NEWS OF THE WEEK
HETHER the full facts about the clash between an American naval patrol aeroplane, a B-24, and Russian fighters in the neighbourhood of Libau will ever be known is problematic. Certainly they are not known yet. From the official statement issued by the Soviet Govern- ment, three days after the event, one clear conclusion emerges. The Russian fighters fired at the American plane, which ".turned towards the sea and disappeared." So much may be assumed to be true, since the Russians admit the attack themselves. But nothing else can yet be assumed. Was the American plane destroyed ? It seems almost certain that it was, though survivors may yet be found. Did the Americans, as the Soviet Note to Washington suggests, open fire on the Russian fighters ? The American authorities say that the B-24 was not armed. Did the incident take place " south of Libau " ? If so what was an American plane, which, according to the Americans. was on a routine training flight from Wiesbaden to Copenhagen, doing anywhere near Libau, which is in Latvia, at the extreme eastern end of the Baltic? All these questions need an answer, but till the answer is available judgement on many aspects of this disturbing affair must be suspended. The American claim to fly freely over any part of the Baltic may be legally tenable, but it appears that Russia has elaborate defensive—and not necessarily only defensive— installations on the Latvian coast, and anything that looks like an attempt to spy on them from the air is calculated to provoke a sharp.reaction. Is it worth while to invite that reaction ? Wherever the rights and wrongs may ultimately prove to lie—and it must be assumed to be possible that there is some of both on each side— it is clear that something very like the kind of incident that was always feared during the blockade of Berlin has taken place. The matter could not be in safer hands than Mr. Dean Acheson's, and American public opinion is showing commendable self-restraint.
