ABSOLUTE POWER"

Wairarapa Times-Age, 24 August 1942, Page 4

ABSOLUTE POWER"

SEIZED BY THE NAZIS, IN GERMANY ' STATE MACHINERY SET ASIDE. ‘ AS “HOME FRONT” DETERIORATES In the struggle for power in Germany today the Nazi Party has achiev- ’ ed another important triumph on the home front through the concentration ' of absolute power in its own hands, : a London correspondent of the “Christian Science Monitor wrote recently. This is the real interpretation of the assumption by Nazi Party offi- ' cials of supreme control of all those . branches of the administrative machinery concerned directly or indirectly with the prosecution of the war. The party has long been a state within a state, ready to take over in an emergency. Now, however, it has , actually superimposed its control on , top of the existing German juridical machine. This has been done by placing the “issuing of orders in the widest sense” in the hands of Party officials. In this new setup, the existing departments have, it is presumed, only consultative functions. Nazi district leaders in authority can cut right across traditional legislative or judiciary methods. In other words, these “Gauleiters” form a state administration superimposed above the autonomous departments. Nazi Party officials claim this makes for greater fusion with the central authority and for political strengthening of all departments of the war effort. One of the newest appointments under the new plan is that of Robert Ley as Reich's Commissioner for Social Housing Policy and of various Gauleiters as housing commissioners in their respective regional areas. The needs of the war machine have already made reorganisation on a regional basis necessary, with a party official, Fritz Sauckels, as general plenipotentiary for employment responsible for all distribution of labour and the allocation of raw materials. HITLER’S LIMITED TRUST. The present situation may well be ; interpreted as meaning that at the present juncture Hitler can only trust • faithful Party men to produce that total zeal in the war effort spoken of in his last public pronouncement. Also it is seen that Hitler means what he i says in statements like “never again i will the German nation be allowed to suffer a stab in the back as at the close of the last war. In the event of further deterioration on the home front, therefore, the Party machinery is to hand to produce an immediate stiffening. Propaganda once more has been concentrated upon efforts to increase the nation’s birth rate. The Press is emphasising that the “master race” must not stop at its present rate of increase but that this “Herrenvolk” must advance by 60 or 70 per cent if it is to be ready to fulfill its mission and to make good its losses on the battlefield. ECONOMIC PROBLEMS. Meanwhile a fundamental economic problem continues to be that of transportation due mainly to the lack of locomotives on railroads and to insufficient petrol for road traffic on the home and fighting fronts. This is shown in the neutral countries like Switzerland and Sweden. Germany has delivered to the Swiss only 10,000 tons of benzine instead of the promised 14,000 tons, while coal exports to Switzerland have been drastically reduced. Sweden has up to the present refused German demands to lease or hand over reserve locomotives so as to speed up coal deliveries. Sweden knows this will not solve the coal problems since the R.A.F. bombardment against North Sea and Baltic ports also played their part. Food and business conditions in Berlin are deteriorating rapidly, according to the report of an Hungarian journalist. Though writing from one ally to another he has to admit that “it is true that the Weiner Schnitzel does not always overhang the edge of the plate, that the leading Hungarian restaurant —the Czarda on Kurfuerstendamm —nowadays serves turnips more c often than goulash.” c Despite the fine window display 1 there is little to be bought, even book- c sellers sell only one book to a cus- v tomer. “The only entertainment in t Berlin which is not affected by the “ war,” the article concludes, “is a visit |v to the Zoo. And the only genuine'i peace-time commodity is the spring.” “