NEWS OF THE WEEK
SO far as Mr. Eden's statement in the House of Commons on Monday cast new light on the inten- tions of Signor Mussolini in Abyssinia it was extremely disturbing light. The conversation at Rome appears to have made it clear that the Duce's resolve to go to war with Abyssinia for the sake both of prestige and cc m- niercial outlets is fixed and definite. That confronts this country with one fundamental issue, which the Cabinet is understood to have had before it on Wednesday, —Is the League of Nations to survive or be abandoned ? It will survive, however truncated and paralysed tem- porarily, if Italy leaves it. It will be dead in fact if not in name if . its . principles are deliberately betrayed by countries like Great Britain and France in order that a war of aggression and aggrandizement by Italy against another member of the League may be condoned. Whenever the League stands by its principles it gains influence and authority. Whenever it abandons them it is ignored and contemned. In the present emergency there are three possibilities. The League may give way and lose everything. It may stand fast and avert the Abyssinian war altogether. It may stand fast and fail ,to avert it, but still keep intact a foundation on which its structure can be restored in saner days. The one fatal policy—fatal to all hope of world-peace—would be the first.
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