Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1918-03-21


the revised map of Europe. indicating
the latest annexations. will reveal ex.
actIy what future awaits Poland. hai1
surrounded by the new Germany and
dependent upon German ports TOT ats
imports and exports.
BY taking the Aland Islands the Bal
tic provinces Lithuania, Germany has
strangled northern. or Great Russia, IN
closed Poland in her fatal and suffo-
eating grasp. while she has turned over
to her Turkish and Bulgar agents Rus
sian Armenia and the Rumanian Do
brudja-
This Is What Napoleon Did.
This is the sort of thing Napoleon did
when he was master of Europe. 1t was
by arrangements like these that he
translated the victories of Jena, Aus
terlitz Wagram. Friedland into geo
graphical terms. 1t was in this fashion
that Napoleon annexed Holland. Ham
burg. Danzig, the Iliyrian provinces
the Napoleonic performance and the
contemporary Hohenzollern method Ma
poleon brought better government
and greater liberties to the people OF
the countries which he occupied Ger
many has brought only famine, hunger.
misery. Wherever a German army has
been there is ruin. agony, shame.
What Napoleon did in Germany, Ger
many is now doing in Russia, and the
same method is similarly expressed in
France and in Belgium. Aside from the
fact that the great emperor respected
the conventions of the civilized world
of his day and the French armies were
composed of Frenchmen and not Of
Germans. the parallel is perfect Ma
poleon carved up the peoples and the
nations of Europe to suit his own
wishes and to serve the interests of
France
And century ago. as now, it took
time for Europe to recognise the fact
that peace was impossible until the
Napoleonic dream had been destroyed
Half a dozen times the separate states
of Europe tried to find a common
ground for existence with Napoleon
They failed and in the end they aban-
doned a hopeless search for an impos-
sible accommodation and bound them
selves to fight until Napoleon was done
for.
The convention of the great powers,
signed at Chaumont. where there are
of Napoleon, for it bound all his op-
ponents to fight until he was removed
from the throne, until there was a mil
itary victory.
Just as Germans Deny National Life.
In the end Napoleon fell because he
did violence to the principles of nation
y, y.
mans a national life, just as the Ger
mans are now denying the same right
10 the Slav. the Rumanian, the Bel
gian. He bound selfish German rulers
to himself, Saxon and Bavarian kings,
as Germany has bound Buigar and
Turk rulers to her cause. But on the
first military defeat the whole Ma
poleonic structure collapsed and the
first military defeat came when an en-
shaved Germany rose against the con-
Queror.
AS long as Germany played with the
question of an eastern settlement as
long as she took refuge behind phrases
and pretensions, it was difficult to ex-
plain to the war-weary masses of all
allied nations exactly what the German
peril was. The task is simphfied now
when the German has at last made up
his mind to follow his own tradition
rather than to attempt to employ the
color of the tradition of the demo-
cratic nations. Had he chosen to liber-
ate the Pole. the Lithuanian, the Ru-
manian or the Ukrainian had he under
taken to set up really free national
states in the east. had he even pre-
tended to do this. it would have been
difficult to deal with him. having in
mind the allied purposes with respect
of enslaved nationalities.
But the German has followed the
familiar course. SiIesia, Poland, SchIes-
wig, Aisace-Lorraine; the Austrian
the Pole, the Dane and the French
| man have all. in turn, been plundered
and annexed to serve the greater Ger
man, purpose, and now we have the
most colossal of all annexations, and
the least defensible of any claim of
national necessity or legitimate con-
Germ. Because he wanted to- the Ger
man has forcibly annexed 5000 OOo of
people of alien races against their will
and in defiance of every principle that
can be invoked.
Should Simplify Task.
! This German course should enor-
mously simplify the task Of the west
ern nations. We. all of US, French,
British. Italian. American, have now
the simple alternative, to be annexed
or not to be annexed. Although we
| remote from the German. he has offered
New Mexico. Texas and Arizona to
| the Mexican; California Oregon and
Washington to JAPANESE. just as he
has bestowed the Rumanian Dobrudja
| upon the Bulgarian and Russian Ar
menia upon the Turk.
IL the Brtton does not want to fight be
| can make a new Brest-I.itovsk peace, but
he cannot longer deceive himself in the be-
lief that he can reach any other kind of
bargain. The Frenchman can have peace
any time he will agree to cede to Ger
! many, those iron regions, those coal dis
| tricts and those colonial territories, which
the German desires. But not on any
other basis. We are getting back to first
principles at last
| The Russian revolution temporarily up
set the western world But now that
Russia has played Little Red Riding Hood
to the German wolf with the customary
consequence to herself, there is little ex-
cuse for any element in our populations
preserving any further Illusions about
contemporary Germany. Conquering the