The Washington times., 1921-04-25
EUROPE WATTS
HARD|NCMOvE
Any Fair Program viii Get Sup
port Of Allies and Germany,
Says Hapgood.
BY NORMAN HAPGOOD.

BY NORMAN HAPGOOD.
In its effort to divert the Euro
pesn stream of trouble into better
course, the Administration has one
increasing advantage over its prede-
cessor. Mr.. Wilson got nothing like
the settlement he desired for the rea-
son that the conquering powers were
bound by secret treaties and also
still crazed with the idea that they
could get profit out Of extreme terms.
Now everything is changed. Do
Illusion Is creeping over the people
OF Europe. They are not even yet
quite ready to face the dark truth
that there is no salvation for them
In conquest in suppression, in CD
struction. but they are at the point
where they can be brought to face
that truth.
The Germans have a word Siegcs-
krankheit. It means the disease re-
sulting from victory. The British
took a violent plunge into this dis
ease in December. 1918.
In the Khaki election OF evil
enormous power on the issue of
hang -the-k Kaiser and make Germany
pay the entire cost OF the war"
II was fake, as Lloyd George well
knew. Every other thinking person
knew 1t, too. But diseases come even
when We know they are diseases.
As soon as the ut was over, the
public realized that II had been
buncoed or rather that 1t had bunco-
ed itself.
Hanging the Kaiser was seen as
nothing but an imbecile step toward
bringing sympathy to his cause.
That Germany could pay the entire
cost OF the war was seen as a sheer
| impossibility.
FRANCE AWAkENs SLOWLY.
Time passed and more was seen. 1t
was realized that there was a limit
not only to what Germany could pay
but also to what amount of repara-
ton would help the countries receiv-
ing 1T. Slowly 1t came to be under
stood that in the relation of repara-
ton to home industry and to foreign
trade lay problems heretofore ex-
! pected only by few.
In France the awakening Ia COM
ing more slowly. and 1t is held
back by peculiar political conditions
France is naturally more frightened
than Great Britain, and fear is a
shifty basis for constructive politics.
Apparently nobody can remain, at
the head of the government today in
either England or France without ex-
traordinary agility.
BRAND is the Lloyd George OF
! France. The liberal elements in
France do not like his present atti-
tude, but they know he is liberal at
heart, and they also know that II he
falls Poincaire. Foch and the extreme
reactionary group represented by the
, Echo de Paris will take his place.
In Germany there is the opposite
to this disease OF victory. There is
the disease of desperation.
Some elements at the two political
extremes, gloat over the difficulties
of the moderate government, the
Communists dreaming OF their revo-
luton, the junkers watching for a
swing Of popular sympathy toward
0espotism.
This despotic element shows it's
hand. now as slways, in stirring up
en- acute wave Of anti-Semitism. that
unfailing trick OF the reactionary
elements all over Europe.
While these diseases exist there I'M
derlies, nevertheless, a pathetic long
ing for peace, order and progress: a
pathetic hope that the one big
prosperous country in the world may
find the way out.
Any fair program heartily recon-
mended by US will rally the nationa
elements in Germany, France and
England and will triumph
Experience since the armisticc has
proved enough things on which TO
base the new settlement. Here they
are: The seizing OF the Ruhr Valley
would be the depth of folly. France
would face a situation exactly parallel
to the situation England faces in Ire
land.
On q reasonable settlement France
would have plenty of protection in the
one fact that Germany needs abso-
lutely the raw materials that Ger
many and the United States control,
and in the further fact that Germany
Graves and must regain the confidence
of the world.
Germany knows she must pay some
thing around fifteen thousand million
dollars. She wants to be treasured
against invasion, ooncocted plebiscitcs
and deprivation of raw material.
1t Is the delicate but easily possible
function OF Harding and Hughes TO
put Germany and France up against
those simple fundamentals. Both have
appealed to us, and our response will
be a sane view of those settled e'c-
ments that are now beyond reason
able dispute.