THE NEXT MOVES IN THE INTERNATIONAL GAME
Out of the Peace Conference and the welter of policies that followed it
students of international affairs have learned one thing, if nothing
else: to distrust the efficacy of formulas to improve relations among
nations. Despite the sacrifices and the heroic deeds of countless
millions of civilized human beings, despite the educational propaganda
of the war years, despite the high ideals for the triumph of which
we believed that we were fighting, there was a scramble for spoils
immediately the war was ended. The Paris Peace Conference conclusively
proved that there had been no conversion of statesmen from their faith
in traditional foreign policies to the widely heralded and much vaunted
principles of “self-determination,” “rights of small nations,” “making
the world safe for democracy,” “a durable world peace,” and “the league
of nations.” No effort was made to repudiate the Prussian idea that
“might goes before right,” and it was soon evident that the war fought
to liberate subject peoples had resulted in the destruction and ruin
of some of them and in bringing out in the rest of them the bad traits
we condemned the Germans for showing.
The story of Europe since 1918 gives us furiously to think; for we have
seen our statesmen and leaders unable to abandon the traditional rules
of the diplomatic game in their efforts to solve post-bellum problems
and the great mass of intelligent men and women unwilling to inform
themselves about and think constructively upon questions affecting
world peace. It was natural that there should have been indulgence
in prejudices and passions during the war. Whether in a righteous
cause or not, fighting implies the abandonment of the inhibitions of
civilized society and a return of the law of the jungle. Violence and
the reasoning faculty cannot be used coördinately in the settlement
of disputes. The excuse for putting our trust in force was that our
opponents would listen to no other argument, and that when we had won
we intended to restore the rule of reason. Our methods and our aims
were totally different from those of our enemies, so we said, and we
were saving civilization while they were trying to destroy it.
In fairness to our statesmen it must be recognized that public opinion
in all the victorious countries called out for a victors’ peace and
that if the world now exhibits symptoms of social disintegration and
is for the time being on the down grade, it is because the passions
engendered by the war did not die out and because hysterical peoples
forgot or disclaimed in the hour of victory the goal that had made them
capable of stupendous sacrifices and effort during the war years.
The Entente Powers and the United States are beginning to recognize
that their failure to agree upon a common policy in Europe and the Near
East is condemning them to forego the advantages of their victory in
the World War. Protagonists and critics of the Paris peace settlement
are still poles apart. On one point, however, all must agree. The
Treaty of Versailles, and the other treaties modeled after it and
dependent upon it, have failed to bring peace to Europe and the world.
It is fruitless to talk about the bad faith of Germany, the abstention
of the United States, the disconcertingly long lease of life of Soviet
Russia, the imperialism of Great Britain, the militarism of France, and
the unreasonableness of small states and subject nationalities; for
each of these factors, taken by itself, is a result rather than a cause
of the failure of the treaties. If we content ourselves with calling
each other bad names and seeking to find in some one unruly national
current or attitude the source of our ills, the universal chaos will
only increase. It would not be hard to build up a convincing brief
against the foreign policy followed by every nation, friend and enemy,
since the armistice of November 11, 1918. But we get nowhere unless
we are able to show that the present state of affairs is due, not
to the errors of statesmen dealing with specific problems, but to
fundamentally unsound and irrealizable concepts in the general bases of
the treaties.
Among the errors of the Paris settlement we can point out: (1) creating
a League of Nations whose charter provides for the permanent hegemony
of five nations, with widely divergent interests; (2) reserving the
advantages of the treaties to a few nations but making all members
of the League responsible for their execution; (3) treating the
vanquished enemies as criminals without right to counsel or appeal to
an impartial tribunal, but at the same time not providing jailers to
keep them in prison during the period of punishment; (4) denying the
principle of reciprocity in contractual obligations; (5) declaring that
the treaties are based upon the policy of freeing peoples from alien
rule, but limiting the application of the policy to a few especially
favored peoples, and violating it in other cases; (6) failing to apply
one weight and one measure in passing upon the claims to reparations
of peoples who had suffered in the World War through aggression,
invasion, and the violation of international law; and (7) maintaining
the old balance of power theory.
When we analyze the treaty, and study the course of the negotiations,
we see that the first six errors are the children, that is, the
outgrowth, of the seventh. It is possible to explain all the treaties
by keeping in mind that the dominating idea of the Peace Conference
was the recognition of the transcendent rights of the powers that
had big armies and navies. The battle had been to the strong; so
likewise should be the spoils. A new balance of power had to be
created by virtue of which the strong could remain permanently strong
by compounding their rivalries and by allowing one another strategic
frontiers and the privilege of forming new international combinations
for the purpose of keeping weak the peoples that had been conquered.
The methods of waging war and of gauging strength, however, had
radically changed during the nineteenth century. No longer were
man-power and geographical position decisive elements. Coal, iron, oil,
and access to food-stuffs and raw materials had become vital factors in
the power of nations.
Far from being discouraged by the alarming condition of international
relations five years after the war, we should feel relieved that we
have been afforded a salutary demonstration of the futility of the
Paris peace settlement at so little cost. If our eyes are now opened
to the dangers of the international game, as it has been played since
1918, there is yet a chance to mend our ways before irreparable damage
is done. Most of those who are writing on European politics are neither
cynics nor pessimists, and they do not record the failure of these
years with ghoulish delight. In discussing the possible dangers ahead
they do not relish the rôle of Cassandra. The purpose of writing is
to show how policies, approved in the beginning by public opinion,
are likely to work out. Is the game worth the candle? That is for the
reader to decide.
The twofold mandate from voters to those who represent them in matters
of foreign policy is: make us secure, and make us prosper. That is why
the struggle for the possession of coal, iron, oil, and world markets,
and not international coöperation as embodied in the League of Nations
and the Permanent Court of International Justice, underlies the history
of Europe since 1918, and furnishes an appallingly sordid explanation
of the policies followed by European statesmen in the Saar, the Ruhr,
Upper Silesia, Eastern Galicia, the Banat of Temesvár, the Donetz
region of Ukrainia, the Caucasus, northern Persia, and the Mosul region
of Turkey. If Germany and Russia could be permanently deprived of the
resources essential to war that abound in these disputed territories,
their man-power would count for little. They would be reduced to a
state of vassalage, and the strength of the nations possessing or
controlling these regions would be correspondingly increased.
Under the spell of this idea France is trying to reconstruct Europe,
and she has been able to find support for her policy among those to
whom German and Russian coal, iron, and oil have been allotted, and to
whom German and Russian sea-ports and provinces have been given. In the
Near East France was willing to let Great Britain have a free hand in
the Caucasus and Persia and to sacrifice the right to Mosul recognized
in the Sykes-Picot agreement of 1916. To Rumania were handed over
Bessarabia and the iron and coal in Temesvár. Germany’s coal supplies
passed under Franco-Polish control, and the French hope that Poland has
become by the possession of Upper Silesia and Eastern Galicia a state
strong enough to be a permanent barrier between Germany and Russia. As
an additional safeguard against the regrouping of the Teutonic element
in central Europe and its contact with Hungary and Russia, the Little
Entente was formed.
