The Evening Star SATURDAY, JANUARY 28, 1939. “INSANITY FAIR.”

Evening Star, Issue 23177, 28 January 1939, Page 14

The Evening Star SATURDAY, JANUARY 28, 1939. “INSANITY FAIR.”

The Italian Press has lost no time in acclaiming the Nationalist success in Spain as a great Italian victory. “ To General Franco’s magnificent troops and our own magnificent legionaries ” Mussolini ascribes the triumph, “ not only over the Negrin Government, but others of our enemies who at this moment bite the dust.” If II Duce is willing to let it go at that, and be satisfied with a victory for the antiComintern Pact without looking for more tangible advantages from his interference, there will be small inducement to quarrel with his judgment on the performance. A plea for the Russians might be that it is unfair of Fascism to boast as if they had been defeated, because they seem to have withdrawn early from this conflict. Their aid, in material though not in men, to the unfortunate Republicans was apparently substantial for a beginning, but it appears to have faded away when it was most needed. Whoever may be associated with the defeat there is no doubt that Italian aid, along with that of Germany, was largely responsible for the victory. It is extremely probable, however, that German and Italian guns and aeroplanes had much more to do with it than “ our magnificent legionaries.” The dispassionate history of this war, when it is -written, will be more interesting than that of most, because the accounts of few wars while they were proceeding have been so much confined to* those of partisanship. Neither loyalist nor Nationalist high authorities seem to have had any disposition to give facilities to correspondents who could not be depended upon to favour their own cause. Each side has known the value of propaganda, though Franco was much later than his opponents in taking full advantage of that weapon. To an unusual extent, therefore, reports of what was happening have depended on conjecture, made

more irresponsible than usual by the desire of Fascist and Socialist (including Communist) partisans to swaj’ judgment the world over, and on what the leaders on both sides wished to be believed. How many Italians actually have been lighting in Spain? Estimates have varied over a wide range of figures, but it is not likely that they over constituted more than a minute proportion of the Nationalist forces. It is known that the Germans sent only technicians. Major-general Sir Walter Maxwell Scott, writing to the London ‘ Times ’ at the end of November, gives the smallest figure for the actual numbers of “ our magnificent legionaries.” As his facts were received directly from General Franco, given to him after a tour of the Ebro front in the course of a third visit to Nationalist Spain, they are subject to the reproach of propaganda, but facts immune from it have never been obtainable. Franco told the General that on November 10 ho had 18,000 foreign volunteers left in his army of more than 750,000. That would bo after 10,000 Italians had departed. The total agrees' with others that have been published. There were only 82 foreign air pilots, casualties amongst whom were not replaced. These foreign airmen numbered less than one-tenth of the Nationalists’ Spanish pilots. Of a total of 1,000 Russian tanks estimated by Franco to have been sent to the Republicans he claimed that his troops had destroyed ,300 and were using another 60, captured in good condition, in their own tank corps. Nearly onethird of his troops had been armed with material captured from the enemy. It is impossible to compute the degree of help which the loyalists received from foreign sources. According to General Maxwell Scott, “ repeated assurances that the French-Catalan frontier is closed and that the arms traffic to Eastern Spain from French Mediterranean and North African ports has been stopped [this on November 21] are not true.” Mussolini no doubt will welcome all the credit he can get with his own people from the issue that now seems certain for the Spanish war. That will have a bad effect if it should make the Italians more vainglorious or more provocative in their attitude to other peoples than they have tended of late to be. Apart from that risk there is at least some possibility that when the Spanish struggle is ended, and a first-class incentive to take sides with this party or the other removed from half the peoples of Europe, international relations may become easier than they have been since it began. Germany docs not threaten Great Britain while she agrees to subordinate her navy. So far as purely Continental issues are concerned Great Britain must leave Europe to look after itself. There never was a time when she had power to regulate all its affairs, and new developments, in the industrial progress made by other nations and the march of invention, have made that power less than it was. The British Empire affords still an unmatched sphere for development. France also, temporarily or permanently, has fallen from her position as the chief Power in Europe. That position depended on her military strength and her alliances. Her military strength (including aircraft) ceased to be predominant when it was putsecond to her comfort, but she still has her great Empire, which can be developed without friction with Germany. It is Italy and Germany whoso interests have most cause to clash, in that central and south-eastern Europe to which both looked for greater influence, but Italy has her African Empire, largo enough to occupy all her energies without offence or injury to anybody. If the nations cannot live in peace together it is not yet because the world is too small for them all.