IL DUCE IN TYROL

From time immemorial, power has had more force in the evolution of kingdoms Dand governments than ideals and justice. Historians inevitably arrive at this conclusion after weighing every element in the balance, and after attaining a universal perspective of the situation. However, a careful investigation of the trend of history is hardly necessary, for during the past week, a significant illustration of the force of power has arisen. Premier Mussolini, in attacking the "intolerable interference" of Austria in the Upper Adige, or Italian Tyrol, is voicing the assurance of a nation which feels capable of enforcing its own policy and protecting its own boundaries and at the same time is on the point of sacrificing the principles of justice for those of force.

On January 8, 1918, the late President Wilson gave his Fourteen Points to the World. One of them stipulated that all people speaking the same language should be concentrated under the role of one state. Theoretically the ideal expressed is beautiful, but immediately the Italians appropriated German-speaking Tyrol; France took German-speaking Alsace; and the German-speaking Czechs were ignored. As always the rights of the minority were neglected and the few were not consulted.

Regarding the Tyrol the people have always spoken Italian, but between Botzen and Brenner to the north lies the German-speaking populace at the present moment in the Fascist vise. German stock, German feelings, German traditions are indigenous.

Mussolini has tried by brute force to Italianize these people by suppressing the local newspapers and forbidding the teaching of German in the schools. He has forced Austrian families to change their surnames, if there was any Italian blood in the stock. He has done these things in spite of the fact that in 1922 he and the King of Italy insured the people of Tyrol that they might live unoppressed. His actions prove the extent to which Wilson's ideals have been adapted by nations only in so far as they coincided with the individual country's advantage. When the Austrian foreign minister was recently forced by local politicians to interfere with the tyrannical regime of Mussolini in Tyrol, the result was 11 Duce's biting speech in which he said that he was through with "words" and was ready to force the issue with "deeds."

The entire argument reduces itself to the question of why Mussolini wants this country. Why does he place the power of a modern Roman Empire variety before the ideals of a League of Nations." It seems plain that he laughs at the League because he feels secure of the united Italy behind him. If he is dreaming of building up a second Roman Empire, starting with Tyrol, he might well continue with Corsica and Savoy. He justifies his annexations of Tyrol by saying that the Brenner Pass is the natural boundary between Italy and Austria and the logical place to separate the countries, but he forgets that natural boundaries mean nothing at the present time with modern methods of warfare. Blindness and ambition alone are capable of overlooking ideals, the advocacy of which in 1918 was an appeal to the justice and unselfishness of the nations of the world at large.