A SPECTATOR'S NOTEBOOK
WE are now in the crisis-period, and the issue lies with one abnormal man. The fact that by Aug. 15th—next Tuesday—mobilisation in Germany, and in more than one other country, will have reached its peak, suggests that we shall not have long to wait for knowledge of what is in store for Europe. Countries may mobilise, "for manoeuvres," but they cannot stay long mobilised. They must demobilise after a month or two or fight. One part of Herr Hitler's strategy is clear. He hopes once again to achieve his ends by a threat of force ; hence the moving of troops south, west and north of Poland. It does not follow that if the threat fails actual force will be exerted ; but it does not follow that it will not. We are certainly in for a series of new moves in the "war of nerves." The decision whether it shall be more than a war of nerves is not likely to have been taken yet. It will remain possible for some weeks to insist that the manoeuvres were never any more than manoeuvres and to deride the fears of anyone who thought otherwise. Herr Hitler, of course, has two speeches of the first importance in prospect—at Tannenberg in East Prussia on August 27th and at the Nuremberg Party Congress which opens on September 2nd. There is no time to get Danzig before then, in view of the certainty that Poland would fight. The speeches may therefore come first and the coup—if it comes at all—afterwards, as in the case of the Sudetenland last year.
* * * *
Previous page
