15
union of parts of the Old World to be exploited by Germany under the guise of Kultur. And President Wilson, explaining the American principles, is not only the ordinary president elected every fourth year—to him, as the expert in political science and history, fell the great historical task of formulating the principles of the policy of the new world, by which not merely the old Eastern question, but all political problems will be solved. It is no longer the question how to organise the Old World—it is now the question of organising the Old and the New World, all mankind.
5. The German “Drang nach Osten” and the Zone of Small Nations.
12. From the political and ethnographical point of view, Europe is organised in a peculiar manner. For a better understanding of Europe and for a true comprehension of this war, it is extremely important to realise the significance of the peculiar zone of less great and small nations, occupying the territory between the East and the West, more particularly between the Germans and the Russians. From the North, starting with Lapland, down to Greece, there is a connected series of smaller and small nations: the Laplanders, Finns, Swedes, Norwegians, Poles, Czechs with the Slovaks, Magyars, Jugoslavs (Serbo-Croats and Slovenes), Roumanians, Albanians, Bulgars, Turks, Greeks. (The number will be still greater, if one counts as separate nations, such peoples as the Ukrainians, etc.)
West of this zone are the greater nations (Germans, French, Italians, English, Spaniards); the small nations are few (Dutch, Portuguese) but there are a few fragments and remnants of nations formerly larger—the Basques, Bretons, Scotch, Welsh, Irish, Icelanders. In the East (in Russia) there are in addition to the above-mentioned nations inhabiting Western Russia, numerous small nations in the Caucasus and at the Eastern frontiers; the centre of Russia is peopled by only one nation, and that the largest one.
The push of the Germans towards the East and South is aimed at this zone of small nations. Prussia has occupied parts of it, and the Prussians themselves were originally a non-German people of this zone; Austria-Hungary is composed of eight nations of this zone. The majority of the wars of the last few centuries took place in this area, or at least had their origin here; this zone, into which the Germans were pushing from the West and the Russians and Turks from the East, was and still is the area of political danger—danger for the peace of Europe.
The push of the Germans toward the West has been much weaker. The nations situated west of the Germans were protected by their numbers, geographical location and culture. France, up to about 1845, was more populous than Germany and in general was politically stronger; the Italians, too, withstood the Germans, England was too far from the seats of the Germans, and the way led across other nations; Spain and the present Belgium were connected with Austria only temporarily.
A glance of the ethnographical map of Europe shows this situation: the ethnographical boundaries between the Germans, French, and Italians are straight and sharply cut, whereas in the East the ethnographical boundaries are not straight at all but intermixed; the German push toward the East being marked by the many German colonies actually advanced like forts.
The Western part of Europe is different from the Eastern not merely ethnographically, but also politically. In the West are found greater nations and also greater states (the only small nations are Holland, Belgium, Portugal); in the East are smaller states formed of parts of small nations (Roumania, Serbia, Montenegro, Bulgaria, Greece), and Austria-Hungary and Turkey which were composed of many small nations and states formerly independent. Russia contains a large number of small nations and formerly independent states, but as in contrast to Austria-Hungary and Turkey, it contains a great numerical superiority of the so-called ruling nation.
