LISTENINGS

New Zealand Listener, Volume 4, Issue 99, 16 May 1941, Page 14

LISTENINGS

Perpetrated and illustrated. by

KEN.

ALEXANDER

ATLANTIC ADVENTURE

insist that the Battle of the Atlantic will eventually decide the war. Uncle Sam shares the view; hence his Atlantic patrol -- from the North Atlantic to the Antarctic and two thousand miles toward England. Adolf’s submarines are faced with a show-down, or a go-down. \ NUMBER of British broadcasters If Adolf wants another war on his hands he will sink a few U.S.A. patrol ships. If he doesn’t he will have to assume that all Sam’s sea-dogs are snoozing in front of the parlour fire and that any ship on the Atlantic wearing an American accent is a phantom. As Franklin D, says, when Hitler finds it. convenient to attack U.S.A. he will soon find an excuse. So why worry? But the ubiquitous "U’s" must find life on the high-seize a little confusing. No doubt that valiant Nazi water-rat, Admiral Raeder, is busily chatting it over with Hitler who, by the way, has never

been to sea and probably has never heard of King Canute. "This," complains Raeder, "is a snooty sort of problem for a simple sailor. If we have to stay down every time a Yankee patrol ship scoots

by we may as well put wheels on our submarines or snooze in the ooze — a real stick-in-the mud kind of life. If we bat a periscope Uncle Sam will radio our position to the British. and it will be ‘bottoms up’ for us, Talk about ups and downs! I’d rather work a lift. And if we keep out of Sam’s patrol area there remains only the West where the whole British Atlantic Fleet will be waiting to scupper us. It looks as though the most we can do to the Americans is to come up and say the nastiest things we can think of about Franklin D. Roosevelt; but shooting off your mouth is not the same as shooting off torpedoes. Just when merchantmen are so fat and toothsome, too. It fair gives me that sinking feeling." "The sea, the sea!’’ mutters Hitler, "My worst troubles come with water. I’ve always hated the sea, It’s so wobbly on top and goes down so far. I’m always O.K. until I reach the brine and then I find myself in a pickle. What is there about the sea that gets me all diluted? First the despicable English Channel. I thought I could jump it and had to swallow it. What a mouthful! And now the Atlantic! It’s really too much to swallow. Why can’t Roosevelt mind his own business and wait until I am ready to attack him? Breach of etiquette I call it!"

"And I suppose it’s no use sinking the Americans and saying the British did it," muses Raeder. "No; even our own people wouldn’t believe that, even if Goebbels told them." "I wonder if we could blame it on to ‘Musso," said Adolf. "He’s silly enough for anything." "Not a chance," answers Raeder. "Everybody knows that Musso’s submarines are more sub than marine." "Well, you’ll just have to ignore Roosevelt’s patrols. Cut them dead in the sealanes. Swallow your pride!" "If that’s all we have to swallow it won't be so bad. But the trouble with you, chief, is that you don’t know the sea, It’s so darned filling,’ complains Raeder. "Well, it’s sink or swim," says Hitler. "O.K. chief," mutters Raeder, "but it’s a long swim to Kiel."