The new Europe
The new Europe. The Slavic point of view of Tomáš Garrigue Masaryk is a book that contains "the war and peace program that led the Czechoslovak propaganda in its authentic version". It was written in Saint Petersburg in 1917 under the title Nová Evropa , appeared as a partial print in Russia in 1918, the revised and supplemented English ( The new Europe. The Slav standpoint. ) And French edition ( L'Europe nouvelle ) also in 1918 as a manuscript print without distribution on the book market, the Czech 1920 ( Nová Evropa. Stanovisko slovanské ) and the German translation 1922.
content
Preliminary remark
When it was published in the Czech Republic in 1920, Masaryk considered the book to be a historical document for the foreign propaganda that led to the establishment of Czechoslovakia on October 28, 1918. Originally it was dedicated to the soldiers of the Czechoslovak legions , in order to "make them understand the basic problems of the war" (p. 7). Although it was designed as a pamphlet, Masaryk said in 1920 that he had not lost his scientific deliberation in it and had preserved political decency and justice towards his political opponents and enemies (p. 6).
Part 1: "The Historical Significance of War"
In the fourth year of the war, Masaryk expects 25 million dead, wounded, prisoners and missing persons listed in the statistics. Because of this tribute, it seems impossible for him that "the previous organization of states and peoples from which this war arose remain unchanged". This "world war" (p. 9 f.) Would have strengthened the internationality and the democratic world and society; the majority of the people are on the side of the Allies against the German Empire and Austria-Hungary .
He foresaw the war because he carefully observed the two countries and studied the Pan-Germanic movement. Pan-Germanism was most recently organized from the social sciences that were well developed in Germany as the philosophy and politics of the Germans. " Lagarde is his leading philosophical and theological spokesman, Treitschke his historian, Kaiser Wilhelm his politician" (p. 13). The idea of world domination as "pénétration pacifique" (= peaceful penetration) developed through the successful industrial revolution in Germany and the German trade going all over the world (cf. Central Europe ). Lagarde understood Austria after 1866 as a German colony , Austria had become a "bridge" for Germany to the Balkans and to the nearer Asia and Africa . This led to the concept of a Central Europe under German leadership (mention of Friedrich Naumann and his book “Central Europe” from 1915 on p. 97). An Austrian Pangermane coined the catchphrase “Berlin-Baghdad” (see Baghdad Railway ) (p. 16 f.).
Most emphatically, however, the Slavic and other border countries of western Russia would be claimed (p. 18). By Friedrich Ratzel the Pangermanists had the geopolitics learned and went with him believe that a strip of land geologically German territory same, the Germans as a "master race" TO ISSUE (page 24). So Prussia continues the restoration of the German empire of the Middle Ages. Prussia and Austria are shaped by the urge to the east . Originally, Germany under Charlemagne was only German up to the Elbe and Saale ; the Slavic part was "forcibly Germanized and colonized over the centuries, " which is why Treitschke sees the meaning of German history in the colonization activity (p. 37). This German urge to the east is directed from Prussia and Austria against the so-called peoples zone to the east and south-east: "the German urge to the east is characterized by many German colonies that are wedged into foreign territory like forts" (p . 43).
In contrast, in this world war the constitutional, democratic and republican states with America at the top would fight for the right of the peoples to self-determination (p. 36).
Part 2: "The national principle"
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The national principle is fundamental to understanding war and the desired real peace. It has asserted itself throughout life since the 18th century. Since the French Revolution , historians across Europe have been registering the national awakening. The Flemish , Norwegian and Irish questions also had their origins there. Since the Reformation and the Renaissance , the respective national languages have become carriers of national cultural power compared to Latin and French (p. 47).
However, there is a disproportion between nations and states insofar as all larger states are usually mixed. “The mixedness increases in the direction from west to east” (p. 53). Only in Austria-Hungary, as previously in Turkey , does a minority rule as the ruling nation over the majority of other nations with the help of the army and through the authority of the dynasty . That is why the nation is a democratic organization: “(...) each individual is called, everyone can assert himself; the state is an aristocratic, coercive, oppressive organization: democratic states are only just emerging ”(p. 54).
The Pangermanen under one of their leaders, Ernst Hasse , would not recognize this national principle by placing the state above the nation and only seeing the Germans: They would have to correct their borders, provide bread for their growing population and because of the encirclement by other nations Be a militarist (p. 62).
In order to do justice to the small states, it is a matter of creating a real federation in which the peoples can freely unite with one another as they wish (p. 70). At this level Europe is "decidedly inclined towards a continental organization" (p. 73 f.), Because humanity is not something supranational, but the organization of individual nations. This state formation of nations cannot be remedied by resettling national minorities , as the example of Zionism and the emigration system suggested (p. 83). Here also have Marxism to learn (pp 83-88). For the Pan-Germans, mass emigration and resettlement are common demands (pp. 106, 147).
Part 3: "The Eastern European Question"
The war is a bloody lesson clearly given to the world, “that the most important problem of the war is the reconstruction of Eastern Europe on a national basis” (p. 90), because “in this war the exiled Germany, Austria-Hungary and Turkey form one only league against Europe, an anti-national, undemocratic, dynastic league addicted to conquest ”, and“ the German colonization aimed at conquest is directed precisely against the east ”(pp. 91-93). The aim of the war must above all be the dissolution of Austria-Hungary, so that a "real implementation of the nations' right to self-determination" can be achieved, which at the same time would be "the greatest blow to Prussian Germany" (p. 103). Therefore, the Germans must be prevented from ruling the East (see Upper East ). With this they would be able to settle accounts with France and England and later with the United States (p. 107).
