Rumania Rumania, however, is threatened by Germany as well as
Italy. The danger is the greater if her negotiations with Great Britain have not gone further than has so far been announced, though at the week-end Rumania's Minister in London, M. Tilea, is said to have expressed her willingness to conclude a pact of mutual assistance on the lines of the Anglo-Polish agreement ; here again the delays that infest British diplomacy are a matter of the utmost concern. The Italian threat concerns her indirectly, as it is a direct incen- tive to Bulgaria to raise in an acute form her demands on the Dobrudja, taken from her after the second Balkan War, just as it encourages her to press her claims on Greece in Macedonia. Faced with such dangers, it is imperative that Rumania should receive an immediate guarantee of assist- ance, especially as her Foreign Minister, M. Gafencu, on April 19th, makes that journey to Berlin which has wrought the downfall of so many statesmen. Without further assur- ances than she can secure from her Balkan allies, it may prove impossible for M. Gafencu to resist German demands, per- haps in the form of an ultimatum, that Rumania should be neutral in the event of war and continue to fulfil all and more than all the obligations she has undertaken by her trade treaty with Germany. It is possible that, by delaying her guarantee, Great Britain hopes to persuade Rumania to make concessions to Bulgaria in the Dobrudja ; but the pace at which events have developed in the last week makes delay highly dangerous.
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