The Evening Star FRIDAY, MARCH 38, 1941, THREE VICTORIES.

Evening Star, Issue 23846, 28 March 1941, Page 4

The Evening Star FRIDAY, MARCH 38, 1941, THREE VICTORIES.

At the last hour, what seemed almost too much to hope for has happened. In time to frustrate, or at least embarrass to the last degree, another German triumph for duplicity and coercion, the people of Yugoslavia have repudiated the pact by which timid Ministers signed away their independence and security. Following a revolution in Belgrade which the absence of opposition rendered bloodless the timeserving or pusillanimous Government which made the pact has been swept away, its Ministers are under arrest, the Regency of Prince Paul has been ended, and the seventeen-year-old King Peter, educated in England, with English ideas, becomes a King in fact as well as name. It is. hard for Peter, but he will rule through his Ministers, and these promise to be the best advisers. The Chief of the General Staff is nqw Prime Minister, and if at any moment his more normal duties should claim all his attention no doubt a successor will be found by him of his own mind. The army is not in the least disposed to make its country a gift to bullies and confidence men from beyond the Ehinei The whole of the military forces, it has been proclaimed, are ready to defend Yugoslavia and have taken the oath of allegiance to the new War Minister. The reservists who wore disbanding a few days ago rather than face humiliation are very much a .power again, and the nbw Government includes the leaders of all parties. The Serb stands where he did in 1914. He suffered cruel hardships then when he preferred freedom to enslavement, but he bore them with a high courage which was rewarded in the end, as it will be if like sacrifices should be forced on him again. The father of King Peter, the Crown Prince Alexander, whose later rule as king was ended by assassination at Marseilles, was a hero in that struggle. The value of this new act of selfassertion’ by a people who have never lacked courage is that it has not increased division and it does not come too late. The Nazis have not yet sent their army corps into Yugoslavia, as they would soon have found an excuse ■for doing had the pact stood. , If they send them now they will be resisted by an army which is nob divided, and though the Yugoslav army is not one of the most powerful and is weakest probably in mechanised equipment, Yugoslavia is, as little as Greece and Albania, a country in which tanks can operate. Those who seek to force its mountain passes against national resistance will have as difficult a task before them as that which has proved too hard for the Italians. It will be a task offering small reward, as the war has gone throughout the Middle East. ,By this Yugoslav development Hitler is badly checked. And if the myth of the German armies’ invincibility has no terrors left for one European people, it will sOon have less potency for the rest. The Free French and all peoples who are hoping to be free again will be cheered enormously by this development. Marshal Petain will be encouraged to resist German demands. If the Nazis had known that Italy would be such a broken reed and Britain so hard to conquer they would have made their terms of armistice with Franco even more exacting than they are. According to the terms of the armistice the Third Reich can neither advance through France to the Mediterranean coast nor gain bases of operation in the Italian colonies in Africa or elsewhere. With strong cards of his own still in hand—the great army General Weygand controls in North Africa, to which the seat of French Government might be transferred—Petain stands by the precise letter of the armistice, and Hitler, by refraining from any attempt to force new concessions from him, however he may cajole and bully, acknowledges the strength of his position. The Nazis, ten months ago, miscalculated almost as much as the Italians. As for the Italians themselves, except as inhabitants—temporarily—of a German province confined to Europe, they promise soon to be off the map. To-day gives us news not only of the defiance of Yugoslavia to German bullying, but of the capture of Keren, in Eritrea, and Harar. the second city of Abyssinia. With a strong superiority in numbers the Italians fought hard to keep Keren, but their fight was unavailing. Only four days ago it was emphasised that its investment would be a slow process. But the Duke of Aosta, its defender, has been no more fortunate than Badoglio and Graziani. The advance on Keren was made from thirteen points. Its fall promises to open the way straight to Asmara and Massawa. British and Italian Somaliland are now under ’British control. “ The capture of Keren,” said ‘ The Times ’ a week ago. “ has long been delayed, but it is inevitable. If we can simultaneously secure Harar, we shall be nearing a decision, and the final phase in Abyssinia, which General Smuts described the other day as beginning, will be within sight of its end.” Mr Matsuoka has chosen a good time for his visit to Europe. The call at Loudon, which has been suggested ns an addition to the programme, may appear to him now as the most hopeful part of it. Hitler’s star is waning. More than Europe must see ir. Another speech is due from him. It should be unusually frenzied.