Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1919-09-14
SEES EUROPE TIRING
OF u. S. DOMINATION
Mr.. Simonds Believes Resentment of Peo-
pies and Governments Overseas To-
ward America Is Growing
French and Italians.

called upon by the President to- ac-
cept his whole scheme.
French and Italians.
The French people were in no mood,
nor was their government, to consent
to any reduction in the reparations to
be demanded of Germany that the
cause Of international peace in the
future might be advanced. Their
northern regions in ruins, their fac
/ tories wrecked. their mines destroyed:
their sole resources against perma-
nent ruin was discoverable in the
price to be demanded OF Germany.
As to the Italians, they had entered
the war only when they had received
from Great Britain. France and Rus
STA specific promises enabling them to
acquire territory which they had long
looked upon as rightfully their own.
No acceptance Of the fourteen points
suggested to any Italian. high or
low, remuneration of Fiume, and
the millions of Italians who cheer
ed Mr.. Wilson in January were
capable. as the event showed, of ours
ing him in April when he called upon
them for the performance under his
Interpretation of their acceptance of
the fourteen points.
AS for Germany, she had subscribed
to the fourteen points as a drowning
man seizes at a straw. She had hoped
that President Wilson's desire to
achieve a peace of conciliation might
be used to reduce the claims of
France and Belgium against her. to
deny the Poles their right to liberty
| at the expense of the Prussian edi-
! flee reared by Frederick the Great.
Theirs had been a deathbed CONVEX
sion predicated only upon their hope
to escape dissolution and subsequent
perdition.
And if the great powers associated
| and enemy alike. never did more than
! lip service to that American policy,
| represented by Mr.. Wilson, there was
not even this degree of adherence by
| the smaller races. The Poles, the
! Czechoslovaks, the Rumanians and
! the Greeks. the southern Slavs. never
for a single hour conceived the pos
sibility of resigning any fraction Of
that dream they had cherished for
their country and their ancestors had
| cherished over centuries and centuries.
Now the progress of events at
discloses the truth. When Mr.. Will
| SON undertook to call upon the Brit
! ish for performance under the four
| teen points they politely but. firmly
indicated to him that the one point
| which transfixed their own most pre-
! cious interest, namely, sea power.
must be ignored. In the formation Of
a league of nations, with the limita-
! ton of sea power out Of the question,
they were prepared to give Mr.. Will
son every assistance. even against
I their recent allies, but British sup
| port of the larger scheme was con-
| tingent upon the sacrifice of that
point which concerned the freedom
Of the seas.
Secret Treaties.
Moreover. Mr.. Wilson was presently
! to discover that the British jim the
course of the war and in association
| with the French had made a series
| of secret treaties. each of them In
the fourteen points. and each of them
| representing a price assumed to an
other nation as reward for enter
ing or remaining in the conflict. And
Mr.. Wilson was also destined to dis
! cover that, while the British repre-
sentatives at Paris were prepared
/, to give him every possible moral as
sistance in forcing the beneflcfaries
of these secret treaties. to abandon
them. Great Britain still felt herself
bound to stand by them il he was
unsuccessful in persuading their al
lies to surrender.
| When it came to France. Mr.. Will
| son discovered that the French, from
the prime minister to the peasant.
were agreed that Germany should be
compelled to pay the last dollar that
could be extracted from her to reim-
! burse France for wanton injuries
! which were in the aggregate beyond
| the capacity Of Germany to repair.
| and that. in addition, as a consequences
of two unprovoked assaults and in
| vasions in less than half a century.
| France insisted upon her right to
take precautions against a third in
| vasion. provocations which involved
| territorial arrangements contrary to
| the fourteen points.
/ Americans associated with Mr.. Will
| son at Paris promptly denounced
| these British and French positions
] as revelations of an imperialistic pur-
pose. This was grotesquely untrue.
! At bottom both represented precisely
as justif1able a concern for national
security as the United States present.
| ly disclosed in its insistence that the
Monroe doctrine should be excluded
from the purview of the league of
nations. Without unrestricted sea
power. if her fleet were under the
direction of an international body,
I Britain felt herself in instant 1eop-
ardy. Without the guarantee Of the
Rhine France saw herself open to in
vasion, while without German repa-
ration she saw herself ruined.
Again the fourteen points them
selves included an inevitable recog-
liberation of the millions of Poles
living in the territories taken from
the ancient Polish kingdom by Fred
erick the Great and his successors.
but this meant to cut Prussia in half
and to isolate East Prussia from the
balance of the German empire: to
take from Germany territory which
had been for q century and a half
Teutonic. however unrighteous the
acquisition and possession might be.
Presidents Hopeless Dilemma"
Mr.. Wilson. then. early in the peace
conference. faced a hopeless dilemma
He had either to surrender. SO far as
the fourteen points were concerned.
in the case of Britain in the matter
of sea power, in the case Of France
in the matter of security and in
demnity, or break with the French
and British with the absolute GER
tafnty that on these issues the Brit
ish and French people would support
their governments.
But il he should yield to the British
and the French, both OF whom were
united in the matter of reparations,
and IL he should in addition fulfill his
pledge in the matter of the Poles.
then no peace Of understanding with
Germany was even conceivable De-
prived of 10000 square miles Of her
richest territory. faced with the most
colossal indemnity in all history, her
eastern frontiers so mutilated that
an enemy boundary was pushed
barrier interposed between East
Prussia and the rest of Germany.
there was not the smallest possibility
that Germany would accept this peace
in any other spirit than that Of O..
conquered nation that momentariiy