FEB 211919

ITALY'S VICTORY-AND OURS

The armies of General Diaz on the Italian front have not merely checked the Austrian offensive; they have turned it into what may perhaps become an Italian offensive. In the successive reports from day to day we heard first of the enormous extent in importance of the Austrian offensive; then of the relatively slight gains made by Austria compared with what might be expected in such an attack; then that the enemy's advance was positively withstood and held; and, finally, that the Austrians had at many points turned back in retreat, and that something like an Austrian rout was in progress.

The whole story gives cheering and positive evidence of the restoration of morale and efficiency in the Italian army since the disaster of last year. By the end of the first week of the Austrian effort to crush Italy the Italian Prime Minister, Signor Orlando, was able to announce that a real Italian victory had been gained. On June 24 the Italian War Office announced the capture of forty-five thousand prisoners and of enormous quantities of munitions, provisions, and guns, ranging from the largest field cannon to hundreds of machine guns. It also reported that many thousands of Austrian soldiers were retreating in a most disorderly way, throwing away their arms and running for their lives. A statement most welcome to Americans was added, to the effect that American airmen are doing good service with their Italian and British comrades in the prolonged battle.

In an order of the day General Diaz declared: "The enemy who with furious impetuosity used all means to penetrate our territory has been repulsed at all points. His losses are very heavy. His pride is broken. Glory to all commands, all soldiers, all sailors!" And Luigi Barzini, the correspondent of the "Corriere della Sera," concludes his report by saying:

As the Italians realized that on the Marne, the Oise, and the Aisne the destinies of Italy also were in the balance, so the Allies ought to realize to-day what Italian heroism has achieved for the whole Entente cause and ought to honor the Piave as a sanctified stream in the struggle for the liberation of the world. That America was honored by having some participation in this victory of Italy will be a cause for pride in future years. The most decisive gains of the Italians were precisely where the Austrians had at the beginning made the farthest advance, namely, on the lower stretches of the Piave. Here, in the first days of the drive, nearly 100,000 Austrians crossed the river on improvised bridges. But their position on the western bank was from the start exposed to Italian artillery fire, and later their retreat was largely blocked by the destruction of their bridges, either by Italian gunners or by the sudden swelling of the flood of the Piave River. Thousands were cut off and perished on the western bank. Farther north, at Montello, on the right bank of the Piave, a point between the Asiago Plateau and the line along the lower Piave, a tremendous struggle was carried on between the opposing forces. When, on June 24, it was announced that the Montello position had been evacuated by the Austrians, proof of complete defeat was established.

THE EFFECT OF ITALY'S VICTORY ON
AUSTRIA AND HER GERMAN MASTERS

Austrian defeat is certain to be injurious from the internal point of view as well as from the military standpoint. A Vienna paper says: "The manometer is at 99, and the Government must take this fact into consideration "-a cryptical way of indi ating that the political and industrial situation is one of such high pressure that the bursting point is nearly reached. Both before and after the failure of the Austrian armies there have

come repeated reports of political agitation, industrial riots, and desperate food conditions. At Vienna and Budapest demonstrations of protest have been followed by conflicts between the police and the rioters. In Budapest, for instance, on June 22, nine strikers were killed and thirty-six others wounded. In Vienna the crowd shouted "Down with Germany!" and "The Germans want to starve us!" This food outery is all the more violent because of Germany's cold-blooded declination to help Austria in her extremity.

Austria will now undoubtedly call upon Germany for military support, and it is at least doubtful whether Germany is in a position to give that support without weakening her western offensives. Such a flat failure as the German attack on Rheims (June 18) is significant; it was called a feint in German despatches, but no corresponding serious attack followed. Mr. Lloyd George intimated in a speech last week that a new German offensive was then on the point of being launched on the western front and that the comparative quiet of the last week or two on that front meant simply preparation for the new effort. Probably Austria will have to wait until this new drive has been pushed to the utmost before she can hope for military assistance from Germany, and, if it fails, the general position of the Central Powers will be weaker than for a long time.

Three months have now elapsed since the great German assault on the Allies began; nearly half the season most favorable for fighting is over and the Allies still hold firm, while America is constantly and rapidly increasing its forces in Europe.

