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Show fl L ITALY STRIKES BLOW AT LEAGUE B f OF NATIONS Hi i Obsessed with visions of glory and K grandeur, Italy stands, like Chanticler, in H I. the world's new dawn pluming herself in H i disdain at the rising sun of justice. j But in the midst of this self-glorifica- Hj ' tion she looks across the Adriatic and her Hj ' vision is disturbed by another that wear.; HB a terrifying, overpowering aspect. She Hf , can see issuing from the port of Fiume Hf ,j the armadas of a great Jugo-Slavic nation f ! as geat as the Austria Hungary which Hf c lias been swept from the face of the earth Hf j That is why Italy does not accept with Hj patience the cool idealisms of President Hf , "Wilson. "His assurance that Italy's peril Hf ' lias Vanished with the disappearance of Hj f lier old enemy does not comfort her. Nor HS 3 is she cajoled out of her sense of insecur- H. f, ity by his statement that Jugo-Slayia will H j; l)e a member with herself, of the League HJ j of Nations. For all her visions Italy has Hf not lost the Latin clarity and practicality Hf, I of judgment She knows that the league Hl I is an experiment, knows that the contin-H contin-H ! , ent of Europe is a fact. The league may Hf ! long have melted into obliyiqn when a H ? prospei'ous and warlike Jugo-Slavia arms Hj itself to contest with Rome the suprem- B- -acy of the Adriatic. Hl ! To make her new empire as secure as Hj' , -possible Italy would shut out the Slavic H and Hungarian bloc from the Adriatic H ; and tie it down to commercial impotency. H I Italy would avoid war by crippling the I Slavic infant at his birth. And to better accomplish her purpose Italy would possess poss-ess herself of Fiume, which, it appears, Tvas not conceded to her even in the sec-jret sec-jret treaty of London. B Slowly the contents of the London pact n ! "Siave come to the knowledge of Ameri- H cans. They will apk themselves why hey H ? -were not made fully acquainted with the Hl j terms of the treaty before this. The Am- Hf I erican delegation in Paris must have been Hl I told the facts weeks or perhans months. H9 f ago. It transpires that while'France and K Great Britain were willing to grant Italy H practically everything she asked they B j, "balked at surrendering Fiume to her and Hf' I' arrived at an understanding that this Hr I' - port should go to Croatia, then one of the M! f Slavic provinces of Hungary. Hi 1 "President Wilson, we feel sure, rcpre- H I sents the judgment of the world as M , against Italy. He has taken an elevated H I stand in consonance with his announced H prinicples, looking forward to a world M I ruled by justice rather than by force. M I Italy, on the other hand, looks forward H J "even though unwillingly to a world in Hff -which greed and lust for power still will H j lie dominant. It is a case of idealism vei- H I -sus realism. One side believes in a regen- Hi crated Europe which shall adjust its dis- H putes through courts of arbitration. The H j other confesses a pessimistic belief in the H I invincibility of human depravity and im- H:. i plies that wars will continue to be the de- IR i ' -cisive arguments of peoples as they were H of kings. K i As long as Italy cherishes these views B there is a chasm which cannpt be bridged. H i She were better out of the League of Na- Bl tions than in itv Goodwin's Weekly. |