Papers Relating to the Foreign Relations of the United States, The Paris Peace Conference, 1919, Volume I

Inquiry Document No. 889

Report on the Inquiry: Its Scope and Method

March 20, 1918

I.

The purpose of the Inquiry is to secure command of the data which may be needed in the course of the negotiations at the peace conference. Obviously this cannot be acquired by the compilation of a new encyclopaedia or of a series of monographs. It is clear that the American negotiators will not have time to read extensive treatises. It is also clear that no treatise planned now would necessarily be in a form pertinent to the actual negotiations when they are in progress. No one can foresee at this time the order in which data will be requisitioned, nor the ideas about which the data will have to be grouped in the course of the negotiations. Whatever facts are assembled must clearly be under such control that they can be arranged and grouped and presented in almost any form at the shortest possible notice.

The first condition is the reliability of the material. Under the complex and shifting conditions, reliability means not only a critical use of the best sources but a very candid indication in each case of the degree of validity. On many points certain to be discussed there are no reliable data, though claims are often put forward by interested parties as if complete accuracy of information existed. In these cases it will be as important to be in a position to examine such claims critically as to make final statements of fact. Where partisanship infects statistics as seriously as it does in many parts of Europe and Asia, the essence of reliability is to know as clearly as possible the character of the sources upon which assertions of fact are based.

The second condition is complete mobility of the material. The data must not only have been assembled before the conference. It must be immediately available in the course of the conference.

The third condition is simplicity and lucidity of presentation. This involves the preparation of maps, charts, graphs, statistical tables, schematic outlines, upon which a high degree of ingenuity has been exercised.

II.

The range of topics upon which the Inquiry may be required to furnish information has expanded with the course of events. The most striking case is supplied by the disintegration of the former Russian Empire. Four months ago the plans of the Inquiry called for the study of Russia as a unitary Great Power; today Russia is a complex of nationalistic, economic, and religious questions stretching from the Baltic Sea through Central Asia to China. Should Austria-Hungary disintegrate a multitude of new issues and relationships would immediately be raised. Under these conditions it has seemed prudent to maintain a flexible program, and to lay plans for further research in anticipation of new developments.

The method of settlement laid down by the President in his addresses introduces another factor which increases the detailed variety of the topics likely to be discussed. Since the peace conference is to be conducted by open discussion, a command of fact totally unnecessary in secret negotiations is required. Where the whole world is to be the critic of the debates, the American influence will be in proportion to the depth and incisiveness with which just principles are applied to particular cases.

So far as the territorial settlement goes, the following areas are indicated as probable subjects of discussion:

1) On the west from Switzerland to the North Sea and from the military line to the Rhine.

2) The Baltic basin.

3) The Adriatic and its hinterland.

4) The Mediterranean basin.

5) The Balkan peninsula.

6) The Turkish Empire.

7) The Austro-Hungarian Empire.

8) The Polish area.

9) The former Russian Empire.

10) The whole of Asia, with the possible exception of India.

11) The territories of the Pacific Ocean.

12) The whole of Africa.

13) The islands of the Atlantic.

14) Possibly Latin America.

The decisive negotiating power will lie with the United States, Great Britain, France, Italy, Japan, Germany, and Austria-Hungary. The influence of these powers will be increased or diminished insofar as they carry with them the support of the Russian nations, the Scandinavian countries, Holland, Switzerland, Bulgaria, Spain, Brazil, Argentine, and Chile, and in a lesser degree of the smaller belligerents and neutrals.

In order to understand the needs and purposes which inspire the claims put forth by the Powers, it is necessary to have an analysis of the relationship of their political, social, and economic needs to their resources and their present situation. It is important to know on whom they are dependent for supplies and who is dependent upon them, what investments, what cultural and religious affiliations, what political ideas, make them friendly or antagonistic to policies of other Powers and to proposals which may be brought forward in the interests of international order.

The nature of the claims put forward by the conferees will be determined by the views of the dominant parties at the time of the settlement as to the general character of the settlement, as to immediate national interest and need. These views will either be enlarged or diminished by the process of negotiation, as viewed in its effect upon the support of other powers, the adhesion of the second-class powers, and the interests and demands of domestic factions.

