BRITAIN’S RAID ON THE ALTMARK. The story’s all over the Sunday papers about the British Navy’s dramatic rescue of 326 prisoners from the German prison ship Altmark. It’s a wildly popular act in Britain, causing much public jubilation. But it’s controversial elsewhere in Europe, because the British had to invade Norwegian territorial waters to do it. The Altmark, described uncharitably by Raymond Daniell in Sunday’s New York Times as “a floating Nazi concentration camp,” was anchored just off Norway's Josing Fjord after being inspected by Norwegian officials at Bergen. She was boarded on Friday night by sailors from the British destroyer Cossack who “flung grappling irons aboard the German vessel in the darkness...and swarmed over the side of the ship with pistols and rifles blazing,” according to the Associated Press.
Most outraged of all, of course, are the Germans, who are yelling warnings of “immeasurable consequences” directed at Britain and the neutrals as well. Feeling the heat from Berlin, Norway has filed an official protest against the British incursion as a “gross violation” of Norwegian sovereign rights. Incredibly, according to Andreas Backer in the Chicago Tribune, the Norwegians also demand that Britain give the rescued prisoners back. But an article in Monday’s New York Herald Tribune says the British aren’t much concerned. The Chamberlain government believes, in the words of Lord Halifax, that Norway “failed in their duty as a neutral” by (1) not discovering the British prisoners when the ship was inspected, and (2) pretending that the Altmark was a German merchantman instead of interning her as a prison ship. Britain is demanding, and justifiably so, that Norway intern the Altmark now.
Some scholars might consider the Altmark affair an occasion for debating the finer points of international law, and would be prone to find a British violation. But how can Chamberlain and Co. stand by idly while the neutrals kowtow to Hitler’s withering disregard of that same international law? Does anyone really think the Norwegians honestly weren’t aware the Altmark carried hundreds of prisoners? If the Allies are forbidden from taking actions like this in response to the flagrant Nazi disregard for the rights of neutrals, then just what else are they to do? File a lawsuit against Hitler in a maritime court?
MORE BAD NEWS FROM FINLAND. The Russian offensive on the Karelian Isthmus is close to three weeks old, and every day now seems to bring more news of Soviet advances. The Associated Press reports Monday on Red Army claims to have cut off the Finnish fort of Koivisto, the western anchor of the Mannerheim Line. Apparently Stalin’s troops have taken the towns of Maksalahti and Johannes on the Maritime Railway, which puts them on the western coast of the Gulf of Finland -- a Russian goal throughout the offensive. The Soviets have also reached the railway station at Somme, about six miles south of Finland’s second largest city, Viipuri (Viborg).
And no response from the U.S. government -- not since the Senate’s vote last week to extend a $30 million loan to the Finns for purchase of non-military aid. Sunday’s Washington Post reprinted an editorial cartoon from the Richmond Times-Dispatch which sums up Congress’s response nicely. In it, a Finnish man hangs for dear life from the limb of a tree as a Russian bear is about to devour him. The man yells out, “Help! Somebody loan me a gun! Quick!” And, standing in the foreground, a congressman extends a helping hand and says...”Have a sandwich!”
THE BRITISH AND GERMAN VISIONS OF PEACE. Anybody who entertains the idea that Secretary Welles’ mission to Europe has a chance of restoring peace between the Allies and Germany should read a pair of side-by-side articles in the news analysis section of Sunday’s New York Times. The first one, by London correspondent Raymond Daniell, summarizes the British view of what an acceptable peace in Europe would be. The second, by Berlin correspondent Otto D. Tolischus, lists the German conditions for restoration of peace. Here are those two (slightly differing) views --
The Allies. “There are two basic demands on which the British and French are agreed as prerequisites for peace. The first is that the Germans themselves, either with or without outside help, must establish a government whose word the Allies will be able to trust. That means the end of the present Nazi regime. The second is that the Germans must demonstrate that they have learned aggression does not pay, by withdrawing their troops from Poland and Czecho-Slovakia and making restitution to those victims of their aggression.”
Germany. “(1) Complete elimination of British influence from the European continent by the destruction of British military and naval power...(2) Organization of a ‘New Europe’ under the decisive influence of Germans as the greatest people on the continent...(3) World-wide extension of this system until there shall be destruction of the ‘plutocracies’ and ‘international Jewish capitalism’...(4) Extension of the ‘Lebensraum’ [living room] of the German ‘master race’ in proportion to that now possessed by other conquering ‘races,’ such as the British, the French, the Americans and the Japanese.”
Will someone kindly explain just how these two positions are to be reconciled?
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