FINLAND, BERLIN AND MOSCOW [To the Editor of THE SPECTATOR.]
Snt,—Under the heading, " Finland, Berlin and Moscow," in your last issue you say : " If a minor border State (Finland) with such a history, to say nothing of the still smaller States, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, can dismiss alarms about Russia, it is hard to see why Germany, protected by distance and by military strength, should quail so palpably before them."
I take it that this is written more as a debating point than as a serious interrogation, for it must have become obvious long ago that Germany is expected to quail before alarms about Communism with the sole object of conjuring such a state of emergency as will justify the continuance of the present Dictatorship. Both the German and the Italian brand are at the moment demonstrating the historic truth that a Dictator, having risen with a national emergency, should fade out, if he is wise, on its decline.
Of all the world's dictators Mussolini has been the luckiest, for no sooner had Italy ceased to quail—inconveniently soon perhaps—before the menace from Abyssinia than a new excuse was presented to him by the upheaval in the purely domestic affairs of Spain.
On the known facts, it is hard to believe that the Soviets of Russia have any desire whatever for offensive war against anyone. Otherwise they would by now have laid a heavy hand on these minor neighbour States with their Right-wing tendencies. Russia has not attempted to do so. It is equally hard to imagine that the wreckage of war can have any appeal to ex-Corporal Hitler, with a hungry and creditless nation behind him. So when is all this expensive bluff going to be called into the open ?—Yours faithfully,
C. A. E. CHUDLEIGH,
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