As a general rule, it is necessary, therefore, to know, in regard to each disputed area, what resources human and material it contains, what is the concrete interest of each power in the area, what political group or groups within each power are concerned in that interest. It is necessary also to know the place of that area in the general plan of each power’s foreign policy. Finally, the data as to each disputed area and as to the nations with whom it has relationships must be in such form that the displacement of forces effected by any particular proposal can be estimated.

The American negotiators must be in a position to judge whether a claim put forth by a power is supported by the democracy at home, or whether it is merely a traditional diplomatic objective or the design of an imperialistic group. In the fiercely disputed areas they must be prepared freely to offer friendly suggestions either of compromise or of constructive experiment, but if these suggestions are to have much weight they must be supported by a body of reliable fact and must be presented tersely and graphically so as to carry conviction.

In addition to territorial settlements the American program involves complex covenants in respect to trade, future international disputes, the guarantees of minority rights, of equality upon the seas, and of reduction of armaments. For a successful negotiation in respect to each proposal, it will be necessary not only to have the data that bears upon the probable effects of the proposal, but also a large number of alternative suggestions, so as to give an accommodating and experimental character to American purpose.

Finally, the American negotiators should command various well tested programs of reform and reconstruction for the historically embittered areas. They should be in a position to propose to the torn peoples of the Balkans and Turkey or to the natives of Africa expedients of education, sanitation, financial reform, adequate police, and simply administered justice. With this end in view, comparative studies are being made of the different types of government applied to dependent and backward peoples. A careful examination is planned of the various attempts in the past to secure the rights of subject peoples. From sympathetic analyses of failure and success it is hoped that a working program may be derived.

III. The Technique of the Inquiry

1) The assembly of source materials. The inquiry is not purchasing a library. It is locating source materials in the various libraries of the country, keeping in its central office a card catalogue of the materials, a critique of them, and the nearest places where the actual material can be found. The librarian and his staff are instructed to draw up a scheme by which a complete reference library could be physically assembled in New York on two weeks notice. No actual arrangements have been made with the various libraries of the country, but it is assumed that whenever the time came all necessary books could be borrowed or requisitioned.

There is now working in the service of the Inquiry a group of experts each of whom commands the source material in some portion of the field. These men can be assembled at any time, are organized in groups under leaders, and are entirely competent to handle the source materials.

The Inquiry has prepared and keeps current, the declarations of statesmen, of opposition parties and of important political groups in all parts of the world, as they bear upon the settlement. These are arranged so that the total official or semi-official expression of any one nation in regard to the settlement can be studied, or the total expressions of all nations in regard to a particular topic. There is also being prepared a diplomatic history since 1870 arranged in special form so that all the documents bearing upon a topic which has been a continuing object of diplomatic interest are available.

2) The preparations outlined above have as their object the creation of an agency by which research can be carried on from time to time in the course of the negotiations. In addition data are now being collected by specialists for those problems which the present situation justifies us in believing will surely be the subject of discussion. For territorial questions these data will be arranged as follows:

In each area the smallest administrative units for which figures exist are listed on a chart and in parallel columns the latest and most reliable data are assembled. If the data are of a kind about which there is no dispute of authorities they will be designed in one fashion; if there is dispute, as for example in Macedonia, the best figures (in this case the best Serbian, Bulgarian, and Greek, Austrian, German, French and Russian statistics) will be given, together with the judgment of the specialists in the employ of the Inquiry. It is planned to put upon these charts not only statistics but brief historical and political facts or comment of a significant character. Naturally, some districts will require more intensive research than others. The amount of research put upon each district depends upon its critical character, upon the number of scholars whose services can be secured, upon the time available, and upon judgment of the value of research.

Presenting all the available material in respect to an area in this schematic form and in the smallest feasible units, the immediate bearing of any frontier which can be assigned may be determined with some definiteness. Moreover, a great many possible combinations of fact can easily be made if the data are arranged in this way. Thus, for example, if the Cholm question should arise at the conference, the procedure would be to list the administrative districts in the area under dispute, say ten or twelve, extract from the chart of Polish data the facts in regard to these districts and sum them up in a table showing the ethnic composition of the area, the religious affiliations, the condition of agriculture, the industrial plants, the mineral production and mineral possibilities, the educational facilities, the railroad systems and canals which cross it, and any important historical facts connected with the area. If the program is completed and if the proper clerical and mechanical assistance is at hand, the Inquiry should be able to furnish the American negotiators with the relevant facts for a problem of this kind in two hours or less.

