Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1939-08-30
FutefuI Decision

Before today has passed into his
tory, in~the words of Premier Da-
Ladder early this morning, I'VE will
know where we stand" He was re-
ferring to Chancellor Hitler's answer
to the British formula for preventing
war over Poland. That fateful COM
munication reached the British gov
eminent late last night. The cabinet
was called into early session this
forenoon to study what Prime Min
lister Chamberlain in Parliament yes
terday indicated might turn "the
precarious balance" between peace
and war
While the world waits with mount
ing anxiety for these developments,
authoritative word comes from Ber-
lin that Hitler has left the way open
for further negotiation. Nothing in
his newest message to Britain is said
to aggravate the possibility of pre-
cipitate action by the vast and COM
pletely modified German war ma
chine. Louis P. Lochner, the uncom-
monty well-informed Berlin CORE
spondent of the Associated Press,
reports that from the Nazi viewpoint
the answer to the British is CON
ciliatory and far-reaching'' and that
the prevailing opinion in the Will
helmstrasse now is that the Reich
has everything to gain by continued
diplomatic discussion of the Polish
controversy
All of which suggests, in the
famous German idiom, that events
of the past three days are giving
Hitler furchtbar zu denken ("furi-
ously to think"). Those events have
produced a definite and telltale i'm
preston upon government and
people In Germany hitherto imbued
with the idea that their Fuehrer has
only to put on Jove-like frown and
rattle his mighty saber to compel ma
tions to cringe and concede. The
meat on which the Reich was fed,
successfully in Austria and Czecho-
Slovakia, encouraged Hitler's sub
jects to believe in the relationships
omnipotence abroad as well as at
home.
But it is different Europe which
Germany now faces. 1t confronts,
first of all, Great Britain whose
symbol, as distinguished from Mu-
Mich, is not a collapsible umbrella
but rock of Gibraltar-a Britain
described in the House of Commons
Tuesday by the Prime Minister
himself as holding fast to the lines
we have laid down.; Britain which
has not moved "a jot" from the
determination to stand by Poland,
and, finally, Britain ready
for any eventuality" on land, on sea
and in the air. Germany confronts,
too, a France as determined and as
prepared as the ally across the Chan
hel to say to the Nazi Reich, as the
French said to its predecessor at
Verdun: "They shall not pass"
These afflrmations and evidences
of democratic readiness and resolu-
ton to resist the totalitarian threat
do not exhaust the "imponderables"
that are giving Hitler "furiously to
think" Mr.. Chamberlain in a calm
but highly significant passage of his
address to the Commons observed
that "at any rate, we have not had
to begin here in Britain by issuing
rationing cards." 1t was not long
after that reference to the drastic
conservation measures to which Ger
many already has resorted that the
Prime Minister called attention to
the British Navy's advanced state
Of preparedness" AS Der Fuehrer
contemplates the revelation that, by
"a prearranged plan," the British
fleet is ready to move to war sta
tions," and then emissions the food
rations on which the German people
are now subsisting-in the presence
of these twin conditions Hitler's
furious thinking" must be dwelling
primarily on the iron ring which
British sea power drew around Ger
many in 1918. He knows that,
despite U-boat warfare, it was in the
Rst analysis the British blockade
which brought the Hohenzollern en-
Dire to its knees.
Yet one more restraining influence
must be giving Berlin pause-the I'M
mistakable reluctance of Mussolini
to risk the destruction of the Italian
Empire" by plunging it into hope
less conflict with Anglo-French sea
power. Italian preparations for war
continue, but they are accompanied
by no enthusiasm for a war which is
plotted mainly in the interests of
the dominant axis partner.
MIR. Chamberlain holds out an
olive branch which Hitler may grasp
as face-saving solution of his
plight. The Prime Minister declares
that if German-Polish differences
can be bloodlessly composed, such a
settlement might in turn lead on to
wider agreement, which would accrue