Over every radio station in the Third Reich, nervous Dr. Paul Joseph Goebbels, Nazi Propaganda Minister, last week broadcast a Christmas message to the German people.
It was no message of cheer. After a perfunctory mention of "the accomplishments of our Army" (now retreating in Russia), the little Minister got down to business. What he wanted was Christmas presents for the soldiers on the Eastern Front: overshoes, stockings, woolen underwear, furs, blankets, gloves, ear muffs—anything, in fact, that would turn the keen winds of the Russian winter.
The German people, he admitted, had already given all they conveniently could, "in consideration of the...