The Butler County press. [volume] (Hamilton, Ohio) 1900-1946, 1919-03-28
Bands OF Hunger--Maddened rIen
Roam About Numbering
And Pillaging.

BY CHARLES EDWARD RUSSELL
Written Especially for the American
Alliance for Labor and Democracy.
Article /.
When you read in the news dis
patches from day to day items about
! the food shortage in Bosnia or Mora
via or some other remote corner of
Europe do not pass these by as things
of no particular concern to this part
of the world. Ponder them and re-
member them, for they have already
the most grave and important mean
ing for you and will shortly have
more.
They are symptoms of the most
tremendous crisis in human history
and you and your country are already
involved in it.
They mean not merely that the
people in some town or village you
never heard of before are in want,
but that terrible famine threatens
millions and has begun to descend
upon still other millions.
The peace treaty will declare the
end of this wars actual fighting of
man against man. 1t will not end the
cares, responsibilities or huge expen-
ditures this country assumed when it
entered the war. No, nor its self
denials nor it's solemn duty to man
kind
We have been slow in laying hold of
this fact. We shall have to come to it
now. We had all thought in an easy,
comfortable way that our troubles
were about over and with the signing
of the treaty we could go back to the
good, old conditions, do business on
the old terms, make money and be
happy.
Not this year, nor the next
A large part of Europe is starving
We shall have to keep it alive. 1t is
broken, PROSTATE and beginning to
despair. We shall have to set it again
upon it's feet. 1t is slipping upon the
edge of chaos We shall have to
save it, if it is saved at all
For nearly five years agricultural
and other productions has been strang-
led by the war The result has struck
us now. 1t is an utter collapse of all
, the means and machinery of life.
Over great areas of populous coun-
try there is next to nothing to eat;
there are no supplies of clothing,
medicine, seeds, shoes.
Even in countries where conditions
} are the best, countries west of the
, Rhine, such as Belgium, Holland
much of France, the distress is acute
East of the Rhine it is intolerable.
The records of mortality are like
those of some visitation in the Dark
Ages of some black plague.
, Practically all of Silesia, Galacia
. Rumania and all of Armenia, are
starving In parts of Austria fam
ine is appalling. In Vienna only the
rich can get a sufficient amount OF
} food. In Constantinople the people
} in February were dying faster thar
} they could be buried. In Germany
the present slender food stocks will bC
exhausted in about two weeks anc
what may happen then fills all think
ing men with inexpressible alarm.
Italy has worked through the win
B ter on half rations, without coal anc
) with her industries largely paralyzeC
! in consequence France, for reasons
| shall explain hereafter, is in stat
of the greatest economic peril. Il
Russia millions have died this winte
= of starvation and of the epidemic
b that have resulted from undernourish
> ment. Poland and Bohemia are in tn
. direst want. The lives of the ney
. governments hang from day to da..
en- the sheer question of food.
y The terrible possibilities that lurl
= behind these conditions may be gait,
b cred from what is going on in Bul
4 garia. Starvation and despair hav
! been followed by such chaos and an
archy that mankind seems to have re
! turned to the lowest forms of savag
= cry. Except where the Allied troop
= are stationed there is no shadow Q
3 authority or order. Bands of hung