New-York tribune., 1919-02-15

TIME worst feature Of the proposal for
Russian conference in the Sea of
Marmora is that it remains incredible.
1t is incredible that the Associated Powers
in Council should have perpetrated such
poor joke at such tragic moment, and on
a subject of such surprising gravity. No
wonder that even the Bolsheviks are sus-
pcious. For them the news is too good to
be true. For those who still hope for the
triumph of reason and justice it seems too
unrelievedly bad to be possible. No discus
sions on the psychology of President Wilson
and Mr.. Lloyd George, on the nature of dip
lomatic conferences in general and the new
diplomacy in particular, throw any further
light on this curious problem. One is
driven up against crude and elementary
alternatives. Either the proposition was
meant seriously. Then it betrays an appall-
ing ignorance of the present state of Rus
sia and of Europe generally, and this alone
is sufficient to darken the hopes of salts
factory read djustment of equilibrium by the
peace conference. Or else the proposition
is "rebus," stratagem whose recondite
purpose is invisible to all save the inner
circle of the initiated. In that case the
finest Macchiavelian tactics are out-dis-
tanced by the new diplomacy, and the idea
of basing on the force of an enlightened
public opinion a democratic reorganization
of world politics is bubble, shadow, an
empty dream. Either alternative is destruc-
tive of that public confidence which it
should be the first business of the confer
ence to create and confirm.
The position is inexplicable. The victo-
rous Allies instead of graphing directly
with Bolshevism at its centre, gave it every
opportunity to undermine their own
strength. BY the long delay after the ar
mistice they gave the Bolsheviks splendid
opening for propaganda in a war-weary
world. And then, when the danger had be-
come manifest to every newspaper reader,
the eminent gentlemen who sit in conclave
in Paris suddenly decided that it was mere
ly Il local Russian affair, that might be set
tied by negotiation in a remote island.
In the first place, this is an insult to
those Russians who out of loyalty to Rus
sia and to the alliance have been strug-
CLING against those who destroyed the Rus
sian army and betrayed Russia to Germany.
These Russians know that the Bolsheviks
are more implacable and more dangerous
enemies of all that the Allies stand for
than the Germans themselves The gallant
band that gathered round Denikn held out
under impossible conditions in the absolute
confidence that Russia's allies would defeat
Germany and all her allies, including the
Bosheviks, and that liberated Russia
would share in the joy of final victory. And
now they told that they have, in the
eyes of the Associated Powers, no status
higher than that of the Bolsheviks The
hope that has fought against hope and
against the evasive promises, the advancing
and receding Intervention Of the Allies,
might we'll be mortally shattered by such
blow as this.
In the second place, the proposal cndan-
gers our future relations with Russia. The
Bolsheviks are our enemies and always will
be, and, sooner Of later they will cease to
rule in Moscow. With what feeling, then,
will reconstructed Russia regard us-a