ALLIED RESOLUTION

Wairarapa Times-Age, 1 April 1940, Page 5

ALLIED RESOLUTION

MR WINSTON CHURCHILL ON WAR PROBLEMS Intensification of Conflict Expected THE POSITION OF TERRORISED NEUTRALS WAR NOT SOUGHT WITH RUSSIA (British Official Wireless.) RUGBY, .March 30. The First Lord of the Admiralty, Mr Winston Churchill in a broadcast address recalled that. six months ago he had said that if the Allies reached spring without any great event occurring they should in fuel have gained an important success and he commented that he still felt. that, this additional petioi. of preparation had been an invaluable, help to the A ics. “Peaceful parliamentary nations have more difficulties in transforming themselves into I lie cast ol a war-making oigan isation than the dictator Stales who glorify war ami Iced their young on dreams of conquest,’’ he said. “The British Empire and the French Republic have now joined together in an indissoluble union, so Hint their big purposes may be accomplished, and immense progress Ims been imide in almost o\eii direction in strengthening their forces, in improving Jlieii defences and adapting their whole economy and win ol life to the service of the common cause. “Up to the present., time has been on our side, hut lime is a changeable ally, lie may be with you in one period and against von in another, ami then il you come through thal- otliei he may return again more faithlril Ilian before. Il seems Io me that an iiiiensilical ion of the struggle is to be expected, and we certainly by no means are inclined to shrink Irom il.

TASK NOT MINIMISED

“God forbid that we should boast or speak in terms of vain conceit and over-confidence. We have never underrated the terrible nature of what we undertook when, after striving so long for peace, we set ourselves the task of dealing with the Nazi and German menace in such a fashion as would clear the path ’of human progress and enable all countries, great and small, old and new, to breathe freely for a long time to come. “We do not minimise our task, but we can now measure it in its enormous magnitude more exactly than we could before we came into contact with our adversary on the sea and in the air. We do not conceal from ourselves what trials, and tribulations lie before us —far beyond anything we have so far undergone—and we know that supreme exertions will be required from the British and French nations, but we are entitled to recognise basic facts. “Our resources and our manpower, once they are developed, massively exceed those of the enemy. The British and French races together amount to 110,000,000 against less than 70,000,000 Germans, ..for ..you ..cannot count the 16,000,000 they are holding down by brute force. Through the command of the sea, which is becoming continually more complete, the resources of the world are to a very large extent open to us, and surveying the whole scene, we may rightly feel good assurance that if we do our best we shall not fail.

NEUTRAL DANGERS “People often ask me: 'Will the war be long or short?’ It might have been very short—perhaps, indeed, there might have been no war—if all the neutral States who share our convictions upon fundamental matters, and openly or secretly sympathise with us had stood together at one signal and in one line. We did not count on this, and therefore we are not dismayed. ••We trust in God and in our arm uplifted in a cause which we devoutly feel carries with it the larger hopes of mankind. But the fact that many of the smaller States in 'Europe are terrorised by Nazi violence and brutality into, supplying Germany, with .materials of modern war may condemn the whole world to a prolonged ordeal, with grievous consequences in many lands. -Therefore I cannot assure you that that war will be short, and still less that it will be easy. It is our duly to try not only to win the war. but also 1o curtail as far as possible its devouring course. “Some few weeks ago I spoke about the action of the neutral States who have the misfortune to be Germany’s neighbours. We have the greatest sympathy for these forlorn countries, and we understand their dangers and their point of view, but it would not be right or in the general interest that their weakness should feed the aggressor's strength and fill to overflowing the cup of human woe. There could be no justice if. in the life and death struggle, he tramples down every sentiment of humanity and those who resist him remain entangled in Hie tollers of violated legal convent ions . MURDEROUS FRENZY “Hardly a day passes without fresh outrages of a cruel and barbarous character being inflicted upon the shipping and sailors of all the European countries. Their ships are sunk by mine or torpedo or by bombs from the air and their crews murdered or left to perish unless we are able Io rescue them. Syvedes, Norwegians. Danes, even Italians and many more I could mention have been victims ol Hitlers murderous deed. In his frenzy tins wicked man and the criminal regime which he has conceived and erected increasingly turn their malice upon the weak and lonely and, above all, the unarmed vessels of countries with which Germany is still supposed to have friendly relations. “In the British and French convoys there is safety. Only one in lhe 800 neutral ships which have resorted to our protection has been sunk. But outside the shelter of the Allied navies a merciless, baffled, pent up spite is wreaked upon all who come within the Nazi clutch. Nearly 200 neutral ships have been destroyed, and nearly 1000 neutral seamen have been slaughtered in Hitler’s frantic endeavour to terrorise all who seek to trade with the British Isles. During the last fortnight 14 neutral ships have been sunk and only one British ship. After all. it is we who are his foes. Such a form of warfare has never before been practised since the effectual suppression of piracy on the high seas.

