THE TABLET April 5th. 1958. VOL. 211, No. 6150

THE TABLET

Published as a Newspapef

A WEEKLY NEWSPAPER & REVIEW

Pro Ecclesia Dei, Pro Regina et Patria

FOUNDED IN 1840

APRIL 5th, 1958

NINEPENCE

Tensions of the Resurrection: A M ed ita tio n fo r E aster. By the B ishop of Salford

On Easter Day : Passover in the P rom ised L an d . By Sebastian B u llo ugh, O.P.

O Blessed Night: T ra n s la te d from the F re n c h o f Charles Péguy by a B enedictine of S ta nb ro ok

No New Concordat for Austria : Dr. R a a b 's V is it to Rome. By F. M . M. S te iner

Further Education Now: T h e R o le of th e T echnical Colleges

Outpost in Lublin : A lo n e betw een M ila n a n d T okyo

Critics’ Columns : Notebook : Book Reviews : Letters : Chess

A TRUCE TO TESTING?

W HEN the Russians announce th a t they are not going to test any more nuclear bombs, and call upon the Western Powers to follow suit, it is not enough to say that this is only their clever exploitation of the fact that, for the present at least, they have no need to do so, having just completed an elaborate series of fifty explosions, with nine, including four megaton tests, since the end of February. They calculate th a t by the time the data so collected has been digested by their scientists and strategists they will be able to start new tests if they want to, because they will be able to say th a t they have been forced to do so by the Western failure to stop them at the same time. Nor is it enough to dismiss their present announcement as mere propaganda. I t has, of course, a very great propaganda effect. But that is all the more reason why the Russians should be denied the opportunity of doubling th a t advantage by denouncing the Western Powers for not stopping tests as well. It should at least be categorically announced when the Western tests will stop, on condition th a t the Russians do not start theirs again. The number of further explosions envisaged should be stated, with the date of the last one. Merely to dismiss the present Russian announcement as a trick, as the State Department has already shown too much inclination to do, and to say th a t it cannot mean anything without international inspection—as though inspection had been necessary to detect the fifty recent explosions -w ould be to add gratuitously and immensely to the great effect which it will undoubtedly have, especially in Asia and Africa.

President Nasser’s conversations in Moscow will not be concerned only with the Middle East. Egypt itself is an African, not an Asian country, and President Nasser sees himself, and is seen in Moscow, as master of a country which lies geographically at the meeting-place of two continents, whose influence radiates not only northwards and eastwards but southwards through the

Sudan into Africa as well, along routes by which Islam is so rapidly extending itself. The Africans being converted to the religion of the Prophet are more than twice as many as those being converted to all forms of Christianity together, Catholic and Protestant alike.

There is in fact in progress a “ scramble for Africa,” of no less significance than that for which the phrase was coined nearly a hundred years ago. Mission to Moscow

Firing broke out in the Holy Land on Palm Sunday, in the upper Jordan valley, between Ceasarea Philippi and the Sea of Galilee, on what is now the border between Israel and Syria. I t was the first border fighting since the union of Syria and Egypt, and the first, indeed, since quite a long while before th a t union was made ; and it began within a few hours of the announcement th a t after Easter, after the Passover, and, what is more relevant, at the end of Ramadan, President Nasser is going to Moscow.

I t may well be that tension on the Syrian border of Israel is about to be whipped up still more, with the multiplication of incidents and exchanges of fire whenever the attention of the United Nations observers can be diverted, so th a t when President Nasser arrives in Moscow he will be able to say th a t there is a serious situation, with Syria endangered, and so lend support to requests for more intimidating weapons, perhaps of the “ tactical ” nuclear variety.

Yet the Russians have just been displaced by President Nasser in Syria. They will hardly be eager to arm for his benefit an Army which so short a time ago they thought they were about to control themselves, and which they might well be controlling today were it not for him. General Bizri. a friend or, said his enemies, a tool of Moscow, so recently commanded the Syrian Army, and now has had to resign. The Communist