The Oroville weekly gazette. [volume] (Oroville, Wash.) 1905-19??, 1918-04-12
REDRAWISG THE NAP OF
WESTERN RUSSIA
From Home Companion.)

tFTom Home tOInpa1lOu-1
At Brest-Litoysk the German diplo-
mats did something more than dictate
terms OF peace to a helpless enemy;
they remade the map of western Rus
STA We cannot tell how long the ma
tons they credited and the frontiers
that they will draw. will last; but We
may be sure that nothing except the
complete defeat OF the Central Powers
by the western allies can materially
alter the new arrangements. In what
was once Russia. there is no power
left to effect them
First, the Germans have recognized
the new state of Ukrainia. That is ag-
riculturally the richest part of the
great Russian plain-the famous
black earth" region 1t lies between
the Black Sea, the Don river, the mar
shes of the Pripet river and the Dor
ders of Poland and Galicia II is larger
in area than France or Austria-Hun-
gary-approximately 100000 square
miles-and il has population of 3d.
600. 900. The capital is Kiev, and the
seaport Odessa. Its civilization is older
than that Of the rest of Russia; and al
though it contains several millions OF
Jews and Poles besides the Little
Russians who form most of the nation,
its population is reasonably homogen-
eous.
Ukarainia must be established and
supported for the present by German
or Austrian bayonets, for the Red
Revolutionists are numerous there and
would be glad to set up Bosheviki
government in sympathy with the
Petrograd regime. But once on its feet
and going concern, Ukarainia will
probably become permanent national
entity, and Of necessity a valuable
tributary to the political and military
power that has it's center in Berlin.
On the north there is to be a new
state of Lithuania, perhaps nominally
Independent, but actually depedent on
Prussia. Lthuania is to control all of
the Russian shore on the Baltic that
the new state of Finland does not pos
sess, with the port of Riga Libau and
Reval. 1t is perhaps half the size of
Ukrainia.
The Poland that was reconstructed
with so much pompous ceremony last
year is to contain nothing except the
Russian provinces round Warsaw. 1t
Is to be shut out from any access to
the sea and surrounded on all sides BY
German territory, or territory domin-
ated by Germany. The diplomats of
Brest-Litovsk have seen to it that the
most progressive, the most capable
and the most unfortunate of the Slav
peoples is reduced to impotence.
II Roumania Is contrite enough, it
may get Bessarabia in return for the
Dobruja, which it must surrender to
Bulgaria Like Poland, Roumania is
wholly hemmed in, and must perforce
resign itself to economic and political
dependence upon the Central Powers.
Turkey-in order presumably that the
massacre Of the Armenians may be
made completes to receive much of
Russian Armenia beyond the Caucasus
mountains. The great mass Of Russia
that Is left, tremendous in extent and
numerous in population, is at present
undfsturbed. Since Siberia has fallen
away, European Russia is safely cut
Off from every sea except the Arctic
Ocean. and when it has recovered from
the fever OF Bolshevikism It will find
that 1t can do nothing except let itself
be dictated to and exploited BY the