"If Italy were to offend against the freedom and independence of the State of Rieka she would deprive herself," said Signor Schanzer, the Italian Foreign Secretary "she would deprive herself of the name of a Great Power and in the Society of Nations she would retain no authority." Thus did the successor of the relentless but unavailing della Torretta try, with eloquent and noble words, to wipe the blot from Italy's scutcheon. She could scarcely have the nations coming to the Congress of Genoa, there to debate with regard to the economic re-establishment of Europe, while her own conduct was so very much under suspicion. It would have been rather curious, so the Zagreber Tagblatt[67] pointed out, for a robber to invite you to his house with a view to taking steps against robbery. Something drastic had to be done, so that Europe would not look askance at the Italian Government. Zanella, it was true, had been thrown out—but why should not the world be told that this had been effected by the people of the town? A very excellent idea! And so a certain Lieut. Cabruna of the gendarmerie made a plan to get together the Constituent Assembly and then—well, there are always methods by which resolutions can be passed. Perhaps it would not even be necessary for a single rifle to be fired at the deputies from the Distinguished Strangers' Gallery. But most of the deputies succeeded in escaping from the town, although frantic efforts were made to prevent them. Out of the threescore only thirteen poor devils were held fast and came to the futile meeting. The others, with Zanella, assembled on Yugoslav territory at a place called Saint Anna.

And Signor Schanzer went on talking. Officers and men of the Italian army and navy, said he, had shown perfect discipline. Signor Schanzer may not be an expert on discipline, but as a humorist he wins applause. One's ordinary notions of discipline do not include the seizure of a warship by a handful of bandits, the cannons of the vessel being afterwards directed against the Government palace of a neutral State. The fascisti, with the help of Italian troops and accompanied by several Italian deputies, eject the legal Government of Rieka. One of these deputies, Giuratti, is chosen by his friends to be President of the Free State—Giuratti of the fascisti, Giuratti who most barbarically had ill-treated the Istrian Slavs, but—for we will be just—this was when he believed they were barbarians, savages, quite common, brutal men; well, he had learned, he wrote,[68] that this was not the case, they had adopted Western culture, they had raised the revolutionary flag against the dynasty of Karageorgević and if Yugoslavia's dismemberment should ever come to pass, "then, as I confidently hope," said he, "the Croats with their righteous national aspirations will unite with their great neighbour Italy. We salute the Croat Revolution with sincerest sympathy..." and so on and so on. That was the kind of calm, impartial personage to have as Governor of the distracted Free State, where in one point anyhow most of the population think the same, and that is that their union with Italy would be an absolute disaster. Behold this Giuratti posing his candidature, Giuratti whose patriotism and idealism are, says the Italian Government, fully appreciated by them; nevertheless it has advised him to refuse the suggested honour. That he should be punished did not occur to them; but what would they have said if a Yugoslav—surely with more right than an Italian and certainly with a larger following of townsfolk—had been selected as President? "The proceedings of the Italian Government," said Schanzer, "are clear, speedy and determined." But did anything unpleasant happen to Commandant Castelli, an officer sent to make order, when he quite openly placed himself on the side of the fascisti? Would degradation be the lot of any officer or soldier who "mutinied" and joined the fascisti?... Apparently it was due to the unhappy political condition of Europe that the whole civilized world did not launch an indignant protest against the baseness and cynicism of the Italians. But how utterly they failed to persuade others that the wishes of Rieka were as they represented them! Rieka desires to remain independent and this desire the Italians will have to respect. And the later they make up their mind to keep their promises, so much the worse for them. The Yugoslavs can wait, for theirs is the future. A cartoonist in the Belgrade Vreme depicted a rough old Serbian warrior holding on his open hand a very neat little Italian soldier. "Now listen to me," he was saying, "and I will tell you a story. Once upon a time there was a country called Austria...."

There was a characteristic little affair at Saint Anna on March 23. A few minutes after Zanella had left the Lubić Inn a suspicious-looking person appeared. He began observing the customers and their surroundings, when the Police-Commissary Peršić came up to him and asked for his passport. "Take yourself off!" shouted the intruder, as he pulled a bomb out of his trouser pocket. Peršić grappled with him and soon overpowered him. And outside the house four other fascisti, Armano Viola, Carpinelli, Bellia and Murolo, were captured. They claimed to be journalists, and it is quite true that Viola is on the staff of the notorious Vedetta Italiana; but when he comes into a foreign country as a special correspondent and is teaching others how to go about that business—for until then they had been otherwise engaged, Murolo being charged with numerous thefts and attempted murders, while Bellia and Carpinelli were accused of breaking into the Abbazia Casino—if Viola was teaching them how to be journalists he would on this occasion have been better advised if he had restricted them to the conventional tools of the profession instead of bombs, revolvers and daggers. Little use did they get out of them, for a trio of these armed individuals were seized and disarmed by one Yugoslav gendarme, who was himself very meagrely equipped. With tears in their eyes they begged for mercy. "Pietà, Pietà!" they exclaimed. So long as their own lives were spared they were very willing to forgo the 60,000 lire which had been put on Zanella's head.

Unfortunately it seems obvious that this exploit, if not ordered by the Italian Government was, at any rate, permitted by them. How otherwise could the automobile containing these men have got past the sentries at the Sušak bridge and two other Italian sentry posts? Moreover, these men were in possession of documents which proved that official Italian circles at Rieka were privy to their undertaking, and that they proposed to investigate the Yugoslav military positions on the frontier.... These five fascisti brigands—who were also lieutenants of the Italian army—would therefore have to be tried not only for attempted murder but for attempted espionage. They were put into a train and transported to the prison at Zagreb. "If once we begin to march," so the Italian soldiers at Rieka had over and over again been telling the Croats, "then we shall not halt before we come to Zagreb, your capital." Those five will perhaps some day explain to their comrades how quickly Zagreb can be reached.... As yet those whom they left behind them had not lost their bombast: a manifesto was issued by them which declared that five true patriots had sallied forth to Saint Anna, for the purpose of parleying with the Constituent Assembly, and that in a barbarous fashion they had been arrested, maltreated and possibly killed. Let the people avenge the shedding of such noble blood. Everything, everything must be done in order to liberate the captured brethren. And so, towards eleven at night, about sixty fascisti and legionaries came together. Armed to the teeth, they designed to cross over into Yugoslav territory, but when they noticed that the sentry posts had been strengthened they went home to bed.

A number of American and European journalists rushed out to Belgrade, under the impression that the Yugoslav-Italian War could now no longer be avoided. But they did not realize how great a self-control the Yugoslavs possess. It may be, as a commentator put it in the Nation,[69] that Italy "is practically at war with Yugoslavia," for she is obsessed by the "Pan-Slav menace"; but if they insist on the arbitrament of arms they will have to wait until the Yugoslavs have time to deal with them.... The Free State of Rieka owes its existence to a Treaty between Italy and Yugoslavia; both of them should therefore guarantee its freedom. Italian and Yugoslav gendarmerie and troops should resist together the incursions of fascisti; and if the two races cannot work in harmony, then let the administration of the town be entrusted to neutral troops; and as High Commissioner one would suggest Mr. Blakeney, the British Consul at Belgrade. If this imperturbable and most kindly man were to fail in the attempt at repeating in Rieka what has been accomplished in Danzig, then, indeed, one might despair; but he would brilliantly and placidly succeed. All the other qualifications are his; an intimate knowledge of every Near Eastern language—and, of course, Italian; a perfect acquaintance with the mentality of all those peoples; common sense of an uncommon order, and the whole-hearted confidence of those with whom he comes into contact. Great Britain and France compelled the Yugoslavs, at enormous sacrifices, to sign the Treaty of Rapallo; they are, therefore, morally obliged to see that it is executed. For too many months the Italians were saying that they would carry out their part of it and leave the third zone in Dalmatia if the Yugoslavs would agree to a few more concessions, commercial and territorial, that were not in the Treaty. During the Genoa Conference in the spring of 1922 the Italian authorities confessed to the Yugoslav delegates that their hands were bound by the fascisti. These elements would certainly object to the execution of that part of the Treaty of Rapallo which refers to the port of Baroš. Accurately speaking, the arrangements with regard to Baroš are embodied in a letter from Count Sforza, the then Foreign Secretary, and are added to the Treaty as an appendix. Both were signed on the same day, and apparently this plan of an appendix was adopted on account of the fascisti. Yet if Count Sforza had not signed that letter it is safe to say that the Yugoslavs would not have signed the main body of a Treaty which to them was the reverse of favourable. And at Genoa the Italians started haggling about a strip of land near Baroš, in the hope that some success would stay the zeal of the fascisti. Furthermore they pleaded that Zadar could not live if Yugoslavia did not, in addition to supplying it with water, give it railway communication with the interior. The Yugoslavs were thus invited to construct at great expense a railway to a foreign town which their own Šibenik and other Adriatic towns did not possess. This, naturally, they refused to undertake, as also to agree to the Italian suggestion that a free zone of some twenty kilometres should be instituted at the back of Zadar. One might safely say that the Italian agents in this region would not have confined themselves to salutary measures for the welfare of the town. It is stated in the Treaty of Rapallo that in case of disagreement either party could invoke an arbitrator, and the Yugoslavs, who happen now to be the weaker party, have been contemplating application to the League of Nations. Well, in Genoa it was proposed by Italy that Yugoslavia should renounce the clause which deals with an eventual arbitration. If you make a large number of demands—never mind that they should be in opposition to a Treaty you have signed—then you may gain a few of them—and Italy was hoping that the Free State would repay the costs which she incurred there on account of her unruly son d'Annunzio, and, likewise, that the good Italianists who at the end of the Great War committed wholesale thefts from the State warehouses should not be made to pay for it. With all their guile and strength the Italians were endeavouring to avoid the execution of her Treaty of Rapallo. "Italy is the one Power in Europe," says Mr. Harold Goad[70] who thrusts himself upon our notice, "Italy is the one Power in Europe that is most obviously and most consistently working for peace and conciliation in every field."

HOPES IN THE LITTLE ENTENTE

The complicated troubles, avoidable and unavoidable, that have been raging in Central Europe after the War are being met to some extent by the Little Entente, an association in the first place between Yugoslavia and the kindred Czecho-Slovakia, and afterwards between them and Roumania. The world was assured that this union had for its object the establishment of peace, security and normal economic activities in Central and Eastern Europe; no acquisitive purposes were in the background, and since these three States now recognized that if they try to swallow more of the late Austro-Hungarian monarchy they will suffer from chronic indigestion, we need not be suspicious of their altruism. It is perfectly true that the first impulse which moved the creators of the Little Entente was not constructive but defensive; their great Allies did not appear, in the opinion of the three Succession States, to be taking the necessary precautions against the elements of reaction. Otherwise they, especially France (which was naturally more determined that Austria should not join herself to Germany), would not have favoured the idea of a Danubian Federation, in which Austria and Hungary would play leading parts. The Great Powers would also, if they had been less exclusively concerned with their own interests, have handled with more resolution the attempts of Charles of Habsburg to place himself at the head of the present reactionary régime at Buda-Pest; and if it had not been for certain energetic measures taken by the members of the Little Entente it may well be doubted whether the Government of Admiral Horthy, which does not conceal the fact that it is royalist—the king being temporarily absent—would have required Charles to leave the country. The Little Entente pointed out to their great Allies what these had apparently overlooked, namely, that the return of the Habsburgs was not opposed by the Succession States out of pure malice but for the reason that it would inevitably strengthen the magnates and the high ecclesiastics in their desire to bring about the restoration of Hungary's old frontiers. As the frontiers are now drawn there dwell—and this could not be prevented—a number of Magyars in each of the three neighbouring States (the fewest being in Yugoslavia), just as the present Hungary includes a Czech-Slovak, Roumanian and Yugoslav population.[71] But the Great Powers agree that if this frontier is to be changed at all, every precaution should be taken against having it changed by force. It is no exaggeration to say that there can be no real peace in Central Europe until normal intercourse with Russia is re-established, but let it in the meantime be the task of the Little Entente to guard the temporary peace from being shattered.

Apart from this defensive object the countries of the Little Entente have the positive aim of a resumption of normal economic conditions and the institution of a new order of things in accordance with the new political construction of Central and Eastern Europe. It is obvious that these three States have numerous interests in common which make their co-operation very natural, if not indeed indispensable.

FOOTNOTES:

[46] April 16, 1920.