The Washington times., 1921-06-25
RUSSIA ISL|KELY
EI0 BAR CRANE, IS
/ VIEW OF HAPG00D
Predicts Soviet Will Prevent Y.
g. Minister to China Return
\ Ing Via chita.
~ NORMAN HAPGooD.

Charles r. Crane. retiring minister
<ts Chins, IL the ideal American TO go
across Russia, but II IL questionable
whether the Moscow government will
allow him to do SO.
Undoubtedly the agreeable peasant
who II now the Bolshevik minister to
China encouraged Crane to start to
CAtta. in the hope of receiving a ia
xerabls answer from Moscow.
= The simple peasant, of course. thor
oughly understands that as our Gov
srnment recoEnizs In Washington an
asAhassador representing few dozen ex-
patriates in New York and Paris, 1t
cannot recognize I'm China as repre-
sen&lng Russia anybody except the
gsntieman whom the. heather asked
TO leave because they thought they
ought no longer TO deal with repre-
sentative who represented nothing.
Moscow, however. has to 90 beyond
I the question OF Mr.. Cranes splendid
heart and spiritual resilency. 1t has
put down a general principle. 1t
made perfectly clear that It would
rsther lay with us than with any
other power the foundations on which
10 start foreign trade and concessions
- foreign capital.
i nG0CKED BY HOOVER.
! At first 1t looked as II we might
accept this opportunity. The Repub-
lican platform had contained a plank
calling for trade with all countries
with which we wefe at peace.
President Harding had explicitly
stated, both orally and in writing
that he favored de facto recognition.
Then something happened. The
Lodge-Harvey group In the party
were insane with rage at the very
notion OF dealing with group of
standard OF disintersstedness, pro-
gress and liberality.
Mr.. Hoover, the most determined
influence In the Cabinet, took the
Russian field for his. as 1t was COM
merciaI question:
Mr.. Hughes, AS far as can be judged
has put no thought on the subject
would give several hundred dollars to
know what actually would pass in the
mind Of the Secretary of State II he
should asinvest ffteen cents in the
issue of the new republic for June Is
and read the summary given, after a
six months visit to Russia. by M. J.
Olgin.
happen to know Mr.. olgin. No
better equipped or more impartial
man could be found to interpret the
Russian masses. What he says about
the state of mind of the Russian peas
ant would interest Mr.. Hughes II this
were one of the topics on which Mr..
Hughes were thinking.
CHANCE FOR HUGHES.
Perhaps after seading little fresh
and important evidence of large
scope, instead OF the childish hashes
turned in by two-spots in Helsing-
fors, Riga, 3eval. Copenhagen and
Paris, on a formula warranted to give
satisfaction in Washington, our able
and high-minded Secretary might
avoid the approaching chance to
make the Government look still sillier
on the Russian question.
Impossible, you say; not impossible
at all. I do not refer to phantom
ships. treated seriously by our grave
statesmen. increasing in number as
rapidly as Falstaff's assailants.
i refer TO the approaching visit OF
Krassin to Canada. That visit will
give the department a chance to out
do the imbecility that has been pro-
gressive since the time, late in the
summer of 1919, when Mr.. Wilson's
constitution began to break
OF course, Mr.. Crane ought not TO
be held responsible for these perver-
stiles. He is trying to do something
entirely characteristic of his long
record of spiritual vision in American
public life.
Nobody in Washington, even in
the State Department bureaucracy,
.disiiked the Bolshevik resolution
more than he- The intellectusls.
business men and landed proprietors
fell were friends of Mr.. Crane. II