PRECAUTIONS EFFECTIVE

Hawera Star, Volume XLVII, 9 October 1928, Page 5

PRECAUTIONS EFFECTIVE

PEACEFUL DEMONSTRATIONS. RIVAL FACTIONS KEPT APART. STRONG FORCES IN VIENNA. l'fui-*(J Press Association—By Electric Teltgraru Copyright.) (Australian Cress .Association —United Service., VIENNA, Oct. 7. Thanks largely to the military precautions, the rival Fascist and Socialist demonstrations passed on peacefully. All the entrances to the Wiener Neustadt except the main gates were barricaded with barbed wire. Fifteen machine guns were posted m the principal square and shock troops equipped with gas masks and grenades were field in readiness. Cavalry guarded the danger points. Tlie Fascists started first at 9 a.in., when 13,000 marched in a (’recession carrying 11 flags and 151 banners, accompanied. by twelve bands. A moderate crowd cheered the procession, which traversed the main square, saluting the leaders. The procession reached the place of assembly outside the town at 10.30 a.m.

Simultaneously about 16,000 Socialists, with a country delegation totalling another 19,000, assembled in the square, sang and listened to the. speeches till 2 o’clock. Thus the rivals were effectively kept apart. Both gatherings dispersed quietly. A downpour of rain at 3 p.m. damped any remaining ardour. SeveraL Communists attempting to address the Socialists were arrested ; otherwise the proceedings passed wi:hout incident.

The gathering was a display of the strength of the three parties, namely, the Heimwest (Austrian Fascists), tlie Schutzbund (Socialists), and the Government.

DANGERS OF THE SITUATION. RIVAL PARTIES”WELL ARMED INTENSE STRUGGLE FOR EXISTENCE. LONDON, Oct. 7. The Vienna correspondent of “The Times” says that though the Viennese breathe a sigh of relief because a threatened storm has blown oyer, there is little cause for congratulation seeing that one-third of the Federal army and 2000 police are garrisoned at Neustadt. Despite the warning of the July riots in 1927, nothing has been done to enforce internal disarmament. The Fascist organisation is at present better trained, disciplined, and armed. It is also more 'numerous, but the Socialists’ private army is becoming daily better organised and more militant. Every Austrian knows the harm thus done to the country’s reputation abroad, but nobody attempts to stop the intolerable filibustering economicconditions. These conditions mainly explain the creation and development of the Fascist army. As the struggle for existence is dangerously intense the Fascist movement represents the conservative and religious countrymen’s hatred of the city’s godless and predators- “reds.”