The Challenge to Nonintervention

Press, Volume LXXIII, Issue 22136, 5 July 1937, Page 8

The Challenge to Nonintervention

From the beginning of the civil war in Spain, the British Government has had a choice between two policies, each involving serious risk. The first policy was to proclaim its determination to hold other Powers to their pledges under the non-intervention agreement. The second was to base its own attitude to Spain on the principle of non-intervention but to rely solely on the goodwill of the other Powers concerned to make the agreement generally effective. The first policy involved the risk of collisions with Germany and Italy on the one hand and Russia on the other. The second involved the risk that, by means of a rebel victory in Spain, Germany and Italy would establish themselves in control of the western Mediterranean. The British Government chose the second policy, possibly because the risk seemed a remote one, but more probably because a rapprochement with Italy was in process of negotiation. At first sight, the Mediterranean accord of January last appeared to be a complete answer to those who had feared that the Mediterranean was about to become " a Fascist lake." Italy disclaimed any desire "to modify the status " quo as regards the national sovereignty of " territory in the Mediterranean area" and in a supplementary note gave this general undertaking a specific application to the conflict in Spain. But it has since become apparent that the Mediterranean accord, far from being a genuine reconciliation, was a collection of legal subtleties imposing no real restriction on Italy's freedom of action. Its sole purpose was to gain time. The events of the last fortnight have shown clearly that it was a profound mistake to prefer remote risks to immediate ones. A firm stand for non-intervention in the early stages of the war would have created tension, but it is inconceivable that Germany and Italy would have gone further than threats. Failure to check violations of the non-intervention agreement has meant that Germany and Italy have aone so far in Spain that they cannot

draw back without loss of prestige, that the war itself has been prolonged, that all hope of a compromise settlement has disappeared, and that the non-intervention scheme has become so much of a tangle that Germany and Italy can put forward a plausible case for the policy they are following. Briefly, that policy is to press for a general recognition of both parties to the conflict as belligerents. The present position of the Spanish civil war in international law is somewhat obscure. No government of any importance lias yet accorded belligerent rights to the loyalists and the rebels. The British and French view is that the Valencia Government is the government of Spain and that it is engaged in suppressing a rebellion. The German and Italian view is that the government at Burgos is the de facto government of Spain and that it is engaged in clearing away remnants of the old order. The practical consequences of this difference are inconvenient and often dangerous. Since neither side can claim belligerent rights, neither can legally impose a blockade. In the British and French view, therefore, the detention of foreign vessels during the " blockade " of Bilbao by rebel warships was an act of piracy. And in the German and Italian view, loyalist warships were guilty of piracy when they detained German cargo ships. To recognise a state of belligerency and thus bring the relations between foreign States and the contending governments in Spain under the rules of neutrality would at least simplify the situation. But the objection to this course is that it involves abandonment of the patrol system and consequently the removal of the last effective restraint on German and Italian intervention on behalf of General Franco.