Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1929-02-17
PERMANENT PEACE SEEN
in RUSSIAN AGREEMENT
Soviet States Readiness to Cooperate
With Neighbors Is Triumph at
Home of Great Promise.

| in the building of vast industrial es-
| adjustments on Soviet soil, 1t is clear
that there might be much smaller risk
! in investing in Polish establishments
near Russia, which could serve the
Russian market. LODI, for example, was
once the Manchester of Russia and
Lodz and other Polish industrial towns
| are in a position to supply the new
Russian markets
In the exploitation of the Russian
| market either Poland or Germany will
naturally serve as the middleman be-
tween Russia and the west. In reality
1t comes down to a question as to
whether the United States and, Great
Britain will work in Russia through a
Polish or a German medium. Unmis-
takably Germany has been hoping and
preparing to play this role and the
political friction between the Soviet
state and Poland has seemed to ex-
clude Poland.
Advantages of Poles.
The Poles have certain obvious adj
vantages due to propinquity, similar
language and beyond all else to the fact
that before the World War not only
was Poland the industrial servant of
Russia, but Poles were to a consider
able extent the bankers. engineers, as
we'll as the skilled officials of the rail-
ways. And Poland has in history played
the role of middleman between Russia
and Europe-in fact, between the east
and west of Europe.
Thus the agreement just made may
easily mark the beginning of a long
period of economic rather than political
activity. No one longer expects that the
Soviet regime will crash of sudden
The slow but sure rise of the peasant
to authority. his inevitable seizure of
political control from the hands of the
relatively small group of city workers,
seems indicated. Meantime his needs,
in machinery and in goods, must i'm
pose upon the weakening Soviet die
tatorship an increasing need not only
for peace but for the means to satisfy
the needs. And Poland is nearby to
profit first by this situation.
Reverting to the political aspects, the
new protocol seems to me significant
in the extreme as insuring to the exist
ing order in Eastern Europe time,
which is the first and perhaps the
single prerequisite to guarantee sta
bility
The great experiment which was
insured at Paris by the application of
the principle of self-determination re-
quired time. As result of Locarno
Western Europe settled down to busi-
ness. The pacts which guaranteed the
status quo in Europe, so far as the
Rhine area was concerned, opened the
way to the economic and financial
restoration of Germany and France. If
no one believed that perpetual peace
was assured, most people recognized
that for very long time to come
war was ruled out in this dangerous
region. Thus, while for i've years after
the armistice both France and Ger
many went down hill financially, since
the Locarno conference both have
made incredible strides toward their
pre-war situation.
A similar development Is almost in
evitable in Eastern Europe, Ii even APP
proximately the same sense of au-
thority is provided. But all has de-
pended upon the mutual recognition by
Russia and her neighbors that their
supreme problem was one of domestic
existence, not of foreign development
AS long as the Soviets were seeking
to provoke world revolution and OPP
Grating within all the border states to
promote domestic anarchy. while pre-
pairing a new invasion, nothing was
possible.
Triumph at Home.
But the Russian revolution has COM
pleted its triumph at home and recog-
nized its failure abroad. The larger
struggle, that between BolShevism and
capitalism. has ended in draw at the
Russian frontiers. And the first bene-
ficiaries Of the truce are the border
states
In my judgment things may move
rapidly now. Recognition of the
Soviet state by Britain through a
restoration of relations, even entrance
of Russia into the League of Nations,
may come soon. But what is most Ger
tain is that there will be a rapid in
tensification of trade and commerce,
of industrial development, both in
Russia and in the border states. and
along with this gigantic struggle for
primacy in the Russian market, be-
tween Germany on the one hand and
Britain on the other.
AS for the United States, it will
presently have to decide whether 1t
will make the contest in company with
the British, employing Poland as a
base. or in partnership with Germany
leaving the Pole and the British to
work out a basis of cooperation. But
in either event the map of Eastern
Europe seems to have been guaranteed
for period of years, thanks to the
new promise of peace. Thus Mr.. Kel-
logg may have monuments in Moscow,
Warsaw and Bucharest.
(Cnnvrirht 1920