Evening Star Newspaper, April 21, 1940, Page 29

Editorial Page—Features TWELVE PAGES. Tense Neutrals Await .Outcgnie' of Critical Allied Drive Against Nazis in Review of Thirty-Third Week of War By Blair Bolles. Allied and German soldiers came to grips on the land last week for almost the first time since the war’s beginning. They met at Namsos, in | mid-Norway, in the first skirmish of what may be a major battle for the key city of Trondheim, held by the Germans, and then for all Norway. ‘While troops fought and marched, the world contemplated in amazement stories that Germany effected occupation of Norway léss by military strategy.! than by a combination of trickery, treachery and treason. . . On Fighting Fronts Along Norway's fjord-jagged Atlantic coast British transports landed troops last Monday at many points. In the sea outside roamed the British Navy, throwing a blockade around Narvik, the ore port supplying German iron needs until the Scandinavian war opened, and London reported a piece of British sea daring—the laying of a mine field under German noses along the German Baltic coast from Kiel Bay to Lithuania. German naval warriors sank two Brit- ish destroyers in Skagerrak, and the British doughty subma- Naval rine Spéarfish, which Warfare once hid on ocean bot- tom from German vessels dropping depth bombs, torpedoed pocket battleship Admiral Scheer, sister of late Graf Spee, sent in December by its own German crew to the floor of Montevideo Harbor. Other British submarines brought down two German transports. By sea and by air the Germans were sending 2,000 soldiers a day to Norway. Five days it took for the Germans and the British soldiers—held apart since September by the impregnability of the Maginot Line and the West Wall—to meet. Pursuing conquest (which they called “protectorate”) methodically, the Ger- man invaders fanned out from the cen- ters they seized in first attack on Nor- way: Oslo, Bergen, Stavanger and Trondheim. Norwegian Army organized resistance, although Germans held that no state of war existed between them and their “protected” Scandinavians until Friday, when Norway’s Minister to | Berlin was handed his passports—a tacit admission of ruptured relations if not of war itself. British bombers dropped death om Stavanger. Girding for battle, Britain called the class of 27-year-olds to the colors for May 25 registration. While additipnal troops of the British expedi- tionary corps for Norway crossed the North Sea for the seat of battle, other troops of Britain landed in Faroe Is- | lands, north of Scotland, held by the Danes until German invasion of Den- mark, and prepared to hold them against possibility of German claim. First British land objective in Norway was Narvik, port above the Arctic Circle. By Thursday Germans British had retreated from Nar- In Narvik vik before British landing forces soldiers, although Berlin insistently de- nied any British success around Narvik beyond establishment of blockade. Comdr. Heinrich Gerlach, wounded in Narvik naval engagement, told in Berlin on way to hospital of successfully with- standing two British sea assaults on the ore port. Germans moving out of Nar- vik took possession of the ore railway between Narvik and Swedish border. Southward from Narvik for 400 miles Norway is a thin tongue, fattening where the terrain bulges into the Atlantic at the 63d parallel. At the tongue’s end is Trondheim, seaport and railroad junc- tion, on a long, deep, rocky fjord, barring the way to South Norway and its in- dustries and fertile areas. A few miles north of Trondheim on Thursday British troops made contact with Norwegian forces, after British planes bombed Trondheim and downed two airplanes and damaged two others in an air fight with Germans over Stavanger, In Ber- lin it was reported that Stavanger and . Bergen were being prepared by German occupants as bases for air raiding against British Isles. The setting for land battle was laid Friday. Troop ships brought British soldiers to Namsos, 100 miles Troops north of ‘Trondheim. Ger- Clash man planes flew German soldiers to the landing site, where German soldiers floated to ground by parachute. The parachute-soldiers were repulsed, and the Norwegian sol- diery, headquartered at Steinjker, 30 miles south of Namsos, sent ski patrols across the breadth of Norway to the Swedish border to bar German north- ward penetration. Chief German con- cern was to hold its gate to the south, Trondheim, and chief allied and Nor- wegian task was to penetrate the south. That was the setting for battle. By week’s end Germans had 60,000 troops in Norway, the allies, how many? On sea the problem remained same problem confronting beth allies and Germans since Scandinavian engagement PREMIER MUSSOLINI. The world is wondering what Course