Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1919-08-17


manian adventure to Budapest in the
Eight OF recent and past history, For
something like a thousand years the
Magyars have held, in a servitude be-
yond endurance, quarter of the Ru-
ian-speaking population of the
world. They have deprived these people
OF every right and every liberty They
have oppressed them In every conceiv-
able way. Rumania entered the world
war to redeem these lost children. She
was defeated and her country ravaged
terribly, in part at least. by Hungarian
troops. She re-entered the war, when
Austria Hungary was falling. to regain
territory taken from her in 1918 and
territory hers justly, but never yet re-
deemed. 80
Rumania and Poland will unquestion-
ably be the two great new states TO
emerge from this conflict. Both will
have an area greater than modern Italy
and population capable in no long time
of exceeding that of the Savoy mon
archy. Therefore. Rumania, like Po-
land, is a force with which the western
nations must reckon. She will be the
| most powerful state in the near east:
controlling the Danube, rich in natural
resources. capable of an enormous in
dustrial expansion. -, a
In the old world OF practical politics
at the Congress Of Vienna or of Berlin
a state of Runaania's potentialities would
therefore have won a ready hearing Tor
their demands. Moreover. this hearing
would have been granted the more
readily since Rumania had been a faith
4! full and on the whole an invaluable ally
| in a war in which she had suffered
terrible losses alike in men and in
| money. Gf
But the conference of Paris. alike
| in the case of Poland and in the case
of Rumania, has found itself forever
vacillating between new and ideal-
| istic conceptions and old-fashioned
a nd ms al a
through American influence there has
been a constant tendency to seek ideal
solutions repugnant to friendly ma
tions and on the whole pleasing to
peoples recently in arms against the
victorS of the present war. -
Thus the Paris conference has SO
far refused to recognize Rumaniao
| just claims to the old Russian Prov
ince of Bessarabia. 1t has cham-
| pioned Hungarian claims i'm Transyl-
vania and in the Banat and in addi-
| ton supported Bulgarian demands in
the Dobrudja.
Rumanians Disappointed
The result has been that the Ruma-
MAN people have found themselves. after
their great sacrifices and sufferings in
J the war, forbidden by the nations in
alliance with whom they have fought
and to whom, at a critical hour, they
brought invaluable assistance, not alone
| to occupy the territories to which their
| claim was at least as good as the
French to Alsace-Lorraine or the. Ital :
T, ians to Trieste and the Trentino. but
also to establish their title to lands
which they had already occupied. and
| to use their armies against bolshevisto
alike in Russia and in Hungary who
were seeking to undermine RumanIan
security. O..
When I left Paris little more than
two months ago the Rumanians were
prepared to abandon the peace copfers
ence, to fall back upon their own re-
sources, which are not inconsiderabie.
| and vindicate their title to the lands
| which are for them what the French
lost provinces were to France, and rkfaA-
ian Irredenta for Italy. They were pre-,
pared to send their armies into the
pest against the Magyars. whether the
! Faris conference wished il or not. " .''~
Now what has happened is simplex
| In my last article pointed out how the
Paris conference. lacking the troops.
had been obliged to renounce a mihtary
expedition against Bella Kun, with q
consequent loss of authority. and em-
phasized how illustrative this incident
was of the whole world situation.
Within a few days there was then
an important change. The allies haa
no force sufficient to dispose or Bei3
Kun, against whom they continued to
issue proclamations as they had been
doing ever since the outbreak OF the
Hungarian revolution. But Ruman1a
had armies. She had claims to en-
force against Hungary. and when the
allies had neither the troops nor the
will to intervene in Hungary Ruma-
MAN troops were set in motion.
Weakness of Conference.
We had then the ridiculous change
of circumstances which must go far
to explaining to the world the .uiti-
mate weakness of the present author
ity of the Paris conference One day
the allies demanded that Bella Kun
should quit The next day Bella Kun
was ousted. not because of allied proc
lamations, but because Rumanian ar
mics were approaching Budapest, 4nd
the next day. on Hungary's appeal the
allies were ordering the Rumanians TO
refrain from entering the Hungarian
capital and twenty-four hours later
were demanding that the Rumanians
leave the city they had occupied.
What Rumanian occupation of Blu
dapest really means must be clear
Rumania does not arrive as the man
datory of the western powers. She
arrives as one who contested with
Hungary for over thousand years
for the possession of certain provinces
until yesterday Hungary's. with the
memory of recent Hungarian out
RACES in Rumanian territory and the
age-Iong record of Magyar oppression
against Rumanian peoples in Hunga-
rian capital into the bargain. Who IL
going to Dust her? Who is going to
prevent her from fixing those from
tiers which correspond with her view
of her just right, but have been chal-
lenged by the map-makers of Paris?
Who is going to prevent RumanSan
soldiers from exacting some little
compensation from the Hungarian
people for the destruction and the
extortion of Hungarian troops in Ru-
mania?
Yesterday the peace conference was
trying to get rid of a bolshevist lead
er in Hungary as a preliminary to
recognizing Hungarians and all their
neighbors. But today the bolshevist
regime has fallen. not to proclarna-
ton. but to invasion. After a thsn.
sand years the Rumanian people have
at least achieved a unity long sought
The allies had no troops and theyuhxd
no unity Of purpose adequate to. SUD-
ply military force to drive the boil
shevist government and army euto0f
control in Hungary. Will it be easier
for them to find troops to attack Ru-
mania. their recent ally, in ORDER TO
take from her territories to which
her claim is at least as good as the
Hungarian? on mr.
Moreover-and this is capital-Swhat
will be the effect upon the Czecho-
slovaks and the Serbs of seeingyRus
manian armies. in defiance off, the
Paris conference, occupying Budal
pest, and Rumania acquiring poesess
sion of the Hungarian provinces
which she claims? Patiently. It viii
be an Invitation to Jugoslav and
Czechoslovak armies and statesmen to
follow the same example. They have