Peace Talk

Most persistent rumor circulating in world capitals for the last few weeks has been the rumor of peace. In Washington last week the U. S. State Department had to admit it had heard a rumor that Adolf Hitler planned to call the Reichstag to present his peace terms to the world. From Berlin came reports that the Reichstag would soon be summoned. In Rome the Italian Government was said to be still hoping for peace with Greece. Tokyo heard that feelers had been put out for ending the war in China.

Peace offensives are generally for one of two purposes: 1) to weaken the morale of an enemy and his friends, before an armed offensive; 2) to prepare the ground for a real peace offer. The rumors of the past few weeks might be for either. There have always been important groups in both Britain and Germany, in both China and Japan, that felt war was stupid and needless. Weeks ago the Rome-Berlin Axis was supposed to be trying to get the Vatican to propose peace on the grounds that Germany could not conquer the British Isles and Britain could not conquer Europe. Hitler's travels of the last fortnight suggested that he might be planning to consolidate Europe before proposing peace again.

This week Great Britain seemed to be more afraid of peace than war. London circulated a weird story: to convince the U. S. that Hitler had become a penitent, religious man, Father Odo had been sent to the U. S. by Clipper. Father Odo is Karl Alexander Maria Philipp Joseph Albrecht Gregor, His Royal Highness the Duke of Wuerttemberg, whose father, Duke Albrecht, was a Field Marshal of World War I fame. Father Odo's mission was said to be to sell the U. S. on Hitler's plan for a united Christian Europe and the conquest of pagan Russia. Two things were wrong with this story: 1) Father Odo was exiled by the Nazis seven years ago; 2) instead of persuading U. S. bigwigs, he stayed quietly at a Benedictine church in The Bronx.

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