New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1916-12-08

TO the BRUSH plochaue mas
bocn found in the successful Rumanian
campaign, and Germany may easily be
freed from the worst Of her food Difficult
ties during the next year.
After Bucharest the main problem re
mains what it was before. The Germans
must undertake to crush Russia and
eliminate the Cars empire from the
ranks of the enemy as a preliminary to
peace. The chief effort of the Allies must
be 70 break the German lines in the West
and 10 cut the German communication
with Constantinople in the Balkans, as tic
nrelude 70 a new attack upon CONSTANT
nople.
But if the main problems remain IN
changed, no one can mistake the new view
that Bucharest will put into the mind OF
the world at large. No sane observer Will
expect immediate peace, or peace WITHIN
the next twelve months. Recent German
victory will increase German demands,
and the least that Germany now demands
is the right to settle the fate of Russian
Poland, to control Serbia and 10 dominate
Asia Minor. The first of these things
could be achieved only if the Allies sacri-
feed Russia, the second only if they be
trayed and abandoned Serbia; the third
would be a perpetuation of war after
peace, because it would be a permanent
menace to the security Of the British En-
pire, to Egypt and to India.
On the other hand, it is time to face the
fact squarely that there is left only the
remotest chance that Germany will be
beaten as France was beaten in 1871 or
as Napoleon was conquered in 1914. The
prospect of a peace written by the Allies
in Berlin has practically vanished, just
as the chance Of a German-made peace
in Paris disappeared in the second week
of September, 1914. The war must still
90 on, but its horizon is being steadily lin
tied; the things that are possible for
either alliance are far different from the
maximum possibilities of each when the
war opened.
To what extent is it still likely that
Germany will be beaten? How much can
the Allies hope to win by further war?
These questions are inevitable. We know
that the Allies mean to continue the war.
We know that in Russia, France and par
ticularly in Great Britain there have late
ly been taking place events which cannot
be interpreted as having other signifl-
canoe than the promise of renewed effort
and additional energy. What are the
stakes for which the war will now be
pressed by the enemies of Germany?
What arc the hopes-the hopes that can be
supported by reasonable argument?
First Of all, peace to-day would mean a
German victory, because the Germans pos
sess the tangible proofs of victory and oc-
cupy territory from which they cannot be
dislodged without desperate fighting. To-
day Germany insists upon the right to
make Russian Poland vassal state, and
Austria makes a similar demand for Ser
bia. Russa's allies cannot abandon her
now, when peace would cost her vast ter
ritories, and neither Russia nor her allies
can consent to peace which will surren-
der Serbia to the Hapsburgs and give Ger
many and Austria the mastery of the Bal
kans.
Will the German people consent to the
terrible sacrifices that two years more of
war will bring merely TO maintain the
Polish protectorate and Austrian suprem-
acy along the Danube? More and more
the burden of the war is pressing dispro-
portionately upon Germany. In the last
ten months she has made the mighty ef-
fort against France at Verdun; she has
borne the burden of the tremendous Allied
offensive at the Somme, in which the Brit
ish share was by far the largest; she has
been compelled TO send vast masses to Ga
licia and to Volhynia to retrieve the Aus
trian disaster, and now she has had to dis
patch fresh troops for the victorious cam
paign in Rumania.
Against the French at Verdun the Ger
mans lost far more than their enemies;
hey have lost less than the British at
the Somme and than the Russians in
r ol;c;a. tbax, baya 1ost fay Iasa than tbeir