LONDON TOPICS

Evening Star, Issue 22955, 12 May 1938, Page 1

LONDON TOPICS

OUR TREATY WITH ITALY THE TRUTH ABOUT SPAIH [From Our Correspondent.] [By Aik Mail.] LONDON, April 14. The official text of the Anglo-Italian Treaty is not likely to be made public before tbe end of the week; but already enough is known of its general outline to give the lie direct to those of Mr Chamberlain’s opponents who have asserted that he was preparing to give away vital, British interests. In fact, apart from our undertaking to bring the matter of recognition of the Italian conquest of Abyssinia before the League of Nations, there seems to be remarkably little in the pact that can he regarded as being concession on our part. That this is so disproves, moreover, another fond assertion of the Premier’s critics—namely, that he would find Signor Mussolini so overbearing in his demands as to make it impossible to do business with him. Actually, the agreement demonstrates the great moderation of both parties who have been engaged in negotiating it. Altogether, it does little more than set forth in black and white those principles which were always observed between the two countries prior to the estrangement in friendship that occurred with the beginning of the Ethiopian campaign. There _is one clause. in the agreement which will permit our Opposition politicians to hold on to their doubts of Signor Mussolini’s good faith for some time to come. This is a provision which will make the treaty, though duly signed by both sides, inoperative until Italy’s promise to withdraw her volunteers and war material'from Spain has been fulfilled.

Correspondents on the spot state that General Franco’s success in the Spanish fighting has been due not to man but to machine power. This is undoubtedly to a large extent true, hut there is much more in it than that. Intelligent observers, ex-soldiers who have been engaged in the campaign on both sides, assert that the cardinal weakness on the Spanish Government’s side is staff work. The war has been run on that side by a changing congeries of mixed headquarter staffs whose personal views have been often as Conflicting as their personalities. The result has been an inevitable lack of confidence among the front-line battalions,who never felt themselves assured of consistent support, and were frequently let down badly by failure of vital plies. ■* There has been, ■moveover, -r> coherent general plan of campaign. On the other side, of course, Franco has had the assistance of ■ competent professional experts, his own as well as German and Italian. The impartial critics whom I am quoting are entirely incredulous as to the ability of the Government to prevent complete defeat within a few weeks at most. DEMOCRACY’S WEAK POINT. According to Mr L. S. Amery, the Achilles heel of democracy is in its head. Not being an Irishman,, he does not put it quite like that, hut that is what it amounts to. Earl Baldwin once commented on the, big advantage a dictatorship possesses in certain matters of quick decision as to policy. Mr Amery is emphatic in repudiating any notion of setting up a totalitarian regime in this country, hut he strongly favours the plan instituted by L.G. during the war. He would leave departmental work to certain Ministers, and have a small Cabinet of not more than half a dozen to think out policy unhampered by extraneous duties. This is the plan more or less adopted by

President Roosevelt, and it may embody democracy’s best reply to totalitarian efficiency so far as the latter is a reality and not a carefully camouflaged superstition. But, as Mr Amery himself foresees, the difficulty may be to get ambitious Ministers to agree to their own departmental relegation.

