1936-09-14 — Page 20

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THE HONGKONG TELEGRAPH. MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 14, 1936.

• MEN AND THINGS ABROAD

Where Slav and Teuton Meet

ROM the Austrian border to the Polish, roughly, round three sidos of a square, there runs for 600 mlies or so one of the most anxious frontiers in Europe.

Inside the square is democratio Czechoslovakia; outside is Nazi Germany. From Prague, the capital, to the German border is only some fifty miles.

Historically, this frontier line divided the "Crown-lands "'of the Habsburgs from tho terri- tories of Bavarla and Saxony and Prussia. From 1871 to 1919. It was the boundary between the German and Austro-Hungarian Empires.

Then, by the Peace Trenties, Czechoslovakia was created: the threa Austrian provinces of Bohemia, Moravia and Silesia, in which the Czechs were the majority, the Slovak districts of Northern Hungary, and away to the East another bit of Austria, In which the people are Russian.

O

F the 14.700,000 citi- seny of the Czechoslovak Re- puhltr. 7,700,000 are Czechs, 3.000.000 Slovaks, 3,200,000 Germans, 700,000 Hungarlaus, 600,000 Russlans, 80,000 Polcs, and 200,000 Jews.

And of the 3.200,000 Germans (Sudeten-Deutschen, they call themselves, from the Sudete Montalus), the big majority five in the districts by the Derman border. There are, pro- portionately, just about as many Germans in Czechoslovakia as French-Swiss In Switzerland. They inhabit an area nearly the alce of Belgium.

It, is the biggest national minority in any European State. And its exatones is a compil- caling factor in the situation.

These S.&cte-Germans of Czechoslovakeln were, of course, before the Peace, not "Ger-

by W.N

EWER

mans," but "Austrians." When the treaties were made they claimed that they, as well as the Czechs, had the right to "self- determination," asked to be united with "German Austria."

But the treaty-makers rejected their claims. On historical, econo- mic and strategic grounds it was decided that the German districts must be part and parcel of the new Czechoslovak State. Moreover,

there was no sharp language- frontier. In the most German areas there is a Czech aiinority; there are, in other places, German "Islanda" entirely surrounded by Czecha.

Since then they have been a people with a grievanco. At the least, they said, they should have been treated on a footing of com- plete equality with the Czechs: as the French-Swiss in Switzerland.

But, they complained, the State was, in fact as well as name, a Czechoslovak Republic, Czech and Slovak were its official languages. but not German. In the army, In the Civil flervice, marked pre- ference was given to Czechs.

ព 45

They were, they said, treated not in any way as equal partners, but haif-allen minority: with an a

Indeed rights

minority guaranteed them by the treaties: but not with the full equality to which their numbers and their

importance economic them.

COMPLA

entitled

VOMPLAINTS have

not been without substance. The Geriauna of Czechoslovakia have never been treated as the Swiss French. And there have been dis- erimitations. In the Post Once, For example, only 12.54 per cent. of the employees are Geriaus

"

G E R

A N Y

DENLEIN

STIESTA UPPER

Teschen

BOHEMIA

MORAV

USTRIA

SLOVAKIA

Bratislava

"Is his Party the advance guard of an aggressive Nazism?"

on the railways only 12 per cent. In the whole Slate service, the Germans claim, they have nearly 50,000 lower posts than their numbers warrant,

For seven years all the German parties were in opposition. Then Svehla promised that the Germans should be treated s "'equals among equals." The German Agrarians and Social Democrats entered the Government. A new ern seemed opening.

But progress to equality, though real, was slow: and there came the industrial depression, hitting Czechoslovakia vory hard. hitting the highly industrialced German districts hardest of all.

Discontent grew again, with new complaint of economic discrimina- tion piled on the old Much of it. --perhaps most of it--was unjus- tified. "Czech supremacy" took the blame for the effesta of the world slump. German nationalist propaganda found the soll pre-

An Interrupted Holiday.

'AJORCA, the Golden Island

Ma

of the Mediterranean, is doomed.

Five days ago I was in the streets of Palma, her capital, when two antiquated seaplanes sounded the death-knell.

It was not as though Palma had never been bombed before, because every day since the Spanish revo ition began a plane has flown over in the morning to drop pamphlets announcing a bombing before evening.

Government

Every evening the lenders in Barcelona have been as good their word. A plane bins dropped

a few ineffectual bombs.

But Thursday the tune changed. From somewhere the Air Force secured high-explosive bombs, and for the Arst time Majorca learned not to Lug

I stood in the street with a handfai

of rebel soldiers, emiling confidently

na Uwy, certain that it would be only

pamphlets the planes would drop,

I Ran for Shelter

I heard the sound of a terrifle ex-

plosion three streets away.

The smile left our lips. This was no fire-oracker that had gone off.

