Evening star., 1939-07-18
They Mean Business

As midsummer approaches, aug
menting the widespread fear that
the axis powers plan then-in Au-
gust, or perhaps not until September
an aggressive move that may be
provocative of war, Great Britain
and France are emitting no opportu-
nifty either to speed up their arma-
ments or to register their readiness
to use them. Chamberlain and
Daladier have decided that to show
Hitler and Mussolini that the democ-
racies mean business is the most eff
fective club for peace that can now be
welded. Dictatorships have respect
for little except force. "Appease-
ment" only whets their appetite for
domination by intimidation.
Last weeks spectacular twelve
hundred-mile flight of two hundred
British bombing planes over France
was an immensely successful ma
neuver as tar as its. moral effect on
Germany was concerned, This week
one hundred French planes are to
raid" England in a counter demon
Stration Of democratic air power.
Meantime, the London and Paris gov
ernments, co-ordinating their naval
and military forces against the
eventuality Of European war, are
extending general staff talks to two
of the Entente Cordiale's allies
Poland and Turkey. The new in
spector general of Britains overseas
forces, Major General Sir Edmund
Ironside. is due in Warsaw today for
discussions with the Polish authori-
ties A unified command over British,
French and Polish forces in wartime
is one of the subjects General IRON
side desires to take up at Warsaw
the system adopted by the allies in
the latter stage of the World War and
under which Marshal Foch, as gen.
eralissimo, finally organized victory
While staff negotiations proceed at
Warsaw, General Charles Huntziger,
commander of the French army in
Syria, will be at Ankara, negotiating,
together with a British mission, for
unified Franco Turkish British mill
tary effort in the event of European
conflict. The French, too, are shortly
dispatching General Gamelin, COM
mander-in-c n-chief of all Frances fight
ing forces, to Warsaw for perfection
of Franco-Polish operations in an
emergency.
In the Yankee vernacular, this is
the stuff to give 'em-the Nazis, the
Fascists and any or all Of their satel-
lites who are ready to risk war for
the sake of gaining "lebensraum"
diving space for the axis powers. 1t
would be venturesome to conclude
that a mere showing of democratic
teeth or exhibition of the will to use
them will suffice to kill Hitler's will
to war. He is reported still to be
under the delusion that another
Munich is possible. That the Fuehrer
remains under strong domestic pres
sure to maintain the myth of Nazi
invincibility by venturing another
threat to peace-in Poland, in Ru-
mania or elsewhere-appears unde-
niable. But it is equally undeniable
that the democracies are taking the
practical steps that are best de-
signed to cool war ardor in Berlin
and Rome and impress them with the
foolhardiness of a war gamble at this
time.
If the Congress of the United
States, abandoning parish pump poll
tics, were, without further procrasti-
nation, to repeal the embargo on
arms, this country would throw into
the scales of peace weight COM
mensurate with the preparedness
measures which the non-aggressor
European powers are now taking.
The current situation lover there"
UiVnc tho I1oitoI Ctotoc q uo1dop IN.