Hitler’s Dream
Is Shattered
By Allied Victory
European War Cp^t More
Ilian Trillion Dollars,
Six Million l ives
By CARL. C. CRANMER
Associated Press Staff Writer
Germany's dream of world con
quest has come to a shattering
end with the collapse of the Reich
which Adolf Hitler* boasted was to
endure a thousand years.
Ended is the European phase of
the second great war of the cen
tury, a war which, is estimated
to have cost close to $1,000,000,-
000.000 tone trillion) in money
and the lives of more than 6,000,-
000 men.
The collapse of Germany was
foreshadowed last July/ 20 when
an attempt was made to kill Hit
ler and seize power by what the
dictator said was a small clique
of “foolish, criminally stupid"
German officers.
Whole World Fooled
This revolt among Hitler's en
tourage, coming almost exactly a
year after the sorry lackey Benito
Mussolini had been broken in It
aly; the rapid advances of Rus
sian armies in the east, the drive
of Allied armies in Italy, and the
success of the most difficult am
phibious Invasion in history, the
invasion of Normandy, ail sug
gested that the German army was
approaching a debacle.
At the start, the war looked to
the world, grossly underrating
preparations, like the throw of a
mad adventurer.
It turned out that the Allies
snatched victory only after hair
breadth escape from defeat.
Hitler opened it with a razzle-
dazzle of propaganda, secret weap
ons, armored spearheads, bombing
armadas, parachute troops, fifth
columns and political sleight-of-
hand which quickly established
"MIu as a sinister Barnum of war.
First Global W ar
Before it ended, merged .with
the war in Asia and the Pacific
by the Japanese attack on Pearl
Harbor, it had been fought on / all
the oceans and continents.
“In this war there will be no
victors and losers, but merely sur
vivors and annihilated." Hitler
threatened, and accordingly ■ he
set a pace for ruthlessness and
cruelty unprecedented in modern
war.
The conflict became:
A War of Secret Battles—long
silent struggles to smash his in
vasion fleet , off Britain, to mas
ter the submarine which imper
iled the United States’ as never
before, to crush robot bomb
launching sites in France.
A War of Secret Weapons—in
which the Allies with radar, a
brand new conception of massed
fleets of invasion barges, the tech
nique of mass bombing through
clouds, and a host of inventions,
outdid Hitler.
War in the Air-in which whole
armies of millions engaged. For
the first time the capitals of great
nations and scores of other cities
were marked for methodical de
struction.
A War of Cities — Stalingrad,
Leningrad, Odessa, Sevastopol,
Cassino—whose streets, and hous
es were turned into trenches and
forts. A new technique of battle
in the rubble of cities developed.
London was blitzed, and Berlin
shattered.
A war underground between
Quislings and armies of resist
ance, and a war of psychology' in
which the Four Freedoms and the
Atlantic Charter were used to
combat Nazi ideology.
A war fought in the extremes
of weather and terrain, from Af
rica to the Arctic, in the world’s
worst bogs and jungles and most
inaccessible mountains.
Flying Bomb Advent
The war saw the advent of the
flying bomb and many different
rocket weapons, the blockbuster,
rapid firing guns which made ar
tillery barrages more intense than
ever, mass mobility of tanks and
vehicles, the air-borne army, the
flying battleship, amphibious in
vasion on a grander scale than
ever.
All this was started about 3
o’clock on Friday morning, Sept.
1 . 1939, when German armies in
vaded Poland.
Despising the Poles too much to
declare war formally, Hitler an
nounced only that he was answer
ing “force with force."
With smug conceit he declared,
“I am putting on the uniform (the
field gray of the German army)
and I shall take it off only in
victory or death.”
The War on Poland
Hitler planned a blitzkrieg—a
lightning war—and probably nev
er expected that England and
France would do more than wage
a token war when they say the
uselessness of trying to save their
ally.
Amazing armored spearheads
sliced through the Polish cavalry
divisions to the Wisla (Vistula),
trapped a huge army in the Kut-
no area west, of Warsaw and an
other at random to the south.
In 18 days Hitler boasted of vic
tory in a. speech at Danzig, though
it was Sept. 27 before Warsaw,
battered to a, pulp, surrendered.
Hitler claimed 300,000 prisoners.
Taking cognizance of British
predictions of a long war—three
years—Hitler declared he was
ready for a seven years war.
The same day Joachim Von Rib
bentrop arrived in Moscow and
two day’s later concluded with
Russia the. fourth partition of Po
land and an agreement to bring
pressure upon Britain and France
to make peace.
