The various peace treaties regulating the present territorial
situation bear the names of the localities near Paris in which they
were signed: Versailles, Saint-Germain-en-Laye, Trianon and Sèvres.
The first deals with Germany, the second with Austria, the third
with Hungary, and the fourth with Turkey. The Treaty of Neuilly,
comparatively far less important, concerns Bulgaria alone. But the one
fundamental and decisive treaty is the Treaty of Versailles, inasmuch
as it not only establishes as a recognized fact the partition of
Europe, but lays down the rules according to which all future treaties
are to be concluded.
History has not on record a more colossal diplomatic feat than this
treaty, by which Europe has been neatly divided into two sections:
victors and vanquished; the former being authorized to exercise on the
latter complete control until the fulfilment of terms which, even at
an optimistic point valuation, would require at least thirty years to
materialize.
Although it is a matter of recent history, we may as well call to mind
that the Entente Powers have always maintained that the War was
wanted and was imposed by Germany; that she alone, with her Allies,
repeatedly violated the rights of peoples; that the World War could
well be regarded as the last war, inasmuch as the triumph of the
Entente meant the triumph of democracy and a more human regime of
life, a society of nations rich in effects conducive to a lasting
peace. It was imperative to restore the principles of international
justice. In France, in England, in Italy, and later, even more
solemnly, in the United States, the same principles have been
proclaimed by Heads of States, by Parliaments and Governments.
There are two documents laying down and fixing the principles which
the Entente Powers, on the eve of that event of decisive importance,
the entry of the United States into the War, bound themselves to
sustain and to carry on to triumph. The first is a statement by Briand
to the United States Ambassador, in the name of all the other Allies,
dated December 30, 1916. Briand speaks in the name of all "_les
gouvernements alliés unis pour la défense et la liberté des peuples_."
Briand's second declaration, dated January 10, 1917, is even more
fundamentally important. It is a collective note of reply to President
Wilson, delivered in the name of all the Allies to the United States
Ambassador. The principles therein established are very clearly
enunciated. According to that document the Entente has no idea of
conquest and proposes mainly to achieve the following objects:
1st. Restoration of Belgium, Serbia and Montenegro, with the
indemnities due to them.
2nd. Evacuation of invaded territories in France, Russia and Rumania
and payment of just reparations.
3rd. Reorganization of Europe with a permanent regime based on the
respect of nationalities and on the right of all countries, both great
and small, to complete security and freedom of economic development,
besides territorial conventions and international regulations capable
of guaranteeing land and sea frontiers from unjustified attacks.
4th. Restitution of the provinces and territories taken in the past
from the Allies by force and against the wish of the inhabitants.
5th. Liberation of Italians, Slavs, Rumanians and Czeko-Slovaks from
foreign rule.
6th. Liberation of the peoples subjected to the tyranny of the Turks
and expulsion from Europe of the Ottoman Empire, as being decidedly
extraneous to western civilization.
7th. The intentions of his Majesty the Emperor of Russia in regard
to Poland are clearly indicated in the proclamation addressed to his
armies.
8th. The Allies have never harboured the design of exterminating
German peoples nor of bringing about their political disappearance.
At that time the autocratic form of government still prevailed in
Russia, and the Allies still considered themselves bound to Russia's
aspirations; moreover there existed, in regard to Italy, the
obligations established by the Pact of London. That is why in the
statements of the Entente Powers of Europe the restoration of
Montenegro is regarded as an obligation; mention is made of the
necessity of driving the Turks out of Europe in order to enable Russia
to seize Constantinople; and as to Poland, there are only vague
allusions, namely, the reference made to the Tsar's intentions as
outlined in his proclamation.
The Entente has won the War, but Russia has collapsed under the
strain. Had victory been achieved without the fall of Russia, the
latter would have installed herself as the predominating Power in the
Mediterranean. On the other hand, to unite Dalmatia to Italy, while
separating her from Italy, according to the pact of London, by
assigning the territory of Fiume to Croatia, would have meant setting
all the forces of Slav irredentism against Italy.
These considerations are of no practical value inasmuch as events have
taken another course. Nobody can say what would have happened if the
Carthagenians had conquered the Romans or if victory had remained with
Mithridates. Hypotheses are of but slight interest when truth follows
another direction. Nevertheless we cannot but repeat that it was a
great fortune for Europe that victory was not decided by Russia, and
that the decisive factor proved the United States.
It is beyond all possible doubt that without the intervention of
the United States of America the War could not have been won by the
Entente. Although the admission may prove humiliating to the European
point of view, it is a fact which cannot be attenuated or disguised.
The United States threw into the balance the weight of its enormous
economic and technical resources, besides its enormous resources in
men. Although its dead only amount to fifty thousand, the United
States built up such a formidable human reserve as to deprive Germany
of all hopes of victory. The announcement of America's entry in the
War immediately crushed all Germany's power of resistance. Germany
felt that the struggle was no longer limited to Europe, and that every
effort was vain.
