FRANCE: Mass Torture?

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When the defeated Loyalist Catalan Army was pushed over the Spanish frontier into France, one of the greatest exoduses of modern times took place. France had on her hands her greatest refugee problem. The way that problem was handled had developed, by last week, into a world scandal.

Although amply warned of the huge human tide approaching, the French Government made few advance arrangements to receive the refugees. It had thought it would be a matter of only a few weeks before most refugees would return to their homeland. Indeed, one of the reasons advanced for quick recognition of Generalissimo Francisco Franco's Government was that it would facilitate the refugees' return.

Month ago the estimated number of Spanish refugees on French soil was 380,000. Last week French Minister of the Interior Albert Sarraut revised the estimate upward to 450,000. Moreover, far from decreasing, the refugee population was steadily increasing. Hundreds were still slipping over the Catalan border. The Loyalist Navy's surrender in French Africa last week brought 4,000 more.

Few of the exiles want to return to Spain. Stories of dire reprisals awaiting them in Spain have reached the refugee camps by grapevine. Typical of how news travels among the refugees was the method adopted by a recent fugitive from Catalonia. Forbidden by French authorities to make a speech in the camp, he drew a map of Spain in the sand. Inside the outline he sketched a firing squad pointing their rifles at a group of civilians. No refugee misunderstood the man's meaning.

Although the Chamber of Deputies last week moved to appropriate funds to provide meagre board and care for the refugees, the chances are that France in the end will not be out one sou. The daily $185,000 bill can be met for a long time by expropriating the treasures the Loyalists deposited and shipped to France months ago. General Franco would like the money himself. He has hinted that he thought the refugees' care was not his baby. Rebel Spain has, in fact, made the refugee problem a bargaining point with the French Government. Furthermore, it is not likely that the dictator is any more eager to have back almost a half-million militant Republicans than they are to return to his dictatorship. General Franco's Catalan border was closed last week.

Meanwhile the French Government tried to get rid of some of the refugees elsewhere, but with little success. The U. S. offered to take just 352, the unfilled portion of the 1939 quota for Spanish immigrants. South American countries wanted only Basque farmers. Soviet Russia invited only a few big Loyalist leaders to make their homes there. Mexico was willing to receive some, provided they promised to keep out of politics.

Stuck with the refugees, French authorities adopted methods calculated to help "persuade" them that they would be better off almost anywhere else. Typical rations were one loaf of bread daily for six men, a sack of rice for 400 men. Sanitation has been nonexistent. Open latrines have been dug in the camp sand and all modesty about nature's functions has long ago disappeared.