The Richmond palladium and sun-telegram. [volume] (Richmond, Ind.) 1907-1939, 1919-03-12
final PEACE
TERMS BIND
GERMANS TO
IMPOTENCY
Allied Conditions to be Sub
mitted Soon Will Make
Country Powerless for Next
Quarter Century.
FRONTIER IS REDRAWN
BY FRANK n. SIMONDS.
Copyright 1919, by The Mcclure News
paper Syndicate>

paper Syndicate>
PARIS, March 12.-During Presi-
dent Wilson's absence in America the
lines of the new treaty of Versailles
have been on the larger side drawn
and substantially agreed to. The
fourth of the great European settle
ments, counting the treaty of West
phalia and the treaties of Utrecht and
OF Vienna, is now known in outline,
and II one may judge from the past
great settlements, the larger part of
the work which is being completed
in Paris will endure and give form
and character to Europe and to the
world for a century to come.
German Frontier Decisions.
Most important of all the various
departments of what will be the peace
of Versailles is the decision with re-
spect to Germany. This decision as to
the frontiers is as follows: Germany
will hereafter stop at the Rhine and
at the old western frontier of Poland
preceding the first partition Of 1772.
In addition, Germany will lose the
Danish-speaking populations of
Schleswig and the Polish-speaking
populations of upper Silesia. BY con-
trast she will probably acquire the
pure German regions of Austria, the
old provinces which were victims of
the Hapsburg empire when it began
Its process Of expansion many centu-
ries ago.
Expressed in statistics, Germany
will lose between 10000 and 10000
square miles of territory, with a popu-
lation between 100000 and 14,000.-
900, and will acquire between 10000
and 10000 square miles, with popu-
lation of 100000. This means that
Germany will in any event suffer
net loss of 10000 square miles of ter
ritory and upward of 100000 of peo-
pie. Instead of 212,000 square miles,
her area before the war, which was
slightly in excess Of that of France,
she will have about 173,000 square
miles, and instead of a population of
67,000,000 a population of 60,000,000.
Conceivably the Rhenish republic
which is to be created on the left
bank of the Rhine may ultimately re-
turn to Germany, but even with this
ultimate accretion Germany will still
be smaller in area than Spain. But
the measure of her loss is not ex-
pressed in square miles. She will lose
the great iron deposits of Lorraine
and the coal districts of the Saar
outright to France; she will also lose
her highly industrialized iron districts
of upper Silesia to Poland. Thus,
while the reduction of her area is COM
paratively small the reduction of her
Industrial resources is enormous.
On the military and naval side,
Germany is to be compelled not only
to abandon her claim to her war fleet,
1T
but also to give up certain other ships
destroy warships which are building,
destroy all her submarine plants and
in addition agree not to maintain an
army in excess of 100000 as contrast
ed with a standing army of nearly
100000, when the war broke out. Rig
Id provisions are to be made for the
Inspection of German industrial plants
to guard against rearmament, re-crea-
tion of submarine and airplane fleets
and the accumulation of poison gases
in considerable amounts.
In sum, this means that Germany,
having already surrendered most of
her artillery and now deprived of her
fleets and her instruments of war, for
hidden to maintain a conscript army,
pushed behind the Rhine on the west
reduced to q condition which will
make a new German attack on the
western world unlikely for at least a
quarter of a century, and steps have
been taken to provide for the crea-
ton of Rhenish republic that when
such an attack comes, if it does, its
first fury will be borne not in the
French and Belgian industrial dis
tricts, but in the German-speaking
regions of the Rhenish republic. AS
the congress of Vienna undertook to
protect Europe against France after
the Napoleonic wars, the congress of
Versailles is seeking to protect Eu-
rope against new German menace,
and it's military and territorial guar
antics are absolutely Of the most form
idable character.
Continued on Page Ten)