The United States, besides giving to the War enormous quantities of
arms and money, had practically inexhaustible reserves of men to place
in the field against an enemy already exhausted and famine-stricken.
War and battles are two very different things. Battles constitute an
essentially military fact, while war is an essentially political fact.
That explains why great leaders in war have always been first and
foremost great political leaders, namely, men accustomed to manage
other men and able to utilize them for their purposes. Alexander,
Julius Caesar, Napoleon, the three greatest military leaders produced
by Aryan civilization, were essentially political men. War is not only
a clash of arms, it is above all the most convenient exploitation of
men, of economic resources and of political situations. A battle is a
fact of a purely military nature. The Romans almost constantly placed
at the head of their armies personages of consular rank, who regarded
and conducted the war as a political enterprise. The rules of tactics
and strategy are perfectly useless if those who conduct the war fail
to utilize to the utmost all the means at their disposal.
It cannot be denied that in the War Germany and Austria-Hungary scored
the greatest number of victories. For a long period they succeeded in
invading large tracts of enemy territory and in recovering those
parts of their own territory which had been invaded, besides always
maintaining the offensive. They won great battles at the cost of
enormous sacrifices in men and lives, and for a long time victory
appeared to shine on their arms. But they failed to understand that
from the day in which the violation of Belgium's neutrality determined
Great Britain's entry in the field the War, from a general point of
view, could be regarded as lost. As I have said, Germany is especially
lacking in political sense: after Bismarck, her statesmen have never
risen to the height of the situation. Even von Bülow, who appeared
to be one of the cleverest, never had a single manifestation of real
intelligence.
The "banal" statements made about Belgium and the United States of
America by the men who directed Germany's war policy were precisely
the sort of thing most calculated to harm the people from whom they
came. What is decidedly lacking in Germany, while it abounds in
France, is a political class. Now a political class, consisting of
men of ability and culture, cannot but be the result of a democratic
education in all modern States, especially in those which have
achieved a high standard of civilization and development. It seems
almost incredible that Germany, despite all her culture, should
have tolerated the political dictatorship of the Kaiser and of his
accomplices.
At the Conferences of Paris and London, in 1919 and 1920, I did all
that was in my power to prevent the trial of the Kaiser, and I am
convinced that my firm attitude in the matter succeeded in avoiding
it. Sound common sense saved us from floundering in one of the most
formidable blunders of the Treaty of Versailles. To hold one man
responsible for the whole War and to bring him to trial, his enemies
acting as judge and jury, would have been such a monstrous travesty
of justice as to provoke a moral revolt throughout the world. On the
other hand it was also a moral monstrosity, which would have deprived
the Treaty of Versailles of every shred of dignity. If the one
responsible for the War is the Kaiser, why does the Entente demand of
the German people such enormous indemnities, unprecedented in history?
One of the men who has exercised the greatest influence on European
events during the last ten years, one of the most intelligent of
living statesmen, once told me that it was his opinion that the Kaiser
did not want the War, but neither did he wish to prevent it.
Germany, although under protest, has been forced to accept the
statement of the Versailles Treaty to the effect that she is
responsible for the War and that she provoked it. The same charge has
been levelled at her in all the Entente States throughout the War.
When our countries were engaged in the struggle, and we were at grips
with a dangerous enemy, it was our duty to keep up the _morale_ of our
people and to paint our adversaries in the darkest colours, laying on
their shoulders all the blame and responsibility of the War. But after
the great world conflict, now that Imperial Germany has fallen, it
would be absurd to maintain that the responsibility of the War is
solely and wholly attributable to Germany and that earlier than 1914
in Europe there had not developed a state of things fatally destined
to culminate in a war. If Germany has the greatest responsibility,
that responsibility is shared more or less by all the countries of the
Entente. But while the Entente countries, in spite of their mistakes,
had the political sense always to invoke principles of right and
justice, the statesmen of Germany gave utterance to nothing but brutal
and vulgar statements, culminating in the deplorable mental and moral
expressions contained in the speeches, messages and telegrams of
William II. He was a perfect type of the _miles gloriosus_, not a
harmless but an irritating and dangerous boaster, who succeeded in
piling up more loathing and hatred against his country than the most
active and intelligently managed enemy propaganda could possibly have
done.
If the issue of the War could be regarded as seriously jeopardized
by England's intervention, it was practically lost for the Central
Empires when the United States stepped in.
America's decision definitely crippled Germany's resistance--and
not only for military, but for moral reasons. In all his messages
President Wilson had repeatedly declared that he wanted a peace
based on justice and equity, of which he outlined the fundamental
conditions; moreover, he stated that he had no quarrel with the
Germans themselves, but with the men who were at their head, and that
he did not wish to impose on the vanquished peace terms such as might
savour of oppression.