For France the next move in the international game is to settle the
reparations question with Germany and to make peace with Russia in
such a way that Germany will lose control of her essential resources
for war making and will be cut off permanently from the temptation of
forming with Russia an alliance to shake off the stranglehold of the
victors in the World War upon these two powers. France believes that
Great Britain’s interests in Asia and her anxiety to prevent Germany
from making another effort to compete with her for world markets and
the carrying trade will eventually induce the British to acquiesce in
the French scheme for a new European balance of power directed against
both Germany and Russia.
The flaw in the French program is the failure to realize that France’s
control of the Rhineland and the Ruhr and the dependence of Poland
upon her give rise to the suspicion that her aim is the military
and economic domination of Europe. The protestation or the fact of
innocence of any such plan makes no difference to those who fear it.
France has a great reservoir of African troops. With control of German
coal and with Poland as a vassal she will be in a more advantageous
position to impose her will upon Europe than Germany was in 1914,
with Austria-Hungary as a vassal. The control of the Ruhr mines and
factories will inevitably cause other European states to combine with
Great Britain against France as they combined in the decade preceding
the World War against Germany.
Great Britain is in an unhappy frame of mind over the political and
economic situation of Europe. To get France out of the Ruhr and to
release the hold of France on Germany, British public opinion is
prepared to forgive the French debt--and the other interallied debts,
for that matter. It is more important for Great Britain to-day than
ever that no power dominate Continental Europe. The British are eager
for the return of normal economic conditions and the restoration of
their European markets. Outside Europe they have made many sacrifices,
as in Egypt, Mesopotamia, Persia, and India, to get rid of military
burdens and financial outlay by adopting an attitude of compromise
toward demands of native populations for self-government. The
imperialism of British foreign policy after the World War was, as we
have seen, very quickly checked. British public opinion is alive to the
danger of disregarding the aspirations of Asiatic and African peoples,
and is prepared to go to almost any length to keep together the empire
that has been centuries in the building. The greatest difficulty ahead
for Great Britain comes from the insistent demand of Continental
European countries that the world’s raw materials be pooled and that
equality of access to them be granted by the great colonial power.
Italy’s next move in the international game is undoubtedly along the
line of unhampered access to raw materials in Asia, and Africa, and
Australia, and unrestricted emigration to the United States and the
British Dominions. It cannot be too strongly emphasized that Italy
stands in the same relation to the outside world in which Germany and
Japan stand. The three great powers have become industrial nations
with a rapidly growing population, and to exist and prosper they must
import raw materials and food-stuffs and export manufactured goods.
They need also an outlet for surplus population and opportunities for
capital investment in countries where such investment helps their
trade. There would have been no World War had not Germany felt herself
deprived of “her place in the sun.” Other nations were ahead of her in
preëmpting colonizing areas and the regions upon which Europe could
draw for raw materials and rely for markets. The war did not solve
Germany’s problem. It was her own fault, we can assert, and leave it
at that. But how about Italy and Japan, our comrades in arms? Their
need of world-wide equality for trade and emigration are as great as
Germany’s, and they have not forfeited consideration of their claims,
as Germany has done. On the contrary, they have a greater claim to the
consideration of the more fortunate powers than they had a few years
ago.
In attempting to put into one volume the eventful story of Europe since
1918 we have given very little space to the League of Nations and
the United States; for during these years neither one nor the other
has had a vital part in European affairs. What the future will bring
forth none knows. But it is safe to venture the prophecy that Europe
will successfully solve her own problems as she had done in the past,
and that the rôle played by the League of Nations and the Permanent
Court of International Justice will be negligible compared with the
individual rôles of France and Great Britain. These two colonial powers
hold in their hands the raw materials upon which all Europe except
Russia and the Balkans depends for its well-being. What will be the
colonial policy of Great Britain and France toward other European
nations, especially toward Italy and Germany? What will be their policy
toward Japan? Does not the peace of the world depend upon how the
colonial powers will solve the problem of giving to Italy, Germany, and
Japan a fair share in the privilege of developing and trading with
Asia, Africa, and other parts of the world over which fly the British
and French flags?
If Russia were still an ally of France and Great Britain, in sympathy
with the doctrine that to those who have should be given and from those
who have not should be taken even that which they have, the danger of
a war over raw materials and trade and emigration outlets would not be
imminent. As matters now stand earnest men should not be devoting all
their attention and effort to creating and maintaining machinery to
prevent war when no serious attention is being paid to the great cause
of war, which is, in our generation, inequality in trade, colonization,
and investment opportunities among powers of equal size, strength,
standard of living, and productive capacity.
INDEX
Aaland Islands, 208
Abbazia conference, 285, 293
Abdul Hamid, 479–81
Abernon, Lord d’, 391, 539, 543
Adalia, 151
Adana, 480
Adrianople, 425, 496
Afghanistan, 185–6, 475–7
Albania, 134–5, 145–6, 166, 282, 285, 295, 349, 520, 523
Albert, King of Belgians, 374, 545
Alexander, King of Greece, 425, 428
Alexander, King of Serbia, 278–9, 287–9
Allenstein plebiscite, 55, 85
Alsace-Lorraine, 20–1, 79–81, 121, 244, 308, 381, 551
Ambassadors, Conference of, 243–4, 431, 522
Angora, 430–1, 447, 454, 456, 495, 500, 503
Annunzio, G. d’, 206–7, 245, 278, 347, 349, 357
Antwerp, 370, 372, 374, 376, 381
Archangel, 182
Armenia, 35, 151, 155–6, 158, 163, 182, 451–2
Armenian massacres, 8, 189, 439, 449, 480
Armistice commission at Spa, 22
Armistice with Germany, terms of, 14–17, 21–3
Asquith, H. H., 31, 480, 571
Austria-Hungary, armistice with, 3, 7, 12, 23–4, 33, 122, 330–3
Austria, republic of, 261, 266–8, 330–45, 390
Baker, Ray Stannard, 38, 86, 114–16
Balfour Declaration, 153
Balfour, Secretary, 538
Balfour note on interallied debts, 589
Balkan states 474, 491, 494
Baltic republics, 205–30, 295
Barnes, George, 31, 38
Barthou, M., 195–6
Baruch, B. N., 114, 117
Bauer, Chancellor, 55, 394
Bela Kun, 319, 322
Belgium, participation in Peace Conference, 24–5, 42–3, 371–3
subservient to French policy, 43, 377–80, 537
dissatisfied with Versailles treaty, 98
problems internal after World War, 368–85
exaggerated claims of, 369, 375
invited to Washington Conference, 510
joins France in Ruhr occupation, 378, 561–84
money depreciated, 587
Benes, Dr. Edouard, 203, 259, 266–8, 270–2
Berlin, Congress of 1878, 298, 305–7
Bessarabia, 181, 199, 203, 212, 299–302, 309–310, 520, 605
Bissolati, Senator, 347
Bliss, General T. H., 9, 13, 114, 508, 580
Bolivia, 25
Bonar Law, Premier, 539–43, 546, 562–3, 575–6
Bonomi, Premier, 341, 354
Borah, Senator, 509
Bosphorus, _see_ Straits
Boulogne, Conference, 525–6
Boyden, R. W., 565–6
Bradbury, Sir John, 539, 543, 565
Bratiano, Premier, 38, 64–8, 98, 302, 314
Bratislava, 266
Brazil, 24, 25, 42
Briand, Premier, 356, 533, 549, 557
Britain, _see_ Great Britain
British Dominions, participation in Peace Conference, 24, 25, 96;
in world affairs, 593, 608
British Labor party, against peace of revenge, 31–2
opposes Ruhr occupation, 571
Brest-Litovsk, treaty of (1918), 8, 16
Brockdorff-Rantzau, Count von, 50, 55, 389
Brusa, 425, 462
Brusiloff, General, 167
Brussels Conferences, 525–7, 532–3, 537
Bucharest, Treaty of (1913) 135–6
Bucharest, Treaty of (1918), 8, 16
Bulgaria, armistice with, 3, 4, 7, 331
accepts Treaty of Neuilly, 69
loses outlet to Ægean, 135–6
Macedonia still bone of contention, 136–7, 292–4
Prosperity not seriously affected by World War, 139–40
Stambulisky régime in and its overthrow, 141–4, 504
Revolt against treaty, 144, 294
Rumania’s relations with, 295 ff.