AMERICA TO THE FRONT

The announcement by General March, Chief of the General Staff of the Army, made on June 22, that nine hundred thousand American troops had been sent overseas up to that date is an evidence of fine and quick work in transportation and organization. The English Prime Minister, Mr. Lloyd George, in the address to which we have already referred, said: "It is an amazing piece of organization which has enabled the bringing of such vast numbers of first-rate American troops to France.

Since General March a week before this announcement said that eight hundred thousand troops had been sent overseas, and since Secretary Baker a week before that said that seven hundred thousand had been sent, the recent rate of troop movement has obviously been about one hundred thousand a weekan immense increase over anything previous, and the more extraordinary because of the distance, the enormous task of providing for the troops, and the limitations of shipping.

Another interesting announcement by General March was the naming of three American divisions which have done the most notable fighting in France. These are: the First (Regular Army) Division, under Major-General Bullard; the Fortysecond Division (Rainbow Division), under General Menoher; and the Twenty-sixth Division (the New England Division), under Major-General Edwards. In this connection General March praised most cordially the work done by Americans at Cantigny and near Château Thierry.

It is also now positively known that American soldiers are holding the fighting line for a distance of thirty-eight miles on the western front and that "all-American" forces hold six different sections of the line, apart from the American units which are brigaded with British and French units.

Recent news of American war energies tells of a raid across the Marne in which American patrols took prisoners and drove

back the German patrols encountered, and of important work in Belleau Wood, which is now entirely occupied by Americans, who have cleared the Germans out altogether from this strategically valuable point on the Marne front northwest of Château Thierry.

The shipping situation, as well as the military situation, is encouraging. It was announced last week that on July 4 no fewer than eighty-nine ships would be launched from shipyards under control of the Emergency Fleet Corporation. Their total tonnage will be 439,886 dead-weight tons. Thirty-seven of these ships are of steel. From the Hog Island plant comes the news that fifty shipways will soon be completed-twenty-two are now finished-and that the first launching from this yard will take place on July 4.

"Force, force to the utmost, force without stint or limit." These men and these ships are translating these words of the President into deeds. It is leadership of action that the people of America crave and are now finding in President Wilson. And the more they have of it, the more will their enthusiasm and their confidence grow.

OUR CZECHOSLOVAK ALLIES

News as welcome as it is extraordinary has lately come over the cable as to the progress of the Czechoslovak army which is making its way through Russia to Vladivostok with the announced purpose of taking ship from Siberia and joining the French, British, Italian, and American armies on the western front. It is said that already nearly twenty thousand of these haters of German rule have already reached Vladivostok and that about the same number are now advancing eastward on the line of the Trans-Siberian Railway, cutting off as they go rail and wire communications between eastern Siberia and western Russia. These facts, oddly enough, are stated in a despatch from Moscow.

Other accounts state that these forces, or some of them, fought German troops in the region east of Kiev and defeated them; that the Czechs then obtained permission from the Bolshevik leaders to march to Vladivostok; and that recently, at Irkutsk, one section of the traveling army was set upon by an immensely stronger force of Bolshevik Red Guard, but resisted them fiercely and in the end gained their point of being allowed to proceed eastward.

It is evident that both at Kiev and at Irkutsk this antiGerman military movement has had sympathy from Russian peasants, and there are indications of peasant revolts on a large scale because of Germany's levies of forced contributions of grain.

The question is at once suggested whether, assuming these reports to be substantially credited, this little army might not serve the Allies better if it is persuaded to halt not very far from the eastern coast of Siberia, and there help form a nucleus of an Allied army which, with Japan in the lead, may help make a new eastern front against Germany. There are other sources (besides the troops of the Allies already at Vladivostok or in the ships lying there) which need only a place of gathering and a source of supplies to roll up an army the very presence of which, moving forward along the Siberian Railway, would cause Germany to think twice before leaving its eastern predatory gains unguarded.

