the reports appearing in the newspapers of the United States concerning Mr. Sumner Welles's visit to Berlin, purporting to state what is the attitude of the German Government towards the war are correct, and prima facie they certainly seem to be, then the six months which have passed since the commencement of hostilities is merely the pre-Jude to a predatory war which Germany thrust upon Europe by her invasion of Poland. The responsibility for this present struggle has, in the opinion of the whole of the world with the exception of Germany itself, been fairly and squarely placed upon the shoulders of the Reich, and, if the various speeches of the Nazi leaders have not made it clear, the statements reported to have been made to President Roosevelt's representatives most certainly have, they are out on a war. of conquest with the idea of smashing the Allies, and destroying the British Empire. It is reported that both Herr Hitler and his evil genius Herr von Ribbentrop told Mr. Welles that Germany's minimum terms required the Allied recognition of the Reich's conquests by force, and the world's agreement to the German doctrine of tebewsraum. There is a possibility that this implacable altitude has been adopted by the Reich leaders for the purpose of impressing the world with their determination and might. There is about German declarations a suspicion that there is far too much protestation, and that this exhibition of implacability is, Just as much to hearten themselves, and their nationals as it is to impress the Allies. If it is designed to shake the morale of the Allies it will fail of its purpose. It might serve to intimidate the neutrals unfortunate enough to be adjacent to Germany, and indeed may be confidently expected to do so, but as they have already been intimidated too much it is doubtful whether this new display will produce any greater effect than has been secured up to the present. The probability is that these declarations will only serve to prolong it, and to emphasize for their especial benefit that the unscrupulous people dominating Germany at the moment fare definitely embarked upon a programme of destroying the democracies, including, of course, the neutrals themselves.
These German elucubrations have to be placed in their proper perspective, by the Allies as well as the neutrals. It is not so very Jong ago when similar utterances were frequently made by the rulers of imperial Germany. They also were prepared to fight to the last ditch. They did, and the result was the disastrous military defeat which was inflicted upon them in all theatres of war. The Allies are equally prepared to fight to the last ditch in this struggle; the declared intentions of the Reich make it necessary for them to do so, if they ever expect 10 continue separate and individual existences, They are inspired with the determination that the struggle shall result in their emerg~ ence victorious, and that the world shall be saved from the shackles which the Nazis Jopenly desire to fasten on it. American ress reports are to the effect that the Welles-Hitler meeting brought to the fore the German determination to destroy alleged British hegemony. It has to be admitted that in the Empire British hegemony exists. But it is a beneficent leadership of one state in a confederacy of states going to form the commonwealth, and the German desire to destroy it is all part and parcel of the general [scheme to reduce Europe and the world to a condition of servitude to German ideas.
The destruction of the British empire and the substitution, therefore, of a German, would bbe one of the greatest tragedies in thi of the world. It would mean that Europe vould have to retrace its steps back to the brutalities and bestialities of the dark ages, the triumph of evil over good and the nega tion of all those liberties for which mankind has made a bitter struggle throughout the It is another tie, and recognized as such, that the British seek economic domination of the world. They seek it neither economic clearly de-
That the Nazis do is ings of dev Fuehrer and the utterances of his accomplices, for they have made it plain that nothing but the ultimate reduction of the whole world to their overweening ambitions can satisfy them. in their inordinate greed. There is con-[sequently at the moment no prospects of "in carly peace. Allied and German war aims jate so far that there is no apparent likelihood of anyone, playing the part of an honest broker in search of peace, being abl to secure it. The present outlook must, therefore, seem gloomy in that there is nothing indicating the possibility of any termination of the struggle which does not resuit i the utter defeat of one side or the other. Sir John Simon has very clearly defined the issues at stake when he said that the final result of this war will show whether the voluntary discipline in free democracies i more powerful than the mechanical slavery n the strongest of the totalitarian states. Jsuch an issue the Allies may not have all the native assistance they might like, but they most certainly have the sympathy of all people who abhor the political misconceptions which animate the leaders of the Reich.
That which they have conceived as a form of government and international policy is an evil, festering thing which has to be removed i€ the whole of the world is not ultimately to be broken down and reduced to a helotry in which the alleged superior race—that production of the megalomaniac mind—would [secure physical and spiritual domination over the others. The reported statements of the Nazi leaders to Mr. Welles constitute. a challenge which the Allies will not refrain from accepting. They are not to be dismayed by these parades of high sounding words and allegations of might any more than they were twenty-five years ago.. They realize as does the rest of the world that Herr Hitler has failed his own people, in being unable to secure all he wanted without plunging them into that war which he promised they should not experience. He has proved him~ self the prevaricator he is known to be, for when he had the chanco of avoiding war by disgorging his ill-gotten spoils, he broke his word, and the German people must continue to suffer under the enormous economic pressure which the blockade is exerting until in the slow process of time they reach that last ditch, of which he speaks so frequently, and from which the Allies are just as determined as he to emerge
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.