Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1940-11-15
Is Spain Being Appeosed?
Move to Send Food to Madrid Declored
Strange Way to Recognize UnfriendIiness

erwise helps the axis down Britain?
What then? For these people be.
lieve that Gen. Franco Is really
committed to join the axis and will
openly show his colors at the mo-
ment Fuehrer Adolf Hitler and
Premier Benito Mussolini decide
that he shall.
Meanwhile, Spain is on the point
Of being rewarded for threatening
to become an open enemy Of our
friend, Great Britain.
Changing Name Didn't Help.
Or take the case Of Siam. When
I was in Bangkok in 1888, foreign
diplomats were insisting that Siam
was leaning toward Japan and was
busy working up q series Of terri
torial claims on its neighbors.
Changing the name Of the country
to Thailand didn't change this fact.
Yet Thailand was allowed to order
from the United States big batch
of warplaneS. And except for . last
batch OF 10 or is planes they were
delivered, though today Thailand
has publicly proclaimed its designs
on French Indo-China and its
friendship for a predatory Japan.
The last few planes were stopped
at the Philippines and put ashore.
1t was then announced that they
would be given to China. But. here
again, Jealous American ofncials got
busy. The planes have not been
given to China yet.
China, unlike Spain and Thailand,
has been consistently the friend OF
the United States. China has had
a fair amount Of help from this
country. 1t has been allowed to
purchase, over three years, $50 air
planes, most of them for training
purposes. But in the first year Of
the war, China lost 800 planes and
pilots.
Allowed China 81, ZOO, 900.
China has. moreover, been allowed
to borrow $70,O0o.0oo. Getting the
last $25 ,0O0, 900 took the Chinese
statesman. T. v. Soong, about three
months and it was like pulling a
tooth.
With 300 to 500 warplanes,
Chang Kai-sheks armies could
take the offensive. They could not
conquer the japanese. but they
could-it is believed-compel the
japanese hastily to send back into
China those troops they have re-
| Gently been pulling out OF that coun-
try for the purpose Of invading In
do-China, the Dutch East Indies, or
some British possession. A couple
of hundred million dollars, twice
the sum the State Department was
SO blithely ready to give Franco
Spain, would stabilize the Chinese
currency, keep the country consoli-
dated around Chang Kai-shek and
fortify the guerrilla warfare behind
the lines that is the sharpest thorn
in the Japanese flesh.
All this is universally admitted
Everybody in Washington is for
helping China-the President, the
cabinet, the departments. so is
Wendell L. Willkie, so are the Amer
lean people. But when 1t comes to
giving T. v. Soong the planes and
the money that China urgently
needs, one excuse for postponement
follows another. ..
After all, these people seem to
think. China is already on our side.
How Long viii It Last?
The result is that more and more
real friends of China In this city
are wondering just how long Chang
Kai-shek Is going to stand for it.
II. as reported. Hitler has just Sc
cured from Soviet Premier Foreign
Minister Viacheslav M. Moloton the
promise Of free hand for Japan in
the Far East, the long-expected
Japanese thrust is likely to come
suddenly.
Certain American precautions are
already being taken against just
such an emergency. But China,
far more than Russia. is in . posi-