POWER POLITICS: Weird War

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Last week, Germany's journalistic big guns, their aim corrected twice daily, poured an unceasing barrage on Poland. Danzig's Nazi Gauleiter Albert Forster spent two hours with the Führer, hurried to Danzig to thunder still another demand for its return to the Reich—but significantly set no date nor hour for the return. Danzig itself was in a bad way. Its business had gradually approached a standstill—and Nazi papers accused Poland of strangling its trade. Its armed force of Nazis was estimated at 15,000, augmented last week by 1,500 spade-equipped members of the German Labor Service.

Führer Hitler had said that Danzig would be returned to the Reich. He also said it could be gained without war. Leaving this riddle for the world to ponder, he then vanished into the mountains like a figure from Wagnerian mythology. As Poland showed no signs of giving in, it began to look as though the riddle could be solved only if Foreign Minister Josef Beck agreed to its solution.

As the Führer and his ally ended their talk, the press attack on Poland did not end, but slacked off perceptibly. Customs negotiations between Danzig and Poland, scheduled to begin the next day, were postponed a few days—obviously, said correspondents in Danzig, to let Nazis find out what had been decided on the mountaintop. League of Nations High Commissioner for Danzig, Dr. Carl Burckhardt conferred with Herr Hitler, launching a new crop of rumors: 1) that a settlement of the Danzig problem was in the air; 2) that Danzig might be part of a general European settlement. Count Ciano went back to Rome. The Premier of Yugoslavia returned to Belgrade. The Regent of Hungary made an unexpected "private" visit to Berlin. Poland's line remained—in Marshal Smigly-Rydz's artful words—peace could not mean "take" for nations, "give" for others. And all over Europe the 8,000,000 men under arms lined up like marksmen preparing to shoot at a ghost, training their guns against radio waves, trying to surround words in newspapers.