HUNGARY AND THE CRISIS

Press, Volume LXXIV, Issue 22512, 21 September 1938, Page 10

HUNGARY AND THE CRISIS

Revisionist Claims POSSIBLE ALLIANCE WITH GERMANY (SPECIAM.T WBITTXN JOB THE PBKSS.) [By "ARGUS."]

The events of the last fortnight have focused the attention of the world on the problem of Czechoslovakia's German minority. It is important to remember, however, that this problem is only one aspect of the much wider problem of tne status of national minorities throughout the Balkans. Concessions granted to the Sudeten Germans will inevitably be-taken as a precedent by other national minorities in Czechoslovakia and in neighbouring States. That is why Hungary has become almost as important as Czechoslovakia in the present crisis.

Hungary is a danger point in the structure of world peace, because for 20 years she has demanded the revision of her frontiers. In no country have the fires of irredentist nationalism burned so fiercely, and at a time when fundamental changes in the balance of power in Central Europe seem probable, the danger is that they will be fanned by the prevailing unrest into 'an uncontrollable blaze.

tion has been the object of apprehension to the three States which, gained territory at her expense.

The Little Entente

To combat this menace, together with that' of a restoration on the Hungarian throne, which might upset their minorities, Czechoslovakia," Rumania, and Jugoslavia formed the Little Entente, which after a time entered the system of French alliances. For 10 years Germany and Italy have sought to drive a-wedge between the members of the Entente, so that greater pressure could be brought to bear on each one separately. Czechoslovakia has been weakened by the Sudeten German agitation, while German trade expansion has, in some degree, . brought Jugoslavia and Rumania under German political domination. This weakening of the Little Entente has given keen satisfaction in Hungary. An opportunity to change the status of the 3,000,000 odd Hungarians, who are only separated from the homeland by political lines, more especially in Czechoslovakia and Rumania, seems at last to be within her grasp. As a buffer State between the Slavic and the Teuton worlds, through which passes the shortest road from Germany to the Balkans and the East, Hungary occupies such a strategic position that her support for or against German designs, or for or against the Little Entente, has become perhaps the most important single factor in the diplomatic relations of the world. The realities of this new position have been, recognised by the leaders of the Little Entente. Last month Rumania passed a minorities law, giving to her subject peoples, among which Hungarians are the most numerous, new civic rights, religious liberty, and freedom to use their own language. But of much greater significance has-been the overtures of the Little Entente statesmen toward relaxing the militaryclauses of Trianon, which limited the Hungarian army to 35,000 men, and toward the formation of such alliances as might stem the tide of German advance by encouraging the Hungarian Government to retain its freedom of action. Otherwise, it is feared, Budapest will fall under the domination of Berlin. . • The visit of Admiral Nicholas Horthy, the Hungarian Regent, and Dr. Bela Imredy, the Prime Minister, at the end of last month to Berlin marked what is probably the most important if not the culminating, phase in the race for Hungarian friendship. Hungary and Germany Dr. Imredy has since denied that the visit involved Hungary in any new commitments; and it is easy enough to believe that the Hungarian Government regards Germany as a dubious ally. For while Germany may be willing to buy Hungarian support by assisting her to realise some of her irredentist ambitions, it is not the least likely that German statesmanship would assist in the creation -of that Greater Hungary which is the dream of Hungarian patriots. At heart, Hungarians probably- know well enough that their real interests lie with the other small States of the Danube Valley, and not with Germany, and that sooner or later they will find Germany's expansionist aims a menace. However this may be, Hungary's revisionist claims are vastly Tcomplicating the present crisis, and, more than any other factor, will weigh against the acceptance by the Czech Government of a compromise solution based on the transference of the Sudeten German areas to Germany and a general guarantee of Czechoslovakia's revised frontiers. The mere fact that Hungary has revisionist claims against four States shows how dangerous ■ precedent would be the granting of the present demands of the Sudeten Germans.

The Peace Treaties

Hungarian nationalism, the strongest and most pervasive in Europe, has fed on the wounds made by the peace treaties. This ancient kingdom, of whose 17,000,000 inhabitants little more than half were Hungarian, was in 1920 dissolved into its ethnic components. The Treaty of Trianon confirmed the transfer of Slovakia to Czechoslovakia, of Croatia to Jugoslavia, and of Transylvania to Rumania. In the main these decisions were just. But her frontiers, even more markedly than the eastern frontier of Germany, bear witness to the eagerness on the part of treaty makers to stretch their principles wherever possible to the advantage of their allies and to the detriment of the enemy. The cumulative effect of this elasticity was considerable. By these changes Hungary lost 68.5 per cent, of her territory, 58.2 per cent, of her population, her entire mineral wealth, and more than half her agricultural resources. The economic consequences of dismemberment have proved no less bitter than the political results. Her outlet, to the sea through Fiume and Trieste was closed. The balance between industry and agriculture was destroyed; and the reciprocal flow of internal trade, which had been the economic strength of that great commercial unit, the Austro-Hun-garian Empire, was found to be dammed in every direction by tariff walls of economic nationalism, behind whicb the new States were organising iheir economies. Economic Maladjustments To complete this outline of social conditions it is only necessary to add that, being almost exclusively a wheatgrowing country, Hungary's economic condition becomes precarious when "agricultural prices fall. The urgencies of the resultant economic crises are not improved by the maldistribution of economic power. About half of the total arable land is owned by. some 2000 members of the feudal aristocracy, while more than one-seventh of the total population are landless peasants, proportionately the largest group of landless agrarian society in the world. '■ Of all the countries of Europe that suffered loss of territory, none has so bitterly assailed the peace treaties, and none has so emphatically declared; that, whatever the terms of peace it was obliged to sign in 1919, it retained an inherent right to alter those terms by force £.3 opportunity arose. Hungary has, therefore, been the most disquieting element in the political life of Central Europe, and her determina-