RUSSIA: No Philosophical Abstractions

Those three War-born little states on the eastern shore of the Baltic Sea— Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania—would hardly seem a menace to anybody. But they are close to the heart of Soviet Russia. Russia's door to the Baltic is a coast line on the Gulf of Finland only 300 mi. long, and the three little states overlook that channel down the Baltic. The least Russia can do is to be a little friendlier to them than anybody else is. Last week Maxim Litvinoff, roly-poly Commissar for Foreign Affairs, met in Moscow with the plenipotentiaries of the three. They took up the two-party non-aggression pacts they had signed with Russia four years ago and extended them for another ten years. Glowing with the respectability of a proved peaceful intention. Mr. Litvinoff talked for the world's ear:

"In every corner of the globe much is being said about the menace of war, but little about means of averting such a catastrophe. Let the agreements which we have signed here today remind the world that there are governments which consider it their duty to work toward strengthening the peace structure. Chauvinism, nationalism and racial prejudice are foreign to the Soviet State, which does not put its ambition in conquests.

"We had it in mind at first to propose pacts not limited to a specific number of years, but in the end we decided that such pacts would appear too much like philosophical abstractions. Our permanent policy of peace is preservation of the independence of young states of the type which you represent."