The House of Commons and Czechoslovakia

Press, Volume LXXV, Issue 22662, 17 March 1939, Page 10

The House of Commons and Czechoslovakia

The most remarkable feature of the House of Commons debate on the situation in Eastern Europe, summarised in the cable news this morning, -is the absence of excitement or of any tendency to recrimination, Mr Chamberlain, who was moved to a severe denunciation of the German Government when a German newspaper called Lord Baldwin a guttersnipe, is moved by Germany’s annexation of the greater part of Czechoslovakia and Herr Hitler’s repudiation of a solemn promise to nothing more serious than a dopbt whether “ the "manner and methods by which tljese changes “ have been brought about ” are "in accord “with the spirit of Munich.” This phrasing conveys the suggestion that more happened at Munich than has yet been revealed. For Mr Chamberlain does regard the changes themselves as contrary to “the spirit of Munich”; indeed, in another part of his speech, he expressly refuses to make any charge of breach of faith against Herr Hitler and significantly observes that the dismemberment of Czechoslovakia “ might or might not have been in- “ evitable.” It is the “ manner and the methods ” he has doubts about. For the rest, Mr Chamberlain refuses imperturbably to abandon his attempt “to substitute the method of discussion for the method of force in the settle- “ ment of differences ” even though “we may “suffer checks and disappointments from time “to time.” The rest of the debate is an interesting test of British public opinion. Mr Anthony Eden’s impressive appeal for a reai consolidation of all political groups to form a more completely representative National Government was obviously well received by the whole House, a small section of the Opposition excepted. But Dr. Hugh Dalton’s suggestion that Mr Chamberlain’s retirement was the essential condition of the formation of a genuinely National Government evoked no response at all. The conclusion must be that Chamberlainism has been less severely shaken by the dismemberment of Czechoslovakia than it was by Munich. The House of Commons seems to have realised that the Munich settlement had none of the elements of permanency and that what has happened in the last two days is surprising only because it happened so rapidly.