The Dominion. FRIDAY, MAY 23, 1919. GERMAN ASPIRATIONS

Dominion, Volume 12, Issue 204, 23 May 1919, Page 6

The Dominion. FRIDAY, MAY 23, 1919. GERMAN ASPIRATIONS

Although its details have not yefc been made known, the general character of the lengthy protest Germany is about to submit to the Allied may be easily inferred. Apart from the light cast upon the matter by. the tone and trend of German agitation since the Treaty was presented, the German Government has shown its hand in regard to a number of specific proposals. Doing so it has demonstrated not only that it is callously indifferent to considerations of justice and international equity as the militarist regime which preceded it, but that it is intent on securing a settlement which would contain the germ of future war.' Thisjs particularly true of the references .which, ScheidemAnn, as head of the German Government, has made to Danzig.. Soheidbiiann's proclamation to the people of Danzig is worthy of the ex-Kaiser in his''heyday. "We will fight to the uttermost," he declares, "against the separation of German territory by violence. Danzig is German to-day, and will be forever, and must remain as a visible sign to stimulate us in the severe battle'which will demand all our strength." This is an answer to the provisions of the Peace Treaty dealing with Danzig and the Polish corridor to the Baltic. Under these provisions Danzig and an adjacent' area are declared a free city under tlio guarantee cf the League of Nations. The city is to be included within the Polish Customs frontiers, but with a free area in the port— this, of course, in the interests of non-Polish trade by way of the port. At the same time Germany is to cede, to Poland a belt of territory west of the Vistula (extending from Russian Poland to the Baltic) which is largely peopled by Poles. She is called upon also to accept the determination by plebiscites of the boundaries of East Prussia, which now becomes an isolated territory separated by the Polish corridor from the rest of Germany. This is an arrangement consistent with international justice. It restores to Poland the territories in which, for decades past, Germany ■has been attempting 1 with coldblooded and calculating brutality, but without success, to suppress the Polish nationality. It gives Poland also- (subject only to the reservation regarding the free passage of nonPolish trade) a controlling influence over Danzig, a port which belongs to her by historic right and is tho natural outlet and inlet for the commerce of the Vistula valley. On historic grounds, as well as on grounds of equity, Poland might well have claimed the unfettered possession of Danzig. It became a Polish city in 1455, and so remained for nearly three centuries. It came into tho possession off .Prussia as recently as 1793, and after a period of occupation by the French was given back to that State in ! 1814. Prussia obtained Danzig in the first instance by violence, and ultimately under a settlement which completely ignored the national rights of the Polea. These facts are a measure of Scheidemann's effrontery. In tho name of Germany's rights and liberty he demands that as infamous a crime as was ever committed by one nation against another should be perpetuated. No more enlightening revelation of German aims could be desired. That Scheidemann and those- for whom, he speaks arc intent upon confirming an ancient wrong is only part of the revelation. The German Prime Minister's furious denunciation of the Allied plans for the restoration of Poland implies something more. It implies that the present rulers of Germany will raise every possible ' obstacle to an arrangement which would deprive her of that free access to Russia she cannot gain unless Polish rights are once again trampled underfoot. When Sphrjdemann professes to be struck to the heart at the idea of losing the "German" city of Danzig he is obviouslyi parading an impudent falsehood. Danzig and the Vistula corridor to the Baltic are and remain Polish in spite of Ger-. inany's desperate and long-con-tinued efforts to cover them with a German veneer. An assertion of German rights to these territories is so palpably insincere' that Scheidemann's appeal can be addressed only to those of his countrymen who desire that Germany should still pursue, though in a more insidious way than formerly, the policy of exploitation and 1 aggression, in which she was directed py her military masters. His fury is understandable when it is considered that the reconstitutiqn of their country, which is bare justice to the Poles, promises at the same time to oppose a strong barrier to the development of Germany's Eastern ambitions. After the c-xporienco of the war it hardly needs to be emphasised that to give Gcrrhany unimpeded access to .Russia would bo in the most definite sense to place' that country at her mercy. Under the ruinous Bolshevik regime Russia has lost much of the imperfect organisation slie, possessed in pre-war days. On tho other hand, Germany's predatory instincts, though checked, arc far from being eradicated. Given unimpeded access site would find Russia undoubtedly an open field for exploitation and for "peaceful penetration." It would not lake her long in such circumstances to gain a very complete domination over the Russian millions and tho vast potential wealth of their as'.yet undeveloped country. Even an approach to these conditions would destroy the hopes of settled peace. ScHEiDEMANN must be regarded as

' the spokesman of those Germans who hope to recover in a policy of Eastern penetration what they have lost in the war. Even if no question of justice to Poland were involved it would still be incumbent on the Allies in the interests of European peace to thwart such designs. In actual fact, however, there is no occasion to adopt this limited standpoint, 'life reconstitution of Poland on the lines set out in tho Peace Treaty • is demanded on every consideration of right and justice, and it will all the more on that account oppose an effective barrier to German eastward penetration. Schbidbmann's outburst in regard to Danzig would invite only contempt but for the fact that in their present efforts to recover their status as a free nation the- Polish people arc faced by formidable dangers and difficulties. They are end'owed unquestionably with many of the qualities that make for national greatness. In spite , of all that alien tyranny has done to oppress them and stamp out their nationality, the Poles have made a name for themselves in education, art, industry, and all the most creditable forms of human activity. During the war, however, Russian Poland in particular has suffered terrible calamities, and it is not wonderful if those who arc attempting to, reorganise the nation on its former scale are called upon to contend against some internal disruptive forces as well as against external conspiracy. Late evidence of the difficulties under which the Polish Government is labouring was supplied a day or two ago in the news that M. Padeeewski had resigned the Premiership as the result of a conflict with the Diet in regard to military operations in Galicia. , It is hoped that counsels of reason will shortly prevail, and the Allies obviously are bound to use all their inflnenco to that end. It is very clearly'established that not only the welfare of tho Polish people but the hope of settled European peace is largely dependent upon the effective restoration of Poland.