New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1917-08-23
The Only Peace That Can Last
Tribune Readers Vie,Ds of the Pap0l Terms and Wha
the allies Must Demand

| fuse because such conference would look
like IAN Areopagus sitting in judgment over
Austria and Russia?
All further efforts on the part Of England
to have Germany propose some formula
bv which peace could be maintained without
recourse to armed force were ignored by Ger
many.
Moral Issues Ignored
But one cannot help wonder in amusement
at the way the Pope treats the issues OF THIS
war The Vatican seems 70 be entlreiy is
norant of the moral issues that are involved
in this struggle. Germany, by word ana
deed, asserts that the doctrine OF might Is
right" must predominant in the world. what
does the Pope mean when he says that the
whole world recognizes that the honor OF the
armies of both sides is safe? Surely there
must be a mistake in translation. The rope
no doubt. wrote the letter in Italian, then
Cardinal Gasparri translated it into French.
The London Foreign Office issued this French
text which the newspapers afterward trans
lated into English. No one can believe that
the Pope will give the lie to such men as
Cardinal MERCER, Archbishop of Malines
and the Roman Catholic Primste Of Belgium.
The pope surely wanted TO say that the MILL
tarv strength of the armies is safe. IL Is
inconceivable that Pope Benedict thinks for
one moment an army which has done the
things German soldiers did in Belgium, Ser
bia. Poland and Rumana can still call itself
honorable" Which world recognizes that
the German army's honor is safe? Certainly
not the inhabitants of the Allied countries
nor the neutrals.
Was it honorable to destroy Louvain, with
! its university and library, that was the
common property of civilization?
Was It honorable to deliberately and sys-
tematicslly organize massacres Of civil and
non -combatsnt populations in Belgium and
Armenia?
Is it point Of honor to violate women
and murder children in cold blood?
Does the Pope think that the submarine
commanders that fired the torpedo at the
Lustania and drowned the sailors Of the
Belgian Prince-yes, does he think that they
are men of honor?
Is there any honor left In the officers that
ordered and countenanced looting, house
burning and wanton destruction Of property
| Was it honorable to use women and chill
dren as a shield for advancing armies? Sure
", as said, there must be some mistake.
Prussian Madmen
But let us go back to the moral issue OF
the war Should the gospel Of Nietzsche,
Bernhard and Treitschke supersede all that
! is noble and all that humanity has struggled
for throughout the centuries? Because Ger
many wants to get to Paris In record time,
=, is it right for her TO trample Belgian neu-
trality under her iron heels? Is it morally
right to look at treaty-the highest moral
| pledge a nation can give-as scrap OF
paper" just because it is in the way Of sd-
vancing armies? If Germany is allowed to
return to the old order of things, it will
mean that all she did to Belgium, that all
the women and children that were murdered
/ that all the deeds she committed, were justi-
; fed and right as long as they served Ger
man purposes, German aims and German OBJ
/ jects.
! If this war is not going to return in a
more aggravated form after a generation or
two, its causes must be removed forever, so
that no Prussian mailman will dare again
defy the whole world and by sheer vandal-
ism, barbarsm and savagery subdue it. 1t
is not the German people that the world is
/ fighting. No one wants their homes. II is
| the Zarathustrian idea that took root in Prus-
( STA and is trying to poison the whole world
that the Allies are bound together to destroy.
| There can be no peace, no real. long last
! ing peace, with the Hohenzollerns and Haps-
burgs still on their thrones. There can be
no peace with the unspeakable Turk in Eu-
rope. We can only have armistices, short
or long ones, according to the time it takes
the Prussian beast to recuperate.
Peace now, when Prussia still boasts OF
her miserable deeds, when she still glorifes
the bombardments which the Pope complains
of, when she is still exacting indemnities of
the peoples that had the misfortune to fall
! under her heel, peace now? Who can think
Of it? Who can speak of it?
Only after restoration can peace be
possible. Restoration of Alsace-Lorraine to
France; of Trent and Trieste to Italy; of
Bosnia Herzegovina to Serbia; of Transyl-
vania and the Banat to Rumania; of Galicia
and Posen TO Poland; restitution of all in
IDENTITIES exacted during the war; the re-
building Of Belgium, Northern France, Ser
bia and Rumania, and, last but not least,
the removal of the Hohenzollerns and Hans
burgs from the thrones of Germany and
Austria respectively. These are the condi-
tions on which the Allies are going to con-
fer. NJ A. LAZAR
W A.