Evening star., 1943-11-21

Naturally We Nal. Eliot.
are going to get everything we
can from our bombing effort while
the invasion plans are under way.
All that the bombs do to reduce
German powers of resistance, move
ment or production is that much
gained when the moment of de-
cisive struggle arrives. No doubt
these bombing attacks will be kept
up, will be intensified within the
limits OF our ability to do so and
they are having and will continue
TO have a very great effect on the
whole German defensive structure.
Air Police Organized.
What is really significant about
these present raids seems to this
writer to be contained in another
dispatch from Swedish sources,
which tells us that Hitler has or
ganized a special "air police" under
Heinrich Himmler's direction: a spe-
cial SIS unit with armored cars.
planes and picked personnel. The
purpose of this air police is appar-
emily to rush to raided areas to keep
order among the bombed out and
terrified populace by what seems
to be decidedly drastic methods.
Thus it becomes apparent not
only that the bombs are doing great
material damage, but that they are
gradually undermining the German
civilian morale to such an extent
that 1t has become necessary for
the Nazis to take extraordinary steps
to maintain order and prevent the
spread of panic.
In the last war I once had an old
top sergeant in my company who
was veteran of the South African
campaigns and of half dozen lit
tie wars as we'll This old-timer
used to say that with green troops,
the only way to get them to fight
was to make them more afraid of
their officers than they were of the
enemy.
This is just about what the Nazis
appear to be doing. They are trying
to hold frightened, disillusioned
and almost desperate civilian pop
ulation in line by making it more
afraid of the SIS than it is of the
Allied air power.
Must Pay Price.
Of course. Hitler has to pay a
price for this. The price is the
withdrawal from the fighting fronts
of the picked men who make up the
various SIS units. The fact that
in the midst of such a struggle as
is now going on in Russia, in the
Balkans and in Italy, and with
western invasion impending, the
Nazis must still keep on strengthen
ing the SIS shows how basic is their
dependence on terror to hold the
German civilian front firm.
1t suggests how quickly that front
might collapse were the terror re-
moved. 1t points out another and
very great advantage which the
Allies are getting from their air
raids. Not only do these smash Ger
man factories and railways, thus
reducing the total German war po-
tential everywhere; not only do they
tie up, in static defensive measures,
vast numbers of planes, men, guns
and equipment; not only are they
breaking down the fighting spirit
of the German peoples as whole;
but they are also compelling the
increase in personnel and equip
ment of the SIS and they are widen
ing the breach between the average
German citizen, man and woman,
and the Nazi government which has
to use such methods against its
people.
This does not mean that there is
prospect of an early German COL
lapse. No-for the terror still will
be there. 1t will be used, and ruth
lessly used, to keep the German
civilians up to the mark.
Uniform Death Warrant.
The SIS can be depended upon to
hold to the bitter end, because the
black uniform of the SIS is a death
warrant in itself, when the day of
reckoning arrives. But we may we'll
ask ourselves. as the raids continue,
and as the Russians move ahead,
and as the hour of the landing in
the west comes steadily closer, how
much the Nazis can afford to sub
tract from their fighting forces in