1939-12-01 — Page 14

Friday,

HONGKONG-TELEGRAPH

December 1, 1939,

WATSONE

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The

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Hongkong Telegraph.

Friday, Decembor 1, 1939.

Wyndham St., Hongkong

Telephone: 26615

TRE predx "pecial to the Telegraph" is used by the "Hongkong Telegraph" to Indicate news which is strictly copyright under the provisions of the Telecommuni- Cauons Urdinanco, 1915, Buch news 24 bear the indication "UP" to received in longkong on the date of publication by the Called Press Associations who to- serve all rights and forbid republication, eliter wholly or in park without previous arrangement,

Red Light For Hitler

IT would serve no useful pur- pose at this stage to inquire how it comes about that Europe now finds itself committed to a second edition of the Great War, Suffice it to say at the moment that those shallow observers who throw the blame on Hitler and Nazi-ism completely over- look the terrible responsibility

CHEESE PARER

KILL JO

MONOTONY

BIGGER

BRIGHTER

AND RADIO

PROGRAMNES

B. B. C. BLACK OUT

The Russian Riddle Solved

E

VERY morning brings

me letters about Russia, Many are hot with in-

BY

dignation against Stalin. W. N. EWER

Many are hot with indignation that anyone should doubt either his integrity or his supreme wisdom.

But most. I thhik, are puzzled.

How is it that the peace-loving Soviet Unton, with no territorial ambitions, pledged to the struggle against Nazism, pledged to aid all victims of aggression, should sud- denly do this thing?

S. MOUTRIE & CO., LTD. of those who allowed those bale-Not the most ingenious arguments

YORK BUILDING

TO-MORROW

AT---

THE

CHATER ROAD.

KING'S

THE GREATEST ADVENTURE KNOWN TO MAN!

Filmed in the authentic

African locale! Three

years in the making!

"Dr. Livingstone, I presume?””

An unforgettable moment... when Stanley speaks those', famous wordaj

Twentieth Century Fox presents DARRYL F. ZANUCK'S Production of

STANLEY and LIVINGSTONE

with the most brilliant acting cast ever assembledi:

SPENCER TRACY NANCY KELLY RICHARD GREENE

WALTER BRENNAN" - CHARLES 'COBURN SIR CEDRIC HARDWICKE - HENRY HULL HENRY TRAVERS Directed by Henry King

Amesbutu Produtor Konnal Macgrees » Bersanttej vý Philip Dean and Jattan Jomephora • †Bhéarlant Heeveral vad Story Ovillig by Hai Long and Ken Nollmen

'SPENCER

TRACY twice winner of the Acad emy Award. gives another [masterful par

ful phenomena to arise.

It does not seem to make sense. of Western Communists can make It make sense. In view of the assiduous pro-

Clearly there is something wrong paganda already evident in some somewhere. Fact and theory far The cvidence pseudo-high-brow quarters, how-nonsensically. ever, it should be clearly stated clashes with assumptions. that Hitlerism has not been due to the Versailles Peace Treaty, but, on the contrary, to the amazing failure to enforce its terms. All this talk of over throwing Hitlerism is beside the point, and curiously paradoxical under the guise of democratic action.

Neither we nor anybody else have any moral or historical right to dictate to the German people, or anybody else, under what form of government they must choose to exist. Our right is strictly limited to en- suring that the one European community that has disturbed the peace of our continent for the past century shall never again be permitted to make it- self an international nuisance.

Some of the military pundits have been explaining how we are now encountering an entire ly new kind of war. This as- sertion is based on the fact that in these days war is no longer confined to actual fight- ing between the armed forces of belligerent nations, but that it brings right into the arena both the economic and political fac- tors.

Actually the only change be- tween modern and past warfare, however, 18 that up-to-date equipment to a certain extent Intensifies the latter factors as ponderable issues.

Since facts are facts, the as- We sumptions must be wrong. have to abandon the theory that Stalin's polley has been based on Opposition to Nazism, aggression

and war.