Butler, Dr. N. M., 392
Caillaux, Joseph, 551
Canada, 38, 42, 83
Cannes Conference, 533
Caporetto, 434
Caucasus republics, 35, 182, 200, 443–4, 449, 452, 473–4,
476–7, 604–5
Cecil, Lord Robert, 84, 512
Chamberlain, Austen, 551
Chanak, 459
Charles, Hapsburg Emperor, 269, 287
Chester, Admiral, 503
Child, Ambassador, 500–1
China, participation in Peace Conference, 24–5
Japan’s intentions concerning, 34, 101
championed, then deserted by Wilson, 48
refuses to sign Versailles Treaty, 57, 94–5, 180
renewal of dispute with Russia over Mongolia, 183–4
invited to Washington Conference, 510
victim of European imperialism, 499, 515
“Christian Science Monitor,” 244–5
Cilicia, 150, 152, 156, 159, 163, 443–4, 452–3
Clemenceau, Georges, 28–31, 40, 42–3, 50–1, 57, 64–5, 97, 116, 119,
365, 421–2, 565
Coanda, General, 307
Colby, Secretary, 243
Colby note to Russia, 217–24
Communism, does not attract outside Russia, 173
failure of in Russia, 172–6;
in Italy, 349–55;
in Germany, 388, 394–5;
in Hungary, 321–2;
in Serbia, 287–9;
in Bulgaria, 142
Constantine, King, 415, 419–20, 428–9, 432, 435
Constantinople, _see_ Straits
Continuation conferences, 69, 160, 180, 519–43
_Cordon sanitaire_ policy, 251
Crete, 491
Crimean War, 474
Cuba, 24–5
Cuno, Chancellor, 410–12, 574–5, 580
Curzon, Lord, 184, 364, 457–9, 483, 494, 500–1, 539, 573, 575
Cyprus, 35, 153, 426, 491
Czechoslovakia, creation of, 24, 123–5, 257–72, 295, 333
participation of in Peace Conference, 24–5, 42
relations with Soviet Russia, 202–3
disputes with Poland over Teschen, 238–9
helps Austria, 341
fears _Anschluss_, 343
money depreciated, 587
Czernin, Count, 259
Damascus, 206, 475
Danzig corridor, 80, 86, 237, 270, 284
Dardanelles, _see_ Straits
Degoutte, General, 568
Denikin, General, 182, 192, 194, 212–3, 239, 302
Denmark, 57, 81–2
Dmowski, Roman, 43, 233
Dodecanese, 151, 163, 347, 421, 426, 491
Dorpat, Peace of, 214
Ebert, President, 345, 387, 389, 403, 567
Ecuador, 25
Egypt, 35, 87, 100, 153, 231, 365, 469, 475–6, 491, 607
England, _see_ Great Britain
Entente, Little _see_ Little Entente
Entente Powers, unpreparedness for peace, 4–6
organized Peace Conference, 24–6
secret understandings among, 34–5, 48, 151
difficulties in agreeing on other treaties after Versailles,
61–3, 69, 205–7
gain through treaty compromises, 94, 129–30
sell out Serbia to Italy, 122
Balkan diplomacy of, 140–41
attempt to partition Albania, 146
differ on Near Eastern policy, 150, 469–504
recognize independence of Hedjaz, 152
use mandate scheme to distribute German colonies and divide
Ottoman Empire, 156–9
prestige affected by delay of peace with Turkey, 162
secret oil agreement at San Remo, 163, 524
attitude toward Soviet Russia, 169–71, 193–7, 527
intrigues in Baltic States, 201
attempt to modify Rumanian territorial claims, 302–6
help Belgium after war, 374
generally divergent foreign policies of, 521–43
Epirus, Northern, 163, 421
Eski Sheïr, 425, 430, 443
Esthonia, 35, 200–01, 209–10, 212–14, 216–17
Eupen, 84–5, 373–4
Facta, Premier, 352, 363
Fascismo, 327, 352–5, 357–64
Feisal, Emir, 152, 159
Ferrero, Signor, 105–6
Finland, 35, 100, 199–200, 208–9, 219, 230, 295, 590, 587
Fiume, 33, 48, 80, 86, 100, 122, 206, 278, 281, 283–4, 293, 347,
349, 363, 365, 422, 523
Foch, Marshal, 15, 25, 50, 116, 529, 532, 544
Forster, Henry A., 598
Foster, Sir George, 117
France, unprepared for peace, 4–5
participation in Peace Conference, 24, 27–31
demands against Germany outlined during war, 27
infeudates Belgium, 42–3, 377–80
infeudates Poland, 42–3, 79–80, 122, 231–2, 242, 244–7, 250–1,
265, 269, 487, 605–6
satisfaction with Versailles Treaty, 97–8
length of Rhineland occupation dependent upon will of, 116–17
blocks renewal of German expansion to east, 130–1
aims to become dominant Mediterranean power, 153–4, 364
hostile to Soviet Russia, 168, 192–4, 197, 269–70
policy toward Austria, 343
intrigues against Greece, 421–2
treaty with Turkish Nationalists, 452–5
abandons Cilicia, 159, 188, 452–4
opposes Great Britain in Near East, 469–90
attitude toward Germany explained, 544–60
occupies Ruhr, 561–89
financial weakness of, 587, 591, 595–6
foreign policy of, 605–7, 609–10
Franchet d’Espérey, General, 156
Franklin Bouillon, Senator, 452–4, 460, 483
Frankfort, Treaty of (1871), 121
Gade, Commander, 220–23
Galicia, Eastern, 237–8, 241–4, 295, 328, 520, 604
Galicia, Western, 237
Geddes, Sir Eric, 559
Genoa Conference, 193–7, 270–2, 534–7
George, King of Greece, 429, 435
Germany, armistice with, 3–17, 21–3
did not surrender unconditionally, 19–21, 51
war responsibility, 8, 23, 33, 50, 54, 73, 77
blockade continued after armistice, 16, 23, 50
war prisoners held, 16, 23
excluded from Peace Conference, 26
colonies divided among enemies, 34, 374
required to evacuate Posen on renewing armistice, 46
internal conditions since the war, 55–6, 386–414
her _Drang nach Osten_ blocked by Paris treaties, 130, 297
makes treaty with Russia at Genoa, 194–6
resists reparation payments, 389–414, 519–543
passive resistance in Ruhr, 561–84
France’s fear of, 544–560
Gibraltar, 154, 484, 487, 489
Giolitti, 348–51, 352–3, 363
Gonatas, Colonel, 435, 437
Gouraud, General, 161, 206
Great Britain, participation in Peace Conference, 24, 31–33
against freedom of the seas, 13–14
insists upon modification of Polish frontiers, 47, 55, 250–1
Versailles Treaty advantageous to Great Britain, 95–6, 346, 456
determined to break Germany’s hold on Danubian countries, 130
policies in Near East, 151–6, 159–63, 469–90
evacuates Caucasus, 183, 185
forces treaty on Persia, 185
makes trade agreement with Soviet Russia, 186
sends ultimatum to Russia, 199
policy in Baltic republics, 212–24
supremacy in Mediterranean contested by Italy, 364, 484
attitude toward Belgium, 372–3, 379
refuses to give back to Turkey Mosul, 497–8
at Washington Conference, 510–16
