Wairarapa Times-Age SATURDAY, MAY 15, 1943. RIOTING IN GERMANY.

Wairarapa Times-Age, 15 May 1943, Page 2

Wairarapa Times-Age SATURDAY, MAY 15, 1943. RIOTING IN GERMANY.

REPORTS by a Swedish correspondent in Berlin of rioting in that city and in other parts of Germany are of some interest, though the immediate importance and significance oi the e\ cuts ]io doubt might easily be exaggerated. Details are given at time of writing only of happenings in the German capital, where thousands of women and elderly men seeking information concerning their relatives in Africa were brusquely dismissed from the Army Information Office. It is noteworthy that though rioting then began and fighting occurred, between the ciowd and Storm Troopers, the troops, according to the report, did not use their firearms.

Although this news was passed by the German censor, no reason appears for doubting its substantial accuracy. As it stands it suggests little more than an incipient departure from the tame submissiveness to authority which has thus far been cumstomary in Nazi Germany, together perhaps with some doubts in the mind of the gangster dictatorship about the wisdom of employing the ruthless methods upon which it has usually relied in suppressing protests or opposition.

As yet there is no evidence either of an effective spirit of revolt, or of early collapse in Germany. Much as the people of the Reich have been shocked and disheartened by their losses in Russia and in Africa, and by the increasing effects of Allied bombing, the weight of testimony, based on recent observation, appears to be that a large proportion of them, in many walks of life, are more afraid of the consequences of defeat than of continuing the Avar.

Much as their dreams of conquest and of profiting by the enslavement and spoliation of other nations are. tending' to dissolve, many Germans are still buoyed, up by the hope of attaining a compromise peace. They have been taught to believe that if they lengthen out the war within the confines of Fortress Europe, they will in the end be able to weary the opponents they no longer hope to overcome.

It is now possible to anticipate war development in the comparatively near future which will shatter this belief and give rise to a much more serious crisis than has yet occurred on the German home front. It has been demonstrated conclusively in this war, not least by the Germans themselves, that elaborate fortified lines offer no security against the attack of an active, powerful and enterprising enemy. Moreover, the Fortress Europe' the Nazis now plan to defend encloses large bodies of subjugated people aflame with hatred, and the spirit of revolt and only awaiting the hour of opportunity to rise against their oppressors.

From the hope of immense piratical gains, the Germans have passed to the secondary hope of escaping retribution for the evil they have wrought. The next stage for them is a realisation that they are doomed to inevitable defeat and disaster. When that stage is reached —it will only be brought about, of course, by a great extension of Allied offensive action —it is not unlikely that the downfall of Nazi gangsterdom may be hastened by murderous strife between its own component elements.