A.R.P. AT ST. STEPHEN’S. The suggestion that A.R.P.,instruction should be given to M.P.s at the House of Commons is not quite so ludicrous as it sounds, because there is good reason to believe that on the occasion of the Great War the Houses of Parliament were a special target of the raiding German aeroplanes. Anti-air-craft guns were massed all round the Cceur de Lion statue, but despite this a good many bombs dropped in the immediate neighbourhood, including one which fell in the roadway between the Parliament Buildings and Westminster Abbey. Legislators in those days took shelter in the cellars and underground corridors, which are so numerous that even the resident engineer is said to be not acquainted with them all. These improvised dug-outs were invaded by all sorts and conditions of folk—Cabinet Ministers, peeresses, and others from the ladies’ gallery, journalists, messengers, waiters, charwomen—everyone, in fact, who had business to do about the House. It was usually a rather tedious wait, since card playing is not permitted within the precincts of the House. Many, in fact, strolled away to the terrace, where, though they were in some peril, they obtained a magnificent view of any battle in progress overhead. CONSUL OF ACTION. Mr Harold Porter, whose body is reported to have been found in the Whangpo Creek at Shanghai, was for many years in the consular service in China, Manchuria, and Korea. British residents in China will remember him as being a bit of a rarity—a consul who in times of crisis never hesitated' to reach quick decisions on his own initiative. Thanks to Mr Porter’s prompt action the British Concession of Hankow was once saved from one of the ugliest attacks upon it that was ever threatened. This was during the antiBritish unrest that swept over China'in 1925. At that time the permanent British Consul was on home leave, and Mr Porter was acting temporarily in his place. The trouble developed very swiftly, and one evening the concession' was _ surrounded by a howling mob of coolies and rowdies armed with poles and iron spikes torn from the boundary railings. All the defence available was the local volunteer corps, the fire brigade, and a party of about a dozen naval ratings landed from the one small river gunboat that happened to be in the neighbourhood. This naval party, armed with a Lewis' gun, was hastily entrenched behind ~Eome sandbags and barbed wire at, the’point.of entry to the concession most heavily threatened by the mob. The chief danger lay in the fact that neither *th« officer commanding the the lieutenant in Charge of the lahding pf-rty cared to .take responsibility for deciding as to whether it was time to open fire. Mr Porter, strolling round to survey the, situation, and nonchalantly smoking a cigarette, displayed no such hesitation. He waited until the mob was within 20yds of the barricade, and then vigorously nodded his head to the naval lieutenant. The Lewis gun stuttered spasmodically, and in less than ten seconds the mob had melted into thin air. So far as Hankow was concerned there was no more anti-British rioting that’year. WEST AFRICANS IN LONDON. There is a considerable West African colony in London, with headquarters almost inevitably in Bloomsbury. Anyone who meets these exemplary fellowcitizens of the Empire must be impressed hy their good manners, keen intelligence, and often high standard of culture. Aggrey House is the name of their Bloomsbury G.H.Q., and the secretary is Mr Ivor Cummings, a particularly interesting personality. Ha recognises, however, as keenly as anybody, one unfortunate fact. Practically all , these West African students go in for either medicine or law. Yet the practical opportunities of their pursuing those professions, and more especially the latter, are comparatively small. Whereas there is abundant scope for West African graduates who have acquired a sound technical training in some useful trade. The same mistaken and slightly snobbish tendency is reflected in this country among our own people by the crowding into the hlackcoat occupations. But it is even more disastrous in the_ case of West Africa, where the professional opportunities are few and the technical ’trade openings obvious. ~

LONG-DISTANCE LAUNDRYING, If a wider outlook could he engendered amongst West Africans, and notably on the part of parents who save up to send their children to London, these fine people could play, with great advantage to themselves, a far more hopeful part in their own country’s development. The result of the existing restricted outlook, with its insistence on the learned professions, is that West Africa is almost congested with qualified lawyers and doctors, whereas native practitioners cannot be found in many other essential phases of modern life. There are many inviting commercial lines which are _ entirely neglected. Thus it may astonish some people to learn that many West Africans, who have returned home after acquiring European or American habits, are at a complete loss for efficient laundrying of their white shirts, collars, and cuffs. These are actually sent all the way either to New York or London to be “ got up ” ! Better perhaps than anything else this illustrates the lack of non-professional native enterprise on the West Coast. Imagine having to send soiled linen thousands of miles to be laundered! MECHANISED MOUNTED INFANTRY. The practical lessons enforced by the present Spanish war are being reflected in our latest Army organisation. Infantry rifle battalions have now been reduced from 26 officers and 701 other ranks to 22 officers and 646 other ranks. Even the former figure was a substantially smaller one than the old thousand-strong battalions of the Great War epoch, and these progressive reductions indicate that machinery is now; in military as in civil affairs, replacing man-power. America has carried this principle even further, and instituted battalions of 24 officers and 580 men. A British battalion now consists of four companies, each of three platoons only. Presumably we shall also reduce the personnel of “ sections ” in order to minimise enemy fire

targets. Each, rifle platoon is to have one of the new 2in mortars, weighing only 221 b and easily manipulated by, one man, mainly as a smoke-camouflag-ing weapon. Most interesting of all,, the infantry will be supplied with 10, armoured Bren-gun carriers per battalion, thus converting them intot mechanised mounted infantry. Truly,, the machine age has arrived I HANG-OVER? Lieutenant-colonel' A. A. Irvine, author of an entertaining book on Indiat which be calls ‘ Land of No Regrets, is an admirer of Mr Winston Churchill* and shares that statesman’s views about? Indian reforms. His first meeting withl Winston, however, was hardly , a happy; one. The colonel was one of two young Army subalterns homeward bound pnl leave from India, and early the firsti. morning out from_ Bombay started ai lively conversation in their ship’s cahiiu Presently from a hunk in the opposite, cabin came an irate voice, “ Stop that’ damned noise!” They investigated, and finding the rude person was onljJ another junior sub. like ' themselves, hauled him out of his bunk in his beau* tiful silk pyjamas, and dragged him oof his back up and down the cook’s galley.. That subaltern was Mr Winston Church* ill. Colonel Irvine tells of Indiart nabobs who spent £5 a day on bath) scents and shot birds through catapults with rupees. He also gives us a glimpse of Indian courts of law. As a yonng magistrate he discovered that his native clerk had a great reputation for integrity. This was because, though accepting bribes from both sides, he invariably made some rebate to 'the losing client! . •