attitude toward German reparations, 524–43, 561–3, 565–6
funds debt to United States, 588–590
financial obligations of European Allies toward, 591–3
present foreign policy of, 606–8
holds raw materials and colonizing areas, 609–10
Great Powers, former relations to Balkans and Turkey, 148–9
Greece, participation in Peace Conference, 24–5, 68, 98
Hellenistic ambitions of, 45, 416–9, 421, 488
expansion and debacle of, 415–41
used by Entente in Asia Minor, 155, 161, 422–7, 432
at Lausanne Conference, 436, 438, 440, 491–504
depreciated money of, 587
Grouitch, Dr. Slavko, 279
Guatemala, 24–25
Haiti, 24, 25
Haller, 253–4
Hamburg, 406, 567
Hamilton, General Sir Ian. 105
Hapsburg Empire, succession of, 119–32
Harding, President, 191, 506–8, 516
Hedjaz, kingdom of, 24, 25, 151–3, 159, 164–5, 465–6, 475–6, 475,
491, 497, 502
Hellenism, 416–9, 421;
_see also_ Greece
Herriot, Senator, 197
Hindenburg, Marshal von, 330 388
Holland, 100, 222, 369–73, 381, 386–7, 510, 559, 572
Honduras, 24, 25
Hoover, Herbert, 508, 597
Horthy, Admiral, 326, 332
House, Colonel, E. M., 9, 111, 113
Hughes, Secretary, 458, 508–9, 514
Hussein, King, 152
Hungary the new state of, 126, 259, 266–9, 311, 315
Hymans, 42, 43, 228–9
Hythe Conference, 525–6
India, 24, 25, 96, 192, 405–7, 475, 607
Interallied debts, 518, 520–1, 534, 537–8, 550, 585–98
Irak, 466
Ireland, 231, 469
Ismet Pasha, 493–5, 499–501
Italy, participates in Peace Conference, 24, 33–4
against Serbian expansion, 33, 47, 62–3, 122–4, 279–80, 282–85,
292–3, 349, 523
retires from Peace Conference, 48, 422
opposition in to Versailles Treaty, 100–1
driven out of Albania, 146–7, 349, 523
progressively withdraws from Asia Minor, 161, 453, 459
Russian policy of, 198, 215, 350
foreign policy of, 343, 363–6, 424, 487, 539
intrigues against Greece, 161–2, 421–2, 432–3, 471–2
at Washington Conference, 510–12
indebtedness to United States, 537, 590, 592
demands unhampered access to raw materials and unrestricted
immigration, 608–9
Japan, 24, 34, 42, 101–2, 179–80, 182, 364, 510–18, 579, 608–9
Jewry, international, 476
Jews, persecuted in Poland, 253–5
situation of in Rumania, 305–7
Jugoslavia, _see_ Serbia
Kaiser Wilhelm II, flees to Holland, 386–7
proposed trial of, 32, 77, 371
Karagach, 496, 504
Kattowitz, 246–8, 400–1
Kemal Pasha, _see_ Mustafa Kemal
Kerensky, A., 167, 170
Keynes, J. M., 117
Kiev, 239–40, 302
Klagenfurt plebiscite, 282
Knox, Senator, 73–4, 114
Kolchak, Admiral, 167, 182, 185, 192, 194, 212–3, 239, 302
Konia, 152, 161
Korfanty, 400
Kramar, M., 66, 264
Krupp von Bohlen, 570
Lansing, Secretary, 15, 38, 113–5
Latin America, British investments in, 593
Lausanne, Conference of, 188, 198–9, 364–6, 415. 436, 438, 440, 448,
451, 461–2, 466, 491–504, 517, 537, 539
Latin American republics, attitude toward Versailles Treaty, 102–4
Latvia, 35, 200–1, 209–11, 216–17, 240
Law, Bonar, 31, 32, 83, 539–43, 546, 562–3, 575–6
League of Nations, proposed by Wilson, 41
draft modified, 45
Wilson defends, 59–60
exclusion of Germany from, 75–6
gives British Empire six votes, 96
France shows no faith in, 97
imperfectly safeguards Monroe Doctrine, 103
United States refuses to enter, 106–8 506–7, 522
Lansing against, 114
intervenes to settle Serbo-Albanian frontier, 147
ignores Near Eastern questions, 149–50, 489
fails to enforce mandatory government in Near East, 157–9,
206, 520
important to settle Vilna question, 225–8
helps Austria to get credits, 340
suggests Brussels Conference, 532
ignores German protests, 403
offers membership to Turkey, 431
champions special rights, 489–90
Lemburg, 247
Lenin, 171, 177, 184, 186, 202, 212, 214, 227, 360, 462
Libau, 209, 215
Liberia, 24, 25
Liebknecht, Karl, 388
Lithuania, 35, 100, 200–1, 207, 209–11, 216–17, 219–29, 233–5,
245–6, 295
Little Entente, 251, 266–9, 287, 291–2, 326, 460, 605
Lloyd George, 31, 32–3, 38, 40, 46–47, 116–7, 120, 154–5, 161,
195–6, 279, 356, 365, 395, 421–4, 427, 457–9, 473, 480,
483, 524, 527, 550–3, 538–40, 546, 548–9, 562, 571
London, continuation conferences in, 523, 530–2, 538–9, 542
London, Pact of, 24
London, Treaty of (1839), 370
London, Treaty of (1913), 449
London, secret treaty of (1915), 24, 33, 34, 48, 122, 137, 151–2,
346, 364, 487, 523
Luxemburg, Grand Duchy, 370, 372–3, 380
Luxemburg, Rosa, 388
Lvoff, Prince, 167, 170
Lympne conference, 527–8
Macedonia, 134, 136–8, 234, 280, 292–4, 476, 479–80, 491
Maestricht, 371–2
Malmédy, 84–5, 373–4
Malta, 487
Manchuria, 183
Mandates, _see_ League of Nations
Marienwerder plebiscite, 55, 85
Maritza River, 135, 504
Masaryk, President, 259
Mecca, _see_ Hedjaz
Memel, 86, 207, 209, 228–9, 246, 284, 520
Mesopotamia, British occupation of, 35, 152, 159, 163, 431, 443,
467, 469, 475–6, 491, 607
Mexico, 593
Millerand, President, 161, 356
Minsk, 240
Mongolia, 183–4
Monroe Doctrine, 102–4
Montenegro, incorporated in Serbia, 147, 275–6, 278, 282, 285, 520
Morocco, 87, 365
Mosul, 152, 443, 497–9, 604–5
Mudania armistice, 435, 460–2, 472, 492
Mussolini, 198, 352–66, 450, 462, 524, 540, 542, 576, 591
Mustafa Kemal Pasha, 161, 326, 444, 450–1, 454–62, 465, 488, 501,
504
Narutowicz, President, 253–4
Near East Relief, 440
Neuilly, Treaty of, 69, 134–40, 142–4, 282, 292, 294, 307, 426
Nicaragua, 24, 25
Niedamowski, 253–5
Nitti, Premier, 38, 100, 117, 161, 163, 165, 178, 203, 347–8, 357,
391, 395, 524
Open door, real significance of, 101–2, 596, 603–5, 607–10
Orlando, Premier, 63, 100, 348, 363, 365, 421
Ottoman Empire, _see_ Turkey
Paderewski, Premier, 66, 236, 238
Painlevé, Paul, 557
Palestine, 35, 152–3, 158–9, 163, 165, 469, 476, 491
Panama, 24, 25
Panama Canal, 489
Paris, atmosphere of during Peace Conference, 27
Paris, Conference of (1856), 298
Paris, continuation conferences in, 402, 523, 528–9, 532, 541–3, 563
Paris Peace Conference, 18–70, 111–18, 205–6, 281–2, 298, 307,
