July 17.
So much is taken for granted concerning, the stories of German brutalities that there is a tendency to pass it all off with a shrug of the shoulders, an expression of regret that such things should be and a pious hope that end will Anally be put to it all. But it necessary at times to recall these things in order fully to realize exuetly what the Allies are fighting, the horrors which are being perpetrated not only in Poland but in other countries lying beneath the Nazi boot, what they would have to expect in the un= Uikely event of a German victory. In this connection an interesting document has reached the office of this journal giving in considerable detail the manner in which the Germans are carrying out their policy of extermination—ausrotten, as they term it them= selves,—in Poland. Ti consists of some twenty-eight pages in which are told in plain straightforward language, how by regula~ tions, executions, deportations, confiscations: and expulsions the Germans are secking wipe the Poles out as a nation and a people. The world is witnessing the coldly planned murder of a nation, the greatest eniac in history,—the complete extirpation of the Polish population on territories which a thousand years ago they possessed and which was the cradle of the people and of the State of Poland, Immediately upon their entry into Poland the Germans on one pretext or another proceeded with mass execu Mions of the Polish people. Political leaders, clergy, and members of the Intellectual and commercial classes were the first to become the victims of widespread murder. Those who in 1918-1921 fought {o liberate Silesia from the German yoke have been literally massacred. members of the S. and the Gestapo have ever since the occupation of Poland been busy carrying out executions under the most bestial of conditions. Ten young men were shot in one case because it was alleged that someone had torn down a German flag from a communal house. Tt was dite possible that this was done by the Ger mans themselves to afford a pretext for what they intended doing. There is nothing to show that these young men had anything to do with it, but they were arrested, five shot fon the spot. and the others murdered in a neighbouring village. In Koseian a total of 125. Poles were shot on two occasions, in Bydgoszez 136 Polish college boys twelve or thirteen years of age were done to death, de= porting themselves heroically intoning' the Polish national anthem as they died.
Bydgoszcz saw worse than that, for in the city more than 6,000 have been slain. In Gdynia ater the Germans occupied that city 350 hostages were selected. At Wejherowo, in the prison yard they were shot individual-But why go on? In most instances there was nothing in the nature of 4 trial, nothing to resemble a charge against the unfortunates, though on occasion an in-dietment was produced alleging that the accused had been guilty of anti-German senti~ ments,—deutsehfeludtich gesinnt,—and for some such trivial reason, or for none at all no fewer than 19,000 Polish leaders have been put to death under the most revolting cumstances. But in addition to this rapid death, there is the slow death in the concentration camps, where bad conditions, in= adequate food and heavy labour are doing for the Germans what they have been doing for themselves with the revolver and the vile.
Added to this there is the campaign of terror: directed against the intellectuals of Poland, in an attempt to wipe out all remains Polish culture, and the wholesale expulsions of Poles from towns and villages, allowed to take no more than they could carry, leaving their homes for the Baltic Germans. To quote the document under review The Germans have recently proceeded to mass expulsions of the Polish population of the countryside. AMI Poles, men, women, and children expelled from "cities and "vii ages, fire first se tral Poland, to the pions of Kielec, Radom or Siediee, where ater a i ays, they are Abandoned without shelter, without food, and without any' assistance whatever. Consequently their plight is terrible and the helpless victims of German inhumanity" are dying in their thousands, AN able-bodied men and women are deported into Germany, where they are put to the heaviest labour in what can only bbe described as a typical system of modern It has to be remembered that according the declaration of the East Prussian Gauleiter Forster all Polish traces must disappear from the territory of western Poland in the shortest time possible, and the means devised for doing this are having their dread effect. there is any question as to why reference should be made to this story which is already well known, though not quite so extensively' as in this report by the Information and. Records Service of the Republic of Poland, the answer is this: It is necessary at to goa step further than merely slating that it is an ideology which is being fought, and to realize that that ideology is supported by. men who stop at no brutality, no bestiality, no inhumanity to carry out the logical con= clusions of the doctrine which inspires them. Indeed more than that is necessary. The British and their Allies are fighting to prevent an extension of this insensate cruelty Into other lands. Already the soft methods: by which the Germans hoped to win over the support of the Netherlanders, whose sturdy independence is making them somewhat difficult to handle, are being changed, and, who knows how long it will be before sterner repressive measures will not be taken.
Who knows to what servility the French would be reduced if the Germans are allowed to get away with their present successes. The conduct of the Germans in Czechoslovakia and in Poland makes the bar-
Darities of Genghiz Khan mere child's play in comparison, and stamps them with the ineffable mark of the beast. It is to save Europe from all this that the British and their Athos are continuing the Aight, to save 8 continent from passing under the heel of a system which knows nothing of the decent cles of life, to save it from slavery to a bes~ tial system which knows nothing of any right save that of might. Can there now be any doubt why Mr. Churchill last Sunday said Yhere can be no parley with such an evil thing? Can there be any misunderstanding why he insists that the fight shall continue to the bitter end? It needs no stretch of imagination to conceive what would happen to many thousands of Britons were they to fall into the hands of a victor-lous Germany, and it is because of what has been happening in Czechoslovakia and Poland that there is the determination that no such thing shall happen in other parts of the Continent. This evil thing of Hitlerism has to be rooted out once and for all, for not till then will Europe be able to breathe again in freedom, and get about the task of working out its own destiny.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.