ITALY, THE EMULATOR

Dominion, Volume 32, Issue 156, 28 March 1939, Page 8

ITALY, THE EMULATOR

Immediately after Germany’s annexation of the Czech areas of Czechoslovakia, it was reported that Signor Mussolini intended on March 26 to announce Italy’s territorial claims. This he has done, and in a manner calculated to heighten French antagonism, as well as to increase the prevailing disquiet in Europe. It will be noted, however, that in his speech to 100,000 Blackshirts who gathered on Sunday in the Forum in Rome, the Duce was careful to burn no boats behind him. Before assessing the meaning of Sunday’s speech, it is useful to recall briefly the events which ledrnp to it. For some little time after the September crisis Italian diplomacy co-operated busily with Germany in the first rearrangement of Eastern European boundaries to Herr Hitler’s liking. That done, Signor Mussolini made his first exploratory move on Italy’s behalf by permitting a sudden anti-French demonstration in the Chamber of Deputies on December 1. A speech by Count Ciano declaring the nation’s intention of safeguarding the interests of all Italians was punctuated by cries of, “Tunis —Nice —Corsica!” French reaction to this incident was immediate and discouraging. Spontaneous displays of loyalty were witnessed in the French colonial centres, and in Paris the Daladier Government — replying just as indirectly as Signor Mussolini had inquired—pledged itself to ask for nothing and to give nothing. To challenge that pledge by making forthright territorial demands on France would lead Italy into a dangerous impasse, with war as the only alternative to humiliation in the highly likely event of France refusing any sort of concession. This Signor Mussolini seems to have recognized. Instead of producing actual demands, he has harked back to the Italian Government’s Note to France on December 17, advising that Italy considered the Tunisia Agreement, signed by the two countries in January, 1935, as being null and void. “Italy,” he said, “wants the world to know that the Italian Note . . . defined her claims against France as Tunisia, Jibuti and the Suez Canal.” In a speech made three days previously—the third public utterance in the 30 years of his reign—King Victor Emmanuel anticipated the Duce and talked about the Note to France as containing Italy’s “demands.” An official denial from Paris was immediately forthcoming, and, as no effort was made by Signor Mussolini on Sunday to press the point, it may be taken that Italy is content to acquaint her neighbours of her ambitions, and, for the time being, to let it go at that. It would seem that whatever is being planned on Italy’s behalf by the Rome-Berlin axis, the time for it is not yet believed to be ripe. The war in Spain is not yet at an end, and a< large number of Italian troops are still engaged under General Franco. Germany is preoccupied in north-eastern Europe, and may not be prepared to lend Italy the support she would undoubtedly need in presenting her case with any weight. So, once again, the Italian claims ride uncomfortably across the foreground of European affairs, and on the heels of a bloodless German victory. France, Britain and Egypt are invited to reconsider their monopoly of Suez Canal control, and the Italian and native inhabitants of Tunisia and Jibuti, that important outpost port at the mouth of the Red Sea, are asked to remember that the self-styled Protector of Islam is preparing to extend his sphere of influence in North Africa. At the same time, covert references to the Adriatic no doubt are intended to persuade Yugoslavia and Albania that it is desirable to maintain amenable relations. Britain and France can but stand firm and profit by the situation to the extent of continuing their respective defence programmes with unabated zeal, for more than ever is strength their best guardian of peace. ,The next move is again Italy’s.