The hatred of the Slavs for the Central Powers is indicated in many ways. We have all read with great pleasure and pride of the recent appearance of the Polish Legion raised in this country, largely under the inspiration of Paderewski's efforts, and now on the fighting line on the western front. And now these Polish soldiers have been recognized in France as the army of the Polish nation, and hereafter are to fight under the flag of the Polish White Eagle. The Slavic Legion idea is capable of immense expansion in this country. It has been estimated that possibly half a million Slavs who hate Germany and Austria can be recruited here for what has been called a semi-autonomous army. To be sure, such volunteers may be executed if captured by the enemy. It is an indication of the spirit and feeling of the Czechs and other Slavs who thus enlist that they know that they are incurring the double danger of death on the firing line and death as the revolting subjects of

the nations which have oppressed and abused them, and that they assume this double danger freely and even joyously. No wonder that Senator Lewis, of Illinois, said recently in the Senate: "The United States must invite the Slovak-Czechs, Poles, and other people of Russia who seek nationality to fight for freedom. The United States must aid these people to join in an army and protect Siberia and central Russia from being absorbed by Germany."

THE BULGARIAN CABINET

There is a new Bulgarian Cabinet. To most people this may not seem of any great importance. But we think it is. The retiring Prime Minister, Vassali Radoslavoff, was not, like many of his countrymen, a graduate of the American Robert College, at Constantinople. Vassali Radoslavoff was educated at the University of Heidelberg. This may explain his pro-Germanism. Had he been trained at Robert College, the American ideals derived there might not have been easily sup planted by Pan-German ideals.

Ferdinand I, the wily Bulgarian King, found in his Premier a clever instrument. During the early period of the war the two were able to blind the diplomats of the Entente Allies at Sofia as to Bulgaria's real intentions. Mr. Einstein's recently published volume shows how even so well trained an observer as himself at near-by Constantinople was up to the last moment in the dark as to what Bulgaria might do.

The five years' Ministry of Radoslavoff comprises an important period in Balkan history. In it Bulgaria fought and lost the second Balkan War, and finally obtained revenge for the 100,000 men, $300,000,000 in money, and great stretches of territory which that war is said to have cost her. In addition, there are now the Bulgarian demands for territory not yet occupied by her-not only all of the Morava Valley, in northwestern Serbia, but all of Serbian Macedonia, the Greek territories along the Egean in what was formerly Macedonia, and the Rumanian Dobrudja on the Black Sea.

The Dobrudja-there's the rub. Bulgaria wanted it all. Instead Germany and Austria ceded only the southern part to her. The northern part was intrusted to a condominium of the four Central Powers, each controlling territory proportionate to the number of its troops engaged in the Rumanian war. Hence Germany received forty per cent, Bulgaria thirty-five per cent, Austria-Hungary eighteen per cent, and Turkey seven per cent. This curious arrangement, it was believed, was only a makeshift, the ultimate reason being that Germany would herself alone ultimately control northern Dobrudja, with its valuable railway line from the Rumanian port of Constanza into the interior, and, above all, the Danube.

Against Bulgaria's agreement to this plan there was protest among the Bulgars. Not only was Radoslavoff too much under German control, they charged, he was also too weak in exploiting the obvious strength of Bulgaria's position.

The leader of this opposition was Alexander Malinoff, the head of the Bulgarian Democratic party. The opposition became strong enough to compel Radoslavoff's resignation and to force the King's hand. That monarch, therefore, asked Malinoff to become Premier, and there is now a new Bulgarian Cabinet with him at its head.

Germany is alarmed. The Pan-German Berlin “Kreuz Zeitung" says: "We will not conceal the fact that the change in the Bulgarian Ministry is regrettable for Germany." Doubtless the "Kreuz" remembers that Malinoff was a supporter of Russia, and particularly that in September, 1915, he was one of the Committee which protested against the policy of attacking Serbia and throwing Bulgaria into Germany's arms; moreover, that in October, 1915, shortly before Bulgaria entered the war, he was chosen spokesman of all the opposition parties to meet with the Ministers of the Entente Powers in the hope that war might be averted.

Another reason for Bulgaria's discontent is the food situation. This, it is said, also led to the defection of a large section of the former Premier's supporters and to such popular anger with him that he was horsewhipped in the streets of Sofia.

The combination of self-respect and hunger may yet serve to show Bulgaria what it has cost her to be an ally of the Hun.

DIPLOMATIC RELATIONS

Upon the present exigency affecting the American and Turkish Governments we comment on another page. The exigency also calls attention to the fact that diplomatic relations between the two Governments have been suspended since April 20, 1917, when Turkey withdrew her Charge, who had been at he head of the Turkish Embassy in Washington following the Ambassador's compulsory retirement. After criticising the American Administration in a way which, to put it mildly, was not in accordance with diplomatic usage, the Ambassador went omé on leave," and, as our Government intimated that his eturn would not be agreeable, he did not return.

