STRUGGLE TO CONTINUE

Wairarapa Times-Age, 14 June 1941, Page 5

STRUGGLE TO CONTINUE

UNTIL VICTORY IS WON United Pledge of Allied Nations WILLING CO-OPERATION ONLY TRUE BASIS OF ENDURING PEACE SPEECH BY BRITISH PRIME MINISTER (British Official Wireless.) RUGBY, June 12. A historic conference was held at St James’s Palace, London, by the Governments of the British Empire and of the Allies. They met, in the words of Mr Churchill, “to proclaim the high purposes and resolves of the lawfully constitutional Governments of Europe whose countries have been overrun, and to cheer the hopes of free men ami free peoples throughout the world.” The assembled representatives of the British Empire, and the Allies resolved: “(1) They will continue the struggle against German or Italian oppression until victory is won, and will mutually assist each other in the struggle to the utmost of their respective capacities. “(2) There can be no settled peace or prosperity as long as free peoples are coerced by violence into submission to the domination of Germany or her associates, or Jive under threat of such coercion. “ (3) The only true basis of an enduring peace is the willing co-operation of free peoples in the world in which, relieved 01. the menace of aggression, all may enjoy economic and social security; it is their intention to work together, and. with the other free peoples, both in war and peace, to this end.”

EMPIRE AND ALLIES This resolution was adopted by the representatives of 15 Empire and Allied nations. The United Kingdom delegation was headed by Mr Churchill. Mr Amery, Secretary of State for India, attended the conference on behalf of India and Burma. The self-govern-ing Dominions were represented by their High Commissioners —Mr Vincent Massey for Canada, Mr S. M. Bruce for Australia, Mr W. J. Jordan for New Zealand, and Mr S. F. Waterson for South Africa. The Allied Governments represented were Belgium, Czechoslovakia, Greece, Luxemburg, the Netherlands, Norway, Poland, and Yugoslavia. Most of these were represented by their Prime Ministers and Foreign Ministers. Representatives of General de Gaulle, the leader- of Free France, were also present. PURPOSES & RESOLVES The following is the text of Mr Churchill's speech:— “In the twenty-second month of the war against Nazism we meet here in order to proclaim the high purposes and resolves of the lawful constitutional Governments of Europe. Here before us on the table lie the title deeds of ten nations or States whose soil has been invaded and polluted and whose men, women and children lie prostrate or writhing under the Hitler yoke. But here also, duly authorised by the Parliament and democracy of Britain, are gathered the servants of the ancient British monarchy and/ the accredited representatives of the British Dominions beyond the seas, of the Empire of India, of Burma, and of our colonies in every quarter of the globe. They have drawn their swords in this cause. They will never let them fail till life is gone or victory is won. “Here we meet, while from -across the Atlantic Ocean the hammers and lathes of the United States signal in a rising hum their message of encouragement and their promise of swift and ever-growing aid. What tragedies, what horrors, what crimes have Hitler and all that Hitler stands for brought upon Europe and the world? The ruins of Warsaw, Rotterdam and Belgrade are monuments which will long recall to future generations the outrage of unopposed air bombing, applied with calculated scientific cruelty to a helpless population. Here in London, throughout the cities of our island, and in Ireland, there may also be seen marks of devastation. They are being repaid, and presently they will be more than repaid. HORRORS OF NAZISM “But far worse than these visible injuries is the misery of conquered peoples. We see them hounded, terrorised, and exploited. Their manhood by the million is forced to work under conditions which are indistinguishable in ,many cases from actual slavery. Their goods and chattels are pillaged or filched for worthless money. Their homes and their daily life are pried into and spied upon by the all-pervad-ing system of secret political police which, having reduced the Germans themselves to abject docility, now stalks the streets and byways of a dozen lands. Their religious faiths are affronted, persecuted, or oppressed in the interests of a fantastic paganism devised to perpetuate the worship and sustain the tyranny of one abominable creature. Their traditions, their culture, their laws, and their institutions. social and political alike,' are suppressed by force or undermined by subtle, coldly-planned intrigue. The prisons of the Continent no longer suffice. The concentration camps are overcrowded. Every dawn German volleys crack. Czechs, Poles, Dutchmen, Norwegians, Yugoslavs and Greeks, Frenchmen, Belgians, Luxemburgers, make great sacrifice for faith and country.

