22 APRIL 1938, Page 2

Fascism in Rumania King Carol of Rumania is to be

congratulated on the ability with which, up to this moment, he has routed th, dangerous and powerful Fascist movement in his country. In the last few months he has completely outmanoeuvre( the Iron Guard, and in the last week has discovered their plans for a putsch, has had their leader, M. Codreanu. committed to prison for six months, and 2,000 of his followers arrested. Only two months ago M. Codreanu announced that his movement was dissolved and he himself would retire to Rome to write a book. For the moment Rumania has been saved from the dangers of a violently anti-semitie movement which threatened the King in his tenderest spot ; and party politics have been suppressed. The interesting question, however, is whether King Carol's victory will prove to be complete and final. Herr Schuschnigg's Govern- ment also harried, arrested, imprisoned, and in some cases executed the National Socialists, only to surrender in the end to the overwhelming pressure of Germany. King Carol has good reasons to resist that pressure ; but he will hardly do so unless he has even better reasons for believing that Germany is not, as Rumania is tempted to believe, invincible.

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