Potent Birthdays

Most of the new States begotten by the War were born in Autumn. Wilhelm II abdicated as Kaiser and King in November 1918. The sixth birthday of the Fascist Regime in Italy has just been celebrated (TIME,, Nov. 5). Czechoslovakia was ten years old last week, and the Turkish Republic was five. Today there are eleven red candles on the cake of Soviet Russia. Therefore last week birthdays loomed as potent news:

Five-Year-Old. On the fifth birthday of the Turkish Republic, last week, every State and Municipal official was examined to see whether he knew his ABC's. Scared and trembling like so many toddling five-year-olds, more than 1,000 potent functionaries submitted willy nilly to the test. Those who flunked out would be demoted or dismissed. Such were the orders of the President of Turkey, stern and ruthless Mustafa Kemal Pasha, called Ghazi, ''The Victorious." Progressive to the point of rashness, President Kemal resolved and ordered (TIME, Sept. 17) that every Turkish official must learn the 26 letters of the Occidental alphabet before the fifth birthday of the Republic. Though examination statistics were not issued, it was reported that Prime Minister Ismet Pasha and his entire Cabinet had "Passed."

The major event of Turkey's birthday was the broadcasting of a speech by Mustafa Kemal Pasha to every Turkish city and town and to hundreds of villages. Attempts at a similar broadcast last year failed miserably. The transmitter broke down but a few hours after "The Victorious" one had launched into the preface of his famed and unprecedented Seven-Day Speech (TIME, Oct. 31, 1927).

Last week Kemal spoke less gargantuanly. First he opened Parliament. Then sonorously he recalled the triumphs of his regime--Sultan overthrown. Republic proclaimed, Calif overthrown, the Church disestablished, polygamy abolished, the fez abolished, women unveiled, and a new Capital built at ancient Angora. Finally the President reported progress in his incessant strivings to "Westernize Turkey." Proudly he declared that 12,000 teachers are now instructing Turks how to write and read their language in Occidental ABC's, though with the same phonetics as of yore.

Ten-Year-Old. Every alert U. S. citizen remembers that President Woodrow Thomas Wilson was the Godfather of Czechoslovakia. Without his decisive intervention the new state might have been snuffed out as soon as born. But of course every Czech and Slovak knows that the Father of Czechoslovakia is Professor Thomas Garrigue Masaryk, first and still President of the Republic.

Professor Masaryk's egotism is as titanic as his achievements. Single-handed he built up the marvelous organization of propagandists, spies and deserters who finally erected themselves into the nucleus of a state. True, Professor Masaryk was indispensably assisted by Dr. Edouard Benes, now Foreign Minister, but none the less Professor Masaryk is the Father of Czechoslovakia. His propagandists are become statesmen, his spies heroes, his deserters officers in the Army of the Republic.

And so Thomas Garrigue Masaryk was not idly boasting, last week, when he said to a U. S. correspondent on the tenth birthday of Czechoslovakia: "I wish it were possible for me to take a quiet evening stroll past our new statue of President Wilson [in Prague]. They tell me it looks splendid under the floodlights at night. But alas I am always recognized and overwhelmed with public adulation!"

Anniversary ceremonies included day and evening fetes in all cities of the Republic. The Prague garrison thundered a hundred-gun salute.

Eleven-Year-Old. Red Russia's birthday was November 7. Sadly enough, it could not be celebrated by the two famed founders of the Soviet State: Lenin & Trotsky. Dead is Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov, called "Lenin" (TIME, Jan. 28). Banished is Leiba Bronstein, called "Leon Trotsky" (TIME, Jan. 30). Today Red Russia is dominated by a Dictator more egotistical than even Masaryk, more ruthless than even Kemal. He is Josef Vissarionovich Dzhugashvili. Because his inflexible will is like tempered metal, the great Lenin called him "Stalin." meaning "Steel." When the eleventh Red Birthday was celebrated. Comrade Citizens rejoiced, gamboled and swigged vodka*--but Stalin remained as usual coldly, inscrutably by his own fireside, never addressing the mob by radio, never overwhelmed with public adulation, never interviewed, scarcely recognized on his infrequent rides about Moscow in a closely guarded limousine.

*Vodka should never be tasted, sipped, or mulled upon the tongue. It is esteemed not for its taste but for the warm and stimulant sensations with which it fires the entire gullet. Therefore Russian epicures invariably down vodka in long, potent scorching swigs.