What then has it been? Is there an answer to that which will t

with the facts, which will make sc

sense instead of nonsense and mero melodramatic villainy out of this year's happenings?

think there is. The answer is this:

That Josef Stalin (whatever he was in youth) is to-day at Im- perlaist. His desire is not for the welfare of the Soviet peoples, but for the power, the aggrandise- ment, the expansion of the State over which he ruler as Autocrat.

Look back and see how the theme of power has for some years run through the speech of the men around him. As the "old Bolsheviks have passed, the new Bolshevism has changed its lan- guage, its manners, its mode of thought: like Jacobinism turning

Info Bonapartism.

Stalin's here-an official hero of the new Bolahovism-Is Poter the Great: tho Tear who began Rus- Gla's expansion westward, subdued the Ukraine and conquered the Baltle States.

For Stalin, disciple of Peter the Great rather than of Lenin, the recovery of Russia's lost provinces has been an increasing

purpose.

Little enough was said about it: for it was politic not to reveal such ambitions while there was no chance of fulling them, and a the revelation Dossibility that might units Europe in opposition to them.

The economic and the political factors have always, since the bloodshot dawn of human an- tagoniams, played their part in conflicts between peoples. Siege

Last September came the first warfare is as old as stone walls, and siege warfare is mainly This time they can do the economic and political in its im-frontal attacking. The Maginot pingement. In fact we may Line will welcome auch efforts truly say that the more the with a terrible ovation. The dreary business of warfare. Nazi theory of Blitzkrieg con- changes, the more it remains demns them to face that music, the same. There is certainly or endure the economic and nothing newer than Ancient political hazards of a long-drawn Greece in an attempt to starve war. If they think of trying air an enemy into subjection, or frightfulness as a last desperate oven in trying to upset his remedy, well, while their offorts morale by pamphlet propaganda. must be divided between two But an economic slege can be objectives-Paris and London- torribly exhausting to a nation the Franco-British bombers will liko Germany, and if the slow be concentrating on Berlin. attrition of economic warfare Hitlerism already has its back does not ault Germany's mas-to the wall-and-Germany- itself fring tors, it will be up to them to try may yet supply the to break out of their cagé, aquada.

chance. Had there been war over Czecho-Slovakia, Russin would have had pretext for breaking into Poland in order to bring aid to the Czechs.

She got so far as a menacing note over Teschen. But England and France went to Munich.

The storm passed, and with it the opportunity. The spring brought a new one.

After the conquest of Czecho- Slovakia It was clear that a new Stalin's was impending. crisis problem was how to turn it to his prabi own advantage, how to snatch, with

territoriai minimum risk, gain for Russia out of Europe's conflict.

Either Two courses were open. he could join with Britain and France, and get his objectives as the price of Russian support, Or he could swing over to the Hitler

side and get them as price of neutrality favourable to Germany.

Very shrewdly, he played a double game, negotiating with both aldes aimultaneously until he dis- covered which would pay his price.

In the negotiation with Britain and France he insisted firmly and unshakably on two things:

First, there must be a clause in the Treaty which would give Rus- sia the right to Intervene in either Poland or the Baltic States when- ever she chose to consider herself Indirect aggres- menaced by

sion."

Second, in the ovent of war Rus- sla must be allowed at once to take over full military occupation and control of Poland's Eastern pro- vinces from which the Polish army would be withdrawn.

Britain, France and Poland were

unwilling to pay the price: for the meaning of these demands was only 100 elcar. And on these crucial points the negotiations had deadlocked,

That same price-recognition of Russia's "sphere of influence" in the Baltic States, agreement to her occupation of Eastern Poland in the event of war-Germany was ready to pay for Soviet neutrality and Soviet friendship.

The The bargain was struck.

and with Britain negotiation France was broken off. The pact with Germany was signed.

