PAGE SIX P TO THE YEAR 1940, Hollanders were building a sturdy and prosperous nation on 13,500 square miles of land. With an amazing system of dykes and reclamation projects and 4,500 miles of canals, eight and one-half million people had <on- verted their country into an engineering landmark and given it a unique and respected position among the nations of the world. Holland was a country of small farms, of famous flower nurseries, of dairy products, of chemical and shipbuilding industries. Living under a constitutional hereditary monarchy, the Dutch, to- gether with their rich empire in the East and West Indies, had spent their income on social legislation, raising their own standard of living. Into this peace- ful country, against a people who wanted to be friend- ly, without warning, Germans hurled the full fury of their blitzkrieg on the morning of May 10, 1940. 4 PEACE-TIME Holland was mixture of old and new. With their country literally built on the sea, Dutchmen have always found fishing profitable. DUTCH cities and villages have been famous since the Middle Ages for clean, . well-planned streets and homes. The Royal Palace in Amsterdam, with well-kept square, symbolized Holland’s orderly civilization, before the Nazi invaders came. GERMANS had respect for neither neatness nor order. Even after formal capitula- ON DAY of German invasion, Hollanders rushed to MIDDELBURG’S Town Hall was center of tion of the Dutch army the Luftwaffe bombed defenseless Rotterdam, killing and mobilize. But Germans had more tanks, planes, and city’s democracy for centuries. Thus, to German wounding tens of thousands of civilians. This was, Hitler said, “a lesson in total war.” troops—and many Dutch soldiers never returned. army leaders it became a “military objective.” ACKED BY A TREMENDOUS air armada and the usual Nazi trickeries, German invaders over- whelmed Dutch opposition and occupied Holland in five days. Even after formal capitulation, German bombers sowed a train of death and destruction through one of Holland’s principal cities. The object was to break Dutch resistance once and for all. Now two years have passed since the German in- vasion. Finance and business have been incorporated into the needs of the German Reich. All papers are Nazi-controlled; all schools teach Nazi racial theories and German interpretations of history; religion is treated as something that can be done without; workers are being geared to Hitler's war machine. This is the “New Order.” But also after two years, the Dutch have remained solidly behind their Queen Wilhelmina. Less than one per cent of the entire popu- lation has joined the so-called Dutch Nazi party. All German promises and collaboration efforts have met with nation-wide passive and open resistance. Dutch- men at home or fighting with their Allies, have borne out the conviction of one of their leading statesmen, E. N. Van Kleffens, who said: “A nation which for centuries has been used to free institutions, never loses the taste of them.” HOLLANDERS, like these pedaling homewards after a day’s work in Amsterdam, were content, industrious and religious. Dutch had not seen a war since 1814. with the Allied Fleet off England, in NEW Dutch destroyers are cooperating ® & the Mediterranean and in the Far East. WAR came suddenly, and with it indiscriminate bomb- - ing. Century-old churches crumpled in seconds. To- day Catholics and Protestants are united vs. Nazis. NAZI bombers were not unopposed. A small Dutch air- FOR DAYS AND NIGHTS the city of Rotterdam was swept by aa inferno of fire, smoke, TWO and one-half millic: tend wf force fought bravely, often recklessly, and many Ger- ruin and death. But even as Germans marched into Holland’s cities, Dutch soldiers were armed Dutch merchar’ shin. ave are man planes crashed on cities they meant to bomb. assembling in Britain, and naval craft were entering British ports to renew the struggle. CRT RR RL i Ly YL
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