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Czechoslovakia retaliated with the accusation that not only during last week but for the past month 34 German planes had been observed on the wrong side of the border.
¶The German press raged that a Sudeten German farmer had been beaten by Czech soldiers when he failed to produce an identity card.
¶Germany claimed that Czech engineers had been detected at the German side of a bridge near Linz trying to fire it with straw and gasoline. The Czechs answered that the bridge had been destroyed six months ago.
"Direct Action." To the question—Just what does Henlein want?—the Sudeten Führer last week made answer. To G. Ward Price, friend of Adolf Hitler and correspondent for Viscount Rothermere's pro-German London Daily Mail, Henlein declared: "The northwest end of Czechoslovakia forms a sort of foreign appendix in the body of the German Reich. This appendix cannot be allowed to remain in its present state of high inflammation. . . . If such a dangerous condition is neglected, the inflamed appendix would burst one day and instantly infect all Europe with political peritonitis."
Henlein suggested three alternative appendectomies: 1) Local autonomy for the Sudetens, with municipal rule, education, public services and police left to the community majority; foreign affairs and national affairs affecting the whole country to be administered from Prague. 2) A plebiscite under foreign control to determine whether the Sudetens want to be citizens of Germany or Czechoslovakia. "The result," assured Henlein, "would be a 98% majority for Germany." 3) "The third solution," continued the Führer, "would be simpler still." It is that if Czech repression of the Sudetens continues, their resentment may one day force the German Government by direct action to bring them within the frontiers of the Reich.
This time Herr Henlein had apparently let one cat too many out of the bag. The German Minister in Prague, Ernst Eisenlohr, received a telephoned dressing down from Berlin, the Sudeten party leaders went into hurried conference. Soon a party communiqué denied that Henlein had given any such interview. It appeared that for the present Germany is not ready for talk of "direct action," may prefer one of Mr. Henlein's alternative causes.
One factor holding back Germany was candidly expressed last week by a Nazi sympathizer, Colonel Euchi Tatsumi, military attaché in Japan's London Embassy: "I don't believe German soldiers will invade Czechoslovakia. Germany is not yet fully equipped for a long war, although she has, perhaps, sufficient airplanes for a short war."
Settlement? Evidence that the Czech leaders want time to consider Henlein's demands, perhaps to accept his "autonomy" solution, was seen last week when they postponed for a fortnight a session of Parliament that is to tackle the problem.