Poland Under the Nazis
The treatment of the Polish population under the German administration is a warning to other nations of the fate that awaits them if they fall under Nazi rule. The con- querors are not content with the oppression of numbers of the once ruling class. The whole people have been reduced to a condition of something worse than slavery. The broadcast from the Vatican wireless station last Monday dwelt upon reports received which show that the excesses committed upon the people were even more violent and persistent in German than in Soviet Poland. It spoke of the ceding to Germans of the richest part of the country, the deportation of the proprietors, the removal of food reserves and personal belongings to Germany, the stark hunger that 70 per cent. of the population is enduring, and the closing of the churches for 64 days a week. Reports from other sources tell of the internment in concentration camps of all professors and other intellectual leaders by the Gestapo, the robbery of libraries and scientific centres, and the spoliation of museums. It was with news such as this before them that M. Paderewski, as Speaker, addressed the exiled Polish Council of State at the Embassy in Paris, and that the President and Prime Minister spoke of their war and peace aims. Both recognised the need of a democratic reconstitution of the redeemed Poland in which there would be no repetition of the faults of a " system of government divorced from the people." It is gratifying to know that the Polish forces in France, re-equipped by Britain and France, number some Ioo,000 men and are now ready to fight by the side of the Allies.