The “Phoney War”
Great Britain and France served
an ultimatum on Germany on
September 1 and declared war on
Sunday, September 3, while Lon
don evacuated her children and
waited breathlessly for the bombs
to fall. None fell. This was the
“phoney war."
On September 3 the French an
nounced that their army had come
“in contact” with the Germans,
I but the French preferred to have
I the Germans throw themselves on
I the Maginot Line and struck into
flje ^ailg Abvarpt
VOLUME: XXXIV THE DAILY ADVANCE, ELIZABETH CITY, X. C. VICTORY EDITION
Saga of the Austrian House Painter WhoTried to Conquer theWorld
As a baby. In World War I. On release from prison,’in 1924.
'T'HE HOUSE PAINTER (1889-1924): The turbulent life of Adolf Hitler had its humble beginning at
* Braunau. Austria, where the “little man with big ideas” was born April 20, 1889, the son of a
drunken petty official Hitler’s early life was an unhappy one, both at home and later in Vienna and ,
Munich, where he went as a youth to work as a common laborer, house painter, and newspaper sketch
artist ,.^ .. .
Serving as a corporal in the Bavarian Army during World War I, Hitler was wounded, gassed, and |
later decorated. After the war he joined with a group of six men, the original National Socialist Ger- J
man Labor Party In 1923 came the Munich “beer hall revolution," when Hitler- led an uprising ;
against the government and proclaimed himself dictator |
Sentenced to jail for five years (he served only eight months), he spent his prison time writing
“Mein Kempf,” wherein a portent of things to come was set forth as “A state which, in an age of
racial pollution, devotes itself to cultivation of its „best racial elements, must some day become master j
of the earth”.
q”HE RISE' TO POWER (1924-36): After his release from prison in 1924, Hitler began to form his
*■ party and gather his henchmen—Goering and Goebbels were among the first. By 1933 Hitler’s
powar forced President Von Hindenburg to appoint him as chancellor of the Reich. The reign of
terror began, with the burning of the Reichstag, arrest of 500 Communists, suppression of newspapers
and Abe; political parties. All civil liberties were banished, and with the creation of the Gestapo bj
Goering, the bloody persecution of the Jews began.
Hitler quit .the League of Nations and disarmament conference, and in 1934 signed a non-aggres-
sion pact with jittery Poland. Hitler became President on Von Hindenburg’s death that year and
assumed the title of “Fuehrer.” \
During 1935 annexation of the Saar, creation of the Luftwaffe under Goering, and breaking of the
Versailles treaty all presented sharp contradiction to the Fuehrer’s 1933 Reichstag speech, when he
shouted, “Germany wants nothing that she is not ready to give to others. The German people have
no thought of invading any country.” 1 “ “ * ” ' ' *
Poles weep as Hitler and Blitzers invade in 1939.
Hitler directs war with Russia.
the ex-Duce in 1943.
1944 army revolts augur civil uprisings as in 1918.
Hitler rescues
BEGINNINGS OF CONQUEST (1936-39): The Nazi march toward European domination began in
, when German troops, breaking the Locarno Pact, occupied the Rhineland. Next came- forma
tion of the Rome-Berlin Axis, when Hitler joined with Mussolini in a partnership dedicated to war
Find aggression. In 1937, all Nazi male youths were ordered to. work or military service and with
the entire German nation now behind him either by choice-or domination, Hitler sent an'ultimatum
to Austria. The bloodless occupation followed in 1938.
t ^7'^ n ’"al in g. 200,000 troops on the Czech frontier, the Nazis refused all offers of concessions of
}, pless nation. Chamberlain became the symbol of democratic appeasement when he signed the
Munich pact, giving Hitler 11,000 square miles of Czech territory with a population of 3,500,000. In
bis same city—where the Nazi “beer hall gang” met each year to celebrate founding of the party—
HiTle narrowly escaped death in 1939, when a bomb wrecked the shrine just after he left.
l! " o 5^ u P a ^ on of Austria and Czechoslovakia came just six months after Hitler told the world
There is no nation in the world which longs more for peace than Germany.” *
German territory only for a few
thousand yards near Sarbrucken.
Their “offensive” never developed-
The British were dropping leaf
lets on Germany all winter long
as Hitler alternately threatened
“total war” and held out hopes of
peace.
Norway and Denmark
Ori April 9, 1940, the war broke
out with all it’s fury. Hitler's
troops slipped into Denmark and
invaded Norway by sea and air.
A few goosestepping soldiers and
a military band marched in and
took Oslo. Soldiers hidden in the
holds of previously-arrived ships
seized Narvik, Bergen, Stavanger,
Trondheim and other coastal
points.