President Wilson's ideas on the subject have been embodied in a
bulky volume.[1] Turning over the pages of this book now we have the
impression that it is a collection of literary essays by a man who had
his eye on posterity and assumed a pose most likely to attract the
admiration of generations as yet unborn. But when these same words
were uttered in the intervals of mighty battles, they fell on
expectant and anxious ears: they were regarded as a ray of light in
the fearsome darkness of uncertainty, and everybody listened to them,
not only because the President was the authorized exponent of a
great nation, of a powerful people, but because he represented an
inexhaustible source of vitality in the midst of the ravages of
violence and death. President Wilson's messages have done as much as
famine and cruel losses in the field to break the stubborn resistance
of the German people. If it was possible to obtain a just peace, why
go to the bitter end when defeat was manifestly inevitable? Obstinacy
is the backbone of war, and nothing undermines a nation's power of
resistance so much as doubt and faint-heartedness on the part of the
governing classes.
[Footnote 1: "President Wilson's State Speeches and Addresses," New
York, 1918.]
President Wilson, who said on January 2, 1917, that a peace without
victory was to be preferred ("It must be a peace without victory"),
and that "Right is more precious than peace," had also repeatedly
affirmed that "We have no quarrel with the German people."
He only desired, as the exponent of a great democracy, a peace which
should be the expression of right and justice, evolving from the War a
League of Nations, the first milestone in a new era of civilization, a
league destined to bind together ex-belligerents and neutrals in one.
In Germany, where the inhabitants had to bear the most cruel
privations, President Wilson's words, pronounced as a solemn pledge
before the whole world, had a most powerful effect on all classes
and greatly contributed towards the final breakdown of collective
resistance. Democratic minds saw a promise for the future, while
reactionaries welcomed any way out of their disastrous adventure.
After America's entry in the War, President Wilson, on January 8,
1918, formulated the fourteen points of his programme regarding the
finalities of the War and the peace to be realized.
It is here necessary to reproduce the original text of President
Wilson's message containing the fourteen points which constitute a
formal pledge undertaken by the democracy of America, not only towards
enemy peoples but towards all peoples of the world.
These important statements from President Wilson's message have,
strangely enough, been reproduced either incompletely or in an utterly
mistaken form even in official documents and in books published by
statesmen who took a leading part in the Paris Conference.
It is therefore advisable to reproduce the original text in full:
1st. Honest peace treaties, following loyal and honest
negotiations, after which secret international agreements will be
abolished and diplomacy will always proceed frankly and openly.
2nd. Full liberty of navigation on the high seas outside
territorial waters, both in peace and war, except when the seas be
closed wholly or in part by an international decision sanctioned
by international treaties.
3rd. Removal, as far as possible, of all economic barriers and
establishment of terms of equality in commerce among all nations
adhering to peace and associated to maintain it.
4th. Appropriate guarantees to be given and received for the
reduction of national armaments to a minimum compatible with
internal safety.
5th. A clear, open and absolutely impartial settlement of all
colonial rights, based on a rigorous observance of the principle
that, in the determination of all questions of sovereignty, the
interests of the populations shall bear equal weight with those of
the Government whose claims are to be determined.
6th. The evacuation of all Russian territories and a settlement
of all Russian questions such as to ensure the best and most
untrammelled co-operation of other nations of the world in
order to afford Russia a clear and precise opportunity for the
independent settlement of her autonomous political development and
of her national policy, promising her a cordial welcome in the
League of Nations under institutions of her own choice, and
besides a cordial welcome, help and assistance in all that she may
need and require. The treatment meted out to Russia by the sister
nations in the months to come must be a decisive proof of their
goodwill, of their understanding of her needs as apart from
their own interests, and of their intelligent and disinterested
sympathy.
7th. Belgium, as the whole world will agree, must be evacuated
and reconstructed without the slightest attempt at curtailing the
sovereign rights which she enjoys in common with other free
nations. Nothing will be more conducive to the re-establishment
of confidence and respect among nations for those laws which they
themselves have made for the regulation and observance of their
reciprocal relations. Without this salutary measure the whole
structure and validity of international law would be permanently
undermined.
8th. All French territories will be liberated, the invaded regions
reconstructed, and the wrong done to France by Prussia in 1871,
in the question of Alsace-Lorraine, and which has jeopardized the
peace of the world for nearly half a century, must be made good,
so as to ensure a lasting peace in the general interest.
9th. The Italian frontier must be rectified on the basis of the
clearly recognized lines of nationality.
10th. The people of Austria-Hungary, whose place among the nations
we wish to see safeguarded and maintained, should come to an
agreement as to the best way of attaining their autonomous
development.