325–6, 334, 338, 420–4, 446, 519–20, 548, 599
Pashitch, Premier, 265, 277, 280–1, 285, 290
Pellé, General, 503
Pershing, General, 508
Persia, 35, 96, 151, 180, 184–6, 443–4, 474–7, 604–5, 607
Peru, 25
Pilsudski, Marshal, 236–7, 251–2
Plastiras, Colonel, 435, 438
Poincaré, Raymond, 40, 184, 364, 460, 483, 525, 533–4, 538–43, 546,
549, 563, 573
Poland, resurrection of, 24, 79, 123, 125, 231–56, 295–6
participation in Peace Conference, 24, 25, 42, 43
real interests not considered at Peace Conference 79–80
wins victory over Soviet Russia, 200–1
frontiers of, 48, 55, 233–5, 250–1, 520
Vilna seizure, 206–7, 225–8
protests Lithuanian seizure of Memel, 229
financial weakness of, 249–50, 587
and Upper Silesia, 400–2
dependence on France, 42–3, 79–80, 122, 231–2 242, 244–7, 250–1,
265, 269, 487, 605–6
Porta Rosa Conference, 342
Portugal, 24, 25, 510
Pressburg (Bratislava), 266
Przemysl, 243
Racial equality, Japanese ask for at Peace Conference, 101–2
Rapallo, Treaty of, 283–5, 349
Rapallo, Treaty of (Russia and Germany), 194, 193–7, 536
Rathenau, Walter, 195
Reciprocity, denial of principle in Versailles treaty, 76–81
Reparations from Germany, 32–3, 52–4, 91–2, 375–6, 399, 402–13, 469,
518, 520, 525–43, 561–4, 588, 591, 596
Reparations Commission, 405, 520, 525, 539, 541, 565, 576, 591
Reval, 210, 215
Rhineland, occupation of, 18, 21–2, 79, 97, 116–7, 373, 404, 414,
483, 549, 557–9, 563, 569, 606
Ruhr, France threatens to occupy, 398, 404, 411, 529, 532, 534,
541–3, 546, 561
occupation of, 208, 228, 500, 561–84, 606–7
Spartacist, insurrection in, 394–5
Rhodes, _see_ Dodecanese
Riga, 209, 215
Riga, Treaty of, 201–2, 215–227, 240–2
Root, Elihu, 114
Rumania, aggrandizenment of, 24, 123, 125, 275, 295–316
participation in Peace Conference, 24, 25, 64, 298–302
intervention bought by secret treaty, 34, 122, 137, 265
protests against Treaty of St.-Germain, 64–8
annexes Bessarabia, 203, 212, 300–2
common frontier with Poland, 241
occupies Budapest, 299
signs treaties, 307
finances of, 587
Russia, Soviet, Entente Powers in war with, 35
excluded from Paris Peace Conference, 57, 180
stands behind Turkey, 162–5
internal evolution and foreign policy of, 167–204
makes treaty with Afghanistan, 185,
with Turkey, 187–9, 453,
with Great Britain, 186,
with Germany, 194–7,
with Poland, 201–2,
with Czechoslovakia, 270
at Lausanne Conference, 188, 198–9
at Genoa Conference, 193–7
Great Britain sends ultimatum to, 199
relations with Baltic states, 205–30
anti-Bolshevist movement, 211
excluded from Washington conference, 510–12
German economic activity in, 406
no peace for in League of Nations, 180
Russia, Transcaucasian, 96
Saar Commission, 83
Saar Valley, 82–4, 100, 604
St.-Germain, Treaty of, 62–9, 99, 119–32, 221, 258, 265, 267, 274,
282, 288, 305–6, 335–40, 344, 426
San Remo, Conference of, 160–3, 187, 395, 424, 431, 471–2, 523–4
San Stefano, Treaty of, 474
Scheidemann, 389, 394
Schleswig, 57, 81–2
Self-determination, violations of principle of in Versailles
Treaty, 81–7
in St.-Germain and Trianon Treaties, 123 ff., 205–6, 284, 304,
317–19
in Treaty of Neuilly, 137–9
in Treaty of Sèvres, 205–6
in Treaty of Riga, 201–2
proclaimed by Soviet Russia, 179
Wilson’s dilemma concerning, 218–19
Serbia, aggrandizement of, 24, 123, 125–6, 273–294, 295–6
participation in Peace Conference, 25, 42
conflict between Pan-Serbs and Jugoslavs, 265, 276–8, 281, 286–91
Sèvres, Treaty of, 162–6, 326, 424–7, 429–34, 443, 446, 459, 462,
471–2, 477–8, 484
Shantung question, 48, 50, 87, 94–5, 101, 365, 515–16
Siam, 24, 25
Siberia, 179, 182, 200, 203, 510–11
Sikorski, General, 255
Simons, Secretary, 402, 530–1
Smuts, General, 38, 58–9, 72, 116, 157
Smyrna, Greece asked by Big Four to occupy, 160, 365, 415, 422–5,
434–5, 443, 453, 455, 501
Spa Conference, 396–7, 525–8 592
Stambulisky, late Premier, 141–4, 504
Stefanik, General, 259
Straits, question of, 162, 166, 188, 198, 315, 425, 448–9,
460, 469–90, 517
Suez Canal, 475–6, 484, 487, 489
Supreme Council, 6–13, 25–6, 40, 295, 299–302, 305–6, 431,
444, 458, 522
Sweden, 100, 559, 572
Switzerland, 100, 559, 572
Sykes-Picot agreement, 35, 152, 605
Syria, French occupation of, 35, 158–9, 161, 432, 443, 491
Tardieu, André, 38, 116
Tchitcherin, 188, 195, 198–9
Temesvár, Banat of, 44, 126, 138, 280, 282, 298–305, 310,
324, 327, 604
Ter Meulen plan, 532–3
Teschen dispute, 44, 238, 265
Thrace, Eastern, 134–6, 162, 425, 427, 433, 435–6, 439, 443, 453,
460, 462, 479, 483, 492, 498
Thrace, Western, 135–7, 441, 447, 496–7, 504
Transiberian railway, 179, 183
Trianon, Treaty of, 69, 119–32, 258, 265, 274, 282, 288, 305, 307,
312, 317–23, 326, 344, 426
Triest, 80, 86, 283
Tripoli, 480, 491
Trotzky, 171
Trumbich, M., 66
Turkey, armistice with, 3, 7, 150, 331, 442–3, 459
Hedjaz detached from, 24
secret understanding among Entente Powers concerning, 35, 135
proposed division of 148–66
future not settled by Paris Conference, 159–60
money depreciated, 587
Turkish Nationalists, 161–2, 165–6, 187, 189, 423, 431, 440,
442–68, 491–504
Ukrainia, 35, 182, 200, 212, 237–8, 240, 244, 295, 302, 604
United States, participates in Peace Conference, 24, 29, 44
involved in Entente war against Soviet Russia, 35
Yankee imperialism, 102
Monroe Doctrine, 102–4
no moral leadership of, had treaty been ratified, 104–5
refuses to ratify treaty, 106–9
protests against partition of Albania, 146, 523
not offered mandate over Armenia, 155–6
protests San Remo oil agreement, 165
Persia asks for financial mission, 186
Russian policy, 217–24, 510–11
difficulties encountered in taking sides in European
questions, 224
Finland funds debt to, 230, 588
refuses to refer German protests to Allied Governments, 403
refuses to recognize return of Constantine, 429
and Panama Canal, 489
at Lausanne Conference, 500–3
at Washington Conference, 505–18