66

During the absence of an Ambassador the counselor or secretary of an Embassy becomes Chargé d'Affaires. The mere withdrawal of an Ambassador does not sever diplomatic relations. When, in 1915, we requested the retirement of Dr. Dumba, the Austrian Ambassador, Austria made her counselor of the Emassy Chargé d'Affaires, and, in a strenuous effort to make it appear that there were no "hard feelings," finally sent another Ambassador. The cause of the severance of relations came later when we declared war on Germany. We informed the Austrian, Bulgarian, and Turkish Governments, allies of the German Government, of that fact. In consequence we would not receive the new Austrian Ambassador who had just arrived. Bulgaria already had a Minister here who had been duly received, and she made no change in her diplomatic relations. But Turkey took advantage of the opportunity to "slap back" in return for our compulsory retirement of her Ambassador by replying that, since we were making war upon one of her allies, she could not continue diplomatic relations with us. Thereupon she withdrew her Chargé. It was not his withdrawal, but the Turkish Government's reply that it could not continue diplomatic relations, which severed those relations.

In general, the withdrawal of all diplomatic representatives constitutes a severance of diplomatic relations. But not always. It depends upon circumstances. For instance, a government might, for reasons of its own, withdraw all its diplomatic representatives and yet continue relations by placing a consular official temporarily in charge.

MEDICAL MEN IN WAR TIME

Like all other great gatherings in these days, the sixtyninth annual session of the American Medical Association held in Chicago last month was dominated by the thought of the war. There is a special reason for this in the case of the National organization of physicians and surgeons because the medical profession has served the Nation so greatly in this time of need. Surgeon-General Gorgas of the Army expressed the belief that the medical profession has made greater sacrifices than any other branch of the community." We, as a profession, are so accustomed to altruism from the time that we are born," he said, “that we little appreciate ourselves the altruism the rank and file have shown in coming into the Army in this war. The doctor, from the time he first commences the practice of medicine, is accustomed without thought to give a larger portion of his time for nothing than men in any other calling." General Gorgas attributed this fact to the doctor's education, for from the time he goes into the profession he is taught that this must be done. It is not altogether surprising, then, that whereas a year ago the medical profession had about seven hundred men in the Army, it has now about twenty thousand commissioned medical officers. The Surgeon-General of the Army paid special tribute to those " young men with practices of two thousand or three thousand dollars a year, with one or two children, with mortgages on their homes, who drop all these things, knowing that when they come back they will have to commence all over again."

Much has been heard about the Army in the war; much less about the Navy. This is particularly true with respect to the health conditions of the two services. One of the speakers at the Convention at Chicago was Admiral Braisted, SurgeonGeneral of the Navy. There was about his address the flavor of independence and confidence that the sailorman seems to find in the salt air of the sea. "Remember this," said the Admiral; "the Navy has always been ready, the Navy always will be

ready, no matter what may happen in this struggle that is going on. We are ready, we are brave, we are strong, and we are resourceful." As to health conditions in the Navy, he reminded his hearers of the special need of careful sanitation on shipboard, and asked them if they had ever thought what would happen if contagious disease attacking the fleet got beyond control. And he gave them these facts, that ought to be reassuring to all who have friends or relatives in the naval service : So far as the health of the personnel of the Navy is concerned, of nearly half a million men, it is running about as it does in peace times. At the end of the first week of June our casualties, deaths, for all diseases in the Navy was only 2.8 per cent, a very excellent showing for the whole length of the war. From casualties due to disease in every quarter of the globe, casualties due to accidents, casualties due to military activities, etc., we have lost out of half a million men which we have now about four men a day on an average. When I first figured that up, it seemed to me that it must be impossible that the mortality should have been so small as that. Of course the conditions that exist in the Naval service are far better than you find them in civil conditions in every way. Nowhere can you find sanitation that compares with that we have in the Navy.