The futilo machino-guns were pat- -tering now, as I ran for shelter, count- Ang the seconds as I went. Bome Instinct warned me to sing myself to carti in a broad ditch. A deafening noise blotted out my sight, my sound, my feeling.

Toppling Walls

Bita of stone and mortar wero falling All around.... I struggled to mỹ knees and strove to see through the thick dust.

Down by the Puerto, not a hundred yards from where I crouched, stands The dust The Almuctaina barracks. cleared in time for me to see one ancient Moorish wall of those barracks crumble, and topple into the broad „strect, burying tho shattered bodies of

a machine-gun crew.

I did not walt for more. I ran. The pignes would be back in a moment. You could hear them banking in the dflance.

Screaming Woman

As I ran a taxi screeched to a stop bealde me and, a woman I know. creamed to me to get in. She was

by

PAUL MORTON

A Canadian Journalist who was taken of Majorca by the Repulse.

On the outskirts of Majorca.

near hysteria. Her face and hands were bloody and her frock torn. In her. hand she clutched a bundle of banknotes,

As the taxi tore along the boulevard to the safety of the suburbs, she tail me how she had been in the Danc Itecasans drawing out chough to leave - the Island when a bomb scored a direct ht. Two floors of the big building crashed down about her ears, burying many people.

She had had a miraculous escape." The shock of the explosion had thrown her under the overhang of the counter and the debris had inlased her by inclics.

Companion Shot

A couple of hours later I was obey- ing the command of the Pro-Vice-Con. sul, Mr. George Saward, and was rac- ing in a naval pinnace out to 1.8LS. Reise.

Speeding to safety on the deck of the Navy's second largent battleship, I looked back on the sun-kissed elty of Paima. It was with difficulty the. I realised t10 sweeping changes

4.

that had single week.

taken

place within

+

On Monday I had bathed with young Juan on the beach at El Terreno. I was teaching him to do a back-dive,

Tuesday morning I was to have re peated the lesson. Instead I sat in the Plaza Gomila aud watched 1115 funeral procession pass slowly down the street. He had been shot by the rebels.

That night In English friend sounded what is called a "Razzberry" at a sqund of the little boy soldiers. Ite was arrested and spent the night in prison.

The Governor was pained, and sald he hoped the habit would not become. general.

Buried Revolver

following The

day all elvillan weapons were confiscated. With a sigh of regret Major Charles Gilson surren- dered hilo sword to the authorities. An other ex-officer buried in service revol ver in his yard, hoping to retrieve it at a later date.

Late Wednesday afternoon an officer in Pollenza asked Palma to send food. A truck was sent out with four soldiers, The officer shot the soldiers as they turned over the food, and raced for the open sea in a speed boat.

Near Porto-pi I saw an execution. Three little boy soldiers were taken out and shot. They tried to be brave, and succeeded. But their obvious fright was horrible to watch,

*

16 Bombs

Just before the Repulse weighed anchor in Palma Bay, I watched two more pinnes-drop sixteen heavy bomba in the city. This attack completely broke the moralo of the civilian popu- lution of the city. In thousands they iled to the hills.

Through my glasses I watched the slow evacuation of Palma, and as the Government bombers disappeared over the mountains towards Barcelona, 1 suddenly realised that I wea

BCC. Ing the Palma I knew for the last time.

Vienna

For there can be no doubt that whichever way the tide of war goes. before the revolution is ended. Us Golden Island of the Mediterranean will have been bombed off the map of) Spain.

To-day's Thought: THE magic of the tongue is the most dangerous of all spelts. -BULWER-LYTTON.

Budapest

Germans un

C÷Slovakia Magyars (do.)

Ruthenians (da)

Chief Coal & Cracow Industrial Districts

N D

RPATHIANS

E. SLOVAKIA

HUNGARY

.200

400

RUMANIA

600 Miles

Map from "The Atlas of Current Affairs," by J. F. Horrabut.

among

pared: especially

the young. At The General Election In May of last year the new Sudeten Deutsche Patiel. headed by Con- rad Henlein, a former bank clerk who had become organiser of German athletic associations, won startling victories, sweeping the German areas.

The Czechs hear.

they nee not convinced. They frankly dis- trus Henlein and his assurancos. 'They see in 113 mavement a double thrent: an internal threat to demo- cracy: and external threat from over the frontier,

"Distrust," they say, "will only vanish when it becomes clear that Henlein's

words

genuinely

It is a new and a dangerous phenomenon, for

meant." the Henlein party-though Henlein vehemently denies that it is either Nazi or dis- guised Nazi, or that it is in touch with the Nazis and the Reich-has marked Nazi characteristics.

It s vehemently anti-Bocialist, and anti-Libern). It is totalitarian, in that it claims that the one party with its one leader should repre- sent all the Germans of Czecho- slovakia, that within the commun- ily parties and class conflicts must vanish... It is, though less vehem- enlly, anti-Semitic.

