1941-08-06 — Page 20

THE SUN AGAIN!

Wednesday,

HONGKONG TELEGRAPH-

August 6, 1941.

STUDEBAKER

1941 TRUCKS

BIOGRAPHY

> OF BENITO MUSSOLINI

1921

1924

1925

1926

1927

1928

MATCHLESS FUEL SAVERS

NEW Economy

1920

1930

1933

1927

1913

1914

WE

WEREN'T

READY

A

NOW FOR

WATSON'S

LIME FRUIT SQUASH.

I say it's an injustice -cruel-to give us harsh adult laxatives. I want Castoriat”

BIA

WHAT A MOTHER SHOULD KNOW..

ABOUT HER BABY

"Specialists say a baby's system is the most delicate thing on varth. Everything baby gets should be made especially for him"...even a special taxative! If all mothers realized this, grave mistakes would often be avoided. Many mothers with the very best in- tentions, give their children a small dose of the same laxative they use. They do not know that an adult's laxative, even in small dores, can be much too irritating for a child's tender system.

Protection for baby

It's a comfort for mothers to know there-in-a-safe-laxative,- Castoria, made especially and unly for children. It contains no harsh "adult" drugs.. Castoria is mild and gentle, you couldn't ask for a nafer, more effective laxative. Children love Castorin's wonder-

NO

HARM

ful taste. It's one lax- ative you never have to force a child to take. Al- ways use Castoria for your children, from baby-

hood to 11 years. Give it at the first sign of a cold, upset stomach or constipation. Get a bottle teday.

P103

CASTORIA

Where there are children, Casterials

needed. Economi: -cal.-12-doses.or...

morein eachbottle.

CASTORIA

The SAFE laxativo for children

MANY ATTractive cOLOURS

FROM

ROUGH TREATMENT

Kinsel

EASIER

ΤΟ

'KEEP

CLEAN

VENETIAN BLINDS

WITH Flexible Steel SLATS

MADE TO YOUR WINDOW MEASUREMENTS DELIVERED 24 HOURS AFTER ORDER RECEIVED

Estimatos Free

NEW Style

NEW Comfort

NEW Performance |

1935

1936

Full Particulars on Application Inviting Your Enquiries

HONGKONG Hotel

Stubbs Road

GARAGE

The

Hongkong Telegraph.

Wednesday, Aug. 6, 1941.

Wyndham St., Hongkong

Telephone: 20015

THE prenx "Special to the Telegraph

is ued by the Tangkong Telegraph" to indicate news which is strictly copyright under the provisions of the Telecommuni bears the indieation "UP" is received in Hongkong on the date of publication by the United Press Associations, who ca *ither wholly or in part without previous arrangement.

peres all rights and forbid republications,

POVERTY AND CRIME IF cleanliness be next to god- liness, it can be equally claimed that poverty makes for crime. In Hongkong, in fact, this is Crime here well nigh a truismi.

1938

1939

1940

The Humiliation of

ITALY

as we knew it FROM A SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT is no, more.

ON THE ITALIAN FRONTIER

The independence for.

faded before even the last blank

1941

Italy

The vice of political interven- tion und divided control was in- herent in the very organisation

of this as of all the Italian which Garibaldi and Maz- taken, perhaps reluctantly, cer- physical impossibility as the armies, with their Blackshirt and Independent Phone 27778-8. zini began their struggle tainly not until the imminence Gestapo and the Reichswehr formations

less than 100 years ago has of total internal collapse, fol- can make it: It remains only Fascist commandera at logger. lowing military disaster, made for Goebbels's propaganda heads with the professional vanished overnight.

it essential if the foundations of machine to persuade the Italians generals. The United Kingdom of Italy, the Axis in Europe were to be that it is better so.

To make disaster certain, proclaimed barely 70 years ngo saved.

Immediately before the Ger- Mussolini, after failing to pro- with Rome as its capital, has

man occupation Italy was ready vide Graziani with the supplies become 1 German province.