In each area it is necessary to have available, besides the facts as to that area, the best possible analysis of the interests of the neighboring states and of the Great Powers in any particular settlement. With this object in view, there is now in course of preparation a schematic and analytic study of the special interests, commercial, political, religious, military, of each power. These interests are sometimes expressed by treaties, sometimes by informal understanding, sometimes they exist merely as ambitions among certain influential classes. Wherever possible, it is important that the interests of each nation should be visualized as concretely as possible and traced home to its course [sic].

3) Presentation of material. There are being prepared for the Inquiry a set of base maps for all the areas under discussion. Upon these base maps will be laid a large amount of the data which seems relevant, and copies of a complete loose-leaf atlas will be at the disposal of the negotiators. In addition, the Inquiry is planning, by means of a properly organized force actually at the conference, to be in a position to lay any proposal made upon a map, showing the relations of that proposal to any set of facts for which information is at hand. Thus, if a certain boundary for Poland is proposed, the Inquiry would be prepared to furnish the negotiators with maps showing the relation of the proposal to the distribution of Poles or to the location of mineral deposits, railways, etc. Besides maps, the Inquiry is planning charts and graphs showing various relationships, as, for example, the dependence of Austria upon the port of Trieste, or the relation of the trade of an independent Poland to Germany and to Austria. Provided there is a sufficient expert staff to control the underlying source material adequately, and provided sufficient draftsmen and cartographers are available, the Inquiry ought to be in a position to furnish the American negotiators with graphic representations of sets of facts in their relationships upon very short notice.

[IV.] Topics of Research

I) The Western Theater.

A) Belgium.

B) Luxemburg.

C) Alsace-Lorraine.

II) The Italian Theater.

A) Trentino.

B) Trieste and Istria.

C) The Adriatic Coast.

III) The Former Russian Empire.

A) The Baltic Provinces.

B) Lithuania.

C) Finland.

D) Poland.

E) Great Russia.

F) White Russia.

G) The Ukraine.

H) Cis-Caucasia and Trans-Caucasia.

I) Bessarabia.

J) Siberia.

IV) Austria-Hungary.

V) The Balkan States.

A) Serbia.

B) Montenegro.

C) Bosnia and Herzegovina.

D) Albania.

E) Bulgaria.

F) Greece.

G) Rumania.

H) The Aegean Islands.

I) The peninsula as a whole.

J) The disputed areas.

K) Various solutions of the Balkan question.

VI) The Ottoman Empire.

A) Constantinople and Adrianople.

B) Anatolia.

C) Armenia.

D) Syria.

E) The Gulf of Akaba.

F) Arabia.

G) Mesopotamia.

H) The Nestorians.

I) The Kurds.

VII) Persia and the Persian Gulf.

VIII) Pan-Turanianism and Pan-Islamism.

A) Russian Central Asia.

B) Chinese Turkestan.

C) Afghanistan and Beluchistan.

IX) Africa.

A) General.

B) Northern Africa.

C) Central Africa.

D) South Africa.

X) The Pacific.

A) The British possessions.

B) The German Pacific Islands.

C) Indo China and Siam.

D) Japan.

E) China.

In addition to these areas, topical research is either being conducted or material assembled on the world situation as to commerce, agricultural products, routes of trade, immigration and emigration, shipping, tariffs, commercial privileges, credit, debt, budgets, armaments, international law.

As a part of the field of international law, it is planned to have readily available all the leading precedents and authorities, together with the views expressed in diplomatic correspondence or otherwise, and also the treaties and agreements heretofore and now existing which have either a bearing upon, or may be affected by, the proceedings of the conference.

V. Tentative List of Issues

The section of the report which follows is tentative and is submitted merely for purposes of illustration. The questions listed have at one time or another figured in the plans of the belligerents.

i. the western theater

A) Belgium.

