The Dominion. THURSDAY, APRIL 8, 1919. A CRITICAL STAGE

Dominion, Volume 12, Issue 191, 8 May 1919, Page 6

The Dominion. THURSDAY, APRIL 8, 1919. A CRITICAL STAGE

At the moment when everything is at last in readiness for the first and greatest step' in the peace settlement— the- conclusion of a treaty with German}'—nothing stands out more plainly than that the Allied nations are in a position of power from which they cannot he dislodged unless by their own act. . It is to bo decided 1 within a week or two whether or not the war has been fought and won in vain. The issue turns, undoubtedly, less upon anything that the enemy may do or leave undone than upon tho ability of tho Allies to persevere steadily to tho end in the course which was pioneered' in the faraway clays of 1914 by the Entente Powers and tho small nations whose cause they championed. Tho'Germans have indulged of late in tall talk about what they will accept or refuse to accept in tho way of peace terms, but all such talk is empty bombast, provided the Allied nations stand loyally together, and maintain the internal _ discipline that enabled them to win tho war. Thisand nothing elso is the crucial condition upon which tha whole future of the world depends. Unless she is helped by treason and disunion wifhin the Allied ranks, Ger-. many is powerless, and can do nothing but submit. Thanks to their command oyer supplies of food and raw materials the Allies are as well placed to exact her submission as if they had occupied her territory from end to end. It is stated today that the complete economic isolation of Germany has been decided upon in the event of her delegates' refusal to sign the peace terms. To Germany economic isolation spells famine and ruin.-' There is no doubt abdut tho effectiveness of tho blockade as a means of finally bringing her to terms. The only question I open is whether the Allies are capable of maintaining the pitch of resolution and discipline which will make it possible to use this weapon should the need arise.

No doubt, with the peace terms in' hand, the Germans will expend all their cunning ,in a final effort to sow disunion in the Allied ranks. In activities of this kind they ma'y find a measure of encouragement in such incidents, happily tho v comparatively rare exception thus far, as have' disturbed or threatened Allied harmony at the Peace Conference, or the solidarity of individual Allied nations., Incidents like the dispute between Italy and the Jugo- ■ Slavs, now reported to be settled, and the disorderly upheaval which occurred in Paris on May Day, occasion anxiety less in their immediate aspect than as endangering the conditions of stable order and sound organisation which are essential to tho enforcement of a just and enduring peace. Nothing should tend more at this stage to safeguard the Allied peoples against foolish strife and divisions than the fairly plain evidence in sight that Germany and those i of her former satellites who remain more or. less under her influence are far from, being reduced to as hopelessly chaotic a condition as their, ruling factions would have the world-believe. When ■the- ar-/ mistice was signed six months ago tho idea was industriously propagated by Gorman spokesmen, • and was readily taken up by • many people outside Germany, that nothing but.prompt peace on easy terms would save Germany and a great part of Europe from becoming a prey to Bolshevism. On the whole, this prediction has been strikingly falsified. It is true that a great deal has been heard from time to time about Spartacist upheavals in Germany,, but those seem to have had no very definite result. On the other hand there is positive evidence that the German Government is in tolerably effective command of the situation. No one, for instance, in Germany or elsewhere, has thought of suggesting that the delegation sent to Versailles does not represent tho German Govern-ment-and people. If conditions of political chaos had been even approached in Germany some doubt would,naturally* appear in regard to the standing and authority of tho delegation, but no such question seems to have been as much as raised. If is decidedly significant also that, the. German Government's troops have invested Munich, which is the chief centre of Spartacism, and also of such separationist tendencies as are astir in Germany, and, as reports stand, are in a position to enforce the unconditional surrender of their Spartacist opponents. The. truth seems to be that the long delay in completing the peace treaty, has had the inconvenient result for the German rulers of exposing the real character of the bogeys they hastened to dangle before.the eyes of the world as soon as the armistico was signed. This impression is heightened on looking a little further afield. Hungary, for instance, has been named as, next to Russia, the centre of Bolshevik influence in Europe. There is no real evidence, however, that Bolshevism of the Russian brand has taken any real hold of Hungary. What is demonstrated is that the Hungarian Soviet Government, with Belakun as its Foreign Minister and chief spokesman, has concentrated, like the Governments which preceded it* upon an attempt to defeat the national aspirations of the Rumanians, Czecho-Slovaks, and Jugo-Slavs. When the Soviet Government was set up at Budapest in March, leading 'politicians in Bohemial declared that the transformatiorii, had been artificially ar-' ranged by Count Karolyi, who surrendered his office of provisional President in favour of the socalled proletariat Government. The change of Government was denounced as simply a political manoeuvre—a new attempt to perpetuate the Magyar domination over subject races which was so jealously maintained by men like Count Tisza and Count Karolyi. This opinion finds verification in the strenuous efforts the Hungarian Soviet Government has made to retain its hold on the subject races, particularly upon the Rumanians of Transylvania. _ It has now been compelled by military defeat to agree that these races shall bo free, but its activities from first to last strengthen the opinion that in Hungary, as in Germany, Bolshevism has been used as a screen and disguise by men who are in full sympathy with the old militarist regime and its political ideals. It is not .more evident that only unity and'

steady resolution ave demanded of the Allied nations at the critical stage now reached than that the enemy is alert and ready to profit by any failure on their part to fully meet this demand.