The
Charlotte News
Wednesday,
September 13, 1939
THREE
EDITORIALS
Two
Neutrals
The Italian minister to Paris is reported by the Associated Press as
having assured the French authorities that Italy is pursuing a course of strict
neutrality in this war. In view of that, the following AP dispatch from Basle,
Switzerland, is interesting:
Rail traffic between Germany and Italy has
increased so much since the start of the European war that the direct line
through the Brenner Pass has proved insufficient.
Many trains are being re-routed over the
Mannheim-Basle-Gothard route through Switzerland. Inspection under the Swiss
neutrality laws showed Germany shipping coal to Italy and receiving foodstuffs.
That indicates pretty clearly that Italy is in fact serving as a base of
supplies to Germany. The mention of coal passing from Germany to Italy also
adds significance to the French advance in the Saar. If it succeeds, Germany
will have a great deal less--perhaps no--coal to send to Italy.
Interesting in this connection of neutrality also is a dispatch from
Brussels:
Belgian frontier observers told of large-scale
food smuggling into the Netherlands.
That suggests, for one thing, that the British blockade may not be nearly
so effective as the admiralty claimed it was going to be. But it also suggests
that Holland is playing with fire. The British had more trouble with Holland
serving as a base for German importations in the last war than any other
nation. And this time they are apt be much less patient. Holland has a very definite
stake in an Allied victory, since nothing is more certain than that, if Hitler
wins, he will grab her and her tempting empire at once. Moreover, Holland
happens to represent the most desirable route for the English and French to
strike Germany.
Manteo is a salty village of 547 year-round inhabitants on Roanoke
Island, North Carolina, where the first English settlement in America was
established in 1584. In the last three years Manteo has been having a Summer
boom, principally on account of Paul Green's play, "The Lost Colony,"
but secondarily because the whole island abounds in history and atmosphere.
Early Monday morning most of Manteo's waterfront, which is its business
section, went up in flames, with a roaring blaze that only a collection of
frame buildings can make. Loss was estimated at $250,000, which is to say more
money than Manteo can stand to lose and still rebuild. Besides, the town ought
to be rebuilt with an eye to the picturesque rather than merely to utility.
What Manteo needs, it begins to dawn on us, is some well-heeled
philanthropist to play Rockefeller to its Williamsburg. The two places have
nothing in common, to be sure. Williamsburg exudes unbridled magnificence and
Manteo being in its earlier years probably as it is now, a simple fishing
village. But fishing villages can have their charm, and it is more relaxing
charm for not having to be put under glass.
Charred Manteo as a rare opportunity of designed reconstruction, ought to
be called to the attention of Mr. Rockefeller or that other great
philanthropist, PWA's Harold Ickes, or at least the State Department of
Conservation & Development.
What the conference between Chamberlain, Daladier, Gamelin, and Chatfield
was about, we haven't been told. But it is quite probable that it was Italy,
and that the hour is approaching when the heat will be turned on Mussolini to
force a decision one way or the other.
The present situation is clearly intolerable for the Allies. Italy is not
now a neutral in any legal sense. On the contrary, she stands deftly in the
status of an enemy. For she has issued no neutrality proclamation, and she
remains a military partner in the Axis. All she has done is to refuse so far to
strike, reserving the right to strike when she chooses. Hence if Britain and
France pitched into her now and without warning, they would be well within
their rights.
And undoubtedly that would already have been done but for the hope that
she may be weaned away from Germany and brought into the Allied camp, perhaps
after a period of benevolent neutrality. For from the military standpoint, it
is preferable to have her as an open enemy than as a secret one, serving as a
base of supplies for Germany. That is so, not only because the conquest of
Northern Italy and the Brenner Pass represents a comparatively easy way into
Germany, but also because she must be smoked out and either brought into camp
or engaged in action before the Balkan states, Rumania, Jugoslavia, and Greece
will dare join the Allies.
Can Mussolini be brought over? To judge by the recent tone of the Italian
press, you would not think so. However, violent press attack on the nation or
nations with which he wants to make a deal is a part of Benito's stock in
trade, by way of raising the ante. It is not altogether impossible that his
adherence to the Axis, for the last few months, at least, has been based on the
axioms of his great teacher, Machiavelli, and has been designed precisely to
get himself into a good bargaining position for the switch over to the Allies!
On the other hand, it is also barely within the range of possibility that
he is attempting to use his position on the fence to extract greater
concessions from Hitler within the Axis.
But on the whole, logic seems to suggest the first best thing he can do
for himself and for Italy is to go in with the Allies. If he goes with the
Axis, victory is apt to be almost as disastrous for him and his country as
defeat. Italy will be a mere vassal state of colossal Germany, and himself a
mere satrap. Moreover, Italy is so vulnerable by sea and the land routes from
France that she would stand to be wrecked in the first few months of the war.
Further still, his people plainly have no wish to fight for Germany,
their ancient enemy and oppressor. And certainly, the Church must be reckoned
with. Would the Pope and Catholic Italy ever stand for fighting on the same
side with a nation whose leaders are not only boldly proposing to restore the
ancient gods of pagan Germany but also are more or less allied (how far we do
not yet know) with Red Russia? It seems unbelievable.
On the reverse side of the case, he can certainly count on large
concessions from France and England if he does come in on their side. According
to the rumors, he is already being promised a big hunk of Tunisia, a section of
British Somaliland, more power in the Suez Canal, the Djibouti railway. And it
is quite likely that he may get a deal more, perhaps even the secret promise of
Austria--his most coveted goal--in case of the defeat of Germany. All this may
be painful to the Allies, but they can reconcile themselves to it, on the
ground that once Germany is eliminated, Italy by itself can be no great menace
under any circumstances.
About the only ground of which it can be supposed that he will still
choose to go with the Axis is that of personal spite for the past attitude of
England and France. But Mussolini is not Hitler, and so far has acted always
from the standpoint of cold opportunism rather than from that of emotion.
Framed Edition
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