It is characteristic of war times that the new President of the Association, elected to succeed Dr. Arthur Dean Bevan, is a physician in uniform-Major Alexander Lambert. About a month after the United States entered the war he went to France and served as chief medical adviser of all American Red Cross activities in France and Belgium, and soon after the close of the Convention was en route again to France to resume his duties. He is among the best known of New York physicians, is a graduate of Yale and of the College of Physicians and Surgeons in New York City, and has rendered public service as attending physician to Bellevue and other New York hospitals, as former Assistant Bacteriologist in the New York Health Department, and as Professor of Clinical Medicine in Cornell University Medical College. Major Lambert's portrait, together with that of Admiral Braisted, is in our picture section. "America," Major Lambert said in his address before the Convention," perhaps distinguished herself, when suddenly called to war, by going into the war Red Cross hand first." He said that he had been asked of one's feelings while under fire, and he answered by telling this anecdote of one of the engineers at Cambrai: "After a battle, an English officer, who complimented him [the engineer] on the efficient work he had done, asked him if he had ever been under fire before, and he replied, 'No, sir.' 'What do you think of it?' said the officer. He replied, I didn't mind it much, but I noticed it took my mind off my work."""That, I think," added Major Lambert, "is the best description of a soldier's feelings under fire."

We may add that the medical profession has been under the fire of this war since it began; but its mind, so far from being off its work, is more keenly applied to it than ever.

THE COLLEGES STRIPPED FOR WAR

Alumni returning for their college reunions this year have. found their respective colleges in stern mood. They have found them, too, but scantily supplied with undergraduates. At Princeton only fifty-two members of the graduating class were present to receive their diplomas in person. At Yale degrees were conferred on three hundred and twelve candidates, whereas two years ago there were nine hundred degrees awarded. At Harvard, out of a senior class that numbered seven hundred and twenty-five in its freshman year, the members who were present at Commencement numbered only ninety-eight. To those undergraduates who have left their courses uncompleted in order to join the fighting forces of the Nation, Princeton and Harvard and other colleges have presented certificates which recognize not only these students' scholarship but also their patriotism. The colleges are discovering the truth of the saying that he that loseth his life shall find it, and are learning, too, that that truth is applicable not only to individuals but also to institutions. They have been fitting men for life, and now that life calls to these young men to put their training at the service of the Nation, and perhaps compact a lifetime into a moment, these men are proving their fitness.

And the colleges as never before are identifying themselves

with the Republic. It is not by chance that as Princeton, Yale, and Harvard held their Commencement exercises successively, they successively bestowed an honorary degree on the British Ambassador, Lord Reading. Symbolic of this union of the college with the Nation was the review of radio men which followed the Commencement exercises at Harvard. After the speeches had been made, most of those assembled walked across from the Yard to an open space near the gymnasium, and there watched company after company of young men in white naval uniform march past the reviewing officers, who included a visitor from France and one from England. These young men, coming from all over the country, some of them with hardly more than grammar school education, have found here in this great University a naval station of their country. They have almost taken possession of the University.

As the "Harvard Alumni Bulletin " puts it: "The same cause which has taken these students [the undergraduates who have left college for military and naval service] away, the cause of the war, has poured a multitude of enlisted men in the Navy into the Harvard buildings and grounds." These enlisted men number about four thousand five hundred, which is almost exactly the number of the total enrollment of the University. And these radio students, gathered for a brief period of study of the practice of wireless telegraphy, have been received and welcomed and made to feel as much as possible that they are entitled to all that Harvard can give them; and their response to their environment has been an irrefutable proof of the fine quality of the average young American. The presence of these radio students at Harvard is but one sign of the part that the American universities and colleges are playing in the service of the Nation.

PREPARING FOR ELECTIONS

Whether we like it or not, we Americans will have to pay attention this year to political affairs. We cannot, as England can, forego the excitement and distraction of political contests in order to put our whole mind and energy upon the war. And yet it is safe to say that there never was less interest in party politics than there is just now. Only a few years ago the whole country was in a turmoil over the question of a Presidential third term. This year the third-term bogey appears and frightens nobody. Former Governor of Indiana Samuel L. Ralston, on the occasion of the Democratic State Convention, called for the "renomination and election in 1920 of Woodrow Wilson." There have been many overturns in political opinion; but none is more amusing than this suggestion of a third elec toral term from a spokesman of a party that once writhed in pain at the thought of a third term for a political opponent, even though it was not the third full term. We welcome this overturn. That old tradition had nothing in it of special advantage to us Americans these days. The people of America ought to keep themselves free to elect as President any constitutionally eligible man, and it is foolish for them to worship a tradition which prevents them from electing a man just because he is experienced. This, however, is no time to begin a Presidential canvass for 1920.

