Page:The Bohemian Review, vol1, 1917.djvu/186

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The Bohemian Review

tral Europe, as the Germans plan it, the other drawing the boundaries as they will be after the Allies’ victory. Mr. Thomas says:

A day or two before that I had been talking with a youngish-looking, calm-eyed quiet-spoken man who wore the horizon-blue tunic of the French uniform. The end of the war was the topic, and this is what he had to say about it:

“If you want this war to be the last war, you must make it come to a perfectly definite end. Otherwise it is but a matter of time before the old questions will raise their heads and cause a new and probably a worse war.

“And the only way to reach that perfectly definite end, as President Wilson has said, is to establish the right of men of every nationality, great or small in numbers, to choose their rulers and their form of government.”

The speaker was emphatic about it, in a dispassionate way. Wings embroidered on his collar marked him as of the Aviation Service; golden bars and chevrons on his sleeves, denoted the high grade of Commandant. And the decorations on his breast—Cross of the Legion of Honor, Military Cross with Palm, Serbian Gold Medal and Cross of St. Vladimir with swords—showed that he had rendered particularly distinguished service on more than one front.

He seemed a good deal of a personage as he said it, this aviator-commandant, who before the war was Dr. Milan Štefanik of Paris, distinguished in quite another field, recognized as a leader among the younger astronomers of the world and crowned as a “laureate” by the French Academy for his work in science.

“And,” he added, “it will be stopped. The Polish people, the Bohemians, Slovaks, the Serbians and Roumanians will not be laid down as pawns on a peace-council chessboard. Neither justice nor common sense will permit any such farce.”

About the reconstruction of Central Europe Štefanik has this to say:

“To my mind the future of the whole world depends in no small degree on the peace dispositions which shall be made of the nations of Eastern Europe and the Balkans. Look at these two maps which I give you. One shows the Pan-German scheme—a Teutonic, imperialistic wedge driven straight through the center of the continent, cutting it into three sharply separated sections, providing a purely German trade route from the North Sea to the Persian Gulf, and constantly suggesting and favoring further encroachments on the non-Teutonic neighbors to the east and west. The other shows the anti-German scheme—a solution which would end Pan-Germanism once for all, and at the same time satisfy the historic rights and present-day desires of the smaller nations. A unified, organized and liberated Poland, a restored Bohemia or Czecho-Slovak State, another state erected out of the Serbs and other Jugoslavs who live there, the annexation of the Roumanians and Italians of Austria-Hungary to their ethnographic wholes—think what that would mean.

“It would mean the end of the Balkan question. It would mean a Germany, a Bulgaria and a Magyar state quite free to be as German, as Magyar, as Bulgarian as they chose within their natural and ethical boundaries. It would mean an Austria reduced to its proper dimensions as a Grand Duchy. It would mean, by a railway link from Trieste through Pressburg and Bohemia to Petrograd, free and unobstructed intercourse between the eastern and western non-Germans. It would build a permanent anti-German barrier across Europe, outside which small states could develop safely and freely.

“To my mind, those two maps show the only two possible solutions of the war. There can be no effective compromise between them. These are the days when the rest of the world must decide whether it can safely tolerate Pan-Germanism any longer. If it cannot, there is but one way to end it. That is by the carrying out of the project I have outlined to you, the project for which we Czecho-Slovaks have done and will continue to do our utmost. Fortunate it is that the project is not only impeccably logical and historically just, but that it also corresponds with the moral principles proclaimed by the Allies for which millions of men have already fallen—principles never put more tersely and clearly than by your own President. Shall this world be a safe place for democracy? Has a small nation as much rights as a large one to live a national life? This war must settle those two questions. And the place where it must settle them is in Central Europe.”


STATEMENT OF THE OWNERSHIP, MANAGEMENT, CIRCULATION, ETC., REQUIRED BY THE ACT OF CONGRESS OF AUGUST 24TH, 1912.

Of The Bohemian Review, published monthly at Chicago. Ill., for October 1, 1917.

State of Illinois, County of Cook, ss.

Before me, a notary public in and for the State and county aforesaid, personally appeared J. F. Smetanka, who, having been duly sworn according to law, deposes and says that he is the editor of the Bohemian Review, and that the following is, to the best of his knowledge and belief, a true statement of the ownership, management (and if a daily paper, the circulation), etc., of the aforesaid publication for the date shown in the above caption, required by the Act of August 24, 1912, embodied in section 443, Postal Laws and Regulations, printed on the reverse of this form, to-wit:

1. That the names and addresses of the publisher, editor, managing editor and business managers are: Publisher, The Bohemian Review Company, 2627 S. Ridgeway avenue, Chicago; editor, J. F. Smetanka, 2824 S. Central Park avenue, Chicago; managing editor, none; business manager, J. J. Fekl, 2627 S. Ridgeway avenue, Chicago.

2. That the owners are: (Give names and addresses of individual owners, or, if a corporation, give its name and the names and addresses of stockholders owning or holding or holding 1 per cent or more of the total amount of stock.): J. F. Smetanka, J. J. Fekl, Joseph Tvrzicky.

3. That the known bondholders, mortgagees, and other security holders owning or holding 1 per cent or more of the total amount of bonds, mortgages, or other securities are: (If there are none, so state.) None.

4. That the two paragraphs next above, giving the names of the owners, stockholders, and security holders, if any, contain not only the list of stockholders and security holders as they appear upon the books of the company but also, in cases where the stockholder or secuprity holder appears upon the books of the company as trustee or in any other fiduciary relation, the name of the person or corporation for whom such trustee is acting, is given; also that the said two paragraphs contain statements embracing affiant’s full knowledge and belief as to the circumstances and conditions under which stock holders and security holders who do not appea rupon the books of the company as trustees, hold Btock and securities in a capacity other than that of a bona fide owner; and this affiant has no reason to believe that any other person, association, or corporation has any interest direct or indirect in the said stock, bonds, or other securities than as so stated by him.

J. F . SMETANKA, Editor.

Joseph J. Langer, Notary Public.Sworn to and subscribed before me this 20th day of September, 1917.

My commision expires May 3d, 1921.(Seal)