NOTE OF FEAR

Wairarapa Times-Age, 13 October 1942, Page 3

NOTE OF FEAR

IN SPEECHES OF AXIS LEADERS EMPHASISED BY BRITISH PRIME MINISTER. CALL FOR MAXIMUM ALLIED EFFORT. LONDON, October 12. Iu a fighting speech at Edinburgh today, when he received the freedom of that ancient city, the British Prime Minister (Mr Churchill) spoke of the fear that could be detected in the recent speeches of Axis leaders.

Mr Churchill’s summing up the Allied achievements during recent months was greeted with loud applause. Of August and September, lie observed that he would not say they had been the best, but they had been the least bad months since January. These months had seen the new building of merchant ships substantially outweigh the'losses; they had seen the greatest tonnage of British bombs dropped on Germany; they had covered, too, the most numerous safe arrivals of United States troops in Britain and they had marked a definite growth of Allied air superiority over Germany, Italy and Japan. The Prime Minister made some pun,gent comments on recent speeches by Ribbentbop, Goering and Hitler. In all their speeches, he said, which revealed the state of mind of those who made them, could be heard the loud, whining note of fear and the consciousness of guilt. The most striking part of Hitler’s speech was his complaint that no one paid sufficient attention to his victories. With all his victories and vast conquests, said Mr Churchill, Hitler’s fortunes had declined while those of the Allies had moved steadily onward from strength to strength. Hitler was under the shadow of remorseless, approaching doom.

Mr Churchill referred to the commando raids as a forerunner of what was to come. Hitler had vented his fear and anger on prisoners of war and had cast them into chains. In occupied countries the German Army, on Hitler’s orders, had murdered tens of thousands in cold blood . As many as 54,000 had been shot the day after the fall of Kiev. One reason for the large-scale chaining of British soldiers was to throw a new topic into the arena of war discussion so as to divert eyes from, the evident failure of Hitler’s second campaign against Russia. Mr Churchill paid a tribute to the splendid Russian Army, which everywhere was unbeaten and unbroken and was counter-attacking with amazing energy on the whole front. He referred .also to the fearful losses suffered by the Germans and to the near approach of another Russian winter. All those grim facts cast a freezing shadow on the German people, already flinching under the increasing impact of British bombs. Mr Churchill ended with an appeal to the Allied nations to go forward united and inexorably and to drive themselves to the utmost limit of their strength. “To show any weakness to such a man as Hitler is only to encourage him to further atrocities, and you may be assured that no weakness will be shown him,” declared Mr Churchill. He was referring to the chaining of prisoners of war. Mr Churchill declared that Üboat warfare still remained the greatest problem of the United Nations, but there was no reason why it should not be solved by prodigious measures of offence and defence and replacements, on which the British Commonwealth, and, above all, the United States, were engaged. The army in Egypt was confident that it would stand an unbreakable barrier between Rommel and the Nile Valley, while the Fleet was once again confident that it would stand between the Continental tyrant and dominion of the world. The whole country _ was pulling together as never before in all its history. Mr Churchill declared that all occupied Europe was seething with the spirit of revolt and revolution and hatred of the German race and name burned fiercer daily in the hearts of the people. His soldiers dwelt among populations who would kill them one at a time when the chance came.