VARIED OPINIONS

Wairarapa Times-Age, 6 September 1943, Page 3

VARIED OPINIONS

HELD IN GREAT BRITAIN REGARDING REMAINING LENGTH OF WAR. NEW LINES OF NAZI PROPOGANDA (Special P.A. Correspondent.) LONDON, September 4 The start of the fifth year of the war was made an opportunity for recapitulation by most newspapers, which agree that the raid on Berlin, the fresh Russian successes and the invasion of Italy, all within three days, give an impressive beginning. The “Daily Mail lists the views of several prominent persons as to whether the war can be finished in the coming year. Lord Winster states: “Certainly the Allies can win in Europe within 12 months.” The Earl of Cork' and Orrery agrees, adding that the “Axis fabric is tottering, and a long, strong push will bring it crashing down.” Emil Ludwig comments: “The war will not last another six months. The Nazis will quit this winter. They cannot last through it.” Mr Shinwell says: “The war will not end in 1944. I see no evidence that the Allied Governments have so far worked out a combined strategy.” Lord Vansittart expresses the opinion that the Germans may have had enough of the war any time within a year from next winter. Mr Ward Price thinks' that by April or May of next year, when the Allied armies are ready to invade from all sides, Germany may well be in disintegration. Dr. Goebbels has started a new line of propaganda for the German home front, including campaigns to prove that Hitler and his confederates were forced into the war against their will, and to convince the German people that the gains of territory in the early years of the war were so great that Germany could not be beaten by starvation or lack of raw materials. He is replacing war talks by topics calculated to take the people’s mind off the fighting. Thus, in “Das Reich,” Goebbels states: “The German people and their leaders are not guilty of this war. It has been forced on them. Our intentions and plans were exclusively in the field of peaceful activity.” He also said: “We did not want this war, and therefore we do not enjoy it.”