Evening star., 1939-08-31
Danzig Nazis Push
Ansch|uss by 5eizing
Polish Rail Station
Hope to Present Europe
With Accomplished
Fact of Reunion
By RICHARD MOWRER,

Chicago Daily News Foreisn Correspondent.
WARSAW, Aug. 31.-At II o'clock
last night Danzig came step nearer
to anschluss with Germany-and
war-when the Nazi Gestapo occu-
pied the main railroad station,
kicked out or arrested its Polish
employees and ran up the German
flag. Thus, the Nazis are going
ahead in the process of assimilating
Danzig into the Third Reich-an
eventuality which Poland has re-
peatedly asserted it would never
tolerate.
Today, as Danzig Nazis were tear
Ing down the Polish white eagle
and the P. K. P. Polish State Rail-
ways) signs from the station, Poland
was confronted with the difficult
choice of letting Danzig go to Ger
many or resisting and firing the first
shots of what could easily develop
into a European war.
Polish sources in Warsaw re-
ported that Germany has now
seized all railroad stations on
Danzig territory and cut COM
munications between the Free
City and the nearby Polish port
OF Gdynia, according to the Asso-
ciated Press.
(Gestapo agents now enter and
search all trains on Danzig terri
tory and prevent Danzig citizens
of Polish nationality from cross
Ing into Poland. Groups of armed
Germans were alleged to have
attacked the Polish frontier sta
ton of Orlowo. on the outskirts
of Gdynia, and fired on a pas
senger train near Cadaca, on the
Slovak frontier)
Poland Is on Edge.
Poland held back in Danzig when
the Nazis began to violate the
statute of the Free City and when
Germany began to militarize the
territory; Poland held back when
German forces moved into Slovakia
and extended the encirclement of
Poland, but it is obvious today, with
an accomplished fact in Danzig just
around the corner, that Poland is
on edge.
Government quarters this morn
Ing grimly declared that they took
a very grave" view of the situation
In Danzig and that by now every
body knows who the aggressor is"
Thus, with the Nazis occupying
Danzig's main railroad station, it is
hard to find any Polish rights in
Danzig which can be described as
still existing. Polish customs con-
troll in the Free City territory is
negligible now, Polish railroads in
Danzig have been taken over and
transit trains through the territory
are no longer operating; Polish har-
Dor rights have been consistently in
terfered with to the extent of ar
resting or throwing out Polish pilots
and employees and stopping ships;
Polish post Office rights have shrunk
to almost invisible proportions fol-
lowing continual Nazi interference
with the mails and systematic ar
rests Of Polish postal employees.
Yesterdays seizure by the Nazis
OF the Danzig Station and the con-
sequent stopping of transit trains
to Gdynia has particularly serious
aspect in that it virtually isolates
the Polish munitions dump and fort
OF Westerplatte. Westerplatte is
within the Danzig Free City terri
tory at the mouth of Vistula that
enjoys extraterritorial and military
rights.
Accomplished Fact Is Aim.
The Germans game in Danzig is
plain. BY forcing out the Poles and
blanking out Polish rights in Danzig
they will soon be able to say to the
world: Look! Danzig is German:
we have everything we want there,
and a declaration of anschluss with
the Reich would merely be symboli-
cal-surely you, Britain, and you,
France, are not going to fight ter
rible war because of mere symbolic
declaration.
The truth of the matter is, how
ever, that hard facts come before
symbolic gestures, and the Poles
make it clear that hard facts in
Slovakia, all along the German
frontier and in Danzig, are closely
bound to Polish security and Po-
lands existence as an independent
nation.
An assortment of confused reports
reaching here from Danzig this
morning indicated that some sort of
miniature civil war is going on in
the Free City. Shootings are report
ed between bands of Danzig citizens
who apparently do not want to re-
turn to the Rech and Danzig Nazis
who can hardly wait to return to the
Reich.
Adding to the confusion are re-
ports that scraps have occurred be-
tween S. S. (Storm Troopers) and
Danzig Heimwehr CHome Guards
men. Whether this state of affairs
IN Danzig is to be the signal for
German troops to march in to "es-
tablish order" will be known very
soon.
tcopyrisht, 1889. Chicago Daily News, Inc.)