REBEL ATTACKS ON SHIPPING

Press, Volume LXXIV, Issue 22437, 25 June 1938, Page 15

REBEL ATTACKS ON SHIPPING

DEBATE IN HOUSE OF COMMONS BRITISH PROTESTS SAID TO BE IGNORED MR CHAMBERLAIN REPLIES TO CRITICISM (17K7TZZ> PBXBB ASSOCIATION —COPYRIGHT.) (Received June 23, 5.5 p.m.) LONDON, June 23. After a scene in the House of Commons Mr Speaker (Captain E. A. Fitzroy) granted leave to the House to debate to-night the bombing of ships in Spain. It is significant that the issue was forced by the Conservative members, Mr D. Sandys and Captain Sir William Brass, who were supported by Mr Lloyd George and the whole of the Labour members. The debate resulted from an answer by the Prime Minister to a private notice question from Mr Sandys. . . Mr Chamberlain, after outlining the attacks on the Thorpeness and the Greek steamer Sunion, said that the Government was asking in Burgos for an early explanation of these attacks.

Mr Sandys then asked: “Does the Prime Minister realise that the failure of Britain to offer any resistance to these unlawful acts of violence is an encouragement to lawbreakers, not only in Spain, but all over the world?” Mr Chamberlain: The policy and position of Britain have been fully explained. The Leader of the Opposition (Mr C. R. Attlee) and Mr Lloyd George joined in supplementary questions, and finally Mr Attlee announced that he would move the adjournment. In Legitimate Trade In moving the adjournment of the House to call attention to the attacks made yesterday on two British ships off Valencia, Mr Attlee said that there was no doubt at all that these ships were engaged in perfectly legitimate trade. They had non-intervention observers on board —in one case French and in the other German. Attacks were delivered at a low altitude and must have been deliberate. A British ship was as much a part of British territory as Gibraltar, and a British sailor was just as much a British subject as any other person. The Prime Minister, he added, must be more specific if he wanted the House to believe that he could not defend them.

This had followed a long series of other attacks on British ships and the latest British protest at Burgos, yet the Prime Minister declared that nothing could be done. Mr Attlee claimed that it was really an extraordinary position if a powerful British Navy could not assure protection or exact immunity for British shipping from General Franco, whose naval forces were relatively negligible. Mr Attlee recalled that Mr Chamberlain had insisted that the attacks must be regarded as haying been made by aeroplanes and pilots under the control of General Franco, and argued that, in that case, the position was simplified, for if the Government took action no complications. he inferred, could arise with any other Power—the least of all, he suggested, with any other Power represented on the Non-Intervention Committee, which must share the British feelings regarding these attacks on merchant ships operating within the provisions of the non-in-tervention system and under the surveillance of the Non-Intervention Board’s officers.

Mr Chamberlain, in reply, announced that the British Government had instructed the British agent at Burgos to ask that an explanation of these latest attacks be given without delay, and it had directed him to return to London as soon as he had received a reply in order that the Government might consider, in consultation with him. the situation which would result from the term of the answer received. The Government, was not going to change the policy it had already proclaimed fn the Spanish situation. The motive of that policy was not a preconceived idea in favour of one side or the other in the Spanish civil war. but the will to preserve the greatest of British interests—peace. Avoiding Spread of Conflict All through, the object of the nonintervention policy had been to avoid what they conceived to be the inevitable result of intervention, namely, the spread of the conflict beyond the borders of Spain until it became a European conflagration. Once warlike action was started, whether against General Franco or against some objective, who could tell that thi operation would end there. He asked whether it was claimed that the country should go to war or take action which might conceivably involve it in war in order to give protection to people who had gone in for the purposes of making profits in this risky trade, in spite of the warnings given by the Government. Mr Chamberlain twitted the Opposition with a new found enthusiasm for defence of British rights and property, and expressed doubts if their motives were entirely unmixed. He charged them with really desiring to see intervention on the side of the Spanish Government and when the Opposition leader intervened to assert that the Labour movement had accepted the non-in-tervention policy until it had been shown to be absolutely one-sided, he said that if gny of the Opposition were still for non-intervention it behoved them not to be diverted from it bv any provocation. The Prime Minister was subjected to considerable interruption from the Opposition benches, and at one point in his speech interrupters had to be ejected from the public gallery. The motion for the adjournment was defeated by 275 votes to 141. Interview with Captains Two sea captains, Captain Llewellyn and Captain Jones, whose ships were among those which have been attacked by aeroplanes oper-

ating in favour of General Franco, were received by Mr Chamberlain in his room at the House of Commons immediately after the end of questions. The British destroyer Isis is conveying the crews of the Thorpeness and Sunion to Marseilles.

Confirmation has been received in London of the African Trader incident. The destroyer Imogen escorted the African Trader towards Gibraltar. An insurgent aeroplane had circled the African Trader and ordered her to go to Palma, but the captain sent out an SOS which brought the destroyer to her rescue.

ITALY’S INTEREST IN SPAIN

DESIRE FOR INSURGENT VICTORY IL DUCE’S ATTITUDE SAID TO BE UNCHANGED LONDON, June 23. The Australian Associated Press understands that Signor Mussolini has made it clear to the Prime Minister (Mr Chamberlain) that his constant aim for a complete and final victory for General Franco remains unchanged. This undoubtedly tempers the recent optimism regarding a truce. It is learned that the dispatch from the British Ambassador to Rome (Lord Perth) to the Foreign Secretary (Lord Halifax), recounting his conversations with the Italian Foreign Minister (Count Ciano), shows clearly that II Duce’s approval of a truce or the cessation of hostilities in Spain is contingent, not only on an insurgent victory, but also on General Franco dictating terms and extinguishing the Republican Government.