And the Rapallo Treaty of November 1920, when at last the statesmen of
Italy and Yugoslavia came to terms regarding all their frontiers! This
Treaty was received with much applause by the great majority of the
French and British Press; in this country of compromise it was pointed
out by many that as each party knew that the other had abated something
of his desires the Treaty would probably remain in operation for a long
time to come. And column after column of smug comment was written in
various newspapers by the "Diplomatic Correspondent," whose knowledge of
diplomacy may have been greater than his acquaintance with the Adriatic,
since they followed one another, like a procession of sheep, in copying
the mistake in a telegram which spoke of Eritto, the curious suburb of
Zadar, instead of Borgo Erizzo. They noted that each side had yielded
something, though it was true that the Yugoslavs had been the more
generous in surrendering half a million of their compatriots, whereas
the Italians had given up Dalmatia, to which they never had any
right.[58] "The claim for Dalmatia was entirely unjustified," said
Signor Colajanni in the Italian Chamber on November 23--yet it was not
our business to weigh the profit and loss to the two interested parties.
After all, it was they who had between themselves made this Agreement,
and one might argue that it surely would be an impertinence if anybody
else was more royalist than the king. These commentators held that it
was inexpedient for anyone to ask why the Yugoslavs should now have
accepted conditions that were, on the whole, considerably worse than
those which President Wilson, with the approval of Great Britain and
France, had laid down as a minimum, if they were to realize their
national unity. And, of course, these writers deprecated any reference
to the pressure which France and Great Britain brought to bear upon the
Yugoslavs when the negotiations at Rapallo were in danger of falling
through. If we take two Scottish newspapers, the _Scotsman_[59] was
typical of this very bland attitude; it congratulated everyone on the
harmonious close to a long, intricate and frequently dangerous
controversy. The _Glasgow Herald_,[60] on the other hand, was one of the
few newspapers which took a more than superficial view. "Monstrous," it
said, "as such intervention seems, no student of the Adriatic White
Paper--as lamentable a collection of documents as British diplomacy has
to show--can deny its possibility, nay its probability. It is precisely
the same game as was nearly successful in January 1920 and again in
April 1920, but both times was frustrated by Wilson. We are entitled to
ask, for the honour of our nation, if it has been played again; indeed
if the whole mask of direct negotiation--a British suggestion--was not
devised at San Remo with the express purpose of making the game succeed.
If it be so--and if it is not so it is imperative that we are given
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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