opposition to League of Nations, 506–7, 522
at Brussels Conference, 537
declines invitation to Genoa Conference, 534
European indebtedness to, 537–8, 550, 585–98
suggested fixed indemnity at Peace Conference, 548
duty of to help France constructively, 554, 557–60
Great Britain funds debt to, 587–8
observer on Reparations Commission declares Versailles Treaty
impracticable, 566
has had no vital part in European affairs since 1918, 609
Unkiar-Skelessi, Treaty of (1833), 474
Upper Silesia, 55, 85–6, 207, 237, 246–7, 344, 399–402, 404,
520, 537, 604–5
Uruguay, 25
Vaïda, Premier, 312–14
Vandervelde, 38
Venizelos, E., 68, 98, 154, 160–1, 163, 265, 415, 418–24, 427–9,
436, 438, 441, 493–4, 504
Versailles, Treaty of, 49–61, 71–118, 160, 167, 178, 221, 228–9,
237, 328, 334, 337, 347, 373–5, 398, 414, 519, 523–7, 543–5,
558, 566–7, 573–4, 601–4
Versailles, Treaty of, principal features, 74–5, 446, 461, 506
Vienna, Conference of (1815), 26, 95, 208, 219, 415
Vilna made Lithuanian capital, 210–11
Vilna, question of, 201, 207, 225–8, 245–6, 344
Viviani, Premier, 356
Vladivostok, 183
Warsaw, 204, 236, 253–6, 261
Washington Conference, 180, 183, 485–6, 505–18, 550
Wei-hai-wei, 515
Weimar assembly, 389, 396
Wilson, President, war speeches of, 4, 7–8, 13–14, 27, 35, 43, 47,
48, 104, 218
arrival in Paris, 36
distinguished between Germans and their government, 7–8, 119
refers Germany’s armistice request to Supreme Council, 8
curious attitude of on Polish frontiers, 48
Fourteen Points of, 9, 10, 13–14, 21, 30, 47, 52, 283
at Peace Conference, 21, 28, 40–1, 44–9, 95, 122
Manchester speech, 30
proposes Prinkipo conference, 40
seems to break physically at Paris, 48
ignorant of secret treaties, 48, 158
deceived on mandates question, 157–9, 374
tries to keep Versailles terms secret, 52
lauds treaty in statement to press, 59–60
betrayed into defending Old World diplomacy, 66–8
denies accuracy of Peace Conference records, 67
urges ratification of Versailles Treaty, 72, 106–7, 506
note to Austria-Hungary, 217–18
opposes Italy on Fiume question, 48, 86, 101, 346, 365, 422
joins in asking Venizelos to occupy Smyrna, 160, 421–3
Wirth, Chancellor, 401, 404
Wojciechowski, President, 255
Wrangel, Baron, 154, 167, 182, 192, 194, 204, 527
Yudenitch, General, 182, 192, 212–13
Zara, 283
Zeligowski and Vilna, 207, 225–9, 245
FOOTNOTES
[1] Since writing this chapter, my attention has been called to a
remarkably clear and frank article contributed by General Tasker
H. Bliss, American military member of the Supreme Council, in the
September, 1922, “Journal of International Law.” General Bliss quotes
copiously from his own notes and correspondence to show that the Allied
Premiers had begun to discuss the armistice on October 8, and that the
French, British, and Italian military advisers were subject to higher
political authority in fixing the terms of the armistice. General Bliss
protested on purely military grounds. He believed that whether the
Germans consented or not, no armistice should be proposed that did not
render the enemy immediately impotent. The Entente Powers, according
to General Bliss, allowed the military and naval terms of peace, which
could have been communicated to the Germans within a few weeks after
the armistice, to be withheld until the final treaty was ready seven
months later. The unmilitary character of the armistice and peace
negotiations was due to the fact that the Entente Powers were “out for
loot,” as the General puts it, and were constantly suspicious of one
another. From the beginning there were programs--but no common program!
[2] In his last great speech, on September 27, 1918, speaking of the
work of the conference ahead, Mr. Wilson had said: “There must be a
full acceptance of the principle that the interest of the weakest is as
sacred as the interest of the strongest. That is what we mean when we
speak of a permanent peace.”
[3] Many observers, like myself, marveled at the change that came over
Mr. Wilson between January and May. His vindictiveness, as brought out
in the discussions over Polish frontiers, puzzled the British as well
as the Americans. He had traveled far from the spirit of his message
to Congress of December 4, 1917, in which he had said: “No nation or
people shall be robbed or punished because the irresponsible rulers of
a single country have themselves done deep and abominable wrong.... The
wrongs ... committed in this war ... cannot and must not be righted by
the commission of similar wrongs against Germany and her allies.”
[4] Shortly before the election of 1920, Mr. Wilson, in a public
statement, denied having made any such statement. The words had been
attributed to Mr. Wilson by Senator Spencer of Missouri, who was
running for reëlection on the Republican ticket. The denial was given
at St. Louis, thus showing that it was meant to influence the campaign.
Because Senator Spencer had quoted from one of my articles in “The
Century Magazine,” I was called upon to substantiate the citation.
This I was able to do from the minutes of the eighth plenary session,
a complete copy of which is in my possession. A curious refutation
was attempted in the form of a newspaper despatch from Chicago
purporting to give the exact transcription of the notes of Mr. Wilson’s
confidential stenographer. But the official minutes did not misquote
Mr. Wilson. They had been established very carefully, and had not
been filed in French in M. Dutasta’s office at the secretariat of the
conference until they had been submitted to the American delegation and
approved by it. The words quoted here are what Mr. Wilson wanted to
have put on official record as expressing his sentiment at the time.
The whole context of Mr. Wilson’s speech, moreover, bears witness to
the accuracy of the sentiment expressed in this extract.
