Bitter Pills

"Many Moscow residents listened in on the radio this morning expecting every moment to hear an announcement that Soviet troops had crossed the Finnish frontier," cabled the New York Times's Moscow Bureau last week. "In some respects Finland's situation closely resembles that of Czecho-Slovakia in September 1938."

Instead of Adolf Hitler it was Soviet Premier Viacheslav Molotov who alternately cajoled and threatened, and instead of the Voelkischer Beobachter it was the Communist Party official newsorgan Pravda ("Truth") that was out to whip up public indignation against the tiny "aggressor."

Russians were told that Finnish Foreign Minister Eljas Erkko had made a speech at Helsinki in which he denounced "Russian imperialism" and cried, "There is a limit to everything. Finland cannot accept the proposals of the Soviet Union and will defend her territory and her inviolability and independence by all means!" Pravda headlined its story ERKKO INCITES TO WAR!, editorialized that this speech "cannot be understood except as an appeal for war against the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics." In Moscow only the diplomatic-journalistic colony was aware that Mr. Erkko never uttered the words quoted by Pravda but in fact made a conciliatory speech designed to string out further the protracted Finnish-Soviet negotiations (TIME, Nov. 6, et ante).

Meanwhile in Moscow restaurants and on streetcars Soviet citizens could be heard remarking to each other with guffaws, "This Finn has gone mad. He is threatening to hurl a nation of 3,000,000 people against our 180,000,000!"

In Helsinki diplomatic Mr. Erkko remarked easily that the Russians "must have got hold of a wrong translation," but Pravda stuck grimly to contending that Finland's Foreign Minister had shown "exactly the same attitude as that of former Foreign Minister Beck of Poland. He [Beck] too made provocative speeches before the war between Poland and Germany and--as a result of this--provoked the war with Germany."

Big Bolshevik No. 2 did the big talking in Moscow last week. He is broad-shouldered, bushy-mustached, pince-nezed Premier Viacheslav Molotov who looks something like the late Theodore Roosevelt, stutters explosively. Last week, when the Supreme Soviet or Russian Congress met in extraordinary session to admit new delegates from the slice of Poland taken by Dictator Stalin, curiosity was rife as to whether Orator Molotov would again, as in 1937, have to make three great efforts before his speech impediment would permit him to utter the most important cry in Russia: "Long live Comrade Sssssss. . . . Long live Comrade Stttttt. . . . Long live Comrade Stalin!" The long-suffering Premier last week had no trouble and in his secondary capacity as Soviet Commissar for Foreign Affairs made an extremely long and rambling state-of-the-world speech in which he ticked off Turkey, Germany, Great Britain and France, Japan, Finland and Franklin Delano Roosevelt.

The Premier wondered aloud "whether Turkey will not come to regret" that she recently tied up with Britain and France instead of with Russia (TIME, Oct. 30); he declared, "We have always held that a strong Germany is an indispensable condition for a durable peace in Europe," but promised no Soviet aid except in vaguely seconding German bids for peace; he denounced Britain and France as "aggressors" who falsely invoke "democracy" as their excuse for waging an "imperialist war" which the British blockade of Germany "turned into a war against children, women, old people and the sick."

In speaking of Japan, Orator Molotov first boasted that Russia had given effective aid to the Sovietized Mongolians in resisting Japanese aggression, whereas he sneered that Britain & France had welshed on succoring Poland; but the Soviet Premier then dropped his belligerent tone to congratulate Japan in honeyed words on signing peace with the Mongolians (TIME, Sept. 25), hinted the starting of Soviet-Japanese trade negotiations and beamed, "We have reason to speak of the beginning of improvement in our relations with Japan.

"The decision of the American Government to lift the embargo on the export of arms to belligerent countries raises justified misgivings," said Moscow's Molotov. "Of course this decision may insure big profits for American war industries."

In a slap at President Roosevelt, promptly rebutted from the White House (see p. 15), the Premier found "hard to reconcile with the American policy of neutrality" Mr. Roosevelt's recent admonition to Russia lest she crack down unduly upon Finland. This was precisely what Dictator Stalin was engaged in doing last week and Viacheslav Molotov as Foreign Minister paradoxically proceeded to state the terms of the crackdown.

Russia's Demands. From the start of negotiations Finland has refused to sign with Russia one of the euphemistically named "pacts of mutual assistance" which reduced Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania to vassalage, and Big Bolshevik No. 2 said that the Soviet Government has dropped this broad demand. He asked, however, last week specific concessions fully as drastic: 1) Finland must surrender to Russia her entrenched and fortified defensive frontier against the Soviet Union, together with highly strategic Finnish islands near Leningrad and part of Finland's ocean frontage in the Arctic; 2) in exchange the Russians offered territory "twice as great in area" but strategically and economically valueless, among Russia's Karelian crags and swamps; 3) Finland must lease to the Russians a naval base at or near her best harbor, HangOe, dominating not only the northern entrance to the Gulf of Finland but also the Aland Islands and thus strategically threatening adjacent Sweden.

Premier Molotov, far from sugaring these bitter pills, gruffly told the Supreme Soviet that "we do not think Finland will seek a pretext to frustrate the proposed agreement" and warned that if the Finns did refuse to sign on J. Stalin & Co.'s dotted line this "would of course work to the serious detriment of Finland."

Bolsheviks & Scandinavians. This was diplomatically crude work, since the negotiations were still supposed to be in the confidential stage. But in Moscow the Finnish Delegation, headed by former Premier Dr. Juho K. Paasikivi and Labor Leader V. A. Tanner, patiently kept the negotiations going and even dined with Dictator Stalin while the whole Scandinavian press began to shriek alarm and mobilized Finland grimly strengthened her defenses. (The overtaxed Finnish National Defense Organization had an inventive brainwave, announced that "by an ingenious device" Finnish dairy separators were being converted quickly into anti-gas purifiers.)

Such was Swedish alarm that Foreign Minister Rickard Sandler declared flatly that "if the Finns agree to present ports to the Soviet Union this would signify the end of Scandinavia!" The Pravda headline over this was Hypocritical Political Game Of Certain Swedish Statesmen. Russian press and radio charged that Britain and France were egging Norway and Sweden into egging Finland into disastrous truculence. "During the Tsarist regime Finland was completely subjected to Russia," snorted Pravda. "Then, Swedish statesmen never muttered about danger for Sweden, but cringed and groveled in every way before the Tsarist Government!" They now have a chance to do the same before Joseph Stalin.

With Denmark helplessly at the mercy of Germany, Finland desperate, and the cave-digging Swedes still uncommitted to a scrap for Scandinavia, Norway delivered what looked like a spunky slap at the glowering Russian Bear by baldly reversing the Russian view of the City of Flint case and turning the ship back to its U. S. crew (see p. 33).

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