Voices

Out of Germany last week came revealing voices.

The voice of Propaganda Minister Paul Joseph Goebbels: "I know you have it hard today. . . . Your wives sometimes stand for hours before stores in order to buy some vegetables. Your children are frequently sent into the country and separated from you for months. . . . Then because necessary hands are not available you have to shovel coal; then at nights go into air-raid protection cellars and, after two hours' sleep, back to hard work. That is the way it is in many cities of the Reich and in some even worse."

The voice of New York Timesman George Axelsson, passed by the German censors: "A well-mannered non-Jewish German does not stare at any one wearing the Star of David, but looks the other way. The Army, as a general rule, is not nearly so anti-Semitic as the Nazi party. ... In public places or in contacts as a fellow-worker in factories the German working man seems to treat the Jew as an equal."

The anonymous radio voice of Germany's secret, Socialist, year-old Station of the European Revolution: "For four weeks now Hitler has struggled to take Moscow. . . . You think: 'Wouldn't it be better if Hitler wins? Wouldn't they all tear Germany apart, if he loses?' . . . Hitler knows that you think like that, and he is gambling on it.

"Surely, if Hitler conquers the world, you will get a little more than now, a little more and better food, and you will travel on Strength Through Joy trips to faraway countries. There you will be able to see for yourself how Fascism has made slaves in your name.

"But be aware of one thing: in the eyes of the world you will be a representative of that master face of German imperialism that, through robbery, ruthlessness and gangsterdom, through superiority of a scientifically developed system of terror, has erected a system of exploitation and suppression. The real masters will be the Krupps and the Goerings. You are only needed as the slave driver, as the soldier who carries out police missions in the interest of his masters and who has, if necessary, to die in silence. . . .

"Your interest is different. You want the same as the worker in France, as the miner in Wales, the same as the Russian peasant and the stevedore in the port of Tripoli. You want peace, you want to live on your hands' work, and not at the cost of freedom and happiness of other peoples. You want to take part in determining your own fate, and you want to contribute your part in order that your children will find a better world than that you are leaving."

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