"LORD PROTECTOR"

Evening Post, Volume CXXIII, Issue CXXIII, 10 April 1937, Page 11

"LORD PROTECTOR"

4SEW TITLE FOR STALIN ?

FORECAST FOR NOVEMBER

LONDON, April 2

"Stalin has, decided;, that: his clamation as- Lord Protector of Soviet Russia shall coincide with the: twentieth anniversary of the Revolution, which will be; celebrated in November," writes M.. Yves Delbos, French Foreign Minister", in the Paris "Matin." y. ■ :

The centralisation of administrative power in Moscow, he adds, has been so solidly established- that political commissaries sent, into the federal republics have been recalled. Among the November, reforms will be the use of the ballot in Communist Party elections, instead of a vote by acclamation; • ■ . ■

Chosen units of all arms will be given a privileged 'Status. The old Imperial Guard" will be revived in a new form. Tartar cavalry from the Crimea, recalling that of the- days of the Empire, will join Stalin's personal guard, and the old military position of the Cossacks will be revived.

Twenty thousand citizens will receive Soviet decorations—the Orders of Lenin, the Red Star, the Red Flag, the Red Flag of Labour, or.the Signal Of Honour, while 100,000 will receive titles, "Hero of Toil," "Notable Citizen," or "Herb of the Soviet."

An amnesty, will be given but it is unlikely that persons imprisoned for sabotage or Trotsky supporters will benefit., . ■ • '■ ■■

"All the measures," writes M. Delbos, "tend to one'end—the placing of the personal power of Stalin on an inaccessible height and creating therefore an enlarged basis no. longer resting only on the Communist Party.

"Among the titles from which Stalin will be asked to choose are 'Chief of the Peoples' and 'Saviour of the Soviet Fatherland.'"