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New Zealand Listener, Volume 7, Issue 179, 27 November 1942, Page 3

Sir-So E. A. W. Smith (Christchurch), that disciple of Lord Vansittart, has popped up again with his pernicious argument that all Germans are bad Germans and that there is no opposition

between Hitlerism and the German people. He has quoted Professor F. W. Foerster: May I be permitted to quote J. B. Priestley, who in a recent BBC talk said, "A good many accounts of life in wartime Germany ... have suggested that the German people are fairly solidly behind the Nazis, and that there is little evidence of any widespread opposition to the rule of Hitler and his gang. These statements have been used to prove that the people who denounce all Germans as dangerous barbarians have been right all the time. They have provided fuel for the ‘Hate All Germans’ machinery. They have encouraged people in the belief that we are fighting not only Hitler and the vast Nazi machine of aggression but the whole G2rman people. For my part, I have always distrusted and disliked this point of view. To begin with, I don’t think it helps the war effort, but tends to hinder it. It tries to turn this war into a purely nationalistic war, which it isn’t. It gives considerable assistance to Goebbels in his attempts to line up all his people behind Hitler. It is the worst possible kind of propaganda . . . Moreover-and this is still important-it simply isn't true. The facts contradict it at every turn..." Priestley then goes on to describe an exhibition recently held in London to show how different classes of Germans are fighting Nazism within Germany. The evidence which he quotes of highlyorganised and widespread opposition is truly remarkable. What a pity Mr. Smith wasn’t in London at the time

AUDAX II.

(Wellington).