The singularly assorted trio who have authorised the publication of
their views on colonies in a German news- paper have at a bound achieved a greater notoriety in Ger- many than any distinction that has fallen to them here. That is least true of Mr. Harbutt Dawson, who has written some valuable books on Germany, and it is no doubt an un- discriminating admiration for that country, coupled perhaps with the fact that both his wives were German, that has led him to volunteer assistance to Herr Hitler's campaign for the return of the colonies. Lord Redesdale's sympathies with National Socialism are well known, and perhaps not sur- prising in the son of the translator of Houston Stewart Cham- berlain and the father of Miss Unity Mitford. Sir Ernest Bennett's sympathies were not generally known, nor do they very greatly matter. No one could object to these or any other persons who hold strong views about the German colonies expressing them in an English newspaper, but when they offer themselves as grist for Dr. Goebbels' propaganda- machine by supplying a German paper with opinions at variance with their Government's, at a moment when the sub- ject in question may involve difficult and dangerous negotia- tions between that Government and the German, they deliberately invite the criticism which their action must universally evoke.
Previous page
