THE TABLET A WEEKLY NEWSPAPER AND REVIEW

ESTABLISHED 1840 REGISTERED AS A NEWSPAPER

VOL. 172 No. 5121

LONDON JULY 2nd, 1938

SIXPENCE

I N T H I S I S S U E

THE GERMANIC SOUL

A S tudy o f H err Rosenberg’s Theories

By D r . O . Forst de B a tta g lia

IN SEARCH OF A MIRACLE

B y Graham Greene

CATHOLIC ACTION General Outlines, the Schem e for W estm in ster, and Editorial Comment

THE

OSCOTT CENTENARY

By Philip Hughes

THE

HAWTHORNDEN PRIZE

Presentation to M r . David Jones

F u l l L i s t o f C o n t e n t s on p a g e 4.

THE WORLD WEEK BY WEEK General Franco’s Reply

Sir R. Hodgson has returned to London with General Franco’s answer. The Nationalist attitude has all along been consistent. It was restated in an interview which General Franco gave to The Times’ correspondent. There is a great distinction, obviously, between attacks on the high seas and in ports, some of which are already directly in the zone of military operations. It is completely reasonable to demand that British ships on the high seas shall suffer no molestation. But we must remember that long before the civil war, the Spaniards, like many other countries, claimed six miles, not three, as territorial waters. It is not reasonable to expect the Nationalists to refrain from attempting to wreck enemy ports because foreign shipping, including British, is using them. When a city is being invested, an army endeavours to cut the roads leading to it and to make them impassable by artillery fire. Yet to read some of the violent comments in the British Press about the rights of ships in Spanish harbours, is to see that the same argument, that there is a right of free access to trade with either side, could just as well be made to cover a demand that land transport should go unmolested to Madrid or any other town. Once a ship enters Spanish waters or a Spanish harbour it is entering a zone of war, and is exposed to all the risks of war. Much the most sensible compromise is the proposal of General Franco to set apart a. port where, under stringent international control, ships not carrying contraband can berth in safety. This would involve the frank recognition that the other harbours will only be entered at a ship’s own risk. The whole of this trouble is a direct result of the refusal to face facts by granting belligerent rights. It has been repeated over and over again that such rights do not carry with them any moral verdict. They merely take due account of reality. There is a large scale civil war raging in Spain and the parties fighting it must be recognized for the belligerents they are. At present we are asking General Franco to modify his operations and we make this request without at the same time offering to extend a right of search to his naval vessels. The Italians, whose mediating offices have been sought, are believed to have pointed out that General Franco is the head of an independent State, and that the Italians know that in these matters of policy they can only make suggestions. The Nationalist cause has suffered so much through being represented as a subordinate and dependent movement, directed by Germany and Italy, that it is the height of simplicity to expect, when it becomes convenient, either the Italians or the Spaniards to act as though that travesty of their relations was true. Recent Operations in Spain

Meanwhile the Nationalist operations on the TeruelSagunto road continue. The road has been fiercely held, as the best ground upon which General Miaja's troops can make a stand. Sagunto and Valencia are both bases of the greatest importance. Where May saw the great abortive counter offensives against the Nationalists in Catalonia, attacks which were intended to hold up the advance upon Castellon, it is now obvious in Barcelona that the Nationalist advance South cannot be delayed by attacks elsewhere, and must itself be held if it is to be resisted.

Great numbers of untrained infantry were sacrificed last month, and apparently great numbers are being sacrificed now. This is one of the most tragic features of the war, and one more deserving of consideration than the more spectacular air-raids. The people conscripted in Government Spain, great numbers of them having no sort of political enthusiasm for Left Wing revolution, are badly led and recklessly sacrificed simply to maintain a resistance which few impartial observers consider has any ultimate chance. These fruitless attacks are justified by the reasoning that it is