1) The Flemish-Walloon question.

a) Its relation to the German administrative division of Belgium during the occupation as a possible center of intrigue and interference in Belgian politics after the war.

b) The incitement of Flemish nationalism coincident with the strict control of the submarine bases.

2) Antwerp.

a) The relation of Antwerp to German export and import commerce: to the Rhine trade and the German waterway system.

b) Possible methods and probable effects of discrimination against German trade with Antwerp in Belgian control, or of discrimination in favor of Germany with Antwerp in German power.

c) The effects of different proposals made by Germany for commercial treaties involving a special position in Antwerp.

3) Railroads.

a) Economic and political factors involved in the control of Belgian railroads.

b) The strategic railway system of Germany aimed at Belgium: possible safeguards.

4) Studies of frontier questions between Belgium and Germany in regard to Belgian territory lying across the German border.

5) Methods of estimating reparation; methods of payment; conditions of evacuation.

6) Sources of supply and markets for Belgium on the conclusion of peace, looking to the reestablishment of her industry.

7) The Scheldt question.

8) Fortifications, armaments, and guarantees of neutrality.

B) Luxemburg.

1) The importance of the mineral resources and strategic position of Luxemburg in relation to the German Empire, Belgium, and France.

2) Probable economic and military effects of:

a) The continued neutrality of Luxemburg within the German customs area.

b) Incorporation into the German Empire.

c) Partition among Belgium, Germany, and France, or between Belgium and France.

C) Alsace-Lorraine.

1) Brief history to 1871.

2) The constitutional position of Alsace-Lorraine and her experience within the German Empire.

3) Detailed study of the popular vote of Alsace-Lorraine by districts in Reichstag and local elections since 1871: electoral procedure; the character of the electoral districts; political map of Alsace-Lorraine by election-districts. Such data form the basis for inferences regarding:

a) The different forms of plebiscite proposed, whether by referendum, by constituent assembly, or otherwise.

b) The necessity of international control in the case of a plebiscite.

c) The probable results of a plebiscite, either for the Reichsland as a whole or for its districts.

4) The exact delimitation of the coal, iron, and potash areas.

a) The relation of these areas to the geographical distribution of French and German sympathizers within Alsace-Lorraine.

b) The effect on German iron industry of the retrocession of Alsace-Lorraine.

c) The effect on French industry of the return of Alsace-Lorraine.

d) The effect of retrocession, partition, or autonomy on the economic welfare of Alsace-Lorraine itself.

e) The tariff problem.

5) The position of Alsace-Lorraine in relation to vital railway and canal systems.

6) The immigration and emigration statistics of Alsace-Lorraine.

7) Various proposals with regard to the provinces:

a) The case for and against the retrocession of Alsace-Lorraine: 1) with guarantees of certain economic rights to Germany; 2) without such guarantees. Political, economic, and strategic effects of retrocession; the problem of the German population.

b) The proposal to grant Alsace-Lorraine a larger measure of autonomy within the German Empire.

c) The proposal to partition Alsace-Lorraine between Bavaria and Prussia, with a view to the probable democratizing effect of such a partition.

d) Alsace-Lorraine as a neutralized state.

e) The nationalistic and strategic aspects of a possible division of Alsace-Lorraine, and its relation to the mineral areas.

8) The French claim to the boundary of 1814 rather than that of 1815.

9) The resources of the Saar valley.

10) The French desire for the Rhine frontier; the ethnic, economic, and strategic results of such a boundary.

11) The Briey-Longwy district: its resources, present ownership, and the direction of its export and import trade; the problem of strategic defense.

ii. the italian theater

A) The Trentino.

1) A general ethnic, strategic, and economic study of the area from the Italian frontier of 1914 to the highest peaks of the north.

2) A detailed study of the disputed triangle at the conclusion of the Italo-Austrian negotiations of 1915, with special attention to the ethnic composition of the Bozen valley, the position of the ridge crests, and the economic drainage of the area.

B) Trieste and Istria.

1) The ethnic composition of Trieste: of the environs.

2) The relation of Trieste to the Austrian hinterland.

a) Estimate of the effect of Italian annexation and of internationalization.

3) The economic affiliations of the Italian inhabitants of Trieste.

4) Ethnic composition of the peninsula of Istria.

