NEWS OF THE WEEK
THE war in France has ended—significantly enough the last military communiqué to be issued recorded French suc- cesses in the Alps against the uniformly unsuccessful Italians— but the war of Frenchmen outside France has not. No announcement regarding the fleet has yet been made, but there is good reason for the belief that the greater part of it will not fall into German hands. The French army in Syria refuses to recognise an armistice, and the latest news available suggests that the‘ all-important dependencies of Morocco, Algeria and Tunis will take the same line. With British, and it may still be hoped French, sea-power to keep them supplied they should be in a position to resist all attack, particularly as the attack is likely to come only from Italy. That situation may have results of some significance. Germany's appointed booty is in Europe, Italy's mainly in North Africa. Italians who see Germany in possession of her spoils, and Italy as far off from hers as ever, while their own cities are being bombed and they are being invaded instead of invading in Libya, may find their never very intense ardour cooling rather rapidly. Italy is a very weak partner in the Axis alliance, and the sooner and the harder she is hit the better for what, in spite of Marshal Petain and M. Laval, is still the Allied cause. We are fully capable both of dealing with Italy and defending our own coasts, though simply to do that, as Mr. Eden rightly observed on Wednesday, will not win the war. The small raids carried out on enemy and occupied coasts on Tuesday were, it may be hoped, only a foretaste of many indications that the possibilities of the offen- sive are not being ignored.
