The Wilmington morning star., 1942-02-17
AUDACITY DOES IT

Since wars began. audacity has played an
important part in victories. Surprise has al
ways contained elements Of success. Surprise.
no less than terror, is the new weapon Hit
Ter talked of when this war started. and which
has accounted for more than one of his vic
tories
It was the sheer audacity Of the venture, as
much as anything else, that carried the Ger
man warships through the Dover strait from
Brest to Helgoland. It may have been jeal-
ousy of Japanese successes in the Orient while
he was suffering a setback in Russia that led
Hitler to plan this exploit, as much as the op-
portunity they would afford to increase the
tempo Of Atlantic fighting if the ships won
free; but the motive is not of equal interest.
from the academic viewpoint. with the method
by which the operation was conducted
Anne O'Hare Mccormick of the New York
Times staff, deals with fine insight with this
phase of the operation. We quote:
The worried eyes of the British people
were fixed on faraway straits-on Malacca
and Macassar and Suez They were think
ing Of the last stand of Singapore, of Ran
goon, of channels in the Antipodes the
broken arteries in the circulatory system
of the empire It was one of the darkest
days in their history, and although they
take bad news with Incompatible cheer
fulness The Times correspondent in Lon
don reported yesterday that the mood of
Britain was grimmer than he had seen it
since the war began.
This was the day the Germans chose to
stage their daring dash from Brest to Hell
goland Did they want to recall attention
to the Strait of Dover? Is Hitler tired of
being out of the spotlight? He has never
yet been able to shake the props of the
British Empire, and to be suffering re-
verses in Russia while the Japanese were
delivering the greatest single blow the
chief enemy has received must have been
pretty calling to the Master Mind of the
Axis.
There was kind of insolent bravado in
the parade of the Scharnhorst and the
Gneisenau through the English Channel
while Singapore was falling. For the Ger
mans dared to parade their ships under the
guns OF Britain itself, the empires strong
est fortress. They may have taken the
risk to show that they could or to prove
to the world that the imprisoned battle
ships were able to move under their own
steam after Ito bombardments of thegport
VI o.eoI. 1ney would nardly have acted to
remind the British of their own danger.
but the restive populations of Europe. even
OF Germany itself, might be expected to
pe impressed by demonstration of power
and audacity. ~
The height Of fashion usually can be found
on the price tag.
Even if your life Is an open book there are
times when you should turn over new leaf,
The idea of moving the clocks ahead an
hour in wartime is to get us all up earlier
to get ahead Of the Rising Sun,
Don't tell us there is a shortage of textiles
after the way the ladies have been saving
material on dresses all these years!
Five million autos in the u. S. are 10 years
old or older, but that isn't the reason lot
OF them won't be running not so long from
now.
Herr Goebbels' latest propaganda makes
the pagan god Wotan a first cousin of the
Jap sun god. Next logical step is to rechrister
Adolf Hirohitler.