“Such is the plight of once-glorious Europe, and such are the atrocities against which we are in arms. It is upon this foundation that Hitler, with his tattered lackey Mussolini at his tail and Darlan frisking by his side, pretends to build out of hatred, appetite and racial assertion a new order for Europe. Never did so mocking a fantasy obsess the mind of mortal man.

“We cannot tell what the course of this fell war will be as it spreads remorselessly through ever wider regions. We know it will be hard, we expect it will be long, we cannot predict or measure its episodes or its tribulations. But one thing is certain: It will not be by German hands that the structure of Europe will be rebuilt or union of the European family achieved. “In every country into which German armies or Nazi police have broken there has sprung up a hatred of the German name and contempt for the Nazi creed which the passage of hundreds of years will not efface from human memory. We cannot yet see how deliverance will come, or when it<

j will come, but nothing is more certain than that every trace of Hitler's foot- ! steps, every stain of his infected and ■ corroding fingers will be sponged and. ■ purged, and if need be, blasted, from ■ the surface of the earth. UNION FORTIFIED “We are here to affirm and fortify ' our union in that ceaseless and un- ‘ wearying effort, which must be made if captive peoples are to be set free. A year ago his Majesty's Government was left alone to face the storm, and to many of our friends and enemies alike it may have seemed that our days too were numbered. But I may with some pride remind your Excellencies that, even in that dark hour, we proclaimed to all men, not only to ourselves, our determination not to make peace till every one of the ravaged, enslaved countries was liberated and till the Nazi domination had been broken and destroyed. “See how far we have travelled since then. Our solid, stubborn strength stood the awful test. We are masters of our own air, and now reach out in ever-growing retribution upon the enemy. The Royal Navy holds the seas, the Italian fleet cowers diminished in harbour, the German navy is largely crippled or sunk. Murderous raids upon, our ports, cities and factories have been powerless to quench the spirit .of the British nation and arrest our national life or check the immense expansion of our war industry. Rood and arms from across the oceans are ! coming safely in. Full provision to replace all sunken tonnage is being made, and still more by our friends in the United States. We are becoming an armed community. Our land forces are being perfected in equipment and training. ON HITLER’S TRACK “Hitler may turn and trample this way and that through tortured Europe, he may spread his curse far and wide and carry his curse with him, he may break into Africa or into Asia, but it is this island fortress that he will have to reckon with in the end. We shall strive to resist by land and sea. We shall be on his track wherever he goes. Our air power will continue to teach the German homeland that war is not all loot and triumph. We shall aid and stir the people of every conquered country to resistance and revolt. We shall break up and derange every effort which Hitler makes to systematise and consolidate his subjugations. He will find no peace, no rest, nq halting place, no parley. And if, driven to desperate hazards, he attempts an invasion of the British Isles, as well he may, we shall not flinch from the supreme trial. “With the help of God, of which we must all feel daily conscious, we shall continue steadfast in faith and duty till our task is done. “This, then, is the message which we send forth today to all States and nations, bond or free, to all men in all lands, who care for freedom’s cause, to our allies and well-wishers in Europe, to our American friends and helpers drawing ever closer in their might across the ocean, this is the message: ‘Lift your hearts. All Will come right. Out of the depths of; sorrow and sacrifice will be born' again the glory of mankind.’ ” PLEDGES AND HOPES Speeches in support of the resolution adopted at the meeting were made by representatives of the Allied Governments present. The Polish delegate said that the Allied meeting should represent the beginning of an organisation devoted, to the cause of the new order in Europe, assured of the certain support of the Allied nations and of democratic opinion throughout the world. The Netherlands delegate said that the purpose of the meeting was to impress the whole world, and not least . the enemy, with the determination of the Allies to continue the common struggle till victory was won. The Belgian delegate stressed the necessity for organising a real and lasting system of guarantees. The Free French delegate said that France repudiated the monstrous new European order. Peace without liberty could not be thought of. The Czechoslovak delegate said they knew Christian civilisation would triumph in the end. Other delegates spoke with equal determination.

In closing the proceedings, Mr Eden said that it was not possible to hold such meetings continuously, but he hoped this meeting might represent the inauguration of a new phase of collaboration, and that it might form part of the machinery through which victory would be won and by which peace would be maintained after victory.