side on which Hitler will range himself.