Evening star., 1941-03-17
Czechs Asking U. 5.
For Full Recognition
Of Regime in London
Move Would Be Helpful
To Britain in Three
Ways, They Believe
BY EDGAR ANSEL MOWRER,

Chicaso Daily News Foreign Correspondent.
-Slovakia is asking the
American administration to extend
full recognition to the Czecho-
Slovak goyernment-in-eXi of Pres
ident Eduard Benes in London.
Through the person of Minister
Col. Vladimir Hurban, whom the
American State Department has
always treated as the representative
of fully recognized and sovereign
state, the Czechs yesterday, it is
believed, submitted to Secretary of
State Hull the more cogent reasons
why the recognition, never with
drawn from Czecho- -Slovakia in the
abstract, should row be extended
to DR. Benes and his associates in
London.
The Czechs like to quote from the
eminent American professor of in
ternational law Quincy Wright of
the University of Chicago. They
argue that there is good reason for
claiming that since the resignation
of Pre- sident Benes was obtained
under threats, it really comes under
.the Stimson doctrine of non-recog-
milton of changes obtained by force
Nazis Make Propaganda.
They plead that the American
Government never really recog-
nized the Hacha government that
followed and that in its publicized
correspondence the State Depart
ment seemed to take no stock of
any other government. They then
reach the conclusion that, in law,
DR.. BeneS has never ceased to be
the only legal President of Czecho-
Slovakia and that he and his COL
laborators should be recognized by
the United States, not only as the
provisional government Of the con-
quered state, but as the regular"
and only existing government.
The Germans, Col. Hurban says,
have been using American failure
to recognize the BeneS government
for propaganda to convince the
Czechs that, unlike the Poles, the
Scandinavians, the Belgians and
the Dutch, they have been de
serted" by their American friends.
Since this Is obviously not the in
tention of the American Govern
ment, the conclusion is obvious.
Col. Hurban declined to comment
on the story of the memorandum to
Secretary Hull. Yet it Is known
that, at least until recently, the
State Department, though more
than friendly to the Czech cause,
has seen no reason to abandon its
present attitude of what might be
called abstract" recognition of the
Czech state, in favor of something
more concrete. Pressed by this
writer to explain their reluctance,
certain State Department officials
have simply answered that it would
"serve no useful purpose"
Policy Is "An Help"
mo useful purpose" in this case,
can only mean mo use in helping to
win the war;" since the American
policy has been publicly established
as all help to Great Britain short
OF armed participation in the con-
flict.
If, therefore, the Czechs here show
that recognition of the Benes group
as the legitimate government of
the Czecho-Slovak republic would
be helpful, even in a small way, in
obtaining a British victory, then it
follows that the State Department
should logically change its views.
Czechs here and in London see
at least three concrete ways in
which such recognition would be
helpful to Britain:
l. 1t would fortify the position of
the Benes government in London,
thereby unifying the Czecho-Slovaks
around the only group that Is at
present in a position to lead the
nation back to liberty.
2. 1t would annoy the Germans
and cut under the base of their
propaganda among the Czechs to
give up the struggle against Ger
man rule.
3. 1t might, in the near future,
greatly strengthen actual armed in
surrection and sabotage against the
German armed forces within Czecho-
Slovakia. The Czecho-Slovaks are
past masters at passive resistance
and are already opposing their mas
ters.
Hatred of Invaders.
But all over the vast area con-
uuered by the Nazis there glows a
holy hatred of the invaders that |
asks only a favorable occasion to |
burst forth as a devouring flame. |
Such an occaSion-many feel-will
inevitably arise in such places as
Poland and Czecho-Slovakia if and
when the Germans start to wobble
under the first defeats.
The CZechs claim that their peo-
pie have for the United States a |
more than usual respect and affec- |
ton. They claim that American |
recognition of the Benes govern |
ment would be accepted by the en-
tire Czecho-Slovak population as a
pledge that Germans will not be
permitted to win the war, and that |
reinforced by such knowledge even
the waverers among the Czechs will
take heart, and at the appropriate
moment pass from passive resist
ance to active assault upon the Ger
mans and all their works.
This being the case they just can
not understand why the Americans,
who did more than any other people
to revive Czecho-Slovakia in 1917,
should now withhold their recogni-
ton longer from the only conceiv-
able Czecho-Slovak government in
exile, that of DR.. Benes and his
friends in London.