“AN ENCOURAGING INDICATION.”

Wairarapa Times-Age, 10 April 1941, Page 4

“AN ENCOURAGING INDICATION.”

yyiHLE it has been hailed throughout the British Press as highly important, the conclusion of the Soviet-Yugoslavian Pact has drawn from the American Secretary of State, Mr Cordell Hull, the observation that it is “an encouraging indication of the increasing number of nations that are acutely aware of the nature of the movement to conquer peoples by force.” Bearing in mind Russia’s comparatively recent action in Poland and the Bailie States, the encouragement of which Mr Hull lias spoken may seem to be something less than completely justified. It is rather easier, however, to accept, the belief credited to him by the “New York Times” and other commentators that Russian policy is changing as a result of the German thrust-into the Balkans.

There is little enough prospect of’ the Soviet giving any tangible help, at the present stage of crisis, to the nations large and small that are bearing the brunt of the struggle to make an end of Nazi aggression, but it is something to the good that even the pretence of friendship between the Soviet and Nazi dictatorships has largely faded away. Obviously dangerous possibilities were raised by the Soviet-Nazi partnership in the early stages of tin' war. Events like the partition of Boland and the subsequent division of spoils in the Baltic regions most certainly did not make for the creation of a better international order.

Au ultimate understanding' between the democracies and Russia appears to be one very important condition of future peace and international order, and if is therefore something to the good that events are more or less forcing the Soviet, as a. writer in the “Manchester Guardian” observed not long ago, “into a virtual coalition with Britain and the United States.” It is perhaps over-optimistic to describe the present relationship of. the Soviet with the English-speaking nations as even a virtual coalition, bill there is no doubt that Russia has excellent reasons of self-ini erest and prudence for drawing away from Nazi Germany—reasons emphasised by the latest turn of events in the Balkans.

Tn the opening stages of the war. Hie Soviet pursued with some success a policy in which non-belligerency went hand in hand with a readiness to gather in any profits and advantages that came within reach. Since the Finnish adventure, however, the Russian experience has been less happy. The Nazi occupation of'Norway and Denmark, to say the least, cannot have given pleasure to M. Stalin and his colleagues and the grip Germany has since fastened on Hungary, Rumania and Bulgaria. and now on Yugoslavia, must he even less Io their taste.

On the whole, in its non-belligerent contest with the Nazis, the Soviet has met with scant success. While they may still be entertaining hopes of an exhaustion of both sides in the war, the Soviet dictators, exercising norma) common sense and foresight, cannot afford to be content with the present state of affairs in tile Balkans or the threat that il involves to the Turkish Straits. Neither can they overlook the possibility that Nazi Germany may presently extend her aggression Io the Ukraine and perhaps other Russian territories. Caution is still the keynote of Soviet policy, but that Russia finds herself placed of necessity increasingly in opposition to the Nazis seems io lie beyond all question.