THE VERSAILLES PRINCIPLE

Bay of Plenty Beacon, Volume 06, Issue 100, 20 August 1943, Page 4

THE VERSAILLES PRINCIPLE

FOR the breakdown of the Central European new order in 1918, Versailles is being made responsible. In this country very many political thinkers have been taking this view for years. Now a number of them admit that Versailles may have committed mistakes, but that the main political principle upon which it constructed a new order was the only one possible. It was the principle of the national liberty and independence of the small peoples. Meanwhile, very many national sovereignties already accepted modifications imposed upon them by a new and steadily developing European trend toward tightening collaboration. After a 20 years' experience the position may be clear to all. Versailles's mistake was certainly not in clothing small peoples with the right of self-determination. The mistake, may lie in the fact that these small nations of Central} Europe were not authoritatively advised to set up a cooperation which would provide them with the advantages of a great commonwealth able to normalise and stabilise its relations with its neighbours and all concerned, and therefore able to be a strong factor of peace and security. ■ —Dr. Hodza, Prime: Minister of Czechoslovakia before Munich, in his book, "Federation in Central Europe."