Evening star., 1939-05-28
Ray Of Hope Seen
That Europe Will
Escape Conflict
Acquisition by Have Nots'
May Make Warfare
Too Greet q Huzord
By WALTER DURANTY.

Dy w AA XIV ~
PARIS, May ~ (N.A.N.A0.-After
4 rapid but comprehensive trip
through Eastern Europe and the
Balkans, this correspondent finds it
harder than ever to draw any con-
clusions save that no one apparently
wants war and no one is certainly
willing to bet more than even money
that war does not come this year.
If war comes, this writer ventures
to assert that it will be more through
human folly, credulity and greed
than through any nefarious plans
of.aggression or encirclement.
Wrongs, hates and rivalries, both
old and new, burn white-hot, and
the amazing influence of the radio,
which is still too novel to be fully
realized, has been recklessly abused
Everywhere nerves are so strained
that there is a growing and fatal
tendency OF say, Let's have it and
get it over" or one hears the grim,
mer German phrase, Better an end
with terror than terror without
end"
First Ray Of Hope.
I find rather surprisingly, after
20 years experience of Moscows S
economic materialism. that racial
national, military and political issues
seem more important nowadays than
economic considerations. was slow
to believe this, but am almost sure
that it is true, and it may even help
to explain the elimination in Russia
itself of the "old Bolsheviks," Marx
ian ideologists who clung to their
hidebound convictions in a world
where change was Allah and ma
tionalism his prophet.
In sense, it is a conflict between
the have nots," or the would
haves," and the "haves," but with
this great difference: In the last
six months the have nots" have
got quite a lot and the "have"
have stiffened their resistance
Which provides the first ray of hope
In the dark scene-that the oppos-
Ing forces are being crystallized into
groups of sufficient equality and
with sufficient material and moral
gains on the have not" side for
war to become a hazard too ter
rible to be contemplated.
AS matters stand today, an anti
aggression front is being slowly and
fumblingly created. The chief diff
flculty in forming it arises from
geography. as many of the points
where aggression threatens are be-
yond Germany's Siegfried defense
line, whose reduction the Franco
British general staffs regard with
the same qualms as the Germans
view similar operation against
Frances Maginot line. Incidentally
this is another ray of hope, as
these terrific Notifications have a
salutary cooling effect on the mill
tary hot-heads.
Russia Indispensable.
The geographic factor, which is
thus dominant, not only regarding
1dil1ls, UuG dlSO Ill tIle BLACK Oed
has tended more and more to make
Soviet Russia an indispensable unit
in the anti-aggression front, to the
holy horror of the Right Hon. Mr..
Chamberlain, who for a long time
did not think that even the misery
of Czecho-S -Slovakia or of Poland
could justify so strange a bedfellow
as Comrade Stain. Mr.. Chamber
lain for many days conducted his
obstruction of an Anglo-Russian
agreement, which now has improved
chances of being effected, with
characteristic acumen."
The Kremlins terms have been
clear and unchanged from the out
set, but the Conservative London
press has consistently assured its
readers that successful end to the
negotiations is "just around the
corner" so that, if Mr.. Chamberlain
should later on decide to refuse to
swallow the Russian pill, most Eng
hshmen will believe that he has
done his best to reach an agreement
which has been baked by Soviet
unreasonableness or last-minute
French interference.