[5] The comparatively trifling value of the Saar coal, when one thinks
of the violence done to the sentiments of over half a million people,
was first brought to my attention by a group of Alsatians, all of them
thoroughly loyal to France, but who were opposed to the Saar clauses
of the treaty. They told me in December, 1918, that the propaganda
for separating the Saar from Germany was ill advised, both from the
political and economic points of view. Politically, they were afraid
of the reunited provinces being swamped with more Germans, who could
easily cross the frontier from the Saar valley. Economically, they
declared that the coal was of little value and that the clamor for
the Saar mines was simply a prelude to the annexation of the Rhine
provinces by France, to which all Alsatians were opposed. What they
told me is borne out by an article in “The New York Times,” March 25,
1923, in which a consulting engineer, Mr. Walter Graham, says: “The
Saar coal basin is almost useless; for the coal makes a very inferior
coke and the mines are deep and gaseous, the veins thin, and the coal
impure.”
[6] One hundred years of trial have made Americans feel that the
Monroe Doctrine is not to be unthinkably and lightly surrendered.
The Senators who questioned the Covenant of the League of Nations
were on unassailable ground when they insisted upon a reservation to
make clear Article XXI. How poorly this article was drafted is shown
by a comparison of the English and French texts, which have quite a
different meaning. One cannot be called a translation of the other.
The French text reads: “Les engagements internationaux, tels que les
traités d’arbitrage, et les ententes régionales, comme le doctrine
de Monröe, qui assurent le maintien de la paix, ne sont considérés
comme incompatibles avec aucune des dispositions du présente pacte.”
The English text says: “Nothing in this Covenant shall be deemed to
effect the validity of international engagements, such as treaties of
arbitration or regional understandings like the Monroe Doctrine, for
securing the maintenance of peace.” Which text is right? The defenders
of the League are necessarily silent on this point. Of one thing we
are sure, that from the American viewpoint, the Monroe Doctrine is
neither an “entente régionale” or a “regional understanding.” It is
simply a unilateral declaration of purpose, valid only because of our
determination and ability to enforce it.
[7] The assertion, so often made, that the United States was offered
a share in the exploitation of the Ottoman Empire, and that the
opportunity to aid effectively in the solution of the Near Eastern
problem was rejected by our refusal to accept President Wilson’s
mandate scheme, is without foundation. No such offer was ever made
by the Entente Powers. It was not their intention to grant us any
mandate like their own in Asiatic Turkey. Within narrow limits that
excluded the plains, the mines, the timber, and the oil-fields, the
British, French, and Italian premiers would have been glad to see
created an Armenian state, financed and protected by the Americans,
to which they might deport the Armenians remaining in Asia Minor,
Syria, and Mesopotamia, and which would serve as a buffer between
their sphere of influence and Soviet Russia. This purpose is revealed
in a memorandum of General Franchet d’Espérey to the Ministry of
Foreign Affairs, in which he summed up the resources of the regions
inhabited by the Armenians. Citing the figures of agricultural and
mining engineers, military observers, and railway experts, the general
advocated the retention by France of Cilicia and the upper valley of
the Euphrates, on the ground that this part of Armenia was a rich
country that could be profitably exploited and easily defended, while
it was geographically accessible from the Gulf of Alexandretta on the
Mediterranean. The bare mountains of Armenia he declared to be without
economic value and costly from the points of view of defense or the
establishment of communications. He recommended that these regions
should therefore be given to the United States!
[8] This statement is sure to be challenged by those who believe that
Communism would have its fairest test in a small thickly populated
industrial country like Belgium or larger industrial nations such as
Germany and England. But we must remember that Communism does not
appeal as strongly to Occidental peoples as to Slavs and peoples
of Central Asiatic origin. In an Occidental industrial country the
Bolshevist theory would have taken the form of State Socialism
demanding to be immediately applied, and the suddenness and insistence
of the challenge would have led to crushing failure within a few
months, followed by a counter-revolution.
[9] The most bitter of Russian reactionaries were jealous of the unity
of Russia. General Yudenitch, for instance, could never be induced
to recognize the independence of Esthonia, even though he needed its
military aid when he was using Esthonian territory as a base for
operations against Petrograd. General Denikin sacrificed a chance
to overthrow the Moscow Soviet in order to fight separatism in the
Caucasus and the Ukraine. Admiral Kolchak could not be persuaded to use
the bait of Siberian independence to help along his cause. In 1919 the
Entente Powers and the United States felt they could not risk dampening
the ardor of the Russian reactionaries by revealing their eventual
policy. This is the explanation for the delay in answering Rumania’s
pleas concerning Bessarabia.
[10] De facto recognition was eventually given to the Baltic republics,
and their unofficial missions at Washington were changed to legations.
But only Finland is as yet regarded by our State Department as on a
footing with sovereign states.
[11] In fairness to the Polish Government it must be stated that the
Diet, in anticipation of the Ambassadors’ action, passed a law in
September, 1922, granting autonomy to Eastern Galicia. According to
Count Skrzynski, the Polish Foreign Minister, interviewed in London on
April 13, 1923, by a correspondent of the “Christian Science Monitor,”
there are to be three local parliaments in Eastern Galicia, with two
chambers, one of which must be composed of members of the Ukrainian
community. Permanent officials will be appointed by the governor
in a way corresponding “with the actual requirements of the two
nationalities.” Governmental and judicial affairs are to be conducted
in the Polish language, but the county parliaments may determine their
own official language. These measures seem to me (I am familiar with
local conditions) calculated to prevent the Ukrainians from voicing
their national aspirations, and for this reason to be the granting of
autonomy in name only. The law contains two good provisions, however,
the promise of the establishment and maintenance of a Ukrainian
university out of state funds, and the prohibition of colonization in
Eastern Galicia.
[12] “Perhaps the severest blow to the prospects of peace in Europe
and its economic recovery,” is how a number of British economists
characterized the Upper Silesian decision in an open letter to the
press. They pointed out that the loss of Königshütte, Kattowitz,
Rybnik, and Pless made inevitable the day of German default in
reparation payments.
[13] The assassin was disclaimed by his party, the National Democrats,
as an irresponsible neurotic, and was executed on January 31. But
ever since his death the Nationalists have regarded him as a martyr.
Contributions to “place a wreath on the grave of Niewiadomski” were
solicited in the press; and all over Poland mass was said, in the
presence of distinguished congregations, “for the pure soul of Eligius
Niewiadomski, who by the sacrifice of his own life has awakened the
spirit of the nation.” According to the Warsaw correspondent of “The
Manchester Guardian” (April 6, 1923), in many places shops were forced
to close when these services were held; and the movement gained such
volume in the churches that the Roman Catholic episcopate of Poland saw
itself forced to intervene and declare that “although it is laudable
to pray for the souls of the dead, the Holy Mass should not be made to
serve purposes of political propaganda and demonstration.”
[14] The United States, however, owing to the skilful diplomacy of Dr.
Slavko Grouitch, aided powerfully by his American wife, had recognized
the union of the Jugoslavic portions of the defunct Hapsburg Empire
with Serbia in January, 1919, and received Dr. Grouitch at Washington
as “minister of the Kingdom of the Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes.”
Throughout the Peace Conference Jugoslavia had American support, and
President Wilson did not hesitate to risk wrecking the Conference to
protect the Jugoslavs against the territorial greed of Italy.
[15] My Rumanian friends have sent me lengthy criticisms of the new
constitution. Their objections seem to me not well taken; for their
complaints are rather against the methods used in framing and securing
the adoption of the constitution rather than on the contents of the
document. The truth of the matter is that in Rumania as in Jugoslavia
the new provinces are unwilling to lose their identity by being
incorporated, without safeguards of local autonomy, in Greater Rumania
and Greater Serbia. This same tendency I found last year among the
Greeks of Asia Minor and Constantinople, and the Athens Government
would have had troubles similar to those that are confronting the
Belgrade and Bucharest Governments, had their military efforts against
Turks ended in the liberation of Ottoman Greeks.
