Order of the Day

The Big Three are not too big to be defied by the London Poles. Last week the flag of defiance was boldly waved by Polish General Wladyslaw Anders, an Allied field commander in Italy. Before Winston Churchill had returned from Yalta, Anders denounced the Crimea verdict. Publicly he declared: "The Government ... in London [is] the only legal Government of the Polish State."

In London, outraged Churchill summoned Anders and took him to task for intransigence in a heated two-hour interview. The London Polish Government responded by appointing the General commander in chief of all Polish armed forces still loyal to the London Government. Thumbing his nose again, Anders issued a flamboyant order of the day, addressed to a quarter-million Polish soldiers, sailors and airmen scattered throughout Western Europe and the Middle East: ". . . Our standards covered with glory, we are facing the greatest tragedy of our nation. ... We shall remain faithful to our honor, and to ... Poland, we shall return as soldiers with arms in our hands."

The British Foreign Office hastened to disavow responsibility for the General's appointment, saying that it had not been consulted.

But the Polish Government in London also was not too big to be defied. In Poland, Soviet authorities arrested Mme. Tomasz Arciszewska, wife of the Polish London Prime Minister--or at least such was the report in London. When Foreign Secretary Anthony Eden was questioned about it in Parliament, Soviet Ambassador Feodor Gusev rose and left the house.

The fate of Poland might be settled, but nose thumbing would go on & on.

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