C) The Adriatic Littoral.

1) The Isonzo front: Ethnic and strategic aspects.

a) The possibility of a slight modification of the Italian frontier towards the east.

b) Görz and Gradiska as gateways.

2) The Dalmatian coast.

a) The ethnic, economic, and strategic bases of the Italian claim to the Dalmatian coast and the adjacent islands.

b) The Italian Jugo-Slav question on the Dalmatian coast.

3) Fiume: its commercial hinterland and relation to the Jugo-Slav question.

4) The Italian claim to a protectorate over Albania.

a) The relation of this claim to Serbia and to Greece.

b) The effect on Serbia, Albania, Greece, and Austria of the Italian occupation of Avlona.

D) The Franco-Italian frontier.

1) The Italian claim to French Savoy, with an analysis of the strategic, ethnic, and economic factors involved.

iii. the former russian empire

A) The Baltic Provinces.

1) The German landed aristocracy’s aspirations and the native aspirations.

2) The question of German colonization.

3) The problem of western Russia’s access to the sea.

B) Lithuania.

1) Historical and economic relationship with Poland; with Russia.

2) Ethnic affinity with Letts of Courland and Livonia.

3) Delimitation of the Lithuanian area.

4) The bearing of various proposals on German economic penetration of Lithuania:

a) Autonomy.

b) Annexation.

c) Union with Baltic Provinces.

d) Union with Poland.

5) The tariff question.

C) Finland.

1) Finland’s historical experience with self-government.

2) German influence and interests.

3) The dispute over the Aland Islands; relations with Sweden.

D) Poland.

1) Frontiers: ethnological, historical, strategic, economic; a critical study of conflicting statistics and partisan claims.

2) Special studies of contested districts, such as Cholm and Suwalki.

3) The “Austrian solution” of the Polish problem.

4) Estimate of Poland’s economic and political relations with the Central Powers under the following conditions:

a) The creation of an independent and united Poland with complete right of self-determination.

b) The exclusion of Prussian Poland, or Galicia, or both.

c) The inclusion of Lithuania and Courland.

5) The protection of Jewish and other racial and religious minorities.

E) Great Russia.

1) Political and social forces significant for the future of Russian democracy.

2) Access to the sea.

3) Economic resources; problems of reconstruction; economic treaty relations with Central Europe.

4) Historical, ethnological, and economic data for an estimate of the probable relations with border states in case the latter achieve independence.

5) The proposed federalist solution.

F) White Russia.

1) Degree and extent of national self-consciousness.

2) The conflict of religions, as affecting educational and political problems.

3) Relations with Great Russia; with other Russian border-nations; with Germany.

G) The Ukraine.

1) Historical and ethnographical frontiers.

2) The Little-Russian portion of Galicia.

3) Economic resources and relations with the Central Powers.

4) Odessa, the Black Sea routes, the mineral basin.

5) The land system, social classes, and counterrevolutionary forces.

6) Economic treaty relations with Central Europe.

7) Political and social forces making for or against constitutional stability.

H) Cis-Caucasia and Trans-Caucasia.

1) Armenian claims in Trans-Caucasia—historical, racial, and religious.

2) The international importance of railways passing through Caucasia.

3) Oil, manganese, and other mineral resources.

4) The racial and religious map of Caucasia, with an estimate of the results of self-determination.

5) Difficulties in the way of Pan-Turanianism.

6) The protection of minorities.

I) Bessarabia.

1) Rumania’s claims, historical and ethnological.

2) Ukrainian and Jewish minorities.

3) Relation to Odessa; to control of the Danube.

J) Siberia and Central Asia.

1) Resources and potentialities.

2) Japanese interests in the Maritime Provinces and the Amur basin; strategic importance of Trans-Baikalia.

3) Central Asia: prospects of autonomy; of continued development under Russia; of Pan-Turanian agitation; agricultural possibilities, especially in cotton.

iv. austria-hungary

A) General data.

1) Decentralization and federal autonomy.

2) The balance of political and ethnic forces.

B) The place of Austria-Hungary in the project of Central Europe.