the Italian dictator will _ €hoose in the second world war. { —A. P. Photo. A of marines and | began: For the first, to block German troop transport to Norway and to cover own transports; for the second, to guard the dispatch of German troops over the water between Denmark and Norway and to keep open the difficult lines of communications with the mother coun- try. Premier Paul Reynaud told the French Senate that Germany lost almost a third of her navy in a week of NoziNavy fighting in Scandinavian Suffers waters—78,000 tons in all, a 20 per cent of her cruisers, 25 per cent of her destroyers. In the midst of war arose intriguing mystery. Where is King Haakon VII, Norway’s tall monarch? When Germans entered Oslo, he moved to Hamar, still now in Norway hands, barricaded by logs thrust across the highway tc block German troops moving by motor cycles. There on Friday British officers flown in from coastal points conferred with Norse leaders From hot Hamar Haakon moved to Elverum, and then northward from town to town until yesterday his trail was lost. In Oslo, Einar Christen- sen headed administrative council which took over civil government functions in German-occupied territory. He was not concerned with ideologies, of the right- ness or the wrongness of the German invasion or occupation. This was his concern: “Our chief duty is to create a connec- tion between producers and consumers and between farming districts and small towns on one side and Oslo on the other.” Out of battle’s smoke through the week came strange story of how Germans corrupted many key men of a sturdy nation to speed their assault on Norway. The day the Germans entered Oslo Leland Stowe was there. Six days later this great newsman was in Stock- Stowe's Scoop SECRETARY HULL. He politely warned Japan not to upset the status quo of the Netherlands Indies—A. P. Photo. holm, cabling to United States details of vast conspiracy by which “German dictatorship built a Trojan horse inside of Norway” that opened Norway's sea lanes to Norway's vital spots. Four thousand miles away in Washington, Minister de Morgenstierne of Norway expressed a patriot’s doubt of con- spiracy, but in Europe’s neutral nations fears mounted lest they, too, become vic- tims of similar enemies from within. * x % x Behind the Lines To the west and to the south and the southeast of Germany lie the eight small neutral countries of the Nether- lands, Belgium, Switzerland, Yugoslavia, Hungary, Rumania, Bulgaria and Greece. For them the German Scandinavian putsch and the play on human weak- ness and disloyalty made to achieve it wer2 solemn lessons. ’ Most apprehensive were the Dutch. On the North Sea, looking across at Britain, sits their low nation, a temptation for any military commander pondering how best he might get at his Martial Law enemy, England. None InHolland knows this temptation better than the Dutch themselves, and on Friday -théir Prime Minister, Derek Jan de Geer, proclaimed & state of martial low throughout the tiny kingdom, which owns a vast em- pire of rich islands in the Far East, threatened by the Japanese. Said Pre- mier de Geer to the 9,000,000 European Dutch: “Whoever enters our country to at- tack from here an enemy lying behind will find his Way obstructed in the most drastic manner. This secures each of the fighting parties. And this gives us the right to trust even more the word given from both sides that our neutrality will e respected.” . Martial law strengthens the govern- ment’s hand in dealing with subversive, elements and in exercising closer control over thousands of foreigners in the land. Amsterdam wonders whether the weak Dutch Nazi party, 50,000 strong, headed by Dr. Anton Mussert, might contribute toward German invasion. In looking for illegal firearms, police searched a castle of 2 Nazi member of the Dutch Parlia- ment ' A Dutch court sent the last of four conspirators against Holland to prison. He was Franz Sturm, German engineer, was ordered to serve five years after a long secret hearing resulting in his conviction on charges of espionage. Already in jail are his three Dutch ac- complices, officials of the Ministry of Eco- nomics, serving terms of 332, 24 and 18 months. Belgium. began & reundup -of A -~ ¢ PART TWO—EDITORIAL SECTION he Swdwy Fhae ‘WASHINGTON, LITTLE BELT— shallowest of the three channels. s forces move north from Oslo THE SOUND— . C, APRIL 21, 1940. oute from morth- ern iron mines closed by ice till May 10. | question. | limits.” | plan for the use of hundreds of “Paul | city and village to village, shouting the Oland | countries’ trade agreement. | Parliament, in a conciliatory move, ap- | War. On the day the Rumanian Senate acted he reported to the League his vain Organizations—Civics Rumania’s Army needs oil, coal and wood; and the