FIGHT TO THE DEATH

Wairarapa Times-Age, 10 April 1941, Page 6

FIGHT TO THE DEATH

As a result of the German, invasion of the Balkans, Mr. Churchill said, nations which had > never wished to take part in the war and which were incapable of doing the slightest injury to Germany, must now fight to the death for their freedom and the land of their fathers. Until Greece had been treacherously invaded, at the behest of the base Italian dictator, she had observed a meticulous neutrality, and only when she appealed for aid did Britain give the support in air and supplies which were possible. After the Italian invasion, the Germans continued to behave in the most friendly manner to Greece, but meanwhile moved troops through Hungary and Rumania.

More than two months ago, by the traitorous connivance of the Bulgarian King and Government, advance parties of the German, Air Force, in plain clothes, were gradually admitted and took possession of the Bulgarian airfields. Many thousands of German soldiers had already percolated into Bulgaria before she formally acceded to the Tripartite Pact, and thereafter German troops poured in. Mr: Churchill then explained the counter-measures Britain took, with a view io helping the threatened States to save themselves. At the end of February,' Britain sent Mr. Eden and Sir John Dill to the Middle East Io see whether anything could be done to form a united defensive front in the Balkans. They went to Athens, they went to Turkey and they would have gone to Yugoslavia, but were refused permission by the Government of Prince Paul. These three threatened States could together have disposed of from sixty to seventy divisions, which, if a good combined plan had been made and prompt united action taken, might have confronted the Germans with a prospect of resistance which might well have deterred them altogether, and must in any case have delayed them for a long time.