GENERAL SCEPTICISM.

Manawatu Standard, Volume LIX, Issue 116, 17 April 1939, Page 7

GENERAL SCEPTICISM.

TOO LATE TO COUNT. REACTION TO APPEAL. NEW YORK, April 16. The first reaction to President Roosevelt’s appeal to the dictators shows that it won wide Congressional approval but almost equally there is general scepticism that it would achieve any success. The majority regard it merely as a gesture which, if the dictators are looking for a way out, could not do any harm. There is a growing feeling in Congress that it is too late for American influence to count abroad, and this is shared by the middle-road thinkers, who now believe that the United States could have contributed 20 years ago to a more stable and more contented world, but that the country’s insistence through the years that it would have no part in any European problems was accepted by the European chancelleries. They believe the totalitarian plans were formulated on the assumption of isolation by the United States and that this is unchangeable at this later date by a mere presidential pronouncement. POSITION STRENGTHENED. It is felt in political circles that the President has at least strengthened bis own position by demolishing charges of warmonger being made against him within the United States, it is felt also that the appeal may help tlie formation of the “Stop Hitler” bloc.

It is noted that in asking for nonaggression pledges from the dictators, the President specifically listed 31 countries, incidentally omitting Danzig. If the assurances are refused these countries may all feel themselves in tlie orbit of totalitarian ambition and hasten to line up with the democracies. The New l r ork Times interprets the message not as an appeal “to their better nature and sense of responsibility which the dictators do not possess” but as a warning “that if they resort to acts of aggression threatening the pence of the world they will find the odds overwhelmingly against them.”