country faces a wheat failure with too many _husband- men in the army to care for all the wheat fields. Germany pro- tested the export prohibition violated the Rumania’s proved a bill for leasing an 83,000-acre timber tract to Germany for a 30-year period. Finally Rumania yielded to Nazi pressure, agreeing to exchange wheat for German military supplies. Space in Eastern Europe to raise tim- ber is one of Germany’s foremost needs, Reichsfuhrer Hitler told Dr. Karl M. Burckhardt last August 11 in an inter- view at Obersalzburg. Dr. Burckhardt was League of Nations Commissioner for Danzig, the free city which provided the diplomatic dispute leading to the Polish efforts for arbitration of the Danzig At Obersalzburg Herr Hitler | announced that he lacked the scruples of the Kaiser who guided Germany in | the World War and that he would right | “without mercy up to the extreme Hungary, between Germany and Ru- | mania, was said in Budapest to be look- ing to Russia for security from any Ger- man action in Southeastern Europe. Switzerland, ready like | the Dutch to fight, will | mobilize as soon as in- vasion should come, the Swiss government proclaimed to the people. The proclamation outlined a Switzerland Nervous Reveres,” who would ride from city to warning that the enemy was at the gates. Between 375,000 and 425,000 Swiss troops man the Winkelreid Line | from Basel to Lake Constance on the | German front. The Swiss borders are | barred to tourists, who may be foreign agents. For thé moment those small lands outside Scandinavia might feel safe. It | is Sweden, Norway’s neighbor, who | | senses the sword of Damocles. The | ‘Bamholw} —?OITED MINE FIELDS The battle for Scandinavia is being intensified in the area shown in this map, prepared by the Associated Press. The shaded arrows show how the German forces have fanned out from Oslo and have driven south- ward from Trondheim in their efforts to consolidate gains. from Trondheim within the past few days to battle British troops. suspicious aliens. On the day martial law came to Hol- land a treasonous conspiracy in Ger- many’s favor was crushed in Yugoslavia, the long Balkan kingdom stretching from the German to the Ital- Yugoslavian ian Empire, from Aus- onspiracy tria on the north to Al- bania on the south. Milan Stoyadinovich, Yugoslavian Pre- mier from 1936 to 1939, was taken into custody after a police raid on his home | disclosed documents linking him with Nazi “Fifth Column” lated mountains south of Belgrade, an vutpost cut off from the world, even from airplane communication, police put Stoy- adinovich—for how long Premier Dra- gisna Cvetkovich did not say. For Yugoslavia’s eastern neighbor, Ru- mania, whose wealth in critical war ma- terials has brought her unwelcome at- tention since the war's beginning from activity in this | country. - At Rudnik, in the rugged, iso- | Other forces are said to have rushed northward | Germany, the week was busy and re- plete with the cautious, now bold, now conciliatory, maneuvering which has marked Rumania’s policy for the past difficult six months. On Monday Ru- mania was firm. The government eco- nomic council in a decree prohibited in- definitely all exports of wheat, petroleum, coal and wood. Hardest-hit of Rumanian-goods buy- ers was Germany, unsympathetic with Premier Tartarescu’s explanation that LLOYD GEORGE WEIGHS DARING POSSIBILITIES Famous Briton Watches for Hitler Moves in Sweden and Holland LONDON.—After months of harmless barking at each other, under or behind deep entrenchments on the western front, the combatant armies are at last fighting openly with each other in the Norwegian mountains. The fog of war, unusually dense and swirling in the hills, makes it difficult to ascertain what is the actual position. The Germans have landed troops. That, of course, is known. But how many? I have seen the numbers put as high as 40,000 and as low. as 15,000. The allies also have succeeded in landing some contingents. But their numbers have not yet been announced nor the points at which they got ashore. Information on these subjects has been withheld, and rightly so. Nazis Not Seriously Resisted. Notwithstanding the advantage which the rugged nature of the terrain gives to the defenders, the invaders have estab- lished themselves without much dif- culty or loss in the south of Norway. There has been no serious resistance to their advance anywhere. Positions which could have been held for weeks by any resolute body of men, resolutely led, have been surrendered or abandoned without striking a blow. No leader like Mannerheim has yet arisen to put heart into the people and organize them to defend their native land. This state of things may be due to divided counsels. There has been in recent years a strong and growing Nazi movement among