4 AUGUST 1939, Page 14

There are those also who contend that the slightest indi-

cation of lack of confidence in the present Government will encourage the militant Powers to believe that British opinion is divided on the issue of resistance. Such an argument dis- plays ignorance both of the temper of Great Britain and of the temperament of the Nazi leaders. It is not the official Oppositions nor the dissident Nationals who will convey to Obersalzburg the impression of any weakening of our public will. If Herr Hitler be under any illusions regarding the temper of this country he derives those illusions, not from the critics, but from the more fanatical supporters of the Prime Minister. It will be from the self-appointed missionaries of appeasement, from the dupes of The Link and the Anglo-German Review, from the untutored Munichois who angle for invitations to Niiremberg, and from those informers who have maintained their discredited contacts with Herr von Ribbentrop, that the Fiihrer will derive the impression that our gigantic national effort is no more than some flaccid motion of defiance and that there are still those within the circle of Downing Street who hope to purchase peace at the cost of other people's liberties and of our own eventual degradation. * * *