A few he needed, ordered him to make Mussolini's dream of empire has AFTER the loss of Cyre- for a separate peace.

naica, and the Greek more reverses abroad, a few the premature advance to Sidi and afterwards to map on the wall of the Roman fiasco, Italy was ripe for revolt. more weeks of pressure on Italy Barrani

The battles in Libya and Al- herself and the move. would defend the untenable "Fascist Forum was filled in.

Italy to-day is as helpless bania, Taranto, and the failure have been made with or with- bastions" of Bardia and Tob- the Duce. The Italian ruk. Mussolini, not Graziani, cations Ordinance, 1918. Such new aras France in Hitler's hands, as of the Italian air force against out

humiliated as Bulgaria, more the British were caused not by Army was beaten and knew it; is the real loser of Cyrenaica. truly beaten than Poland or lack of gallantry in the Italian the navy was crippled and short Czechoslovakia. And the Duce forces, but by political inter- of fuel; the hopes placed in the

WHEN Italy declared war who boasted of her coming ference, incompetent leadership air force had proved vain.

the young Italian, Navy Some good judges believe triumpha six months ago is the and bad equipment. direct and supreme cause of her Wounded soldiers returning that if Britain had made her (described by Mussolini as "the downfall.

home spread these black tidings bombing of Italian towns really most modern in the world") In 1922 when the Blackshirts more swiftly than any radio. heavy for a short time and had was ready and eager for daring marched on Rome (followed by In their hospital cots they swore then made a peace offer to enterprise. It might have made their Leader in a sleeping-car) vengeance on the Duce and his Rome, the Fascist Grand Council a dangerous attack on Malta Fascism was proclaimed as a henchmen for their vain suffer- itself would have insisted on an and Alexandria, reducing the

Armistice. movement by which

new ings.

disparity between the British But The chance for that has gone and Italian squadrons.

the Mussolini kept the fleet at home ous, was being born. Though revolt from spreading; and he now, but the collapse of blotted by many cruelties, half- could do it only if his system of Italian war machine remains a and ordered it to avoid decisive hidden murders and dark deeds, police espionage and intimida- fact. the new system had its creative tion received the backing of siile..

visible and urishaken military A respectable record of social power.

economic achievement To prevent the first resound- could be set against Its crimes. ing collapse of totalitarianism In the easy phrase of his in Europe the Nazis had first to themselves, that the Fascist runaway actions, the Italian Taranto affair set the seal on. admirers Mussolini"did a lot save Mussolini from the conse- system and policy, which set sailors lost their spirit. for Italy." He might have done quences of his folly. To do this out to make the Italians native clerks and fokis, especi- more if the craze for conquest they had to occupy Italy with nation of conquerors, are the Italian naval impotence. But "ally those employed-by-Chinese-had-not-got-into-his-blood.. troops and take over the true root cause of their military it was Mussolini, not Cavagħari,

government there, failure. firms, it can be found in the To-day the rebirth of Italy always with the appearance of number of cases where these under Mussolini is an exploded friendly collaboration. The pro-

The Italian air force, created types of workers indulge in myth, even at home. With the cess took time, partly because its crumbling of Italy's armies first stages had to be accom

in by the Fascist Party as a symbol GRAZIANI'S army fraudulent conversion of firms overseas under the blows of plished secretly, partly because Libya suffered the most of Young Italy's new-found monies. Often, it is true these Britain, deluded Italian communications between Ger- humiliating defeat in modern crimes are

the product of people have seen through the many, and Italy were restricted, history, losing prisoners in strength, reached a pitch of

fundamental hypocrisy of Fas- nothing but a criminal mind; cism. just as often it is found that the miscreants have been either

is more opportunistic than pre- meditated, from the vulgar lar- ceny of a shop-soiled overcoat to the more daring type of fraud. And in many cases both types find their cause in want or in temptation which thousands would find hard to resist..

