New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1919-11-09
A Year After the Ar1nistice-The Unsettled Disput
New Issues Have Arisen in Placo
of the Old and the Condition
of America Is Unsettled

VereSt Indictment that can be
justly framed will only charge tina,
he went to Europe advocating g
method Of settlement which was
momentarjly accepted by nations
and peoples having no method te
offer themselves and, either through
faith or policy, or both, subscribing
to the Presidents formula.
1t may be that q league Of ma.
tons was always impossible; was
totally impossible in the circum-
stances existing after the German
defeat, but there has never beer
any alternative offered, and those
who most bitterly perceive the linn.
itations of the Presidents scheme
still profess to see in it the single
present hope Of escape from the
vicious circle Of confict~breeding
wars and settlements.
In q sense, all Of the larger
problems which were presented al
Paris have proven themselves in.
soluble through centuries of Euro.
pean history. The Congress OF
Vienna nearly broke up as a con.
sequence Of disputes over Poland
In the same assembly the Saar
Basin, now the object Of world dis
cussion, was, in larger part, as
signed to France once and with.
drawn on second thought, after Ma
poleon had come and gone. The
Balkan rivalries were bitterer SOC
years ago-before the Turk came
and temporarily abolished them
than at this moment, while even the
Romans were unable to manage the
lllyrian difficulties, which are the
Adriatic disputes of the presen,
hour.
A year ago the hope that war.
making disputes from the Scheldt tc
the Beresina could be solved 1T the
Peace Conference was general. bu,
neither the hope nor the disappoint-
ment which has followed it's disap-
pearance seems to me to have been
justified. Similarly, the hope that
an exhausted world could imme-
diately perform the gigantic tasks
necessary to resstablishirg order
politically or economically, will un-
doubtedly appear to the future to
have been a mirage rather than a
we'll founded conception.
Ebb Point Is Passed
BY contrast, it seems to me that q
year after the armistice we have
perhaps touched, and even passed
the lowest point in the inevitable
pessimism. The real results Of the
war may henceforth become clearer
and clearer until it becomes unde-
niable that If the defeat of Germany
did not, as some men and women
momentarily hoped, open the short
way to establishing heaven on earth,
Il no less contributed to making the
earth more tolerable for human be-
ings.
The defeat Of the German must
unquestionably seem to the future
as great deliverance as the defeat
Of Spain, when that nation sourht
to fasten it's equally fatal system.
political and otherwise, upon Eu-
rope. The independence of the sew
eral tribes and races of Europe
and of the world was reestablished
and to the free peoples millions were
added.
The world went to war to save it.
self from German tyranny and Ger
man domination. In this it was sue
cessful, although the struggle was
long and the issue in doubt until the
end. Germany beaten, the world for
a moment dreamed that the victory
could be stretched to cover insur-
ance against all future perils. q
guarantee Of peace, protection
against future war. So far as one
can now see, this later and supple
mentary purpose has not been meas
urably achieved. Disappointment
at this has brought with it forget
fulness of the actual victory in the
main struggle.
A year after the armistice it is
plain that many questions out Of
which wars may arise will survive
the settlement of Paris; it is even
possible that certain circumstances
in the settlement itself may provide
the occasion of later wars. The Ger
man defeat carried with it no auto
YrQfio oIiytcf1>,1~s ~