NEWS OF THE WEEK
THERE could be no grimmer or more tragic comment on the situation in Czechoslovakia than the suicide of Jan Masaryk supplies. The reference to insomnia in the official communiqué is a futility that will deceive no one in Czechoslovakia or out of it. What mental anguish the Foreign Minister must have undergone will never be known, for even if he has recorded it the document will never be allowed to see the light. His silence during the first hours of the coup d'etat, followed by his acceptance of office in the new government,- followed in its turn by the report of a halting apologia, all deeply distressed his friends in this country and else- where. Whether Dr. Masaryk took a course repugnant on the short view in the hope that the ultimate would be good, whether Dr. Benes thought it would be well to have one trusted friend inside the new Cabinet—that again is never likely to be known. If Jan Masaryk took a wrong step he has expiated it to the full and his memory will live unstained in history beside his father's. But there is, in fact, no ground for such assumption at all. Czechoslovakia has become a Police State. All communications are in the Government's hands, and the fabrication of reports is easy. There is no ground for crediting the declarations attributed to the Foreign Minister. One thing is certain—the shock in Czecho- slovakia will be profound and the political consequences far- reaching, for no more damning verdict on the new administra- tion could have been recorded. Meanwhile in Prague the customary lesser tragedies are being enacted. The purge is being extended among university teachers and has reached to the judicial bench. Justice in Czechoslovakia in future is to be determined by politics, not jurisprudence. Journalists and other writers are suffering simul- taneously. In industry and agriculture sweeping nationalisation, whose immediate results must be a diminution of efficiency even if its ultimate results are not, is being prosecuted with little relaxation. At the same time the Minister of Commerce is expressing his desire for the continuance and development of trade with the west. With how much enthusiasm the west will share the desire in the light of immediate events is an open question. There will be no boycott of Czechoslovakia. Trade must be prosecuted regardless of the Vicis- situdes of politics. But British exporters may prefer to wait a little. The day will come when the true Czechoslovakia will return to the family of nations.