BUT

BUT Above all there is the

other question. are Henicin and his party loyal to the State? Are full they fighting merely for

for equality

the Germans of Czechoslovakia? Or are they the advance guard or an aggressive Nazism, planning to break the Stato from within, to prepare the way for a new German conquest of the Czech lands?

Henlela himsel insists that his movement is neither disruptive nor pan-German.

"We do not want to work against the State. We wish to work loyally with the State. We want to be treated as citizens having equal rights with the others, and to find within the State security for our nationality."

He insists that internationally he is working for peace and recon- ciliation.

"Our real mission iles in acting As mediator between our great German mother nation and the Czech people. That is our great s task in the

o! peace."

cause

ого

Abroad, they ray, he talks of loyalty and reconciliation. But at home "his party does not Indulge in positive and loyal criticismi, but in criticism at all costs and I pro- voking racial animority."

It is a cult and a dangerous situation for the Czechs, A large, organised, discontented national minority is a serious problem for any, State. It is a hundred thnes more serious when that minority Is Inked by language and national feeling to a people of a great and militunt Power Just over the border.

A policy of conciliation involves the risk of strengthening and bringing into key positions in the State machine elements which would work from within to weaken and destroy it.

A polley of repression might easily lead to open revolt and au appeal for at from across the border: it might play straight into the hands of pan-Germanism. It

and. aggravate must certainly make

between worse relations Czechoslovakia and her powerful neighbour: a dangerous thing in itself.

T

HE cholco is not easy. But there are signs that President Benes and Premier Hadza are trying quietly the possibilities of conciliation. If Henlein responda: if he can satisfy them that the Germans will be loyal, a settlement should not be impossible.

And then from this most anxious of Europe's borderlands some at. least of the anxiety should vanish.

ROUNDABOUT

by The Showman

OLIDAY makers are finding much to interest them in the House of Commons. There is, for example, the magic wand used by Mr. Walter Elliot when he makes his periodical entrances dressed as the fuiry queen of agri- cultural prosperity.

There is the famous cow from. Burma, whose voracious exploits you and I have noticed before. She arrived in this country a fortnight ago, and iler la now stabled at Westminster. task is to eat Ministers' words-se as to save them the trouble-before Par Hament reassembles.

And there is Mr. Chamberlain's comic dickey, preserved in a case just Inside the door to the right. It is worn only at full-dress debates, and is sa contrived that it flies up and hits him 6 smack on the nose whenever laughter is needed to case the tension,

Eut visitors" anxious to see the sent on which their local M.P. sits" will bu disappointed, I fear. The M.P. usually Lakes it with him.

Or have I been vulgar? ·

The Old Red Cow

HAVING talked of a cow, I am re- minded that our Fascist friends are now all equipping their trains of thought with Moscow catchers.

When the Brass Band Goes....

I

AM glad to read that Mr. O'Donnell, conductor of the B.1.0, Military Band. thinks that musiclans must be brought to the studios "since the broadcasting of band musle in the open air can be seriously marred by adverso weather conditions.”

A friend of mine used to play one of those vast funnel-shaped instruments that go "comp. comp "once, or at most twice, in the course of a plece. In be tween times he would do his knitting, or read a book, or talk to his wife, ot have a cup of tea. well, anyhow, one day, just after his Arst "oomp." there was a heavy shower of rain.

It was a long piece, and, when it came to his neri “ponip" the day had cleared and the rain was Torgotten.

Well, he blew. There was no "comp." Instead there was a violent water-spout that fell on the audience.

The conductor simply loved it. Or have I got things mixed up?

- ONE FINE DAY"

It has already been pointed out to me that we have had it.

Camouflage

AID a woman competitor in the,

When you are Olymple Games: running before a great crowd you naturally want to feel as little self- conscious as possible; no, of course, I use my cosmetics."

Hero la A useful tip for welshing bookmaker, next Derby Day.

Chinese Scene

THE venerable sage Wang Puk, was sitting beneath a mulberry tree drinking tea with his silk-worm. All was serene. Not a spoon allred. The distant peaks of the mountains of Hal blushed at the approach of night.

**Master," mid the silk-worm. “tell me:, may a man marry his widow's niece?

"May a man..? began the ange, and then, suddenly checked himself. He turned a grim guze on his com- panion.

The silk-worm dropped his eyes, and wriggled uneasily. It went down very well with us worms,” ha stam- morect

But, when he looked up again, the sage had gone. A star feil. An army deserted. He began to collect the tea things.

.

Wags' Corner

THE new minister was talking to the

oldest inhabitant.

I bo ninety-seven years old, sir,” sald the ancient, and I haven't an enemy in the world."

said the

That's a fine thought minister approvingly.

"Yes, sir, was the reply, "I'm thankful to say I've outlived thema all.'7

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