New-York tribune., 1918-11-20

vent war would inevitably produce. We OF
this generation would watch very skepticai-
ly any assembly of which Germany was a
member, and so guard our safety but the
league of nations is not intended for us of
to-day; the threat of the next war will not
come in our time but in the time of our
children's children. We who had for warn
ing not only 1866 and 1870 but Germany's
thoroughgoing, wholly visible, nowhere
concealed, preparation for war in the last
twenty years, deluded ourselves with no.
tons about economic interdependence and
the impossibility of war in the highly COM
pick twentieth century; how much easier
would a league to prevent war make it for
the men and women of seventy-fve years
hence to blink the facts as we binked
them?
No Guarantee
This would be no argument were the
league of nations to offer us security. 1t
cannot offer US security; nothing car. AS
the world stands divided now by the four
last years there is no such thing as a guar
antee against another war-leagues of ma
tions no leagues of nations. The leaders
who have borne the brunt of the war are
not deceived by our present magnificent.
heart warming victory; let US be no less
courageous of vision than they. We have
defeated Germany and her friends in their
1914 adventure, but we have neither over
whelmed German ambition nor blocked the
field to it. Germany is not in the minority
yet; the world has by no means swung
solidly over to our side and left her stand
ing in isolation; no one supposes that mill
tary defeat has taken Austria, Hungary.
Bulgaria and Turkey out of reach of Ger
man influence, and within the last month.
even while Germany was retreating in
Northern France amid barbaric destruc-
tlon against which the whole Western world
cried out, delegation of Norwegian, Swe-
dish, Danish, Persian, Spanish, Mexican and
Argentlnlan representatives was being en-
tertained on an educational tour conducted
by the apostles of De1Atschtu1,,. through
centres of Kultur like Jena, Mannheim,
Strassburg and the Rhenish- -Westphalian
= industrial district. The sober observers in
Germany are already pointing out that it
was not faulty military organization but
weak diplomacy which lost the war: an
other time it must be seen to that the
United States keeps out of Germany's fight
and that the friendly neutrals come in.
An lnperishable Gain
The end of this war will not bring peace,
and those who are insisting it must are
throwing away the bitter education of
these four years. The war has brought
about close alliance of the Western ma
tlons; this is an imperishable gain; it is
sure a safe approximation toward the fut-
ure confederation of the world in the prn-
clpes we hold to be right, and no easv
takers about millennial leagues should be
permitted to belittle the achievement The
forcrunner of the league of nations ALREADY
exists in the league of those of us who
are banded together to fight GERMANY to
the finish. Mr.. Wilson says such league
is not acceptable, but for all that it is the
stan on which our children will lean. For
the implication of the league against Ger
many is watchfulness, and it is watchfnl-
ness alone which is our strength AGAINST
any desire of Prussianism to trv again