C) The relation of Austria-Hungary to the Russian border nations

D) Special studies of the several nationalities:

1) Austrians, Magyars, Czechs, and Slovaks, Poles, Ruthenians, Rumanians, Italians and Ladines, Serbo-Croats and Slovenes.

a) Exact delimitation of each linguistic area.

b) Study of political experience, nationalistic aspirations, literacy, economic resources, and fecundity of each nationality.

E) Dalmatia.

1) The ethnic and religious composition, the economic affiliations, and the political relationships of the tongue of land from Ragusa to Volavitza.

v. the balkan states

A) Serbia.

1) The Serbo-Albanian frontier.

2) Ragusa, Durazzo, and Saloniki as ports for Serbia.

3) The Serbo-Bulgarian frontier.

4) The question of South Slav unity.

B) Montenegro.

1) The Montenegrin-Albanian frontier.

2) Mount Lovcen and Cattaro.

C) Bosnia-Herzegovina.

1) Economic resources and affiliations.

2) Attitude of the various ethnic and religious groups towards Austro-Hungarian domination and towards Serbia.

D) Albania.

E) Bulgaria.

1) Political and economic sympathies.

2) Demand for national unity.

3) Social structure.

F) Greece.

G) Rumania.

1) Frontier rectifications.

2) Economic relations with the Central Powers.

3) Land system.

4) Treatment of minorities.

5) Claims.

H) The Aegean islands.

I) The ethnic and religious composition of the peninsula as a whole.

J) The disputed areas of the Balkans:

1) Epirus.

2) Macedonia.

3) Thrace.

4) Dobrudja.

5) Pirot and the strip of Serbian territory between the Morava and the Danube, claimed by Bulgaria.

6) Thasos.

7) Bukewina.

8) Transylvania.

9) The Maritza valley.

K) Various solutions of the Balkan question:

1) Union of Serbia, Montenegro, and Bosnia-Herzegovina as a Jugo-Slav state, or as a federation of autonomous states.

2) Incorporation of Serbia, Montenegro, and Bosnia into a reconstructed Austro-Hungarian monarchy as an autonomous kingdom.

3) A great Bulgaria.

4) An autonomous Macedonia.

5) The proposal to partition Albania.

6) A Rumania including Bessarabia but minus the Dobrudja.

7) Provisional autonomy for contested districts, pending a referendum under supervision of the League of Nations.

8) Proposals for a Balkan federation.

vi. the ottoman empire

1) Studies of ethnic distribution, mineral resources, agricultural possibilities, irrigation projects, railway concessions, railway projects, sanitation, schools, missions.

2) The Capitulations.

3) Forms of guarantee for subject nationalities.

A) Constantinople and the Straits.

1) Topographical outlines of a possible internationalized area.

2) Administrative, military, and economic questions involved in the internationalization, including terminal and port facilities, police, sanitation, municipal administration, ownership of the Bagdad Railway approaches, tunnels, etc.

3) Relation of the area to the Ottoman public debt.

B) Anatolia.

1) The Greek claim to Smyrna and its hinterland.

2) The Italian claim to Adalia.

3) Conflicting Italian and Greek claims to the Dodecanesus.

C) Armenia.

1) Delimitation of the Armenian area; study of districts contested with Kurds and others.

2) Political problems in case Armenia remains under Turkish suzerainty.

3) Economic problems of an independent Armenia.

D) Syria.

1) The projected Jewish state in Palestine.

2) French railway interests and political claims.

3) British claims.

E) The Gulf of Akaba.

1) British claims.

F) Arabia.

1) The Arab question and the Kingdom of the Hedjaz.

G) Mesopotamia.

1) The Arab question.

2) Irrigation projects; economic resources.

3) The Bagdad railway.

H) The Nestorians.

I) The Kurds.

vii. persia and the persian gulf

A) The British zone.

B) The Neutral zone; oil fields; British claims.

C) The former Russian zone.

viii. pan-turanianism and pan-islamism

A) Russian Central Asia.

B) Chinese Turkestan.

C) Afghanistan and Beluchistan.

D) The relation of Pan-Turanianism to Berlin-Bagdad and Berlin-Bokhara.

E) The Pan-Islamic question.

1) Pan-Islamism and the British and French colonies.

2) The Arabian countermovement.

