BOMBS ON OPEN TOWNS
[To the Editor of THE SPECTATOR] Sta,—Last week's Spectator had a number of letters in which the writers clamoured for some action to be taken -against those who. bomb open towns and women and children. In a few weeks or months it is possible that we may have to face that terrible question, whether or not we shall go to war in defence of France should she stand by her alliance with Czechoslovakia (which God forbid) and attack Germany. Before that question is ever answered in the affirmative (it is a question which every thinking man is trying to answer in his own mind) the whole country should understand plainly what going to the rescue of Czechoslovakia and France would mean. It would NOT mean a war of chivalry. There is nowadays no such thing. It would in fact mean the sending off of our own pilots to bomb women and children in open towns, sending them off to do precisely those horrible things that Franco is doing and about which your correspondents are making such an outcry.
If they dispute that plain statement, do the writers of these letters imagine that if, and when, that dreaded day comes, we shall have' a 'polite arrangement with Germany whereby London is not.attacked ? Or are they such unpractical idealists that they imagitie we can wage war without paying back the enemy in his own coin ? But good can sometimes come out of evil. If the people of this country, instead of squealing about Franco's bombing, would learn from it to face up to realities, the chance of this country keeping out of war would be a bigger one than it is at present.
The great realist today is the Prime Minister. He needs, and he is not• getting, the outspoken support of all who can face plain facts.—Yours faithfully, W. H. ALLEN Wiltrwottm,
Framlingham College, Suffolk. Headmaster.
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