Axis Forging

Aside from Spain's civil war, the most lively political project in Europe is the Fascist "axis" swiftly being forged by Dictators Mussolini and Hitler. The latter's beefy No. 2 man. Colonel General Hermann Wilhelm Goring, has been down to Italy twice in four months to discuss it. Last month Chancellor Kurt Schuschnigg went down to Venice from Vienna to find out just where Austria stood in the new picture (TIME, May 3). Mussolini's son-in-law and Foreign Minister, Count Galeazzo Ciano, has been to Berlin for a courtesy call. Last week it was the turn of Hitler's Foreign Minister, Baron Constantin von Neurath, to go to Rome. Count Ciano welcomed his portly confrere who rode around town and laid wreaths on appropriate tombs, ended up with a champagne-popping at Villa Madama, Rome's lush residence for distinguished guests.

After the champagne came the meeting's muttons. Dictator Mussolini, Son-in- Law Ciano and Baron von Neurath discussed Spain. They agreed that Italian and German troops were failing to pull the Spanish chestnut out of the Radical fire, that Germany and Italy must get out before they themselves are burned. Baron von Neurath, representing the Junker (landed gentry) caste in Germany which has opposed Hitler's determination to go through with the Spanish adventure, was all for an early withdrawal. Mussolini disagreed, suggested that Italy and Germany should make no change until they see the outcome of White Generalissimo Franco's next big thrust, which Mussolini was confident would take place on the Madrid front toward the end of May. Guest von Neurath politely yielded to his host and agreed that "everything permitted by the non-intervention agreement" must be done to insure that German and Italian "volunteers" already in Spain have enough food to prevent their starving, enough guns to prevent their being butchered.

On the question of Austria, Mussolini repeated what he had told Chancellor Schuschnigg in Venice, that Italy would not fight Germany to preserve Austrian independence. Baron von Neurath in return gave his assurance that Germany would make no move to annex Austria by arms, would be content "with economic penetration of the Danube basin."

The "Marxists," France and Russia, were tackled next. Germany's ambition is to see a solid Fascist wedge driven between the two, to dominate central Europe as she did before the War--with this difference. Before the War, Germany was the central figure of Mittel-Europa, scheming for a pan-Germany from the Baltic to the Persian Gulf. Then Italy was a wavering German satellite. Now she is the virtual Boss of central Europe and pan-Germany must wait upon Italy's permission even to penetrate the Danube basin economically. To sell their new solidarity to Britain and France, Mussolini and von Neurath were believed by newshawks last week to have discussed a new security pact for Western Europe, which Britain and France would be asked to join, guaranteeing the safety of the Rhineland. As the discussions continued, the German Foreign Minister emphasized that Germany had no intention of returning to the League of Nations, and Mussolini sympathetically indicated that Italy, though still a member of the League, would have no truck with Geneva until the Italian conquest of Ethiopia is recognized.

By & large, the two collaborators were well pleased with their head-to-head. Just before Baron von Neurath entrained for home a glowing communique was issued "reaffirming the two Governments' determination to continue to follow a common policy in all major questions." Thus was the ground finally prepared for what, if it comes off next month, will be the axis-forging climax: a meeting between Hitler and Mussolini at Berlin.

To tighten up the eastern buffer for the Rome-Berlin axis, Hitler's Colonel General Goring proceeded from Rome last fortnight to Bled, a resort in Yugoslavia. There he talked Nazi business with elegant Prince-Regent Paul who already has an understanding with Italy. Hungary, to the north of Yugoslavia, and Bulgaria to the east, are already in the Italian bag. Rumania is next on the list for conversion by Missionary Mussolini. Significantly Poland's pro-Nazi Foreign Minister Joseph Beck three weeks ago was in the Rumanian capital to explain that "Rumania is necessary to Poland's security because of Russia's nearness." Foreign Minister Beck, in earnest conversations with King Carol, sought to renew and put teeth into the 1921 Polish-Rumanian Treaty. If he succeeded, the Rome-Berlin axis would be completely buffered on the east except for Czechoslovakia, satellite of "Marxist" France.

Next visitor from Germany to Rome was scheduled to be the Nazi War Minister, Field Marshal Werner von Blomberg. As though to show his northern friends--and England and France too--that he means business, II Duce last week stood over the Italian Parliament while his undersecretaries for War, Navy, and Air demanded and got appropriations totaling $38,240,000 more than last year when Italy was still at war. And besides ordering a press and newsreel boycott of Britain's Coronation, II Duce let out two other announcements so timed as to be interpreted at Whitehall as "aggressively anti-British," or at the very least, bold gestures by the southern master of the new Axis: 1) Italy's war games will be held this year not on the Austrian front as usual but in Sicily, one of the island bases from which Italy would operate if she were out to control the Mediterranean; 2) Italy's new warboats, provided in the big new "defense" budget, will be designed to make Italy's fleet capable of operating beyond the Mediterranean, on the high seas which England now dominates.

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