the youth of Norway. The Germans have established con- tact with the Swedish frontier where: there exists a railway which crosses this frontier. This is in itself an ominous factor in the situation. They are not, at this early stage, on the lookout for facilities to . escape. into ‘internment camps in- Sweden when they are too hard-pressed in Norway. There must, therefore, be another explanation of these strategic movements. The hill men will rally when they find leaders -and constitute themselves in guerilla bands which will harass the Germans and destroy their lines of com- munication. The allies will supply them with all the necessary light equipment to conduct these operations. If the Ger- mans mean to occupy the whole country they will find it a costly undertaking and it will take them a long time to do so. -They will be confronted With condi- tions similar to those whieh the French By David Lloyd George. experienced when Napoleon invaded Spain. Their difficuities will be even greater, for the French succeeded to the end in keeping open the road for rein- forcements to reach them from their own country. The German access to Norway is by sea and it is becoming increasingly precarious. Use Air Superiority. They have already lost heavily in transport and in protecting craft. The drain on their limited maritime and naval resources may soon become irrep- arable if they persist. They are making a considerable use of their superiority in the air. It is reported that streams of airplanes are carrying troops to their menaced positions at Narvik and Trond- heim. The Russians, by this method of trans- port, managed to land an aggregate of two divisions at points in Finland which were inaccessible by any other means. But guns and heavy ammunition cannot be conveyed by air, and without these the Germans cannot hope to maintain their hold for any length of time against the mass of artillery which the allies will in time be able to bring to bear upon them. The German Puehrer and his staff could not have relied altogether on re- ports from Nazi sympathizers in Nor- way that the country would welcome a German invasion. I suspect that Hitler, who has a strong bump of caution keep- ing control over his audacity, must have had something more in his mind than Quisling’s zealous and glowing forecasts. There may be other grounds for the Fuehrer’s decision. - The first is that he was convinced he could keep open his sea communications with Oslo, and pour in enough troops and equipment to en- able him to occupy Southern Norway and maintain his position there against allied ‘attacks. Superior Air Force. He would then have 8 base for his aerial and submarine attacks on Britain, The German broadcast already has boasted that the distance from Bergen to Britain is between one-third and one- half of the distance from Wilhelmshaven *to the British. coast. . The second factor upon which Hitler undoubtedly counts is his confidence that his air force will establish complete superiority over that of the allies. If he 1s right on his conjecture, the landing of ks troops and supplies by the allies on the ! Norwegian coast will be at least as diffi- cult an operation as that with which he is himself confronted at Oslo. But are we quite sure that he had not in his mind other possibilities of a more sensational character? I will indicate two or three of these alternatives. He might think that if his troops are hard pressed and he is unable to rein- force them by existing methods, he will boldly seize Swedish ports and send his reinforcements along Swedish rails and roads to Norway. The Germans are al- ready in possession of railways that cross the Swedish frontier. Moreover, at one point Denmark is only separated by a very narrow strip of sea from Sweden. The other possibilities are more star- ) tling. In this strange war, where deci- sions depends on so swift and daring an actor as the Nazi leader, no possible ac- tion can be ruled out. There may be & sudden diversion in the direction of Hol- land, Belgium or Luxembourg. Most sensational of all would be the in - tion of Italy in the war. Italy’s Press Pro-German, The Italian attitude during the last few weeks has become definitely more hostile toward the allies. For the first few months of the war, there wa$ g labored attempt at impartiality, Italy posed as & determined neutral. Since the Brenner conversations and our un= fortunate arrest of the Italian coal ships, there have been a distinct chang id the tone of the Italian press. Its néws and. views are both definitely anti-slly and pro-German. 