Futsch Putsch

Breathless, red-faced and disheveled, a young Austrian Nazi ducked into a cafe on Vienna's Wiedner Hauptstrasse one morning last week, slipped up to a table and gasped: "Der Linzer Putsch ist futsch!" (a fizzle at Linz). Within a few hours all Europe knew the details of the latest half-cocked attempt of an Austrian Nazi band to seize power, and disgusted German Nazis were again calling their southern brethren stupid sheepsheads.

A favorite home of Ernst Ruediger Prince von Starhemberg, ousted last fortnight as Austrian Vice Chancellor (TIME, May 25), is his family castle of Waxen-berg near Linz on the Danube. There he organized and drilled his original companies of the Heimwehr and there he kept for many years great stores of machine guns, rifles, pistols and steel helmets.

Last week a polite voice called up the Vienna Heimwehr offices, asked if the castle were open to tourists, if Prince von Starhemberg were there, if his private guard would be drilling or if there would only be the usual caretakers on the grounds. Thus forewarned, a couple of busloads of green-coated Heimwehr hustled out to Waxenberg, hid in the new wing of the castle. About midnight a column of automobiles drew near the grounds. Out tumbled 50 apple-cheeked young Nazis who began tiptoeing toward the castle. Heimwehrmen swarmed out like bees. There was a rattle of shots. The Nazis withdrew, leaving two of their band dead on the ground.

Eight of the actual attacking party were caught. Police raids throughout Austria netted scores more. Once again Italian troops on Brenner Pass were told to stand ready for any emergency. Object of the "futsched Putsch" was not to assassinate Prince von Starhemberg, who had returned empty-handed from Italy and was safely in Vienna, but to seize some of the munitions supposed to be hidden in his castle. It was a local Putsch and any smart Nazi might have guessed there were no guns at Waxenberg last week. Prince von Starhemberg has not yet disarmed his Heim-wehr as the Government is insisting he do, but he had removed every rifle from his castle knowing that if Chancellor von Schuschnigg should feel uppity enough to attempt to disarm the Heimwehr by force, Waxenberg Castle would be the first place he would search.

At week's end Nazis and Heimwehrmen were snapping at each other and bespectacled Kurt von Schuschnigg was still boss of the Fatherland Front. Last week at the ''Old Soldier's Day" celebration in suburban Aspern. newshawks saw 8,000 men in all sorts of uniforms, but not one of the feathered caps of the Heimwehr. Chancellor von Schuschnigg abandoned his cutaway and buttoned himself into his Wartime officer's tunic.

"Old Austria," cried he, "was in the army camp and the new Austria must be there too. Rejoice in the revival of the soldierly spirit!"

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