New-York tribune., 1920-03-16

| ready to share in what must be a new
demonstration on sea and along the
Rhine. The Junkers will watch for the
first sign Of Allied purpose; SO will the
Ebert element, now driven out Of power.
II the same hesitations are revealed
which have cursed the Allied policy with
respect to Russia, the same disasters
will follow. The Junkers, like the Boil
shevists, will make good their control
in their own country, and an alliance
between the two to ovcrturn Europe
will follow at no great distance.
We, the English and the Americans,
have given the Germans the chance to
win back the war. Despite their strength
in numbers, the Germans lack the neces-
sary mechanical equipment, the guns
and munitions, the tanks and the air
over, the destruction Of their feet and
their shore defenscs places them at the
mercy OF the British fleet, while re-
newal of the blockade promises immedi-
ate economic paralysis and proximate
famine.
Decisive Action Needed
But, having the weapons in our hands,
it remains necessary that we should
display the courage to employ these
weapons. If the poison which has been
generally poured forth in recent
months-the effort to justify Germany
and to discredit the alliance-has been
as successful as the German Junkers be-
lieve, then Allied policy will be in
capable of action, Allied weapons will
days Of 1914, with the terrible sacrifices
and magnificent victories Of the war
gone for nothing.
But firmness will strike at the single
real asset of the Junkers. If the Ger
man people have turned to them now
it is not with any desire to fight a new
war, but because they have been con-
vinced that Allied impotence will pro-
duce Allied surrender once Germany
speaks in the old tones and through
fallacy of this assumption must be the
first purpose of the Allied nations.
Not alone their own safety but the
possibility Of democratic and peace
full Germany depends on what is done
in the next few days.
A century ago the Allies, at the
critical hour when Napoleon returned
from Elba, announced that they would
not deal with the Emperor; not only
did they announce this, but, reordering
their divided ranks, they set their ar
mics in motion, and the end was Water
loo, which was the graveyard of all the
Napoleonic hopes and the end Of all
the faith of the French nation in Ma
poleon himself.
When the German people discover
that the return Of the Junkers means
not reduction Of the peace terms and
the restoration of Germany to her old
position, to her old place in the
sun, they will be as little ready
to rise en- masse as were the
French after Waterloo. If the conse-
quence of the present revolution is the
further discrediting of the Ludendorffs
and their kind, if the German people
recognize once for all that such leader
ship means only new invasion, new sac
rifices, new privations, then and then
alone the peace Of the world will be
assured by the fact that the German
IyOo
abolished
Make Victory Sure
But to-day all the countries which
fought against Germany must recog-
nize that their victory was indecisivc
and is now called into question. The
"Old Gang" which made the war, which
gave the war its character of savagery,
are again in the saddle and will remain
IN the saddle to repeat their old crimes
and to preserve the old and evil ira
ditions of their caste unless the Allies
are ready to act promptly and unhesi-
tatingly.
The diplomats have spoiled the vic
tory; the triumph Of the soldiers has
been spoiled by the statesmen; we have
lost the peace, having won the war,
unless in the present crisis, the most
acute for the world since the day of
the Ludendorff offensives of 1918, the
Allied nations, forgetting their quar-
rels over Fiume, the Saar, the Arabian
lands, dismissing the idle gossip of the
economic and moral experts" striko
hands again in a compact to complete
the job.
The German has waited his time; he
has struck at a promising moment. The
disarray of the Allied forces at least
warrants hope that he may regain all
that was lost and the world may lose
all that was won in the four years of
terrible war. In any event, the true
solution Of the situation now lies in
the hands Of Foch; it is for him to
prescribe action and for the statesmen
who have sabotaged his victory to
stand aside.
(COpyrjvht Jdon b,, A..