If a pointer were needed for

the dangerously low standard

of wages which governs the

driven to

Italy, purged of corruption and sloth, clean, young and vigor-

and

the

Only one man could prevent

reins of

action for his own political rea- sons-because he wanted to Perhaps the bitterest pill for keep it as a bargaining counter Mussolini and his admirers to against Hitler after the war. swallow is the fact, which they

Condemned to inactivity or must now recognisé among

a

The

"who disgraced the Italian-navel-

flag.

greater numbers than the whole efficiency some years ago which British attacking force, not be earned it the respect of foreign cause the Italian troops lacked Powers. But it is nowhere truer TO Italian amaur-propre courage but because of poor than in the air that pride comes concessions were made. equipment, bad staff work, In- before a fall; and the systema- it through sheer IN the general. disaffection

which now exists against Hitler' was always careful to sufficient reconnaissance, alow tic boastfulness of the Fascist proved fatal to poverty or because temptation the Duce and his circle, party spare the feelings of his beaten and stupid planning, but above mentality has been almost deliberately secrets are no longer kept. Cor- partner. But the thing is done all political interference from Italian airmen. thrust in their way. Honesty ruption in high places, divided to-day, and a rising against the Rome and most of all from the is a virtue, but it is not inherent councils, ruthless personal Fascist regime is as nearly a Duce in person.

power interfering disastrously

.

What claimed to be a new and Infallible made of government stands revealed as a device to keep an unscrupulous, ignorant and cynical oligarchy in control.

and is thoroughly conditioned. at every point, political "stunts" When a man, for example, who distorting and defeating the earns a few dollare a month, plans of military lenders are and perhaps is allowed in addi-suddenly laid bare. tion board and lodgings, is ex- pected to handle thousands of dollars in complete freedom, there is small wonder if he falls to the inevitable temptation. It is the employer who must shoulder most of the blame if his confidence under these con- ditions is misplaced.

Italians who yesterday ac- cepted Fascism with respect oven though they felt no affec- tion for it to-day curse it as a blight upon their country. But most of all they curse the man A more serious social pro- who embodies the Fascist blem, however, is that of the system and has sold his own) underpaid worker, placed in neople to Germany in order to

position of trust, who through

keep that system and himself.

economle circumstances" is alive.

forced to stoop to crime; the

man who, on a wage of 20 to 40 The German occupation of dollars a month must keep a Italy, now as effective as that wife and family and probably of France, though na polite and ucar relatives. His wages are cautious, is no mere offshoot of wholly inadequate to cover Nazi conquest. It was under- living costs and he faces the prospect of intolerable debt or

probably unemployment if he

seeks an increase in pay,

The attitude of the Chinese employers stands in line for a good deal of, necessary correc- tion. Only recently, when some

on earth gets $20 a month?" There has, perhaps, been too much tendency to place the blame for the social illa of the Colony exclusively upon the shoulders of the white man. The Chinese have only too willingly

JONES WONG & COMPANY social workers were discussing kept wage and living standards

HOME FURNISHINGS_

NATHAN ROAD

TELEPHONE 59487 ...

the problem of wage standards compressed, and until there is à in the Colony, two Chinese em- chungo ployers, upon hearing that $20 was a typical wage for menin's declared in astonishment, "Who

in this direction, poverty, Il-health and in their wake crime, will continue un- abated in Hongkong,

GRIN AND BEAR IT

'OINL Things Move the

CONFIDENT of their

superiority, they neg lected the hard training and

By Lichty constant

~If your boy friend was just made a sergeant, mayba

HE hasn't got a friend!"

vigilance for the progress of rivals which are. essential if a lead in the air is to be kept. Italian aircraft con- structors, encouraged to com- pete for spectacular but short- lived international "records," neglected basic research and broad-based development. The Italian air force entered the war with obsolescent machines and on a down-grade of production which Italian industry, falled, to reverse. The Duce's bold words were no substitute for up-to- date engines and armaments and highly-trained individual air fighters.

Mussolini, not the brave but -sarved-Italian-pilotar-lost- Italy hor place in the air.

Wherever one turns the story is the same the story of gol- lant fighting forces lamed and corrupted by political jobbery; above all, of disaster coming through the rash and uncon- trolled judgment of one man. With the disappearance of inde- pendent Italy, Europe, as D contre of civilisation, is the. poorer.

But Italy bequeaths it one precious parting gift: an awful lesson in the vanity of conquest and the danger of leaving un- bridled power in a Dictator's handa.

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