NAZI ALLEGATION

Wairarapa Times-Age, 1 April 1940, Page 5

NAZI ALLEGATION

PRESIDENT ROOSEVELT AND THE WAR “INVOLVED ABSOLUTELY” | IN BRINGING IT ABOUT. BUNDLE OF DOCUMENTS HANDED OUT. By Telegraph—Press Association—Copyright. BERLIN. March 30. A declaration that the United States was opposed Io any compromise by the democracies with totalitarian States and also a promise that, the United States would ultimately go to war on the side of Britain and Francewere contained in a bundle of documents which Herr Hitler’s Foreign Office handed io United States pressmen. The spokesman alleged that the documents were found in the Polish Foreign Office when the Nazis entered Warsaw. He declared that they proved that Mr Roosevelt had been involved absolutely in bringing about the present war. The accusation was a bombshell for the Americans. The correspondents say that most of the documents appeared to be confidential Polish records, involving not only President Roosevelt, but also the United States Ambassadors, Messrs Kennedy (London), Bullitt (Paris), and Biddle (Warsaw), and high American naval and army officers. In the forefront of the bundle was a report which the Polish Ambassador in Washington, Count Potocki, allegedly sent to Warsaw concerning a conversation with Mr Bullitt in November, 1938. “Mr Bullitt expressed himself regarding Germany and Hitler with the greatest vehemence and strong hatred,” the report stated. “SHOWING A FIST.” Asked how he pictured the opening of the war, Mr Bullitt allegedly declared: “Above all the United States, Britain and France must arm tremendously in order to show a fist to Germany.” The democracies desired to get Germany involved in a weakening war with Russia, after which the democracies would attack Germany and compel her capitulation. The United States would unquestionably participate in such a war, but only after the Allies had bestirred themselves. Another report purported to be concerned with a subsequent conversation between Count Potocki and Mr Bullitt, in which the latter outlined an exact definition by Mr Roosevelt of the United States' standpoint for presentation to the Qua! d’Orsay and Whitehall (French and British Foreign Offices).

WAR PREPARATIONS. “First, Mr Roosevelt sharply and unequivocally condemns the totalitarians,” it was declared. “Secondy, that the United States’ war preparations be increased in tempo to cost the colossal sum of £313,000,000. Thirdly, Mr Roosevelt is firmly of the opinion that Britain and France must end every policy of compromise with the totalitarians and must not enter any discussions concerning territorial changes. Fourthly, a moral assurance that the United States would desert her policy of isolation and be prepared to participate actively with the Allies and. in the event of war, place her entire financial and material resources at their disposal.” An alleged report from the Polish commercial attache in London reviews a conversation with Mr Kennedy, in June, 1939, in which Mr Kennedy promised to see Mr Chamberlain and Lord Halifax immediately to insist on the necessity of helping Poland without delay with money to build up the Polish armaments. An alleged report from the Polish military attache in London In August. 1938, states that the United States naval attache says: “The United States is ideologically completely on the side of the democracies and is'studying the best ways of rapidly assisting Britain and France instead of allowing the .years to pass similarly to the last war. German penetration in South America is intolerable to the United States."

OBVIOUS PROPAGANDA

TREATED with derision IN UNITED STATES. NO SENSATION IN EUROPE. LONDON, March 30. If Herren Hitler and von Ribbentrop expected the publication of the Polish documents to cause a sensation in Europe they must be disappointed. The British Press, London and provincial, treats the disclosure coldly, and apparently accepts President Roosevelt’s comment regarding the documents that “propaganda from Europe should be taken with a grain of salt, or, on second thoughts, two or even three grains.” “The Times” and “Daily Telegraph” each give the documents three-quar-ters of a column on an inside page, and other papers give less. The chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Senator Key Pittman, described the German assertions as “unmitigated falsehoods, circulated to create dissension within the United States.” Mr Bullitt, referring to Mr Roosevelt’s remarks, said, "This piece of propaganda should be taken with even more salt." Count Potoeki said, “Il is obvious propaganda. I never conversed with Mr Bullitt on the subject of United States participation in the war." The Secretary of Stale, Mr Cordell Hull, formally stated. "No member of my department gives the slightest credence to the charges.” He added that the allegations did not represent the policy or thought of the United States at any time. Senate foreign committee men echoed his unbelief. “THE GERMANS LIE.” The case is receiving sensational display in the newspapers. A typical headline is that of the New York “Daily News”: “The Germans Lie." The “New York Times" Washington correspondent says that an official is preparing a complete report on German propaganda affecting the United States since the outbreak of the war. State Department officials express the opinion that the first public reaction to the Nazi White Paper on Mr Bullitt

will be resentment against the Gormans. Senator Clark, who is an isolationist, commented: "The matter is too serious for a snap judgment, but much of the matter probably is propaganda." While rumours persist that Mr Clarence Pickett, a prominent Quaker, may be appointed Ambassador to Germany, it is felt in diplomatic quarters that the White Paper makes an exchange of ambassadors to fill the two vacant posts unlikely. It also eliminates the scant prospect of a peace move by Mr Roosevelt. The "New York Times,” in an editorial, curtly dismisses the Polish documents as "coming from a safebreaker who asks credence for hisword about what he found when he opened the door." The “Herald-Tribune" derisively comments: “The attempt to prove that Mr Roosevelt, Mr Kennedy and Mr Bullitt really started the war, is comparable with Molotov's simultaneous attempt to blame the war on foreign imperialists. . . . For the President and Ambassadors to find themselves in the company of the savage Finns, the war-mongering Czechs and the aggressive Albanians, does not prove their complete moral turpitude."