NEWS OF THE WEEK
THE Members of Parliament of various parties who visited Madrid in the earlier part of this month have issued an important and convincing report, in which they dwell in particular on the need for accelerating the evacuation of the civil population, and one of them,( Captain Macnamara, made an admirably fair and instructive speech on the subject on the closing day of the Session in the House of Commons. With only indecisive fighting in progress still, the dominant feature of the situation is again the attitude of Germany, Italy and the Soviet Union. All Russia is infuriated by the alleged sinking of a Russian merchant ship by an insurgent war-vessel, though the evidence for the occur- rence seems so far meagre. Far more serious is the threat of the reinforcement of General Franco, who can clearly not succeed by his own efforts, by anything up to 20,000 German "volunteers," despatched obviously, if they are despatched, by the deliberate action of the Nazi Government. Theoretically Germany has agreed to interpret non-intervention as applying to men as well as munitions, but the Non-Intervention Committee has reached no formal agreement on the subject, and the influx of Germans into Spain continues. It is a grave situation, for Herr Hitler, through the folly of his recog- nition of General Franco, has made it almost impossible to contemplate Franco's failure. Italy, on the other hand, is plainly less enthusiastic over the Spanish adventure. Some formula making effective mediation a possibility may yet be devised.
