The Wilmington morning star., 1942-04-17
TODAY and TOMORROW
CONTINUED from Page One)

For Hitler is no TOOL. He had, there
fore, to set up regime headed by
some one whom the French trusted
yet some one whom he could trust
not to kindle the fires of French
national resistance. Marshal Pc
tain fitted the role. The very fact
that Marshal Petain is a French
man and patriot, yet also de-
featist, has made it possible for
Hitler to rule France with less
troops and with less Gestapo and
firing squads. y
Therefore, though Marshal Pc
he wanted from France, he gave
tain did not give Hitler all the help
he saved Hitler the trouble, the
a good deal of help, and above all
expense, and the moral conse-
quences of having to deal with
France as he deals with Poland
or Norway.
The question then is why in this
spring of 1912, Hitler has felt that
it is necessary to take the risk of
| governing France. through an
agent who is SO deeply disliked and
distrusted by the French people.
The answer is certainly that the
spirit of French national resistance
is rising, that Hitler is unable to
quel it or to appease it through
Marshal Petain's half measures,
and that he feels compelled to
crush the French resistance by do
ing in France what he has done in
the other occupied countries. The
use of Laval is Hitler's recogni-
ton that France does not accept
the New Order, Of which inciden-
tally nothing has been heard for
quite a time. 1t is a recognition
also that, even at the price of de-
stroying all hope of inducing the
French to collaborate, Hitler must
urgently and Immediately get a
much firmer grip upon French ter
ritory and the French population.
The reason for that lies in Gen.
eral Marshall's presence in London
and all that it signifies in regard to
the grand strategy of the United
Nations. Hitler knows, and III e
Marshall mission is intended to
make him know, that Britain and
the United States will not stand by
while he attacks Russia and the
Middle East. He is going to be
made to fight in the west, at some
point or at many points from Nor
way around France to Italy and the
the Balkans. In this vast theater
of the European war France is the
strategical key, and the fact that
the French people would welcome
us as iberators makes it neces-
sary for Hitler to try to crush
their spirit of resistance before we
arrive.
Laval can succeed only if, after
shooting or imprisoning the hidden
patriotic leaders of France, he is
able to convince the rest of the
French people that the Americans
and the British are unable to at
tack. The French nation will not
expect us to take foolish risks, to
commit ourselves to enterprises
| before we can consummate them.
But they will expect us to take
what military men call considered
risks, using the attack to harass
the enemy and above all TO dem
onstrate that the United Nations
are in fact united, and know that
the main theater of the world war
is not in the outposts or even
among the jewels of archaic en-
pire, but at the center of Nazi
power. For the French people un-
derstand war, and they know quite
well, besides having vital inter-
est in it themselves, that the war
will be won or lost in Europe where
the Nazis are in direct contact
with the Russians, the British and
ourselves.
Hitler knows, as we know, that
even the Pacific war cannot be de-
cided from Australia or in India,
or in Libya or at Suez. 1t will be
decided where the three great pow
ers of the United Nations are at
their maximum combined strength
against their most formidable ene-
my-that is to say, in Europe. For
unless and until the power of Hit
Ter is broken, Britain, Russia and
America can exert only fraction
of their strength against Japan.
And if Hitler were victorious in
Europe, it would never be possible
to defeat Japan: with Russia and
Britain conquered, we should be
left to fight alone a last-ditch de-
Tense in a greater Bataan on the
coasts of North America.
Any confusion of mind which
may exist on this crucial point is
now certain to be dispelled by the
nexorable logic of circumstances.
We have suffered humiliating re-
verses in the Pacific because for
long years we have refused to see
that successful resistance to Japan
was not a matter of having five
capital ships to Japan's three, but
of forming a coalition around ia