Evening star., 1938-09-13
No War-Now.

Europe and the world can breathe
more freely today. Hitler has let off his
steam. but he has not declared war on
Czechoslovakia, or even indicated that
he plans it within the measurable future
That Great Britains views, fully con-
veyed in the proper quarter as the for
elgn Office at London quietly announced
on the eve Of the Nurnberg outburst.
struck home in that quarter there can
hardly be any doubt That they were
also OF directness sufficient to serve
their peace-keeping purpose is no less
manifest. Der Fuehrer saw the light,
and was guided by it.
While the specter of war is thus ban
ished for the time being, the Nazi
chieftain gives no warrant for believing
1t is definitely thing of the past. His
fiery address was anything but a pacific
utterance. 1t bristled with belligerency
and defiance from first to last. Some
may even read in the revelation that the
Reich's vast new watch on the Rhine"
the Seigfried line, on which, Hitler
stressed, work has progressed for two
years and on which 100000 conscripted
laborers are now engaged, will be fin-
1shed before snow flies, as yelled warn
ing that winter may see Germany ready
to fight for her "criminally tortured
Sudeten brethren"
Hitler left President Benes and the
Czechs in no doubt that their wrongs"
must be righted, and that the Nazis in
tend to see that their kind of a settle
ment is reached. The Chancellor hardly
improved the chances for an adjustment
through further Czechoslovak conces-
sions by his unbridled attack on the
Prague government. He accused DR..
Benes of calculated falsehood and hy-
pocrisy in his dealings both with the
Sudetens and with the British and
French. Hitler was particularly savage
in his references to the May crisis, dur
ing which the Czechs modified on such
scale that German plans to stage an
other Austrian coup were summarily
abandoned. The Chancellor clearly
chaf1ng under that humiliation, branded
as "conscienceless lies" the allegations
that the Czechs acted TO offset German
mobilization. Not German soldier, he
alleged, was moved on that occasion.
The Nurnberg Illumination will doubt
less accomplish its object-to convince
the German people that they are i'm
pervious to attack, and that "a united
armed German Nation stands ready to
wipe out Sudeten 'oppression,' which
will mot be tolerated forever" Der
Fuehrer did not omit the opportunity to
thrust at both the British and the Jews.
Hitler rejects a plebscite to determine
their national destiny on the ground that
1t would not be honestly conducted by
Czechoslovakia. Apart from any right
on Germanys part to demand such
referendum from another sovereign
state, it never seemed likely that Prague
would grant it. for it could only mean
handing over the German provinces to
the Reich on silver platter.
This seems to assure an indefinite
season of bluff, bluster and bombast
from Berlin. Hitler needs more Austrias
to sustain the myth of Nazi irresistibility.
He would prefer to achieve them by in
timidation rather than by war. But the
world plainly must reckon with the pos
sibility that if moral suasion, like mass
mobilizations and defiant speeches, does
not bring home the bacon, a desperate
regime may decide that the iron fist
just brandished at Nurnberg must do its
stuff. For the moment 1t is back in its
glove. That is something.