4 Mussolini means to get something out of ‘this war, and that something must:be substantial. What he wants is°now in allied possession. Germany has nothing to give, but she can help Italy to get what she: wants. Italy came into the last war after bargaining with both sides. She joined the combination that prom- ised her the-most. Mussolini is not botherirlg about the merits; .he is out for Italy, and he firmly intends that now is her opportunity for establishing a Mediterranean empire. Should he throw in his lot with his | border patrol and her coastal patrol on Stockholm government proclaimed a “state of preparedness” against aerial | attack on parts of Southern and West- | | ern Sweden, | Heartening news nearest the war's area. was that German troops moving south fyom Narvik were carefully avoiding .activity near the C Norway ing itself ‘from union with Denmark after the Danes succumbed to Germany, laid plans for initiating formal diplomatic relations. Congress heard a suggestion that the United States establish a protectorate over Greenland, huge ice-blanketed island possession of Denmark nestled against the North American continent. The Senate approved a $964,000,000 naval spending bill for the coming fiscal year and a $15,000000 appropriation for a third set of locks for the Panama Canal. Fane The State Department fretted over the evacuation of Americans in the Scandinavian war zone. The President in a Pan-American Day speech said that the Americas are prepared to meet force with force if the Western Hemisphere's scene of peace is challenged. “Whoever touches one of us, touches all of us,” he said. Of vast importance for our future line of conduct were Secretary Hull's pro- nouncement on the Netherlands Indies and the Presidents definition of the j unity of the Americas. Halfway between Sumatra Island's eastern and western erds the Equator crosses the 100th longitude east of Greenwich. Sumatra is the westernmost of the Netherlands Indfes, separated by the Straits of Malacca from the Malay States, a short journey from Singapore, the great British Eastern naval base. From Sumatra the Indies stretch across a thick archipelago for more than 2,500 miles. Twenty-five hune dred miles to the north, with the Philip= pines intervening, is Japan. A German invasion of the Netherlands would give the Indies an anomalous status. In Tokio Foreign Minister Arita made a statement which indicated a prospective Japanese “protective” occu- pation of the islands, rich as producers of three vital materials of war—tin, rube ber, petroleum. In Washington Secree tary Hull told the press in a formal ane nouncement: g “Intervention in the domestic affairs of the Netherlands Indies or any altera= tion of their status quo by other than peaceful processes would be prejudicial to the cause of stability, Hull's peace and security not Wurning only in the region of the Netherlands Indies, but in the entire Pacific area.” The United States is the mightiest nation in the Pacific area, even though it is 8,000 miles from Sumatra. The Dutch government announced it Dutch Indies | had conveyed the view to the Japanese KING CAROL. Rumania’s ruler is trying des- perately to keep his country both prepared and at peace. —A. P. Photo. Swedish border. But Sweden kept her | war footing. *x %% . Domestic Front Last week Secretary of State Hull an- nounced to the world in general and Japan in particular our interest in the status quo of the Netherlands Indies. This Government and Iceland, detach- This Dutch anti-aircraft gun erew, shown in maneuvers, will aid the:Netherlands to fight off any invader. that “the government of the East Indies in the supposed case (of war) will be able in reality to secure the government in these possessions and to maintain or- der to the full extent.” Before Secretary Hull proclaimed our interest as a Pacific nation in the fate of the Indies, President Roosevelt proe claimed our interest as an American nation in the preservation of the New World international system. With great solemnity he spoke to the governing board of the Pan-American Union while the allied Ambassadors, Lothian of Great Britain and San Quentin of France, lis- tened from their seats in stiff gilded chairs. “Peace reigns among us today,” Mr. Roosevelt said of the Americas, “because Y we have resolved to Unity in settle any dispute Pan-America that should arise among us by friendly negotiation in accordance with justice and equity rather than by force. * * * But we shall be able to keep that way open only if we are prepared to meet force with force.” The question of our northern neighbor, Greenland, seemingly orphaned by the German protectorate of Denmark, was less easily defined than the matter of our relations with our southern neighe bors. But apparently a German ine vasion is not in prospect. And the British position with regard to Greenland was stated by Lord Lothian, the Ambassador here, who sald he considered Greerland comes well within the Mofiroe Doctrine. ~—A. P. Wirephoto.