STRONG REACTION IN US.

Press, Volume LXXIV, Issue 22516, 26 September 1938, Page 12

STRONG REACTION IN US.

America Blamed For i Crisis DECLARATION BY SENATOR

Growing Desire For

Isolation

(UNITED PRESS ASSOCIATION—COPYRIGHT.)

(Received September 26, 2.30 a.m.)

WASHINGTON, September 25

The announcement that the Government had instructed its Minister at Prague to urge Americans to leave Czechoslovakia immediately brought a strong reaction. It was the first official disclosure that the Administration was pessimistic of a peaceful solution. There are now more than 100,000 American nationals in Europe, and the news that there is anxiety for the 5190 in Czechoslovakia has brought home to Americans, more than the reports from Europe, the gravity of the crisis. However, much as the country may reverberate privately with expressions of violent dislike for Herr Hitler's course, and critical as it may be ot the sweeping British and French concessions, the last week's events have produced a resurgence in official quarters towards isolation. This probably is only a superficial trend, and if war breaks out, doubtless American sentiment and antipathies, which have been fortified in the last fortnight, will drive the United States towards taking sides in some affirmative fashion. , • . ' Officially the United States is still standing aloof, yet on the theory that where there is smoke there is fire a hint of a crystallising of attitude is contained in the increasing crescendo of isolationist protest r.gainst interfering in any way. The Hearst press brought alx its artillery to bear to-day, featuring an editorial by Mr Hearst himself, urging America to keep out. MrHearst told millions of readers that Mr Chamberlain was playing in politics which are "material, selfish, and without respect for treaties, debts, or other obligations of honour." . ... „ Drily some fresh public figure speaks out favouring American action. To-night it was Senator W. H Kine (Utah), who charged the Unite' 1 States with being responsible for the crisis because it refused to ioin the League of Nations. Mr King after conferring with the Secretary of State (Mr Cordeh Hull) said he would welcome "another declaration by the State Department that the United States, as a party to the Kellogg-Briand Pact, cannot regard complacently the treaty s violation." . , Senator Curtis Glass, chairman of thp Senate Appropriations Committee", declared to-day that European developments convinced him that the United States must have increased naval appropriations, which he had hitherto opposed. Mr Roosevelt, who is nursing a cold, remains silent. The combined American Slovak societies, representing 125,000 former Slovaks, appealed to Mr Hull morally to support Czechoslovakia, expressing the opinion that Herr Hitler would back down if the democracies lined up against him. On his return from Europe, Mr Thonias Mann, the winner of the Nobel Prize for literature, declared that a war against the Nazis would liberate millions of Germans, who were hoping for freedom. Mr Mann is becoming a naturalised American.

GERMAN THANKS TO BRITAIN FUHRER'S MESSAGE '■ TO MR CHAMBERLAIN (BRITISH OFWCIAL WIREI.BSI.) RUGBY, September 24. When Mr Chamberlain visited Herr Hitler to say good-bye, the Fuhrer expressed to the British Prime Minister and the British Government on this occasion his sincere thanks and those of the German people for their efforts to brvag about a peaceable solution of the SuI deten question.

READY TO HELP IN EMERGENCY BOY SCOUT MOVEMENT'S OFFER (FSESS iSiOCIi.TIO* TELIORAM.) WELLINGTON, September 24. In the event of war, earthquake, or other national emergency. 12,500 boy scouts, trained and organised, may be at the disposal of the New Zealand civil authorities. At yesterday's Dominion conference of leaders of the Boy Scout Association Sir Percy Sargood said that with the world in its present condition New Zealand was faced with the danger of attacks of all sorts. Could not the boy scouts assist the civil authorities? Of* course it was against their creed to help in any military way. "I would like to move that it be a request to the incoming committee that it investigate the question of instituting some national activity which the association might embark upon and which would focus public attention and interest upon the movement," he said, "It is suggested that such an activity might include a defensive organisation for dealing with air raids, v»hich might include warning the public, fire fighting, casualty rescue and aid, and gas-mask drill.'V The Dominion Chief Commissioner (Mr H. Christie) said that in the last few weeks the Dominion scout headquarters had been in touch with the Government to ascertain what part the movement could play in the event of an outbreak of war. "We did not wait for disaster to overtake us. We didn't wait to be approached," he said. "We went along voluntarily and at once, knowing it was what the scouts themselves would have wished.",