Askov American. [volume] (Askov, Pine County, Minn.) 1914-current, 1936-07-30
AsKOv, COUNTY, MINNESOTA
INTERNATIONAL
NEWS REVIEW
By GEORG sTRANDvOLD


The fact that American, British
and German warships and pass enger
vessels are stationed along Spani sh
coasts to ,evacuate foreigners whose
safety is jeopardized by the revolu-
ton now in progress. augments the
danger of situation which is already
fraught with pretty dire possibilities.
Of course, a revolution i'm Spain is
primarily a concern of that country
deal of imagination to picture poten-
tial international complications as re-
suits of what is going on. 1t takes
the merest incident" to create seri-
Gus unrest beyond the borders of a
country torn with revolutionary strife.
AS already pointed out in this
column, the Spanish conflict is of
fascist origin. About half year ago
the liberal and the radical groups
won an overwhelming parliamentary
victory over all the conservative ele-
ments, roughly but quite accurately
characterized as fascists. Since that
time the government has had to spend
nearly all it's time, waste nearly all
it's strength, on solving problems that
arose from fascist opposition, and the
task has been made even more diff
ficult than it ordinarily would have
been, because the groups constitut-
ing the government disagree violent
ly among themselves in every field,
except the one which is concerned
with the job of keeping fascism down.
Anti-fascism is the only thing that
has held together the democratic and
radical government-something which
is equally true of the Leon Blum
government in France. In all other
respects the Spanish government suf-
fers from bitter internal dissension.
and that fact, of course. weakens
materially the opposition to the fas-
cists.
Extent of Revolution.
AS yet, the Spanish upheaval is
mildly classified as a revolution, but,
as a matter of fact, it has all the
aspects of civil war, and it is at this
moment impossible to foresee the ul-
innate outcome. Nearly all bulletins
are designedly misleading. When the
government claims victory, one has
to take that with big pinch of salt;
too, it is advisable to accept with all
kinds of reservation the victory claims
of the fascists.
One may sum up the situation by
saying that no one outside Spain
knows anything definite and correct
about it. 1t may be that few per-
sons in the country itself have fair
ly accurate survey of what is going
on, but, granting that, they won't talk;
even if they would like to report to
the world how things are progress
ing, dispatches would most certainly
appear in the foreign press in a form
garbled by either craftsmanship. or
censorship.
1t seems pretty clear that practically
all the major cities of Spain are in
volved in the revolution. Once in a
WIllc SOtcIIlIlcHI tIOOPo Will SdpIui =
a fascist stronghold; then word will
come that the rebels have retaken it.
And so it goes. Apparently the revo-
luton just now has for its goal the
conquest of Madrid, the capital city,
and rebel armies from the north and
the south seem to be converging on
that city. That it is not immune
from danger is evidenced by the fact
that steps we're being taken early
this week to evacuate Americans and
other foreigners from Madrid. Usu-
ally such measures are not considered
unless situation has become particu-
larly dangerous.
In regard to the loss of human lives
so far occasioned by the revolution,
no reliable statistics are available.
The latest tentative figures are to the
effect that there have been 10000
casualties, but as to what percentage
of this number, assuming it is correct,
are actual killings, there is no infOr-
nation. 1t may, however, be pre-
sumed that the largest number of