What we have immediately before us is the election of a Congress to carry on the war, and possibly even, if victory comes in the meanwhile, to organize victory and make it secure for years to come. It is a big task. In these days there is no man too great to serve in Congress.

Less important in some respects are the forthcoming State elections. One of the most significant forerunners of these was the primary vote in Minnesota. There the contest was in the Republican primaries between the so-called National Non-Partisan League, which has been working through the Republican organization in the Northwest, and the rest of the party. As many of our readers may remember, this League arose in the Northwest as a protest and crusade of farmers. There has long been in America, as elsewhere, a movement toward the cities, with consequent emphasis on the economic rights of the so-called industrial classes. There has been a consequent, in many respects justifiable, unrest in farming communities. This has appeared in the formation of several successive organizations. The latest of these is the Non-Partisan League. The difficulty

with the League is that it has been in spirit divisive, and the part of some of its leaders seditious. Some of the organiz of the League have been sent to jail. It looks as if an organiz tion that might have served to unite the people in regions whe union is difficult had fallen into bad hands and had develo an un-American class consciousness and an un-American attim toward the war. At any rate, this is the impression the Partisan League has created in many communities, and it badly defeated in the Minnesota primaries, where Charles Lindbergh, former Representative in Congress, was overcom the present Governor, J. A. A. Burnquist, as the Republ candidate for Governor.

If the League is to serve a useful purpose in this country will have to dissociate itself from some of the influences have made it distrusted by people who, while liberal-mind have no sympathy with anything that smacks of Bolshevism

ONE RAILWAY SYSTEM IN PLACE OF FIFTY

The administration of the country's railways by the G ernment is still in a formative state. Uncle Sam went into t railway business in a hurry. Overnight, so to speak, he fo himself general manager of scores of railways and faced complex maze of problems-financial, industrial, economic, even social. It is too early to take stock of the results in a la way, yet already it appears that unity in control has its ad tages. Efficiency and economy of operation are naturally por sible when it practically makes no difference whether troops passengers or goods go by one route or another, travel in e company's cars or another, or are drawn by engines owned this company or that company (or, as in some cases, by U Sam personally)—no difference, that is, so long as the work done in the best way, the quickest way, and the cheapest wa Two documents just published furnish, the one a declarati of principles, the other a record of accomplishment.

In leaving his work for a short rest-and certainly no soldof industry and finance ever more deserved a rest-Secreta McAdoo, as Director-General of Railways, made an adm able declaration of the purposes which should be borne mind in all the work of administration. These are, says K McAdoo :

First, the winning of the war, which includes the promp movement of the men and material that the Government requires To this everything else must be subordinated.

Second, the service of the public, which is the purpose for which the railways were built and given the privileges accorded them. This implies the maintenance and improvement of the railroad properties so that adequate transportation facilities wi be provided at the lowest cost, the object of the Governmen being to furnish service rather than to make money.

Third, the promotion of a spirit of sympathy and a bette understanding as between the administration of the railways an their two million employees, as well as their one hundred millio patrons, which latter class includes every individual in the Nation since transportation has become a prime and universal necessity of civilized existence.

Fourth, the application of sound economies.

Taking up under the last head the things requisite to car out its intent, the following simple but fundamental classit tion is made:

(a) The elimination of superfluous expenditures.

(b) The payment of a fair and living wage for the service rendered, and a just and prompt compensation for injuries received.

(e) The purchase of material and equipment at the lowes prices consistent with a reasonable but not an excessive profi to the producer.

(d) The adoption of standardized equipment and the introduc tion of approved devices that will save life and labor.

(e) The routing of freight and passenger traffic with da regard to the fact that a straight line is the shortest distance between two points.

(f) The intensive employment of all equipment and a carefu record and scientific study of the results obtained with a view t determining the comparative efficiency secured.

The Director-General recognizes the vastness of his task. hopes that some progress has been made toward the goal. T he is justified is shown by the second of the documents to w