(See front cover)
The most crucial job in the Empire was briskly shouldered last week by the new First Lord of the British Admiralty, Sir Samuel John Gurney Hoare. Few months ago he was Foreign Secretary, and in those now distant times it was still possible for Great Britain to have made a friendly peace with Benito Mussolini—such a peace as the Hoare-Laval Deal for which British public opinion was not yet ready when Sir Samuel signed it in Paris (TIME, Dec. 16 & 23). Last week not peace but a capitulation to II Duce was made by Foreign Secretary Anthony Eden amid cries in the House of Commons that His Majesty's Government were "cowards" and "pol-troons". These cries were hollow, ignored by the Baldwin Cabinet like so much wind, because in fact the Empire has now scrapped all reliance on the League of Nations and is arming at breakneck speed—not necessarily for war, per-haps for Pax Britannica to be imposed on restless Europe in the future. It was more than ever clear last week that Sir Samuel Hoare is now the spokesman of His Majesty's Government to the King's subjects on this greatest shift in British policy since the War. Sounding the new keynote, the new First Lord declared:
"Let us members of the Empire remain firm in the conviction that we can best help the cause of peace by being true to type, by holding firmly to the policy that conforms to our traditions, by undertaking nothing that we cannot fulfill and by remembering always that, while our influence will always be on the side of European peace and that we will faithfully carry out our obligations to that end, —we are an imperial and an oceanic rather than a Continental power. Thus shall we best serve the cause of peace!"
"Imperial and Oceanic" were the significant words in this key pronouncement by Sir Samuel Hoare, for they implied a brand new concept of Empire strategy. Since the Suez Canal was opened (with Britain as a major shareholder since 1875 by Disraeli's finesse), the King's subjects have been taught that the "Lifeline of Empire" runs through Suez. This shortest route to India must at all costs be dominated by Britain, so ran the popular dogma and so the British Admiralty has stiffly held. Today, however, with Italy triumphant and formidably facing Suez, London was fast telling itself last week that an alternative route to India must at once be got into safe shape. In this queasy moment it was British and it was brave to get ready to believe that the new Lifeline of Empire is better, stronger and more glorious than the old. It runs clear around Africa, past the ominous Cape, whose storms were once so deadly to sailing ships. It is no narrow, canalized affair of jealous Europe's pesky little Mediterranean or rebellious Egypt's Suez, but a broad route over the bounding main.
Sir Samuel Hoare, though his keynote is now perfectly understood and clear to Britain's ruling class and may soon be popular with Britain's masses, last week had to be careful as First Lord. It would not do, while Mr. Eden was diplomatically capitulating to II Duce, for the British Admiralty to confirm rumors flying in the Press that Britain is "about to abandon Malta as a naval base."