THE NAZIS SET THE WORLD IN FLAMES
The Nazis Set The World in Flames From The NEW YORK TIMES THE wanton simultaneous assault upon Holland, Belgium and Luxembourg, the unrestrained bombardment of open towns and civilians wherever it...
...their need to explain their failures or to admit their weaknesses to their own people and hence, incidentally, to the enemy-all these put them at times under heavy handicaps in a w> .yiainst na'>»u» {Ightlng without rules or scruples...
...they have expressed before the voters merely the opinions apd sentiments that they believed the voters already to hold...
...that, if nothing else, opinion in his own or neutral countries would stop him from letting loose a war on all civilization that would spare neither the monuments of the past, historic cities or the homes and lives of peaceful civilians...
...The Nazis Set The World in Flames From The NEW YORK TIMES THE wanton simultaneous assault upon Holland, Belgium and Luxembourg, the unrestrained bombardment of open towns and civilians wherever it seems at the moment expedient, have now at length made it plain to the most reluctant mind that Hitler, and the German army behind him, will literally stop at nothing...
...Men who were their titular leaders, instead of dealing candidly with their people, instead of impressing their people with the facts that they themselves had learned or were in a position to learn, have been In fact followers...
...They have been almost fatally complacent in the face of the growing menace of totalitarian armament...
...But the totalitarian countries have exposed other weaknesses In the democratic nations that are in no real sense inherent but abandonments of the very ideals for which democracies, as such, ought to stand...
...Finland, Norway, Holland, Belgium, Luxembourg have all found themselves Invaded despite the strictest neutrality and Iron policies of non-involvement...
...The democracies have been shockingly uninformed...
...But now we know that they are true...
...it is merely necessary to remind ourselves, in considering them, that the processes of democracy are designed primarily for peace, not war...
...No matter what Hitler and his followers have done in the past, there have always been influential groups in the democracies to believe or hope that he would shrink before the last barbarities...
...The very end for which such a regime seizes power, in fact, is to turn a nation Into an armed camp...
...Such a regime, because it does not take its own people Into it.s confidence, or consult their wishes at all, can spring lightning surprises upon other nations...
...and because of the awful instruments of power and destruction in the hands of these madmen, all the values of European civilization now hang in the balance...
...AMONG the delusions destroyed in the last few days have been the last props under the arguments of the isolationists everywhere...
...to fasten military discipline and a barrack-room mentality upon a whole people...
...Many have found it impossible hitherto to believe the testimony regarding the complete recklessness and irresponsibility, the moral insanity of the Nazi leaders, that have come to us from Raus-chning and other observers...
...their need to consult all parties and elements in the population regarding the next step In any broad policy...
...I cannot think of anything that would have made the loss of the election from my point of view more certain...
...The first lesson in all this for ourselves is to reconsider immediately our own defenses...
...THE spectacular successes of the German A arms until now also demonstrate how efficient a totalitarian regime can be for the purpose of conducting a war...
...Supposing...
...Against such an enemy the very virtues of the democracies appear as weaknesses Their refusal to invade a helpless neutral even though they may know that the totalitarian enemy Is planning a foothald there to be used against them...
...s former Prime Minister Baldwin once put the matter with unintended candor, "that I had gone to the country and said that Germany was rearming and that we must rearm, does anybody think that this pacific democracy would have rallied to that cry at that moment...
...It will be a snd day for this Republic if the political candidates, simply because they think that that is the only thing our people want to hear, continue to tell us that what is happening in Europe Is no concern of ours...
...Some of these "weaknesses" of democracy are inherent...
...Nothing has been shown to be more horribly false than the belief that a nation can remain at peace with security merely by an ostrichlike policy of "minding Its own business...
Vol. 10 • June 1940 • No. 22
