Welsh Journals

THE WELSH OUTLOOK The Editor does not necessarily identify himself with the opinions of contributors to the Welsh Outlook" Editorial responsibility is limited to the dews expressed in the Notes of the Month," and in the unsigned article immediately following. NOTES OF THE MONTH The Irish Situation. We readily and willingly accept Mr. Austen Chamberlain's admonition to the implacable section of his poli- tical flock, that they should, at any rate, learn the true facts before beginning to curse. Our wish is to bless, but the advice given to the post applies no less to the gate. Nevertheless we cannot do less than express our admiration of, and our sympathy with, Mr. Lloyd George's firm stand in the attempt to reconcile the extreme, but brutally logical, demands of a sublimated Irish nationalism, with the more rough-and-ready compromises of an Imperial philosophy.. In such a difficulty and at such a crisis, the attitude of the Orangemen exactly confirms what we have always said about that extremely unattractive, but very formidable, district of North East Ulster. If words or phrases have any meaning, their demand is that England shall wage a war which will make it a leprous State among the peoples of the earth, so that they may be secured in a domination over a ruined and devastated Ireland. They have been offered a more effective provincial autonomy than was ever offered to Ireland as a whole until the present moment, but apparently Protestant Ulster has at last become synonymous with capitalist Belfast* and Fermanagh and Tyrone must be kept under the yoke as a safe- guard against possible Labour and Socialist develop- ments within the capitalist citadel. Wou d it not be wiser to depend upon the good sense and feeling ot the Irish peasantry, whose catholicism is in itself a guarantee against the possible domination of the Bolshevist ogre? The greatest of living Irishmen, some years ago, in a very memorable letter wrote these words: For let the truth be known, the mass of Irish Unionists are much more in love with Ireland than with England. They think Irish Nationalists are mistaken, and they fight with them and use hard words, and all the time they believe Inshmen of any party are better in the sight of God than Englishmen. DECEMBER, 1921. They think Ireland is the best country in the world to live in, and they hate to hear Irish people spoken of as murderers and greedy scoundrels." As Welsh nationalists, we understand these words and their accent, and believing them to be true we remain opti- mists in regard to the Irish situation. At any rate, we believe that it will take more than the foaming rage of the reactionary Die-hards of Islington and Liverpool to break up the negotiations, which were initiated by a Welshman's courage, and have been maintained by his tact and diplomacy. The League of Nations. Friends of the League of Nations must not be deaf to criticisms made againjst it or against its members by honest and candid friends. Lord Phillimore, a great international lawyer and a Liberal, raised in the House of Lords the other day the question how far the little Entente powers, Czecho Slovakia, Jugo Slavia, and Roumania, were justified in threatening Hungary with war in case she restored the Ex-King Karl. Obviously it was the duty of the little Entente to have laid the matter before the League. The history of the Hapsburgs has been such that Europe might have a just objection to their restoration!, but the matter was one which ought to have been dealt with by the Treaty of Trianon, and as it was not dealt with then, it should have been settled by the League of Nations. For the Greater or the Little Entente to arbitrarily veto the right of Hungary to self-determination is mere lawlessness. Far more serious still is the action of the French in assigning a part of Cilicia, which they held as man- datories to the Angora Turks. This territory they held as mandatories, and they had no right to surrender it to any power without the sanction of the League. We should hold their conduct most blameworthy even if no evil consequence were to be feared. The fact, however, is that the action of the French has exposed the Armenians, Greeks, and Christians in the districts