Germany's Future

Since Sept. 3, 1939, little Britons in pubs and big Britons in clubs have debated whether the whole German people are to blame for Nazi Germany and World War II, or whether only evil, powerful men and their dupes are responsible. Last week, in a House of Lords debate, smooth, grim Lord Vansittart restated his familiar view that all Germans are accomplices and that, whatever happens to them as individuals, Germany should be destroyed "utterly and forever as a military power." Winston Churchill's grey advocate and Lord Chancellor, Viscount Simon, promptly made it clear that on this issue the British Government has other views. Said Viscount Simon: "I can only say now in plain terms on behalf of the Government that we agree with Premier Stalin--first, that the Hitlerite state can and should be destroyed, and second, that the whole German people is not, as Dr. Goebbels has been trying to persuade them, thereby doomed to destruction."

Said the London News Chronicle: "We welcome this declaration. ... It shows that the Government is making a rational and a constructive approach to the problem of Germany's future. It shows too that upon at least one vital issue of the war our policy is in line with that of Russia. . . ."

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