11th. Rumania, Serbia and Montenegro are to be evacuated and
occupied territories restored: a free and secure access to the
sea for Serbia; mutual relations between the Balkan States to be
determined on a friendly basis by a Council, following the lines
of friendship and nationality traced by tradition and history; the
political and economic integrity of the various Balkan States to
be guaranteed.
12th. A certain degree of sovereignty must be assigned to that
part of the Ottoman Empire which is Turkish; but the other
nationalities now under the Turkish regime should have the
assurance of an independent existence and of an absolute and
undisturbed opportunity to develop their autonomy; moreover
the Dardanelles should be permanently open to the shipping and
commerce of all nations under international guarantees.
13th. An independent Polish State should be founded, comprising
all territories inhabited by peoples of undoubtedly Polish
nationality, with a free and secure access to the sea and its
political and economic independence and territorial integrity
guaranteed by international agreements.
14th. A League of Nations must be formed with special pacts and
for the sole scope of ensuring the reciprocal guarantees of
political independence and of territorial integrity, in equal
measure both for large and small States.
The Peace Treaty as outlined by Wilson would really have brought about
a just peace; but we shall see how the actual result proved quite the
reverse of what constituted a solemn pledge of the American people and
of the Entente Powers.
On February 11, 1918, President Wilson confirmed before Congress that
all territorial readjustments were to be made in the interest and for
the advantage of the populations concerned, not merely as a bargain
between rival States, and that there were not to be indemnities,
annexations or punitive exactions of any kind.
On September 27, 1918, just on the eve of the armistice, when German
resistance was already shaken almost to breaking point, President
Wilson gave it the _coup de grâce_ by his message on the _post-bellum_
economic settlement. No special or separate interest of any single
nation or group of nations was to be taken as the basis of any
settlement which did not concern the common interest of all; there
were not to be any leagues or alliances, or special pacts or ententes
within the great family of the society of nations; economic deals and
corners of an egotistical nature were to be forbidden, as also all
forms of boycotting, with the exception of those applied in punishment
to the countries transgressing the rules of good fellowship; all
international treaties and agreements of every kind were to be
published in their entirety to the whole world.
It was a magnificent programme of world policy. Not only would it have
meant peace after war, but a peace calculated to heal the deep wounds
of Europe and to renovate the economic status of nations.
On the basis of these principles, which constituted a solemn pledge,
Germany, worn out by famine and even more by increasing internal
unrest, demanded peace.
According to President Wilson's clear statements, made not only in
the name of the United States but in that of the whole Entente, peace
should therefore have been based on justice, the relations between
winners and losers in a society of nations being exclusively inspired
by mutual trust.
There were no longer to be huge standing armies, neither on the
part of the ex-Central Empires or on that of the victorious States;
adequate guarantees were to be _given and received_ for the reduction
of armies to the minimum necessary for internal defence; removal of
all economic barriers; absolute freedom of the seas; reorganization
of the colonies based on the development of the peoples directly
concerned; abolition of secret diplomacy, etc.
As to the duties of the vanquished, besides evacuating the occupied
territories, they were to reconstruct Belgium, to restore to France
the territories taken in 1871; to restore all the territories
belonging to Rumania, Serbia and Montenegro, giving Serbia a free and
secure access to the sea; to constitute a free Poland with territories
_undoubtedly Polish_ to which _there might_ be granted a free and
secure access to the sea. Poland, founded on secure ethnical bases,
far from being a military State, was to be an element of peace, and
her political and economic independence and territorial integrity were
to have been guaranteed by an international agreement.
After the rectification of the Italian frontier according to the
principles of nationality, the peoples of Austria-Hungary were to
agree on the free opportunity of their autonomous development. In
other terms, each people could freely choose autonomy or throw in its
lot with some other State. After giving a certain sovereignty to the
Turkish populations of the Ottoman Empire the other nationalities were
to be allowed to develop autonomously, and the free navigation of the
Dardanelles was to be internationally guaranteed.
These principles announced by President Wilson, and already proclaimed
in part by the Entente Powers when they stoutly affirmed that they
were fighting for right, for democracy and for peace, did not
constitute a concession but a duty towards the enemy. In each of the
losing countries, in Germany as in Austria-Hungary, the democratic
groups contrary to the War, and those even more numerous which had
accepted the War as in a momentary intoxication, when they exerted
themselves for the triumph of peace, had counted on the statements, or
rather on the solemn promises which American democracy had made not
only in the name of the United States but in that of all the Entente
Powers.
Let us now try to sum up the terms imposed on Germany and the other
losing countries by the treaty of June 28, 1919. The treaty, it is
true, was concluded between the allied and associated countries and
Germany, but it also concerns the very existence of other countries
such as Austria-Hungary, Russia, etc.: