Magyar külpolitika, 1930 (11. évfolyam, 1-7. szám)

1930 / 7. szám - The Question of Revision

CHIEF EDITORS GYULA DE PÉKÁR, BÁRON JOSEPH SZTERÉNYI PRINCIPAL CONTENTS IV. Horváth: The Question of Revision ... 21 Ward Price: Foreign Politica] Questions 'of the Day 24 Mrs. Vazsony, Florence Áyshford-Wood: Smile 24 J. Hordóssy : Hungárián Reconstruction . . . 25 VThe Question of Revision by Professor Horváth Among the maxims of our age wliich have been brought to the surface by tbe atmosphere preváiling in the years immediately after the war, the mbít importanl arc those which refer to reparations and treaty revision: the re-adjustínent of the reparations and the amendment of the peaée treaties concluded in Paris. These two questions have lutherto, perliaps, never been brought into connection with one another, althougli they are obviously congruent, originating as they do, from tbe same causation. In looking for tliis origin we have to go back to the line of division created by the collapse of tbe Russian Empire during the war. Russia stepped out of the war and from all its connections, with the result tbat the centre of gravity of tbe war sílifted to tbe West, and as the war came to a eonelusion in the West, alsó the mentality of the peace treaties assumed a Western orientation. No one was any longer eonc:'rned as to which members of tbe Tzar's ' family were to rule over the various territories thai were to have been conquered by tbe armed foroes of Russia; military conquest was Éupplanted by the maxim of the transplantation of the western dernocratism, the construction of the peace treaties aceording to western precepts, and the satisfying of the demands of tbe western powers under the title of reparations. Thus was the division of tbe AustroHungarian Monarchy put into effeet by the western powers instead of by Russia and the reparation liabilities were fixed togetber with the peace treaties, to settle the Central-European problems. It remains a question bowever, in what proportion do the treaties concluded in the West, which Russia was to guarantee by armed foroe, cbver western interests, and alsó whether the applieation of western principles on eastern territories meets 1h;' interests of the population living thereon and to whal extent? Have these people been subjected to disast ers as a result of the non-consideration in tbe treaties of the collapse of líussia and which, therefore may he regarded as a conslructive fault against which objeotions can he ráised, and a reason why their modification may justly be demanded and carried out without offending the interests of nations? The fact that the western powers regarded the war as a Germán war, may be stated as the first divergence. They contested with the Germán power and after having settled the provisions of the Germán peace treaty, the Parisian conference was dissolved without any special study of the questions connected with the Central-European peace. We áré readily willing to admit the importance of tbe Germán problem hut are at the same time compelled to declare that the unfortunate fact tbat the western powers did not study and treát the problem of the Central-European States with sufficient circumspection niakes us entertain the claim, Avhich can be justified to all the world, tbat tbis question must be taken up again for re-considei'ation. Wé demand this all tbe more, because in tbe light of data since diseovered it is clearly proved that the representatives of the western powers were quite uninformed in Central-European questions. When Lord Balfour, the British Secretary of State, for Foreign Affairs, lett for America in 1917, to make known the war aims of the Allied Powers, and when he submitted the plan for the division of the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy to Presidenl Wilson, he took with him, according to the statement of Colohel House, a map of Europe on which the frontier lines of the Monarchy itself could hardly be seen, let alone the lines of the proposed distribution It is public knowledge tbat Francé regained Alsaoe-Lorraine, detaohed in 1871, by simple reattachmenl without plebiscite: As a reason for this procedure it was stated that it was a simple reunion. Bearing tbis in mind tbe Governments wbose endeavour it was to have Hungary dismembered in order Ihat they migbt participate in tbe distribution of her territory, made every effort to induce the western powers to apply tbe same rules and to exempt tbem from the holding of a plebiscite, claiming that alsó their cases Avere nothing but a re-union. The origin of their claim, bowever, was somewhat more remote than 1871. dating back as it does, to times more than a thousand years 1 ago, times in which science is unable to ascertain that Upper-