POLAND MALIGNED

Wairarapa Times-Age, 13 October 1939, Page 8

POLAND MALIGNED

ACCUSED OF MISLEADING ALLIES BRITISH REPLY TO NAZI BULLETIN. FACTS WELL ESTABLISHED. (British Official Wireless.) RUGBY, October 11. In connection with Germany’s efforts to explain away the German aggression upon Poland by ascribing to Poland the responsibility for various incidents leading up to the German invasion, the German wireless bulletin yesterday contained a long statement purporting to give proof that Poland deliberately misled Britain and France by suppressing information about Herr Hitler’s demands of which Poland was already aware. This argument today found its way into German agency messages, which, at the same time, represent the Nazi demands from last October onward as moderate and solely aiming at repairing alleged injustices. The truth is that the concessions required by Herr Hitler were regarded by Poland as inconsistent with her sovereign rights, and this and the fact that Herr Hitler had demanded certain territorial concessions were wellknown in London and Paris. The question of the precise moment at which the full extent and details of the Nazi extractions were communicated to Britain and France becomes, therefore, of purely academic interest. What is really important, and what had been publicly stated more than once, and —it is very significant to observe —is admitted in this latest Nazi propaganda, is that the German demands had been definitely rejected by Poland some time before Poland even knew that Britain had any intention of offering Poland a guarantee.