Detroit evening times., 1945-04-06
BEHIND
The NEWS
BY Paul
MaIIon

WASHINGTON, April 5-The
W diplomatic news is warm
ing up 10 the pitch of pressure
politics before the war.
The British press started
few days back 10 murmur that
the British Foreign Minister
Anthony Eden might not come
10 San Francisco either. At the
some time the Russian dis
patches told of the reception
given Mrs. Churchill by them in
Moscow.
These two public events were
read with more significance than
the public may have attached 10
them, by those who have heard
inside the Senate for some
weeks that the British were in
clining more and more TO the
Russian viewpoint.
The trip of Bernard BaruCh
10 London, as a special preSiden-
tial emiSSary on some undis-
closed mission, has inspired new
talk that Mr. Roosevelt is trying
10 draw the British back into
line.
THIS Seething inner steam has
Il prompted Mrs. Roosevelt
who has been everywhere but
Moscow, 10 announce The San
Francisco conference should 60
forward anyway, and there is no
cause for alarm She said
what all official Washington is
trying with considerable diff
Guilty 10 reflect without saying.
But the plain fact behind the
matter ls-that the whole preten-
tiouS concept of our idealism
for postwar continues to break
up, knick by knick, upon the
rocks of solid earth.
These recent international de-
-VelepmentS are leading us into
the same old pressure game, and
we look rather weak at IL. Yet
we thought we held all the big
chipS-food and money.
We financed the war and are
practically proposing to finance
the peace. Everyone should be
coming te-HS,- yet we do not
seem 10 be getting our way in
anything. We are holding
party al which the honor guests
are sending regrets.
WHAT Russia is up to at any
w time is always a censored
guess. Complete bafflement is
an essential quality of her di-
pfomacy Behind her unco-oper-
ative play in this instance may
be her demand for $4,000, ,000.-
900 of postwar credit which the
administration has not yet ac-
cepted, if not many other
things. But essentially behind it
is the strength of her position.
Possession is nine-tenRhs OF
any law anywhere and a glance
at any war map shows the
world what she has in Europe.
Hers are blue chips.
The British oStensibly are in
a weak position, but they are
always winning from weak po-
SitionS. They are accustomed
from long experience TO follow
a balance of power policy, play
ing one side against another
and back again. In fact, this is
almost as firmly established as
a right course in the British
mind. as our own Monroe Doc
trine. She has no chips but she
plays what she has with great
skill.
WHAT they both knew was
w that Mr.. Roosevelt wanted
a certain kind of world peace
and they also knew they could
make him pay 10 get il. They
have both played him for some
years against his peace hopes
and lately they have done it
with increasing audacity.
A war propaganda was built
up in this country -tbut not in
theirS) from which they knew
he could not easily withdraw.
the type of world cooperation
he foStered and favored through
the international organizations.
They trapped him in his own
propaganda
Neither the British nor Rus
slams built up any four freedoms
hopes at home, both fighting the
war basically on the proposition
of saving themselves.
/ report this without any crit
ical intent. as il is now too late
for criticism. although if criti-
ciSm had been allowed to run A
little more freely in the past Mr..
Roosevelt would not be in the
defective technical position he
now occupies in dealing with
Churchill and Stain.
OFFTCIALDOM may we'll be
" right in saying there is no
particular new cause for
alarm" There is no more
cause than there was a month,
a year or two years ago. except
among those who deluded them
selves about the facts Of life
from the beginning. LRead this
column of Oct. ). 1913, for a
sight of the game then already
in progress and now coming into