''Accounts to Settle"

''Accounts to Settle"

Few months ago Benito Mussolini seemed so deeply committed to the big military job of maintaining Austria's independence against Germany that, on that issue and certain others vital to Adolf Hitler, suave British diplomatists could flirt politely with Berlin's Nazis, leaving Italy to bear the brunt of German wrath. By last week Il Duce had all Europe guessing whether he and Der Fuehrer may not soon get together in a deal as to Austria's future, and in London the welkin rang with reverberations of anti-British editorials splashed out in Rome.

Signor Mussolini, himself once an editor, now omnivorously directs the whole Italian Press, guiding its newsorgans from a central Rome bureau of which his sleek young son-in-law, Count Ciano, is chief.

Last week Editor Mussolini opened up full blast to boom his aggressive designs against Ethiopia and blast Great Britain for opposing them at Geneva in the person of that sleek Etonian Peaceman, Captain Anthony Eden (TIME, June 3).

"After the Ualual incident [a border clash between Italian and Ethiopian troops last year] the Ethiopian wounded were tended by British doctors," cried Il Giornale d'Italia. "Italy has no objection to this humanitarian service but we inquire how British doctors happened to be on the scene!"

Other Italian papers charged that a certain Lieut.-Colonel Clifford from British Somaliland has said that Ethiopia's Emperor is willing to place his country under British protection for 25 years as the best insurance against Italy's designs.

"The British Empire is very wealthy, very populous and very widespread and we respect it," snapped Il Giornale next day, "but Britain owes her vast Empire not only to the enterprise and worth of her citizens but also to violent conquests which often were not very scrupulous." Next, small-fry Italian papers rehashed the predatory exploits of Britons from Sir Francis Drake to Lord Elgin who stole Greece's most valuable marbles and enshrined them in the British Museum.

"British Hypocrisy!" shrieked Il Messaggero. "Great Britain has promised a subsidy to the Emperor of Ethiopia to give the Ethiopian troops regular pay." In Rome the Dictator's press office told Italian reporters that "the natives of Ethiopia are so excited that now nothing can stop them. They think they have English support."

Spurred by this directive a minor Fascist paper, Ottobre, blazed: "If England wants war she can have it! ... Our enemy in Africa is not so much Ethiopia as England. ... It might be a good idea to bombard Malta and bring the English to their senses."

Smack! Dictator Mussolini suppressed Ottobre and sent five Carabinieri and some detectives to protect Sir Eric Drummond, British Ambassador to Italy. In the House of Commons, Captain Eden rose for His Majesty's Government to call the Italian Press "wild." And Major Clement Attlee suggested: "If Italy intends to use force against Abyssinia we should close the Suez Canal to Italian troops."

Unofficial sources reported last week that Dictator Mussolini had called three more classes to the colors, making a total of over a million men available for use in Africa. They were leaving Italy last week at the rate of two shiploads per day. As a final twist to the British lion's tail, Il Duce went down to Ostia, took the controls of his trimotored seaplane and flew off over the Tyrrhenian Sea for his first visit in twelve years to Sardinia, found two miles of conscripts lined up ready to embark.

"Blackshirts!" shouted the Dictator, "we will imitate to the letter those who presume to be our schoolmasters! They have shown that when it is necessary to create or defend an Empire, they did not take into consideration the opinions of the world. We have old and new accounts to settle and we will settle them! The entire Italian people are ready to spring up as one man when the power and glory of our country is in question."

This meant about as much and about as little as new British Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin meant last week when he announced that His Majesty's Government are strengthening their armaments to be able to impose Britannia's will--for the general good (see below). Italians, in any case, cannot start fighting in Africa until the rainy season ends three months hence. "England already holds half of Africa," cried Rome's Il Giornale, "and we know how she got it. If we admit that she is doing good by civilizing what she holds, she must admit our right to do the same."

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