The Indianapolis times. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1922-1965, 1934-10-10
MIXED PEOPLES
OF YUGOSLAvIA
FACE CIVIL WAR
Kings Death May Destroy
PoIygIot Nation, Is View
of SimmS.
BY WILLIAM PHILIP SIMMS
seripps-Howard Foreign Editor

WASHINGTON, Oct. 1O.-The
pistol shots at Marseille may set of
an explosion within YugoSlavia
which will destroy the nation.
Now that the strong hand Of Die
tator-King Alexander has been re-
moved by asSasSin's bullets. power
full centrifugal forces within his
newly formed nation may tear 1t
literally to pieces.
Yuogslavia is not nation OF one
people. but of many. These hate
each other in many cases as much
as they hate any foreign foe. There
are Serbs, Croats. Slovenes, Dalma-
tians. Bosnians. Herzegovinians,
Montenegrins. Macedonians and
Mohammedans. and some OF these
like the Serbs and the Croats-are
forever at each others Threats.
History will probably record that
the peace of Paris. not King Alex
ander. was to blame for what hap
pened at Marseille. The young Serb
monarch was never king of Serbia
but of the kingdom of the Serbs,
the CroatS and the Slovenes." And
it was his efforts to weld them into
one people under one flag that led
to his tragic end.
Racial Pride Endures
The peoples of the Balkans are
historically the subjects of various
principalities. At times they have
been under the Turks, the Austro-
Hungarians or other overlords. But
always they have been proud OF
their own culture. Their racial
pride was never broken, whatever
stronger powers CHANGED to conquer
their territory.
Proud as Lucifer, these people are
something like the mountaineers OF
Kentucky, ready to fight at the drop
of a hat for personal, family, tribal
or national honor Only the Croats,
for example, refuse to regard the
new country of Yugoslavia and its
Serbian king as their nation and
king.
They want their independence.
It was this situation that King
Alexander found himself up against
almost from the moment he in
herited his fathers crown.
Played With Peasant Boys
Contrary to a widespread impress
sion, the young ruler was one of the
most advanced thinkers in the
Balkans. AS lad he had played
with the peasant boys of Montene-
gro where he was born. He was the
great grandson Of peasant, the
famous BLACK George" who won
his title to glory by licking the
Turks.
BLACK George" could neither read
nor write. And his grandson, Prince
Peter, the Serb, was very poor. King
Alexander's boyhood, therefore, was
not spent as crown princes boy
hoods usually are, amid luxuries,
but in the simplest of surroundings.
It is true that he spent some Of
his years before his majority as
page in the court of the car at st.
Petersburg (now LeningradD. But it
is also true that he first studied at
Geneva, where his exiled father took
him when Serbia grew too hot. And
during the war he was in France, in
Corfu and among the allies at Sa-
loniki.
Fond of Quoting Lincoln
Opinions differ widely with regard
to King AleXander's rule. His
enemies charge he was a tyrant,
overbearing and even INSCRIPTIONS.
Others who knew him for years and
well regarded him as a real states
man with the interest of his high
spirited but-hard-to-manage people
at heart.
King Alexander himself was the
authority for the statement that it
was upon the advice of the dying
Croat leader, Stephan Raditch-shot
down by a Serb-that he dissolved
parliament and made himself
dictator.
The king was found of quoting
Abraham Lincoln as saying house
divided against itself can not stand.