BOWING TO AGGRESSION “And Ihis is the monstrous Power which even those very neutrals who have suffered and are suffering the most are forced to supply with the means of future aggression. This is the Power before whom, even while they writhe in anger they are forced to bow and. whose victory they are compelled to aid even though, as they well know, that viclory would mean their own enslavement. “Why. only yesterday, while sailors from a British .submarine were carryin ashore on stretchers eight emaciated Dutchmen whom they had rescued from six days of exposure in an open boat, Dutch aviators in the name of strict neulr.ilily and impartial orthodoxy ' were shooting down a British aircraft which had lost, ils way. “I do not reproach the Dutch our valiant allies of former days. My heart goes out to them in their peril and distress, dwelling as they do in a cage with the liger. But. when we are asked to take as a matter of course interpretations of neutrality which give all the advantages to lhe aggressor and inflict penalties on lhe defenders of freedom, I recall a saying of (he late Lord Balfour: 'This is a singularly ill-con-trived world, bin not so ill-contrived as that.’

HIDEOUS AGONY OF POLAND

“But all these outrages upon the sea. which are so clearly visible, pale before the villainous deeds wrought upon the helpless Czechs and Austrians, and sink into insignficance before the hideous agony of Poland. “Here was a community or nearly 35,000.000 people with all the organisation of a modern government and all the traditions of an ancient State, which in. a few weeks was dashed out of civilised existence to become an incoherent. multitude of tortured and starving men, women and children ground beneath the heel of two rival forms of withering and blasting tyranny. “The other day in a well-known British harbour J inspected the crew of a Polish destroyer. 1 have rarely seen a finer body of mem I was stirred by tlieir discipline and bearing Yet how

tragic their plight. Their ship was afloat, but their country had foundered. "But. as I looked around upon all the great ships of war which lay at their anchors and at all the preparations which are being made on every side to carry this war forward at all costs for as long as may be necessary, I comforted myself with the thought that when these Polish sailors have finished their work with the British Navy we will take particular care that they once more have a home to go to. "Thoughtless dilettantes or purblind worldlings, though the fate of Poland stares them in the face, sometimes ask us, 'What is it that England and France are fighting for?’ To this I answer, ‘lf we left off fighting you would soon find out.'

RELATIONS WITH RUSSIA “We shall follow this war wherever it leads, but we have no wish to broaden the area of conflict. At the outbreak of the war we did not know that Italy would not be our enemy. We could not be sure that Japan would not be our enemy. Many people had hopes that Russia would re-enter the comity of nations and help to shield working folk all. over the world from the Nazi. Agression. But none of these things, bad or good, has happened. “We have no quarrel with the Italian or Japanese peoples. We have tried and shall try to live on good' terms with them. It is not part of our policy to seek war with Russia. “The Soviet Government, in its onslaught upon the heroic Finns, has exposed to the whole world the ravages’ which Communism makes upon the fibre of any nation which falls a victim to that deadly mental and moral disease. This exposure of the Russian army and Hie Russian air force has astonished the world and heartened all. States upon the Russian offence. “But there is no need for Russia to be drawn into this struggle unless, upon the promptings of obsolete imperialist ambition, she wishes to do so of her own violence and of malice propense. Our affair is with Hitler and the Nazi German power. There is the head and forefront of the offending, and it is there and there alone that, we seek to strike.

AN IMPENDING AVALANCHE

“All's quiet on the Western Front, and today, so far, nothing has happened on the sea or in the air. But more than a million German soldiers are drawn up ready to strike at a few hours’ notice all along the frontiers of Luxemburg, Belgium and Holland. At any moment these neutral countries may be subjected to an avalanche of steel and fire, and the decision rests in the hands of the haunted, morbid being who, to their eternal shame, the German peoples in their bewilderment have worshipped as a god. “That is the situation in Europe tonight. and can anyone wonder that we are determined to bring such a hideous state of alarm and menace to an end as soon as may be and once and for all? Few there are tonight who, looking back on these last seven months, would doubt that the British and French peoples wore right to draw the sword of justice and of retribution. Fewer still there are who would wish to sheath it till its sombre, righteous work is done."