The British, caught napping,
landed a few thousand Allied
troops on both sides of Trondheim
and later at Narvik, but were
forced to withdraw. On April 30
Hitler proclaimed a complete vic
tory, and within a short time Al
lied troops had withdrawn.
Battle of France
May 10 the great blow in the
west fell on Holland. Belgium,
Luxembourg and France. The fate
of Germany would be sealed for
1,000 years by the outcome. Hitler
told his soldiers.
Swarms of parachutists descend
ed on the airports near Rotter
dam, the Hague and Amsterdam,
seized the bridge at Moerdijk,
south of Rotterdam. The vaunted
Dutch “water line” proved inef
fectual. Holland fell in four days.
The Nazis overwhelmed the
Belgian fort, Eben Emael, and
rushed their columns across the
vaunted 1 Albert Canal near Maas
tricht.
In three days German tanks
surprised the French, seized Se
dan and were racing for the Eng
lish Channel, with fleets of motor-
cyclists spreading fire and terror
ahead of the armored detach
ments.
The Germans reached.the chan
nel at Abbeville on May 21 and
King Leopold announced the sur-
WORLD WAR
invaded Poland,
with invasions of
ings of Hitler and Japan’s Kurusu, for a year later the Pearl Harbor attack came.
Hitler erred gravely in 1941 when, after swallowing the Balkans, he invaded vast Russia. Early
successes were followed by increasing retreats here and in North Africa after U. S. entered the
war By the end of 1943 Germany had also lost Sicily and part of Italy „, .
Allied invasion of France in June of 1944 forced a three-front war on Germany, already re
treating in Italy and Russia Revolt of his army clique and attempted assassination brought on a
“purge” of Nazi officers, as the Fuehrer "dodged blame for military disasters.
Faced with humiliating army retreats and continual air bombardment, Hitler crouched in his
ever-shrinking “Fortress” and desperately told his people that “Victory will one day compensate
each and every one of us for the sorrows suffer ed and the sacrifices made.”
render of his 300,000-man Belgian
army on May 28.
Then Game Dunkerque
Dunkerque, the British epic of
the war, in which a strange ar
mada of 900 warships, skiffs, tugs
and yachts rescued an army of
337*000 men from the beaches,
was over by June 4.
For four years the Kaiser's
armies had fought .to win control
of the channel ports. Hitler got
them in less than a month.
In vain Gen. Maxime Weygarid
set “mousetraps” for tanks along
the Somme. Turning south on
June 6, Hitler brushed aside the
vaunted French army. The Magi
not Line was turned. The French
government evacuated Paris June
10, the same' day Mussolini com-
.mitted his “stab in the back” and
sent troops into the border area
of France, where they dug in
without any attempt to help Hit
ler clean up
Taking over thp French goyern-
I ment, Marshal Petain announced
1 on June 17. “with a broken heart."
II 1939-44): After signing a non-aggression pact with Russia in 1939, Hitler’s troops
England and France declared war on Germany, and Hitler answered them in 1940
Denmark. Norway, the Low Countries and France. Significant were the 1940 meet ¬
that he had been compelled to ask I
Hitler, as one soldier to another, 1
for an honorable armistice.
The high point of the, war—for
Hitler—came at Compiegne on
June 21 in the railway car where
Marshal Foch had dictated peace
terms to Germany in 1918, and
France signed an armistice.
Grandly pleased by this revenge
for the “Dictates of Versailles,”
Hitler visited the tomb of Napo-j
leon.
Battle of Britain
Most popular song in Germany |
was “we’re sailing against Eng
land.” Britain seemed helpless. 1
She had lost all but a few score j
guns and tanks. The RAF was
outnumbered. She fell back on
hastily organized home guards to
fight from haystacks and hedge-;
rows.
Hastily importing hunting ri
fles, old tanks and World War
guns from America, Prime Minis
ter Churchill hunched his head
down between his great shoulders 1
and declared, “we will fight on 1
the beaches and the landing
grounds, in the fields, in the
streets, on the hills. We will never
surrender—” -
It was Britain’s time for blood,
and sweat, and tears.
Grimly, 700 Spitfires and Hurri
canes opposed the entire German
air force. British fighting planes
mounting eight guns, and radar,
which gave warning of coming
raids, probably saved the British
in the aerial battle that lasted
from August through May. But
50,000 Britons died from bombs.
September 15, 1940, when the Ger
mans* lost 185 planes and were
forced to switch to night bomb
ing, has been called one of the, de
cisive battles of the war—a Wa
terloo or Trafalgar.
