Evening star., 1939-11-26
Now It Is Hitler Who Dawdles
In the War, and He Has Reason
Time Is on Side of Allies While Fuehrer Has More
on His Hands Than He Had
Bargained For
By Marx Eli Ravaee

time ago what many people here and
abroad were no doubt vaguely thinking,
when he said: There is something
phoney about this war. It looks as if
they were pulling their punches" They
presumably meant the Franco British
allies
With the ruins of Warsaw still smok-
Ing, 1t was hardly possible to tWit the
Germans for shadow boxing. On the ILL
defended eastern front they had done
mans job with Teutonic thoroughness
and frightfulness; and few of us doubted
but that the moment they had mopped
up that sector they would attend as
swiftly and efficiently to the West That
expectation has not been realized, for
reasons to be looked into presently But
that was not the fault of those who looked
for fight along the familiar lines with
plenty of speed and action.
The quiet on the western front week
or so later got on the nerves of another
elder statesman, on the thither shore of
the Atlantic this time. Mr.. Lloyd George,
successfully British Minister of NUM-
tionS and Premier during the first chap
ter of the World War, might perhaps have
been expected to restrain his impatience
at the dullness of the spectacle his sue
cessorS were providing in Chapter II
He had taunted the Chamberlain gov
ernment with reckless improvisations"
before hostilities began for handing out
guarantees to Poland and Rumania with
out first assuring itself of the support of
Russia. Rightly perhaps. But now he
found it odd and unforgivable that, war
having been declared, the allies were
resting on their arms. Britain had pledged
her word to Poland to help that country
If it were attacked, with all the means
In her power had she not? Bombing
planes were part of her equipment.
Therefore, if the guarantee were honest,
England should have bombarded Ger
manys capital, her industrial areas and
her naval bases. 1t was the only sincere
and practical way to redeem that pledge.
Facts Not So Simple.
The responsible heads of the Allied
War Council took less simple view of
their task and their commitments. They
saw from the outset that, with Russia
unfriendly, Poland was doomed for the
present. That did not mean that Ger
many had won the war. The issue of the
struggle would be decided in the West.
Meanwhile, the destruction of Berlin
would not save Warsaw 1t would only
bring retaliation on London, Paris and
perhaps many other allied cities. The
dogs of war were in full cry, ready to
leap on each other. But to unleash them
impulsively now would compass the de-
struction of Europe.
The Polish episode had filled a vital
role in the allied cause 1t had given
France and Britain precious month,
during which they completed their
mobilization unhampered, moved a great
eXpeditionary force from the isles to
the continent, caught up in aerial arma-
ment, and geared the economies of two
far-flung empires to a war tempo.
With these huge tasks achieved, Brit
ain and France could afford to sit tight
and let the enemy, if he dared, try the
offensive. Time was their ally Delay
would be but an added link in the chain
which encircled and paraly7ed the Third
Reich.
Europe might yet, to be sure, be con-
sumed in the rekinded fires of this
smouldering war. But if this must be,
1t would not be on the initiative of the
democracies. Let Herr Hitler fling the
first bomb.
More Than He Bargained For.
But it l., now many weeks since the
fall of Warsaw, and the Fuehrer has
shown no inclination to fill the role
assigned him. What deters him is per-
haps not decent regard for the opinions
of mankind No scruples irked him
when he fell on Austria, the open towns
of Spain, Czecho-Slovakia or Poland
He scorned the worlds Kisses no less
than its applause. He believed the
detection of Russia from the peace
front" would discourage the British into
letting him have his way with the Poles.
A western front having arisen none the
less, he hoped his foes would listen to
his peace Establishments once Poland
was eliminated both as foe and as an
issue. He was baked both times. And
If he thought there was the least chance
of blitzkrieg bringing him victory he
would not be twirling his thumbs in the
west WIlle IHe crucial weeks pass. he
thunders and menaces and marks time
because this is not the kind of war he
wanted or barganed for. Totalitarian
In doctrine, he has a veritable phobia
against taking on more than one enemy
at a time, and he prefers the foe small,
weak and friendless. The campaigns he
remembers with satisfaction are those
of March, 1888 (Austria), and March,
1889 (Bohemia). Ribbentrop, his foreign
minister, had assured him that England
would not fight, so that Poland would be
another of the same pattern.
Left to himself he might perhaps at
tempt to break through, out of sheer
despair. But there are some sober
brains left in the Third Reich, partcu-
larly in the Reichswehr He liquidated
Fritsch and Blomberg because they were
politely contemptuous of the blitzkrieg
fairy tale in any contest with the great
powers. But Keitel and Brauchitsch,
moved up by the Fuehrer into the va
Gated posts, can only think, being
soldiers, as did their predecessors. A
lightning war, they admit, was possible
In Spain (where it lasted three years., in
Austria, Czecho-Slovakia, Poland-any-