NEWS OF THE WEEK
THE speech Herr Hitler made in Berlin on Wednesday was devoted to preparing the German people for the prospect of a second winter of war. It contained much bombast, many lies, many threats and one truth—the declaration that " the hour will come when one of us, Germany or Great Britain, will break." There is little in Herr Hitler's words that affords purchase for comment, but there may be significance in his declaration that German aeroplanes "are now giving their answer night after night " to the British onslaughts on that German territory which Goering once promised would be inviolate. That, on the face of it, would suggest that the German Air Force at present is exerting all its efforts in reply to the R.A.F.'s attacks on Germany. There is no obvious reason why the Luftwaffe should be refraining from doing its utmost at this moment, but if what we are experiencing is, in fact, its utmost we can afford to be very well content. The R.A.F. has not begun to approach its utmost yet. The only other feature of the speech deserving any attention was Hitler's renewed attempt to foster the belief that everything in his strategy had worked, and would go on working, according to plan, and that at the appointed moment Great Britain would be invaded and fall, which raises the not irrelevant question why the month of August was chosen by omniscience for the loss of a thousand German aeroplanes. Herr Hitler appears to have eschewed all reference to the agreement announced twenty- four hours earlier between Great Britain and the United States. But the official German news agency described the speech as " powerful and moving."
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