Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1944-05-14
War-Breeding Triangle Rises
To Plague Peace Planners
Strategic Borders Program in Europe Runs Into
Age.Old Problem of Rights of Humans to
Govern Selves as They May Desire.
By Constantine Brotvn.


committees and commissions in Wash
ington feverishly studying various po-
litical economic and military plans for
postwar Europe. Thousands of officials
either permanent civil servants or
outsiders members of these COM
mittees. Voluminous blueprints are be-
ing drafted to create a new world In
which wars would be as out of date as
Is hunting with the bow and arrow or
with the falcon.
The inspiration for these plans comes,
of course, from the top policy trainers
In Washington and London. The direc-
tives are given by these trained diplo-
mats who represent an odd combination
of Metternich political philosophy with
the most modern "a bottle of milk for
every individual in the world" slogan of
our most advanced political men.
Hours are being spent contemplating
detailed maps of Europe-the focus of
war infection for as many centuries as
history is known. New territorial lines
are being drawn along strategic lines.
foremost military power in the European
continent, insists that all danger to her
security must henceforth be removed
and our diplomats are busy drafting
boundaries which would give the Soviets
the required security. The courses of
the rivers and the strategic Importance
of the river banks are being carefully
examined. The location of the marshes
is being studied. The peaks and the
character of the mountains which are
to form the future boundaries of Europe
form the subject of long dissertations
on the part OF the official specialists.
A new Europe is being redrafted on
strategic rather than human lines.
However, these excellent officers of the
many commissions and committees ap-
pear to overlook one important element
the human being. They seem to for
get that these valleys and mountains are
inhabited by peoples who have their
own ideas of how they want to live and
be ruled.
Want Independence.
A quick glance at the map of Europe
will show the problem in its naked truth.
If one draws line from, say, Tornio
In Finland to the Adriatic, another line
from the same spot to the Black Sea and
unite the two with a tRnsversal line
from the Adriatic to the Black Sea a
triangle will be formed. In this triangle
live about Inn mn nm y>arcors ,,,ho bou.
national aspirations and who speak diff
ferent languages and belong to different
creeds and races. But they have one
thing in common-an irreducible desire
to be independent and to rule them
selves according to their own standards
For several hundred years most of the
European wars have started from this
area. Either the Slavs in the east at
tempted to subjugate the triangle" or
the Germans from the west tried to de-
prive them of their freedom, or the bay-
barians from the south-the Turks in
the 18th and 18th centuries also were
described as such-conquered them and
endeavored to keep them as a part of
their empires.
They all succeeded for a while. But
so long as the triangle" nations-Fin-
land, the Baltic provinces, Poland, b.
hernia, Hungary, Romania, Serbia, Bull
garia and Greece-were kept in servi-
tude by any of their more powerful
neighbors there was no peace in Eu-
rope. Either these strongly nationalis-
tic states rebelled against their con-
querors or other nations thinking in
strategic and military terms fought each
other for them.
The wars between Turkey and Russia
which lasted more than a century were
waged by the Russian rulers, officially at
least, for the liberation of the Christians
in the Balkans from the yoke of the in