Evening Post. TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 9, 1937. COMMUNISM AS A PRETEXT

Evening Post, Volume CXXIV, Issue 113, 9 November 1937, Page 8

Evening Post.

TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 9, 1937.

COMMUNISM AS A PRETEXT

•'UnrestrictedWervention, wherever the existence of a Communist party provides a pretext." This phrase in the cablegrams epitomises the chief underlying danger of the new mode of warfare that has developed in Europe since outside nations openly took a hand in what was at first a Spanish civil war. The cablegram presupposes "the existence of a Communist party," but all that is necessary is an allegation in a "neutral" country that a party is Communist, or that it has a Communist element. It would be ridiculous to say that—in the beginning, or even now —the forces of the Spanish rebellion are all Fascist and that the forces of the Spanish Government are all Communist. In North Spain Franco has had to fight nationalists and clericals, and in North Spain has occurred some of the bitterest fighting. Yet because the German Dictator and the Italian Dictator choose to apply to the Spanish Government side the name Communist, intervention on the Spain model has become a fact. That the Spain precedent could be applied almost anywhere else in Europe is, and has been all the time, the most alarming fact connected with Spanish history during the past two.years. Those forms of intervention that can "assist" in a civil war can also start one. That power to "name the baby" which Dictators have used for an anti-Conrauinist crusade in Spain can be applied in other countries. There is hardly a civil disturbance anywhere in the civilised world that might not, on analysis, yield one' per cent, of Communism, or some colour-trace of Red. Following the German-Italian precedent in Spain, a trace of Red entitles Dictators to intervene with arms, munitions, and "volunteers"; indeed, even if there were no trace of Red, but if a Red country like Russia sent munitions into the disturbed country, then the Nazi-Fascist Dictators would declare a Jehad against Communism, and the general public of the,civilly disturbed country must submit to becoming a choppingblock for a Fascist-Communist undeclared war. No country is safe from being made the cockpit of a foreign fight against Communism, or of a foreign fight against Fascism, if Herr Hitler and Signor Mussolini on the one side, or M. Stalin on the other side, cries Red or Black (as either of them chooses to see it) and "lets slip the dogs of war." If any people indulges in the luxury of a local faction fight, the important thing is not what these factions call themselves, but what Herr Hitler, or Signor Mussolini, or M. Stalin chooses to christen them. One faction is given a Dictator's curse, and another faction becomes a Dictator's protege; and their names and their hates and their fates thus become.regulated from abroad, by a form of tyranny masquerading, with a magnificent insincerity, as justice and liberty. All this would be a thing beyond belief if the interventionists had not "got away with it" in Spain for more than a year. Whether they will continue to "get away with it" in Spain, or whether, having proved on a large scale that their idea work*, they will now apply it to another country, no one can say. But that the Spain plan contains the seeds of universal war must be obvious to a blind man. The suggestion of a change of scene finds some support in a speculation of the "News Chronicle's" Paris correspondent. He states that the Italian withdrawal from Spain has already begun. Also: The signature of the anti-Comintern Pact marks Fascist preparations to hunt for bigger game than Spanish Republicans. France views the pact with alarm, realising that it enables unrestricted intervention- wherever the existence of « Communist party provides a pretext. "" But it ia not to be supposed that France has arrived at such a realisation only now. France has long viewed the possibility that Germany or Italy will create a Spain in middle or eastern Europe. The unfortunate thing is that the western democracies, while realising this inherent danger in the Spain plan as applied by Italy, Germany, and Russia —and by Italy in an open, avowed, large-scale manner—have been powerless to check it by diplomacy. Though still hopeful, ' diplomacy has . succeeded in doing little more than persuade the fcsterventionists to attend . the Nonintervention Committee. -If, as the "News Chronicle" writer believes, withdrawal, from Spain is "just around the corner," but merely as a preliminary to intervention some-: where else, can this be called progress? Will not the Spanish affair be regarded as a win for aggressive | countries who interfere in civil wars, and who wreck international law by deeds while giving it lip-service in committees and conferences?

While many of the Press, reports and Press, anticipations, must be treated as speculation, the fact that alleged Communism can be made a pretext for intervention is no speculation. Nor is there any element of speculation in the fact that Japan, before sending to China an invading army, shouted "Communism," just as Italy did before sending her "volunteers" to Spaing Similarityiofjnethod suggests similarity of aiW, and i? J, fdl- f lowed by the enrolment oT'the three militarist Powers in a revised version of the anti-Comintern Pact. If they maintain a right to intervene wherever, with the aid of a telescope, they see a Red necktie, then Spain and China are only a beginning. Countries where Communism is a growing danger, countries where Communism is a controlled minority, and | countries where there is actually no Communism alike could be brought into the anti-Comintern net by the zealous officials who' are usually (ound behind political drives and

racial pogroms. The manufacture of evidence offers no difficulties whatever. If there is no fox to hunt, a fox can be smuggled in. It will be noted that a report of a pending visit to the Danubian region by the British Permanent Secretary for Foreign Affairs is officially denied.. ,Aii officia.l, silence concerning W'MrMbiaA4oli»tr*es,' the Little Entente, and the Balkan countries has been maintained for some time; and the public have been allowed to form their owii opinion of the Bulgarian King's visit to Britain. But the Belgian -King's forthcoming visit is on the lips of Ministers and receives the official limelight. Sir John Simon states'with particular emphasis that Anglo-Belgian relations are for peace and "for establishing the widest European understanding." This remark principally affects Germany and may be bracketed with M. Delbos's appeal for a Franco-German appeasement. Brussels is at the moment the centre of a search not only for "the widest European understanding" but for a truce In Asia. The effort of the Nine Powers Conference for such a truce is still in the balance.