The Wilmington Morning Star

Courting Trouble

Even if the Nazi government is more politic than the Berlin authorities who have declared that Germany will not be "buffaloed" by the American reaction to the sinking of the Robin Moor, this reckless pronouncement must have far-reaching effects. Talk of this kind can only fan the flames of justified American anger.

Threats of further incidents of the same kind, added by these same spokesmen, come close to outright insanity. It is a deliberate and defiant challenge to the United States to say that "whenever any ship with contraband sails for England we'll shoot at it, whether it be the Robin Moore or anything else." If that is truly the Nazi attitude, there can be no reply except the adoption of all measures required to defeat their purpose.

The only alternative open to this country would be to withdraw its ships from the oceans. For in this case an American vessel, carrying no arms, ammunition, or implements of war, was attacked on the open sea. She was not in any war zone laid down by the Germans in an attempt to legalize this kind of warfare. She was not in a war zone recognized by the United States. She was where she had every right to be.

Yet because she carried articles the Nazis look upon as contraband she was sunk and her passengers and crew set adrift 700 miles from land contrary to the agreement signed by the Hitler government in 1939.

This was an act of war against the United States. The American people will not permit this incident to swerve them from their course but they will back the President in demanding reparation and a cessation of such attacks, and they will insist that this pledge be one promise that Hitler keeps.