THE WORLD PARADE
Hanighen, Frnak C.
The World Parade By FRANK C. HANIGHEN Anzac Aggrandizement. . -22-.- Washington, D. C. THE British Empire has spawned within its framework not only the commendable democracy of the Dominions,...
...Also, I have heard that the officers of South American armies who have spent some time in this country undergoing training have returned to their native lands very discontented (after enjoying our high standard of living) with the backward conditions obtaining there, and ripe for pro-nunciamentos...
...This seems to contradict statements by Secretary Knox and other Americans...
...As Politics points out, this isn't pure demagogy...
...Lots of strange antics may appear soon in the republics towards whom Mr...
...An article by George Weller, of the foreign staff of the Chicago Daily News, inadvertently discloses not only this phenomenon, but also the potential clash with American imperialism in the Southwest Pacific...
...The National Socialists in Germany at the outset adopted a line especially designed to bring ex-Com-munists into their ranks, and several Gauleiters in the Reich today are former members of that party...
...Observers who have studied this question believe that the natives would receive a better treatment if the protectorates remained under the control of London than if they were handed over to the Union of South Africa, which" has a strong racial bias...
...Finally, Australia and New Zealand agree to oppose unitedly any change of sovereignty or system of control in any of the islands of the Pacific which lacks their consent...
...New Role For Smuts...
...At that time this intra-Empire imperialism was attributed to the reactionary and nationalist nature of the Government, particularly the pro-Axis Foreign Minister Oswald Pirow...
...For, there is more to it than Anzac imperialism...
...Nor is this necessarily all demagogy...
...In the '30s, the South African Government made a strong bid for absorption in their Union of the native protectorates of Basutoland, Bechunanaland, and Swaziland, which lie north and east of the Union...
...The British Government resisted these demands...
...All I am certain of is that when they come, our totalitarian liberals will fail to understand what's going on...
...But on a wider basis, this phenomenon of parts of the British Empire launching forth on little imperialistic expansions of their own may immensely complicate the task of holding the Empire together, not to mention more closely unifying it, as Lord Halifax urged in his speech in Toronto in January...
...This means fighting the tin barons...
...In justice to Perkins, he was never allowed to put his plan into effect...
...I take some dreary satisfaction in having suggested this possibility to Mr...
...Marianas, Carolines, and Pelew groups—'-in what Weller calls "expanding concentric rings" of territories around both Australia and New Zealand...
...a serious nationalist movement in a country as backward as Bolivia would try to improve the conditions of the masses as the necessary base for a stronger nation...
...Informed quarters believe that Smuts may head any unified Empire body which may emerge from the conference...
...Social Revolution In the opening (February) number of Dwight Mac-donald's interesting magazine Politics, there is a succinct editorial on a pattern apparently emerging now in Latin America...
...But it is noteworthy that when the Government changed and the pro-British and democratic Smuts exercised- power, the same attitude towards this expansion continued...
...Without knowing much about the southern continent, I ventured the prediction that if the United States went about backing the old-line dictators and ruling classes, the inevitable sweep of social revolution would find us aligned against whatever elements might champion.the rights of the masses—and that Falangists or Fascist-type organization might revolt against governments backed by our State Department...
...Weller stresses the clash of what he fails to call Anzac and American imperialisms, this nomenclature may provide the key to a real story...
...Politics reports on the Bolivian revolution of January that "here we have an anti-Semitic, authoritarian putsch, led by army officers of the same reactionary .and pro-Nazi stripe as those who engineered the Argentinian coup, overthrowing the Panaranda government from the left...
...Good Neighbor Vs...
...He told me that the Administration had shelved it because it might interfere with Lend-Lease and with aid to Britain...
...Premier Curtin of Australia will stop in Washington, it is reported, on his way to this conference in April...
...Mackenzie King of Canada may also take the Washington route to London for the conference, where he will doubtless play a reluctant part in any moves to unify the Empire—as his reaction to Halifax' speech indicates...
...A similar description of this event came to me from semi-official sources in Washington—except that to the shouts of the mob should be added "Viva Soviet Russia...
...While Mr...
...For many years, observers have noted this development in the Union of South Africa...
...22-.- Washington, D. C. THE British Empire has spawned within its framework not only the commendable democracy of the Dominions, but also another and quite different development—the appearance of intra-Empire imperialisms...
...If Mr...
...Weller tells how Australia and New Zealand "have agreed to a pact which would sharply limit American ¦ rights in these areas and which would attempt to establish an Anzac-orient...
...A Complicating Factor The Anzac pact also asserts political rights over such enemy territories as the Marshalls...
...If plans of some elements come to pass, he may as such occupy a position at least coequal with that of the British Premier...
...Mr...
...This intra-Empire imperialism may play a big role in the forthcoming Dominion conference in London, scheduled according to some reports for the early part of May...
...But, if the pro-Nazi elements in Bolivia can do it, why not in other countries ? I read a letter recently from Peru which reported increases in the Army and described the numbers of young officers who had nothing to do and nowhere to go—save to revolution...
...Weller also says that the Anzac agreement excludes any American participation in those former German mandated territories which remain to be captured, thus disposing of American plans to acquire Rabaul or Kavieng, Jap bases which have been for two years under American air attack...
...Latin-American officers can play the game as well as Hitler and Roehm...
...If this agreement remains in force, America's future political and strategical security in this area will be seriously impaired...
...Down with the North Americans!' The Bolivian tin magnates Went into hiding...
...Perkins sought to prevent this, in his plan, with certain qualifications on loans to those countries, whereby labor would be protected—and by other schemes...
...Weller goes on to say that Evatt, Australia's Foreign Minister, calls "absurd" American claims for bases from which American submarines now leave to harass Japanese shipping and where thousands of our troops and tons of Lend-Lease supplies are now unloaded...
...At least 50 American bases now stand in these territories...
...Macdonald, with his sour view of Stalin, had known of this, I'm sure he would have been grimly pleased to find anti-Semitism bracketed with Stalin...
...But Politics frankly analyzes this phenomenon—unlike various Leftist groups in this country which show an embarrassed silence about the overthrow of a regime which they considered reactionary, by a group labelled pro-Nazi, but offering relief to the oppressed miners...
...Hull shows such a robust Good Neighborly concern...
...Politics may have put its finger on a developing pattern in Latin America today...
...But General Smuts is said to have already started for London...
...Politics says, "The putschists are actually able to pose as the tribunes of the exploited Indian tin miners, and their program calls for better wages and retribution for last year's notorious Catavi massacre...
...ed pattern for territorial adjustments after Japan has been defeated in the Pacific...
...Milo Perkins in the Summer of 1940, when he was projecting a plan for saving South America from what then seemed a Nazi menace...
...The street mobs stoned the offices of the big tin companies and the American embassy, shouting 'Down with the Jews...
Vol. 8 • April 1944 • No. 15