In September and October the
Germans were assembling their
invasion fleet of 3,000 barges and
4,000,000 tons of ships. Not until
1944 did Churchill disclose the rea
son v by the Germans never in
vaded England—--the invasion fleet
(See HITLER page 2
Impact of War 5
In Europe Felt
Lightly In America
Except for Materials and.
Lives Expended Abroad
Conflict Hardly Felt
By DAVID TAYLOR MARKE
Associated Press Staff Writer
It was September 4, 1939, just
one day after England declared
war on Germany, that the physi
cal impact of the European cos
flict hit the United States—with
the sinking of the British Liner
Athenia. Three hundred Amer
cans were aboard, and 30 died.
The United States invoked the
neutrality act, curtailing business
activities with the belligerents
Travel to Europe was banned ex
cept for “imperative reasons.”
Thousands came home.
Harbors from Halifax to R10 De
Janeiro were filled with idle ships
and stranded men.
Despite armed guards aboard
27 Italian ships interned from
New York to Florida were effec
tively sabotaged. Similar Axis ac
tion followed in ports throughout
the Americas.
America Not Immune
Prosecutions for sabotage, libel
suits for millions of dollars against
Axis vessels- and their cargoe.
plus the sinking of the U. 5 3
Reuben James in American wa
ters; the torpedoing of Latin Am.
erican, vessels off the shores of
the U.S., Central and South Ar -
erica and the islands of the Garth
bean, all punctuated the fact that,
no shore of the Americas was im
mune to war.
The battle and subsequent scu' -
tling l of the German pocket bat
tleship Graf Spee were witnessed
by thousands at Montevideo. Ship
yard workers could see the phy
sical damage wrought by war, as
they were kept busy repairing Al
lied merchantmen and warships.
Then came the actual attack 6:
the United States and most of ths
Am e ri cas were at war.
More than 283 American ves
sels were sunk, often within sight
of American shores, as Axis sub
marine warfare reached a new
fury. Thousands of spectator?
watched flames sweep merchant
men from Canada to South Am
erica. Survivors of torpedoed ships
began pouring ashore, more than
1,000 at Miami alone during 194.
Shattered bodies, wreckage an.i
oil slicks strewed stretches of
beach for thousands of miles.
West Coast Felt Attack
Submarines crept close in shore
to the Netherlands West Indies in
February. 1942. to shell Anuta,
huge Standard Oil refinery and to
sink tankers in the harbor there.
Then sank 20 vessels after creep
ing right into the St. Lawrence
River. The west coast, too, felt
the Axis attack, and shells ones
fell in California.
The supply .of oil for civilian
cars and homes was sharply cut
and sugar and coffee stocks san 1 -'
to new lows, necessitating ration
ing. Fishing boats were sunk.
So serious did the off-shore at
tacks become that general din.
out restrictions were ordered to
reduce the glow against which
ships were silhouetted from th*
sea.
The United States establish^?!
air bases in South America and
transferred warships to Latin
American flags to combat the
submarine menace.
Two days after Pearl Harbor
the heavily industrialized eastern
seaboard from New York to Bos
ton experienced an air raid alafn.
“Unknown planes approaching
flashed through defense office.
Navy patrols soared along the
coast and more than 300 plane
from Mitchell Field took to tt -
air. Fire and police sirens serean:
ed. Civilian Defense volunteer
and plane spotters manned the
posts. Millions of children were
dismissed from classes. Thousand'-
of employes were rushed out of
vital defense factories and Army
and Navy centers. It was a false
alarm.
Saboteurs Brought Problem
Even before Pearl Harbor the
Americas, sheltering half a mil
lion refugees from Europe, felt
their internal security -threatened
by the infiltration of dangerous
aliens. Saboteurs tried to slip in
as refugees.
This Country alone held nearly
1,000,000 German, Italian and Jap
anese aliens, to be augmented la
ter by prisoners of war as Allied-
arms swept triumphantly throng s
Africa, Italy and France.
Escaping prisoners kept tt j
Americas on the alert. Citizens of
Axis origins, aiding and abetting
these internees to escape, when
swept up by the FBI and local la
enforcement agencies, tried and
sent to prison.
Six saboteurs sneaking in by
submarine through Long Island
and Florida were caught and exe
cuted and two others were sent
to prison. So were 33 member?
of the dangerous Dusquesne Spy
Ring, and 16 others of high de
gree. These obtained information
of the greatest, military value
which, through counter-espionage,
was rendered valueless before it
could be transmitted to Germany.
Scores of high Nazi leaders were
(See IMPACT page 6)