3) The question of depriving Turkey of the caliphate as a defensive measure against Pan-Islamism.

ix. africa

A) General.

1) Areas in Africa available for colonization.

2) Sources of supply for chief tropical products.

B) Northern Africa.

1) The British interest:

a) In Egypt and the Suez Canal.

b) In strategic control over the Moroccan coast.

c) In the trade of Morocco, Tunis, and Algeria.

2) Libya.

a) The proposed extension of the hinterland.

b) Nullification of treaty rights of the Turkish sultan.

3) The French interest in Tunis, Algeria, Morocco, and the hinterland of the Sahara.

a) The French railway system binding French Africa together.

b) Franco-Italian relations in respect to Tunis and Libya.

c) French and Spanish relations in Morocco.

4) The Italian interest in Northern Africa.

a) In Tripoli and Cyrenaica.

b) Claim to Tunis.

c) Commercial interest in Egypt.

5) The German interest in Northern Africa.

a) In the mines and the trade of Morocco.

b) In the shipping of North African ports.

c) The German policy as protector of the Mohammedans of North Africa.

6) The Portuguese islands off the Atlantic coast.

7) The Spanish islands.

C) Central Africa.

1) The British blocks of territory: i) the Nile valley group, with East Africa and Somaliland; ii) the Rhodesian group; iii) Nigeria and the West African group.

2) The relationship of the British possessions to those of Portugal.

3) The British Cape-to-Cairo project, in its relation to German East Africa and to Belgian Congo.

4) The Belgian Congo.

5) French possessions and claims.

a) West Africa and the island of Madagascar.

b) The French claims in Cameroons.

6) The former German colonies: Cameroons, Togo, East Africa.

a) German colonial policy.

b) Proposals for partition.

c) Proposals for restoration, with guarantees of fair treatment for natives.

7) The Italian possessions: Eritrea, Italian Somaliland.

a) Italy’s entry to the Sahara through Libya.

b) Her aspirations respecting Abyssinia.

D) South Africa.

1) British possessions, including the Union of South Africa, Swaziland, Basutoland, the protectorate of Bechuanaland, Walvis Bay.

a) Treaty rights for the recruitment of native labor in Portuguese East Africa.

b) The control of ports, including Walvis Bay and Delagoa Bay.

2) The problem of Afrikander and the native.

a) The relation of Afrikander to German Southwest Africa.

3) Caprivi’s finger and the commerce of the upper Zambesi valley.

4) Germany’s interest in Southwest Africa, and her relation to the colonial possessions of Portugal.

x. the pacific

A) The British interest.

1) In Australia, New Zealand, Papua, and the Fiji Islands.

2) In the smaller islands of Oceania.

3) In North Borneo, Straits Settlements, Malay States.

4) In Hong Kong, Wei-hai-wei, Yangtze valley, and the trade of China.

5) In defense of Canadian coast.

6) In the General naval situation in the Pacific; in the coolie question.

B) The former German possessions.

1) South of the equator, in British occupation: Kaiser Wilhelm’s Land, Bismarck Archipelago, Solomon Islands, Samoan Islands.

2) North of the equator, in Japanese occupation: Caroline, Marshall, Pelew, and Marianne Islands.

C) Indo China and Siam.

1) French possessions in Indo China.

2) French and British interests in Siam.

D) Japan.

1) Policies and parties.

2) Interests in Eastern Asia and in the Pacific.

3) The emigration question.

E) China.

1) Prospects of stable government.

a) Political parties.

b) Constitutional reforms.

c) Nature and form of economic assistance required.

2) Relations with Japan.

a) Japanese demands and Chinese concessions.

b) Japanese spheres of influence.

c) Kiao-chow and Shantung.

3) The Russian sphere of influence: Northern Manchuria, Outer Mongolia.

4) British interests: Hong Kong, Wei-hai-wei, the Yangtze valley, Outer Tibet, General commerce.

5) French interests in southern China.

a) The leased port of Kwang-chow.

b) Special position in Kwang-tung, Kwang-si, and Yunnan.

c) Railway projects.

6) German interests.

7) American interests and the Open Door policy.

8) Other economic questions.

a) The Boxer indemnity.

b) The tariff.