HITLER’S DEMAND

Wairarapa Times-Age, 5 November 1941, Page 5

HITLER’S DEMAND

MILLION FRENCHMEN WANTED TO LABOUR IN GERMANY. PETAIN AND DARLAN READY TO AGREE. (By Telegraph—Press Association—Copyright) LONDON, November 3. Hitler lias demanded that Marshal Petain send 1,000,000 Frenchmen to work in Germany, says the Madrid correspondent of the “Daily Mail.” This demand is thinly disguised as an offer to assist in banishing French unemployment, but the real reason for the transfer is Germany’s growing shortage of industrial manpower. The German organisers, says the correspondent, have found that Frenchmen are reluctant to go to Germany, live in labour camps, and work long hours for small pay under constant threat of air raids. So far only 75,000 most of whom are from the occupied zone, have gone to Germany. Many were victims of Nazi press gangs. The Nazis raid . working-class districts and round up all the technicians they can find. The men are told that they are suspected of being Communists and will be held as hostages unless they volunteer for work in Germany. Besides this, the Germans are exerting pressure on the Vichy Government to start a labour-recruiting campaign among French war prisoners held in Germany. It is understood that Marshal Petain and Admiral Darlan are in. general agreement with these proposals. Their task now is to persuade Frenchmen to accept them.