High-Grade Lowdown

The leakiest foreign office in Europe is the French, but only when a news leak suits the high policy of M. Alexis Leger, the permanent undersecretary. Greatest diplomat of today, M. Leger has the one striking limitation that he almost never is out of France and some of his major coups are a trifle too Parisian. Last week a few prominent journalists working in France were permitted to read what was supposed to be the entire report of the French Secret Service on what happened in Addis Ababa following the bomb attack on Italian Viceroy Rodolfo Graziani (TIME, March 1). This may or may not have been the real "lowdown," but it made interesting reading and is typical of French finesse in acquiring the goodwill of top-grade foreign correspondents by giving them a peep to ease their heroic curiosity.

Summarized, the French lowdown on Addis Ababa last week was that a slanting tin roof made a great deal of difference. Had not Viceroy Graziani & Staff been standing under its eaves, the five bombs, all inexpertly "thrown high" by Ethiopians, would not have glanced and rolled off to a short distance. They gave the Viceroy 38 body wounds but they killed numbers of Ethiopians and would infallibly have killed Graziani & Staff had the tin roof not been there. The Chief of Italy's East African Air Force General Aurelio Liotta not only had to have a leg amputated, as the world press has reported, but also lost an eye and suffered 20 body wounds, according to the French version.

Under Emperor Haile Selassie the populace of Ethiopia were armed almost to a man. The Italians have disarmed almost every native in Addis Ababa. Therefore when blackshirt squads of Fascist militia proceeded after the bombing to retaliate by shooting up the town, its disarmed, comparatively helpless citizens, accustomed always to giving as good as they got, became bitterly incensed at the white men's behaving in a manner so "unfair"-- even if the Fascists were striking back because their Viceroy had 38 slugs in him.

According to the French report, Ethiopian indignation spreading in ever-widening ripples from Addis Ababa has generated native "passive resistance" on a large scale, with food now growing scarce in Italian garrison towns as Ethiopians stubbornly refuse to sell. Agents of the British Secret Service are doing all they can in Ethiopia to further and foment such native discontent, according to the French Secret Service reports, and Ethiopians are being incited to assassinate Italians.

Immediate cause of French-Italian friction over Ethiopia today, and it probably explains why Paris is indulging in such newsy official leaks, is the quarrel of the two countries over who owns the 15% of the stock in Ethiopia's only railway which Haile Selassie claims is owned by his "Ethiopian Government." Il Duce claims this stock for Italy, by right of conquest. Another 20% belongs to Italy undisputed, dating from the Mussolini-Laval accord (TIME, Jan. 21, 1935). The French are the largest shareholders, holding 35%, but fear Italy has bought up nearly enough shares elsewhere to own stock control of this 494 miles of rail, linking Addis Ababa with the French port of Djibouti. Last week, according to the French, Il Duce had forced the road into a deficit for the first time in 14 years by ordering Viceroy Graziani last year to "ship nothing by rail on which freight has to be paid," using motor transport instead. Inadequacy of this was said to account in part for food scarcity in Italian bases.

That the French Cabinet of Premier Blum took most seriously last week a warning by its Secret Service that the Italians may simply seize the railway if they cannot get stock control, was said in Paris to be shown by. the fact that experienced French General Victor Denain was sent rushing to Djibouti.

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.