Paris Peace Conf. 184.01102/468
Professor A. C. Coolidge to the Commission to Negotiate Peace
[Received May 14.]
Sirs: I have the honor to report that the Chancellor, Mr. Renner, asked me to call on him this morning so that he might see me before his departure for St. Germain. The main subject of which he wished to speak to me was the question of West Hungary, which I shall take up in a separate report. The Chancellor said that he was going to Paris quite unexpectedly, and was not properly prepared for the mission, as he had been devoting his time almost exclusively to internal affairs, but he added that he had good technical advisers. He declared that the terms of peace proposed to Germany had produced a very painful impression here. I asked him if there was anything unexpected in these terms. He answered they were more severe than people had looked forward to; especially the provisions concerning the mixed districts of the eastern frontier surpassed expectations, and that the financial conditions were very hard.
Speaking of Hungary he said that he did not believe that the present Bolshevik government would fall of itself for a long time; but that if there were an advance of foreign troops he thought that things would be settled within a fortnight; that he feared that there might be serious street fighting in Budapest. He pointed out that in Munich the resistance had lasted five days and had been as obstinate the last day as it had the first.
The Chancellor referred two or three times to the work that had been done by the American Food Commission here, and said that Austria owed a great deal to them; that he did not believe men of any other nationality, not even the English, could have put through matters as they had. He added “if it had been left in the hands of the Italians we should have starved”. He spoke of the question of employment, not only at the present moment but for the future, and said “we have thousands more officials than we need and at least two hundred thousand workmen. It is a fearful question to know what to do with them.”
I have [etc.]