"On to Paris!"

Europe raced last week toward another dictator-manufactured international crisis. Italy called out 60,000 men for training, stationed 30,000 troops at Genoa and La Spezia. France virtually doubled her mobilization speed, decided to call up 80,000 recruits in April instead of October. Britain took the first step toward conscription (see p. 16). From Germany came alarming reports of troop movements: five new mechanized divisions had been created, two whole divisions, equipped for "desert operations," passed over the Brenner Pass into Italy headed presumably for Italian Africa, trucks were requisitioned and "spring" maneuvers were scheduled to start February 15.

To the European democracies all this looked suspiciously like the start of another frightening, methodical squeeze by the dictators. British stocks dropped, French bonds weakened, the Amsterdam market fell badly. The British Cabinet held a three-hour session, while British statesmen rushed about assuring their people that Great Britain would never, never give way to force. As the date of Fuehrer Adolf Hitler's annual speech to the Reichstag approached (see p. 17), wild rumors circulated that the Fuehrer would: 1) back up Friend Benito Mussolini in a Mediterranean showdown, 2) demand a redistribution of colonies, 3) ask for $10,000,000,000 as reparations for the colonies taken away from Germany after the World War.

The sound that gave Europe the "Hitler jitters" was the tramp of marching Fascists in Barcelona. Despite the official assumption in France and Britain that the triumph of Generalissimo Francisco Franco constituted no danger for them, there were facts that could not be disguised. Italian troops are still in Spain. Italy occupies lock, stock and barrel the strategic Island of Majorca. German guns back of Algeciras dominate Gibraltar, are able at any time to threaten Britain's Mediterranean "lifeline." Both France and England would have much to fear from German submarine bases on Spain's northwest coast, four of which, by well-authenticated reports, have already been established. German submarine bases on the Canary Islands could threaten Britain's route to the East around Africa. A victorious Rebel Spain, owing its very existence to German and Italian arms, was expected to join up with the dictators. Instead of having a weak, friendly Spain to her south, France would now have a strong, militarized, probable enemy to contend with. Democratic France, in short, would be bounded on three sides by Fascist powers working in concert.

In Italy, Dictator Mussolini left no doubt in anybody's mind that Barcelona's fall was a Fascist triumph and a French defeat. Prominently published was a wire from Generalissimo Franco: "I am grateful for the brilliant effort of the Italian troops who will receive the laurel of triumph with their Spanish comrades in Barcelona. . . . As General and a Spaniard, I am proud to number among my troops the magnificent [Italian] blackshirts."

Flags decorated the cities, parades were held, anti-French demonstrations flared. To a cheering mob of black-shirted Fascists ordered to gather before the Palazzo Venezia, Il Duce struck his usual defiant pose on the balcony, shouted: "The splendid victory of Barcelona is another chapter in the new Europe we are creating. General Franco's magnificent troops and our fearless legionnaires not only have beaten [Premier Dr. Juan] Negrin's government, but many others of our enemies are now biting the dust. Their motto was 'No pasaran,' but we did pass and I tell you we will continue to do so."

The politically wise crowd needed no coaching to guess that prominent among "others of our enemies" was the Republic of France. They cried "Tunisia!" "Corsica!" and "Down with France!" and from one end of the square came the optimistic shout: "On to Paris!" An official order bade Italians put away their flags until Madrid falls.

Amidst all the celebration there came not one indication that Dictator Mussolini intended to carry out the solemn promise he was said to have made to British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain less than a month ago: to withdraw his troops from Spain as soon as the Rebels won the war. On the contrary, there was evidence aplenty that Il Duce intended to use the threat of these troops to gain concessions from France.

In Paris, just a few hours later, Premier Daladier wound up in the Chamber of Deputies a long foreign policy debate which had hinged on the Spanish problem. Foreign Minister Georges Bonnet had warned that a "question of force" might soon arise. M. Daladier said that events were "racing toward a climax," that the "hour of peril" was approaching. But the debate showed such a fatal division of opinion on exactly what constituted a peril that France seemed paralyzed.

Some Deputies on the Right welcomed the Fascist intervention in Spain, believed that Socialism on the south was a greater danger than Fascism. They were the peace-at-any-price party. On the Left, ardent Socialists and Communists wanted intervention at any price. In the Centre, holding the balance of power, were M. Daladier's Radical Socialists, who subscribed, temporarily at least, to a peace-at-almost-any-price program.

The Right and Centre combined to give M. Daladier a 374-to-228 vote of confidence on his non-intervention policy. A vote on the Government's motion to "maintain the integrity of the French Empire and the security of its imperial routes" was unanimous -- 609-to-0. It was on this question that M. Daladier became eloquent:

"We have not replied with vehement words to the demands that have been violently expressed [in Italy]. France is too great a country, too calm and too strong to permit herself to be disturbed by insults and threats. Insults! They do not hurt. Threats! France is strong enough to accept them calmly. . . . France will let no one touch her territorial integrity or her colonial empire or her free communications. . . . She will not yield a single acre or concede a single right."

It had been reported that France and Britain would seize the Island of Minorca, still held by the Loyalists, and might even march into Spanish Morocco if the Italians did not evacuate Spain at the war's end. Radical Socialists believed M. Daladier to have confirmed these reports when, underlining his words, he said to them: "It is characteristic that British and French warships are now cruising in the Mediterranean along the coast of Spanish Morocco as well as near the Balearic Islands."

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.