[16] The most striking example of Mussolini’s unhesitating
determination to use the iron fist rather than tolerate lack of
discipline in the ranks of Fascismo occurred on May 23, 1923, when
he ordered the expulsion from the Fascist party of Captain Padovani,
Commander of the Neapolitan district. Padovani was not only a dear
friend of Mussolini, but also the acknowledged leader of the movement
in southern Italy. In the expulsion decree the names of a dozen other
leading followers of Mussolini in Naples appeared along with that of
Padovani.
[17] Mussolini felt very sure of the loyalty of the younger members
of the Catholic Party. Father Don Sturzo, leader of the Catholics,
found that he could not count upon the willingness of the bulk of his
followers to put Catholic interests above Fascist principles. Fascismo
has so strong a hold upon even the most devout, who are in sympathy
with the objects for which Don Sturzo has been fighting in a country
that is still politically anti-Clerical, that there is a movement on
foot to form a Fascist Catholic Party, which will give whole-hearted
support to Mussolini.
[18] The members of the Raed van Vlaenderen, who were charged with
making the independence of Flanders the real object of their demand
for equality of language and higher education, and certain Activists,
convicted of assisting the enemy by their work for this movement
during the war, were sentenced to death for high treason. But they had
already escaped to Holland, where they were well received by both the
Government and the public. Dutch newspapers declared that these men had
in what they considered a patriotic duty to their own country not aided
Germany, wittingly or unwittingly, but were engaged of composite race.
[19] French policy is endeavoring to find a means of preventing Germany
from developing her aërial activities, even after the five-year period
provided for in the Treaty of Versailles has expired. An aviation
convention, between France and Czechoslovakia, signed at the beginning
of April, 1923, stipulates that the two nations bar Germans from
landing in, or flying across, their respective countries. Germany
retaliated by refusing permission of French and Czechoslovak airmen
to land in and fly across her territory. That she was in earnest in
affirming her right to reciprocity was indicated on May 19, when a
French aviator, having to come down on German territory, was promptly
thrown in jail and his airplane confiscated. When the French protested
the Germans replied that they were doing as they were being done
by. The only way such theses can be maintained is by the virtual
continuance of European nations at war with one another.
[20] According to the “Annual Register” for 1921 (London), p. 180,
Poland obtained almost exactly half of the two million inhabitants,
although she had less than 40 per cent of the votes, and her share of
the industrial region was far out of proportion to her voting strength.
Poland got 49½ out of 61 coal-mines; all the iron-mines; 22 out of 37
furnaces; 400,000 out of 570,000 tons of pig-iron per annum; 12 out of
16 zinc- and lead-mines; and the three important cities of Königshütte,
Kattowitz, and Tarnowitz, which had voted by large majorities to
Germany.
[21] So far as productive capacity is concerned German shipyards have
more than returned to their pre-war position. The new _Deutschland_,
just completed, was the largest vessel launched in the world in 1922.
In 1922 Germany was an easy second to Great Britain in building, her
shipyards turned out 187 vessels of 526,000 tons. Not excepting Great
Britain, every country except Germany turned out a smaller tonnage
in 1922 than in 1921. In 1928, if the record of 1922 is kept up,
Germany will have completely recovered from the effects of the war
on her shipping. Similar reports from credible sources have come to
me concerning airplane building. Germany is again leading the world
in production of light motors, and has invented a new Diesel engine.
The activity of Germany in Russia is emphasized by the concessions
agreement signed at Moscow on May 18, 1923, by which the German Eastern
Relations Society received 2,000,000,000 acres of forest land and the
exploitation of the Moscow-Rybinsk Railway. German firms lead the field
in export and import privileges in Russia.
[22] These figures, and more, are given in the London “Saturday Review”
(March 3, 1923) to show that German industrialists have been taxed so
heavily since the war that they “have gone to the limit in payment of
what private enterprise can bear without breaking down altogether.”
[23] Italy welcomed the evidences of internal weakness and suicidal
political strife indicated by the return of Constantine. The vote
against Venizelos in November and the plebiscite in favor of the King
in December helped the Italian Government to find the excuse that had
been sought ever since San Remo to refuse to ratify the Treaty of
Sèvres and to recognize the agreements made between Venizelos and the
Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs. For fear that the Greeks might
recover their senses, Italy promptly recognized Constantine.
[24] In the interior of Asia Minor in the spring of 1922 I found
many influential Turks who were bitterly opposed to the Nationalist
movement, and the opposition was still more marked in Constantinople.
The summary action of the Angora Assembly against the Sultan was used
by intelligent anti-Kemalists to excite the peasants, with the result
that a Central Revolutionary Committee was formed in January, 1923,
to overthrow Kemalism. With the coming of summer bands formed in many
parts of Asia Minor and the guerilla warfare became formidable.
[25] The treaties recommended by the Washington Conference were:
(1) A five-power treaty involving the scrapping of sixty-eight capital
ships, the restriction of the tonnage of navies and of fortification in
the Far East, and a ten-year naval holiday.
(2) A five-power treaty outlawing the use of submarines as an agency of
attack on merchant ships and prohibiting the use of poison-gas.
(3) A nine-power treaty stabilizing the conditions in the Far East and
reiterating the open-door principle in regard to China.
(4) A nine-power treaty making a beginning of the division of Chinese
customs, abolishing foreign post-offices, and releasing the Chinese
Government from the obligation to keep funds lying idle in foreign
banks.
(5) A four-power treaty binding the principal Pacific powers to respect
one another’s territory in the Pacific and to confer when the peace
of the Pacific is threatened. (This treaty abrogated the existing
Anglo-Japanese treaty.)
(6) An agreement between Japan and China for the restoration of the
German lease in Shantung, coupled with declaration of the willingness
of Great Britain to renounce the lease of Wei-hai-wei and of France to
renounce the lease of Kwang-chau-Wan.
[26] For a fuller discussion of Russia’s rôle at Genoa and the reasons
actuating the attitude of the Entente Powers, see Chapter X, “The
Internal Evolution and Foreign Policy of Russia under the Soviets.”
[27] “Everywhere there are ruins, but as for men, they are not in
ruins, and, in the same fashion as the French have astonished the world
in war, they will astonish it again in peace.”
[28] Just how far French and German nationals have parted with their
American investments is an open question; and many well informed
Americans dissent vigorously from the conventional statement of New
York banking circles, which, for lack of specific data to the contrary,
I have been inclined to accept at its face-value.
Transcriber’s Notes
Punctuation, hyphenation, and spelling were made consistent when a
predominant preference was found in the original book; otherwise they
were not changed.
Simple typographical errors were corrected; unbalanced quotation
marks were remedied when the change was obvious, and otherwise left
unbalanced.
The index was not checked for proper alphabetization or correct page
references.
The illustration on the Title Page is the publisher’s logo.
Page 247: “Lemberg” is spelled “Lemburg” in the Index.
Page 327: “wakeners” and “awakeners” both appear in the same paragraph,
but nowhere else; both retained.
Page 380: "asked to chose between" was printed that way.
End of Project Gutenberg's Europe Since 1918, by Herbert Adams Gibbons