OBVIOUS TRICK

Wairarapa Times-Age, 2 September 1940, Page 5

OBVIOUS TRICK

PROPOSED USE OF RESCUE BOATS

NAZI MISUSE OF RED CROSS. MANY DEEDS OF BARBARITY RECALLED. (British Official Wireless.) RUGBY, August 31. The German proposal that a number of fast motor-boats bearing the Red Cross should be allowed the freedom of waters over which almost continuous battle is being fought is regarded in London as a mere attempt to obtain both military and propaganda advantage by specious argument of a variety to which the whole world is now well used.

Though there have been plenty of cases of individual chivalrous acts by German soldiers, and equally as many of the reverse, the German High Command has never yet appeared to have humane convictions of war unless a material advantage could be obtained thereby. The unrestricted submarine campaign and the use of gas were well known examples of German disregard of conventions in the last war on occasions when an advantage could be gained, and it is felt that the latest suggestion is only the reverse side of the same attitude of mind.

Many of the German pilots brought down over the sea are unhurt or slightly wounded. Their return to the German air force, suffering as it is from a lack of highly trained personnel, would be an obvious advantage to the Nazis. The experience of “Red Cross aeroplanes" has already shown that rescue is not the only purpose such craft are put to. and it is clear what use motor-boats would be to the German Command if they had free passage in waters in which, without the protection of the Red Cross, they could not exist.

It is expected that much play will be made by the Nazi propaganda machine with the British “refusal to honour the dictates of humanity.” The world will, however, remember what the Nazi propaganda forgot —deliberate bombing of hospital ships at Dunkirk after notification that they were coming into the harbour for the sole purpose of evacuating the wounded had been given over the wireless by the British naval commander. the machine-gunning of nurses as they were getting into boats from .sinking ships, the machine-gunning of British motor launches employed in picking up German air crews —and will give the German propaganda the weight and value it deserves.

ENEMY COMMENT LONDON August 31. An authorised spokesman in Berlin, referring to the British Note on Red Cross ships, said: “It is obvious that the British desire to make sea rescues impossible, therefore the German armed forces will know how to answer such a challenge.”