Perched insecurely on the edge of Europe, little Portugal has only two white chips to back her hand in the big international cutthroat game. One is her carefully preserved neutrality, the other her possession of the highly strategic Azores. Last week the world could see how cannily she was hoarding them.
From Lisbon came word of two recent decrees of the Portuguese Government. One forbade aliens to go to the Azores without first visiting Lisbon, getting a personal O.K. from authorities there. Presumably the ubiquitous, stiff-backed German "tourists" would get no visas....