I do not think Stalin realised that this meant war. I think be expected a 'second Munich," the abandonment of Poland by the "peaceful Western Powers, and a settlement" in which the Soviet Union would quietly take its share -as Hungary had taken its share of Czecho-Slovakio.

I do not think ne expected either war or the swift-military collapse of Poland.

At the last moment he had to move very quickly for fear lest his new ally might double-cross him. I suspect that there is a certain anxiety in the Kremlin at the way in which things have developed.

But that is another story. The point I want to put to my puzzled correspondents is this:

If you think of Stalin as a new Peter the Great whose guiding pur- pose is to restore to Russia the territory she lost after the Revo- lution, then all his actions make sense. The whole thing becomes understandable.

But if you reject this explana- tion (and there is much subsidiary evidence for it which would take too long to expound) then you must And another one which will ft the facts and not land you in contradictions and absurdities.

GRIN AND BEAR IT

By Lichty

and lately, Doc, every time I do this I got sharp pains

In the Jointe!"!

Can The B. B. C. SURVIVE

By SPIKE HUGHES

WHEN questions are asked in

Parliament, not about B.B.C. policy, but about B.B.C. programmes, then I ask myself: Can the Corpora- tion survive the war?

So long as the war continues the B.B.C. will contiue to exist, of course, as an instrument of national informa tion and propaganda.' But when the war ends the B,B.C. will have served. its purpose in this capacity, and I am very doubtful whether anybody wil have much use for it then.

For years the B.B.C. falled to court the theatre and the film industry. IL adopted a high-hat attitude instead of making every effort to co-operate, muttering that radio publicity more than made up for low fees.

It the B.B.C..had behoved bettor towards the other two branches of the entertainment business, the outbreak of war would have found the theatre and the fim offering everything they had to broadcasting.

For a week there were no cinemas open. The BBC. could have given the people the best Ersatz for the real thing that has yet been invented: Ue radio version of Alms.

*

In its repertory the B.B.C. Variety Department has Top Hat," "Alexan- der's

Ragtime Band," "Congress Dances," "Sunnyside Up," "Forty Second Street," "Shall We Dance?" and "Gold Diggers of 1035enough to broadcast one every other day for a fortnight.

But the man who produces and ndapted these shows is sitting at the B.B.C. in London twiddling Thumbs

his

As long ago as last April the B.B.C. started to form a shadow repertory company for war-time broadcasting Hitherto It has been the privilege of the critic to complain of the cliquelsh- ness of the B.B.C., and one was re- proved by listeners for willing about purely internal matters.

Now these internal matters have come out into the open. The public has noticed that the repetory com- pany has all the appearance of having been not 50 much engaged

invited" to Join the happy B.B.C. family

party...

"somewhere England."

£5

Apart from suggesting that every regular broadenster could have been cross-examined months ago, I suppose that is why many unemployed and not-yet-npproved artists are now able to sit at home and hear their records being broadcast while they them- selves are barred.

There is every good reason for the part-evacuation of the B.B.C., but that is no reason for closing Broad- casting House, with its deep basement studios and gas-proof doors, to those artists who were unlucky enough not to be invited to join the repertory company.

"I soldiers at the front can run the risk of being bombed," said one artist to me yesterday, "then why should we ask for special protection?" Meanwhile, I have learned the fol- lowing about the B.B.C's wartime

manners:

A concern, which in peace-time puts out sponsored programmes, offered it the use of its recorded transmissions of all-dar programmen. This con- cern has not yet received a

reply,

A well-known producer has been sent back to London, his production. this week taken over by a junior. The senior producer is now in "C" categoryat ilberty to find another job if he can,

Sandy Macpherson, not long ago one of the most popular of all broad- casters, admits to me that he now re- celves abusive letters because he has to broadcast so much.

The entertainment side of the Cor- poration la so out of touch with public feeling that we are given memories of 1914, and Jokes about Hitler. This attempt to build up Hitler as a PLEASE Turn To Page 2.