duly 28. 4
The new Commissar for For+ eign Affairs at Moscow, My Litvinoff, has promptly taken the world into his confidence, Hig speech to the foreign journalist shows that he and his colleague, are in some degree on the defense ive, There is a firm declaration of adherence to the principles of the old regime, but it is tinged with a plaintive justification of the measures considered nece sary to protect the Soviet fabric against the would-be aggression
cherin's disappearance from th Soviet Government is really o of foreign militarists. M. is) little more than personal into est. For the last few years he has been head of the Russian Foreign Office in name only, for illness has prevented his active participation in the conduct of the business of his office, to say. nothing of the fact that' he haa for some time been resident. in Germany. He is the last of the, old guard. It is true that M. Rykoff still remains, but he wag not_ in the inner ring which surrounded the personality of My Lenin. Of aristocratic birth, M. Chicherin was a most valuable adherent to the Soviet cause, He was able to-give tone to what would otherwise have been—and previously was—a most unimpressive rabble, when he took over the chief responsibility for Russian diplomacy, His care int sartorial matters facilitated hia representation of his country in other European States and one of his triumphs was the signature of the Germano-Soviet Treaty of Rapallo on April 16, 1922. By that treaty Germany' recognized the Soviet Union and thus the way was made clear for the initiation of a definite foreign policy. It would be idle to pres tend that M. Chicherin was ever on the best of terms with the majority of his colleagues. He had a natural disinclination to fraternize with the parvenus of the Soviet regime and, in all probability, his elimination from the Government is in the main due to the ascendancy gained by, his enemies in the present ae ministration under M. Stalin.
Litvinoff has taken over charge of the Foreign port folio at a critical moment. His allusion to the activities of the enemies of his Government is, no doubt, inspired by the uneasiness, which he must feel"at recent developments in America over, the alleged misdoings of Russian Trade. Delegation
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.