Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1931-01-04
GERMAN MIDDLE MENACE
TO PEACE OF EUROPE
Combining Communism With National
ism Held Both Crotesque and
Dangerous.

| the one hand to appeal to national SEN
timent outraged by the weakness OF
foreign policy, and on the other. to in
cite domestic unrest reused by hard
| times.
Every i'll, evil, wrong, real and i'm
aginary became a talking point. In
the Hitler program there was a plank
attacking every unpopular measure and
every hated class. Persecution of the
Jews was combined with shaking
down" of the war profiteers. The dis
armament of Germany was to be ended,
restoring to full pay the army and navy
officers on half pay.
Prospect of Upheaval.
The heads of the leaders of parties
and governments responsible in recent
years were to roll in the sand The
accursed treaties we're to be revised,
reparationS were to be discontinued,
Parliament was to cease, dictatorship
was to function, and world that saw
this new strong Germany reappear was
confidently forecast as asserting, bow
ing its head in inevitable acquiescence.
All this groteSque combination of a
Communism that is nationaliStic and
nationalism that is CommuniStic
must be seen in its relation to the mem
tally created by a lost war and q dozen
years of foreign impotence and domeS-
tic ineptitude. Emphasis must, too, be
laid upon the striking circumstance
that for the first time it is possible to
be both CommuniStic and patriotic, to
denounce capital at home and the con-
querors Of 1918 abroad.
And one must recognize the appeal
of this new nationalism to a young
generation, to a generation which did
not know the horrors of the war, which
finds intolerable the limitations laid
upon it by the consequences of. a con-
fiict it had no part in, which is fired
with a patriotic passion with all the
enthusiasm of youth, and which has
escaped all the discipline Of an older
Germany, now completely gone.
Moreover, while without the economic
depression the Fascist movement could
hardly have become swiftly, if at all,
national menace and an international
danger, it would be a profound error
to find the root cause in the economic
detail. The truth is that the hard
times only served to bring about crys-
Utilization of a state of mind that has
developed steadily and with ever-grow-
ing universally since 1919.
I shall reserve to next week a dis
cussion of what is going to happen in
Germany, but the fact I must empha-
size now Is that, contrary to American
opinion when I left the States, there
Is no sign of a elimination Of the force
or the spread of the Fascist movement.
Real Germany Stirring.
And, what is more, behind all this
farrago of economic madness and mill
taristic folly one must perceive a real
Germany stirring. 1t is not Germany
deliberately plotting or preparing the
next war or consumed with a passion
for revenge. The very key TO present
German things Is not organization but
disorganization. It Is impossible to ex-
aggerate the incoherence, division,
fractionalizing Of German life and
thought at the moment. Nor has Fas-
cism in any open or concealed purpose
and it conceals nothing but futile
weapons-any thought Of restoring the
empire, the monarchy, the throne, in
the old sense. In fact, FaSctSm itself
is a final testimony to the bankruptcy
of the monarchial idea, since it centers
not about William II or the Crown
Prince, but about an obscure Austrian
conmoner who has Snatched the ma
tional colors from the irnpotent hands
of the old dynasty and placed them In
the hands Of what Is at best a patriotic
mob.
The Germany that Hitler speaks for
Is in revolt against the treaty Of Ver-
S@@N
present hard times; and this Germany
in revolt adds new battalions every
week At the moment every man Of
sober judgment, reasonable opinion,
world outlook, echoes the same judg-
ment: with the Hitler movement Of
today we can perhaps deal. The situa-
ton Is difficult. 1t may well become
dangerous with the inevitable mounting
Of unemployment, but we do not yet
despair. Nevertheless, looking beyond
the immediate present, unless the world
soon perceives that the present situa-
ton Of Germany internationally Is i'm
possible, then eventual sterilization OF
peace In Europe, with cooperation be-
tween Germany and her neighbors, win
become impossible"
In sum, while it Is possible to regard
Fascism as a fever, while 1t Is exact to
see it as an illness rendered acute by
circumstances which may well pass
without fatal consequences, 1t Is not
less unmistakable that the sick man in
his delirium is repeating words which
are natural to him. And very def
nitely, helpless as the sick man is to-
day, he remains potentially giant.
(Copyright, 1879