Paris Peace Conf. 184.01102/79

Professor A. C. Coolidge to the Commission to Negotiate Peace

No. 72

Sirs: I have the honor to report that among the questions that threaten future trouble in this part of the world is one that has as yet attracted but little public attention, but has already been taken up seriously by the various governments of the former parts of the Austrian Empire, that is the question of “liquidation”. When the war ended there were naturally concentrated in Austria, and to a secondary extent in Hungary—and especially in the vicinity of the two capitals Vienna and Budapest—vast amounts of materials and stores of many kinds, not only military munitions but railway and other supplies. The new states into which the Empire has split up have naturally claimed that all these supplies are not the property of the governments of German Austria or of Hungary, in whose hands they happen to be located at the present moment, but that they should be divided up in fair proportion between the former parts of the Empire. This claim has been admitted in theory by the German Austrians and the Hungarians, and there is at the present day sitting here a Liquidation Committee which tries to deal with this subject. The task is a very large and complicated one. To begin with, no agreement has, as far as I am aware yet been reached as to what the respective share of each [Page 255] of the governments should be. It cannot be based merely on the number of population for no one knows what that is—or can know until the final boundaries are fixed. Besides, a people like the Czechs with their great manufacturies feel that they have contributed far more in the making of the materials accumulated than have, let us say, the Poles in Galicia or the Rumanians in Eastern Hungary. The Czechs would never accept as just a per capita division. On the contrary they are inclined to claim a percentage far in excess of what their numbers alone would entitle them to. In my recent visit to Bohemia I was impressed with the importance that the President and others attach to this question of liquidation and their bitterness towards the Austrians for the way it had been carried out, or not carried out so far. One can understand that the Austrians, especially in view of their present relations with the Czechs, should not be enthusiastic or helpful about carrying out such an arrangement, even though they had theoretically agreed to it. They are accused of selling as much of the material as they can, without informing the others. The result seems to be continual bickerings and much ill feeling.

An even more serious side to the situation is the question how far the principle of liquidation is to be applied. In theory, if not in practice, it may be simple enough if we confine it to such things as war and railway material, but it is being pushed a great deal further. For instance, it has been claimed that all public buildings of the old government that were used for general and not merely for local purposes belong to all the successors of that government. This includes the various ministries here in Vienna, and even the splendid building of the former Austrian Parliament. It can also be applied to governmental and historical archives, as well as the scientific and artistic museums for which Vienna is famous, and to arsenals, training camps, scientific and experimental laboratories and the like. Here too, the principle seems to have been accepted, at least to a certain extent, by the government of German Austria. Representatives of some of the other States are making themselves at home in what were formerly Imperial property. For instance, I believe the headquarters of the Rumanian propaganda are located in part of the former Imperial Ministry of War.

But this is not all. It is claimed that the contents of the scientific and artistic museums for which Vienna is famous do not belong to modern Austria (nor do those in Budapest belong to Hungary) but that they are the property of the component parts of the former Dual Empire and should now be divided in just proportions between them. Then, too, there is the question of how the contents of these museums were acquired. In the course of centuries many articles of value have been transferred from the provinces to Vienna by the closing of monasteries [Page 256] and for many other reasons. It is true the reverse has taken place, for instance the central government has made gifts to local museums, but to a much smaller extent. If the origin of the acquisition of every picture in the art galleries and of every specimen in the zoological museum is to be inquired into, we have the prospect of endless dispute and of a most unedifying scramble. This is no mere imaginary danger. I recently heard one of the most important of the Czech ministers, Dr. Kasin, talk of getting back for Bohemia the things she had been deprived of after the battle of the White Hill in the early part of the 17th century. I gathered from him the impression that, feeling it was impossible for the Czecho-Slovak State to avoid accepting a large share of the Austrian war debt and of the vast issues of paper money which had been brought into existence for purposes to which the Czechs had been violently opposed, he intended to get even with Austria for this and other injuries in every way that he could. He is not alone in that sentiment. The hatred felt for Vienna notably in Bohemia is strong, and the idea of plundering her for the future profit and glory of Prague and other places presents many attractions. Even Italy, apart from compensation she may demand for losses suffered during the war, shows signs of raising claim to certain works of art here that were formerly in Northern Italy at the time of Austrian rule there. It is needless to point out that if this process of liquidation is carried out to the extent that some are now planning, Vienna will come out from it in the condition of a city that has been sacked, and its position as a center of art will be gone forever.

I have [etc.]

Archibald Cary Coolidge