Bismarck & Dynamite

Swank, cynical Prince Otto von Bismarck, grandson of the "Iron Chancellor," lives lavishly in London as German Charge d'Affaires with his moneyed and shapely Swedish wife. Princess Ann von Bismarck (Nee Tengbom). daughter of a famed Stockholm architect. Last week Prince Bismarck was chosen by Chancellor Hitler to touch off a stick of disarmament dynamite.

Ever since the return to Europe last month of President Roosevelt's grey and gracious little disarmament dickerer, Ambassador-at-Large Norman Hezekiah Davis, Germany has been pressed by the U. S., Britain, France and Italy to enter a four-year convention for European armament control (TIME, Oct. 2). In effect a standstill pact, this convention would bind each power not to up its armaments before 1938, would create an international inspection board to see that all nations were keeping their pledges, would provide for eventual parity of armaments between Germany and France, but not until after the four-year standstill had been scrupulously observed.

Prince Bismarck received Chancellor Hitler's "observations" on this proposed convention last week in a long code cablegram from the Wilhelmstrasse. Calling his limousine he sped to Whitehall, marched into the office of tall, frigid British Foreign Secretary Sir John Simon and told him that Germany cannot wait until 1938 before beginning to achieve armament equality with France. At the very least, in Chancellor Hitler's view, the Fatherland should at once be allowed to have "samples" of all armaments now denied her by the Treaty of Versailles; big guns, tanks, battle planes. Finally, even if a four-year standstill convention (including "samples" for Germany) were signed, there ought to be no snooping supervision.

What Sir John said to Prince Bismarck when he heard these "observations" remained their secret, but Europe's chancelleries flew at once into a diplomatic furor. It was discovered that Benito Mussolini had also received a copy of the "observations" in Rome, but none had been handed to Ambassador Davis at Geneva or to French Foreign Minister Joseph Paul-Boncour. What was Germany trying to do--split the U. S.. British, French, Italian disarmament front?

In Washington the State Department recalled that the resolution of 1921 by which the U. S. made a separate peace with Germany provides for the same bars to German rearmament as the Treaty of Versailles. President Roosevelt was reported strongly opposed to "sample" arms for Germany. The French Press raged that Chancellor Hitler was demanding immediate re-armament--which was not strictly the case--and French Premier Edouard Daladier. speaking at Vichy, held up the Fatherland's request for "samples" and rejection of "supervision" as evidence that Germany is ruled by a "cult of force." Most striking, however, was a British warning to the Reich, said to have been dictated by Sir John Simon after he received Prince Bismarck and hastily inserted in a speech which the Cabinet's Lord President of the Council, Stanley Baldwin, was scheduled to make that night. "Any nation which deliberately prevents such an agreement [as the armament standstill] being reached," cried Mr. Baldwin, "will have no friend in this civilized world!" To reassure France further, he invoked the Locarno Treaty of 1925, negotiated by Britain's Sir Austen Chamberlain and France's late great Peace Man Aristide Briand to protect the Franco-Belgo-German frontier against aggression. "What Britain has signed she will adhere to!" cried Mr. Baldwin. "She adhered to her signature regarding Belgium. . . . Her signature and her agreements are sacred!"

Even dullards could see the drift of such talk. Europe's entire Press (particularly the Swiss) broke out in a rash of headlines suggesting that the Disarmament Conference, scheduled to reconvene in Geneva on Oct. 16, will face in acute form the alternatives of Disarmament or War. Slightly appalled by the effect of the dynamite Prince Bismarck had so dutifully exploded, the German Foreign Office appealed to Ambassador-at-Large Davis to "mediate" in Geneva between their delegation and the French.

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