For Masaryk, Prussia represents “secular Jesuitism ” in that it tries to preserve medieval theocracy by all means (p. 113). Russia, too, has been pushing against the West and the peoples zone for centuries. However, the peace that has just been concluded with revolutionary Russia is dishonorable: "Wilhelm sits down at a table with Trotsky , he, the legitimate monarch, with the revolutionary, the Jew who could not even become an officer in the German army" (p. 111 ). Now it is the case that the small nations need Russia as a support in order not to fall under the domination of Germany (p. 122). But Russia is not called to protect, since it has eliminated the tsar , but not overcame tsarism (p. 125).
Bohemia has always played a special role among the Slavic nations. In contrast to the Elbe Slavs and those on the Baltic Sea and in Silesia , the Czechs would have retained their independence. Otto von Bismarck said, “He is the Lord of Europe who has Bohemia in his power (...). A Bohemia with Slovakia stands in the way of the Berlin-Baghdad plan ”, because the shortest route to Istanbul , Salonika or Trieste as well as to Vienna and Budapest leads via Prague or Oderberg (p. 130).
In the Pan-German Konrad von Winterstetten, a publicist who is particularly hostile towards the Czechs and Slovaks appears . Above all, the Poles would have to suffer from Prussia (p. 160).
Due to their geographical location in the center of Europe and their traditional fight against the German drive to the east, the Czech and Slovak people are the vanguard of all Eastern European nations (p. 158). In their high cultural level, both are in no way inferior to their oppressors (p. 145), which is why their right to self-determination is a demand for political justice.
If the Pangermanen in the liberated Poles, Bohemia, Slovaks and Yugoslavs saw a barrier against their urge to the east, this is only correct insofar as it is not about a barrier or buffer state role (see Cordon sanitaire ), but about being loyal to each other as equals To be neighbors (p. 165).
Since Bohemia is “a special case of a nationally mixed country”, care will have to be taken to keep the minorities , “especially the Germans ”, despite the emphasis on the nationality principle . Because there are no simple ethnographic boundaries (p. 145 f.).
Part 4: "War to the End"
Since it is a question of the democratic organization of Europe, Prussian Germany and the exiled Austria-Hungary must be defeated. "In the interests of a lasting peace, war is therefore necessary to the end" (p. 170). The guilt of Austria and Germany for the outbreak of war is undoubtedly certain (p. 177). Examples of this are General Friedrich von Bernhardi , leading commander on the Eastern Front , or Maximilian Harden , who said: “We wanted this war” (p. 178).
Part 5: "The new Europe (summary)"
The German people must be forced to rely on their own resources and no longer exploit their neighboring peoples. Then it took part in the democratic program of the Allies, which was derived from the ideals of humanity.
Since the previously applicable principle of non-interference in the internal affairs of other countries had also caused this war, an international tribunal must be set up "which will control the cultural development of nations and the organization of international reciprocity ( League of Nations )" (p. 189) , 199). Because under the current circumstances there are no purely national states and national minorities will continue to exist for economic and transport reasons. For this reason, only a progressive development could “over time enable a revision and reorganization of the minority issues” (p. 187), because with the nationality issues “each individual is a problem for itself” (p. 191).
First of all, theocracy has to give way to democracy, whereby religion has to be separated from the state. Because “ Jesus , not Caesar ” is the slogan of democratic Europe (p. 201, last sentence of the book).
effect
As it also happened in Polish research on the West , Masaryk drafts a violent "German urge to the east" estimated into the Middle Ages. Masaryk repeatedly refers to contemporary Pan-German journalists or arguments from German historians who express contempt for the Slavs. Again and again he mentions Paul de Lagarde, Eduard von Hartmann and Theodor Mommsen and their hostile and violent statements: Hartmann: “Exterminate!” To the address of the Poles; Theodor Mommsen: “hit the head” to the address of the Czechs (p. 26 and more). This reflects the reactions to the independence efforts of Poles and Czechs, to which Wilhelm Jordan responded most clearly in the Frankfurt National Assembly by proudly evoking a thousand-year history of conquest during which the Slavs of the Elbe and Saale were ousted from Germany.
This historical recourse is left out today when the expulsions beginning at the end of the Second World War are discussed and displaced persons have their say. In a press release by the “ German World Alliance ”, for example, in 2009, while only taking note of the Slavic reaction, “the German settlement work in East, East-Central and Southeastern Europe, which in some cases looked back on 800 years of history, than Act of brutal Germanization for the oppression and exploitation of the Slavic peoples ”was presented.
“Masaryk even warned against a 'Pan-Germanic world domination', whose 'drive to the East' was almost insatiable. Edvard Beneš , Czechoslovak Foreign Minister and President after World War II, described the Germans in the Sudetenland as 'colonists or descendants of colonists' who had 'artificially established themselves in Bohemia'. The talk of the de-Germanization of the old Slavic soil made the rounds. "
In 1998, the Czech historian Bohumil Doležal presented a critical view of Masaryk's overall concept of politics by first stating that Masaryk's involvement in armed conflict was on the side of the forces of democracy, on the side of the Entente , from the course of Czech history seems logical because the Czechs have been on the side of democracy since the Hussite movement . This ideology initially had its positive effects on the implementation of the Czech right to self-determination.
“At the same time, however, the overexposed idea of the 'bulwark of democracy' in Central Europe provided the ideological basis for political deeds in which the complex of the small people reflected itself, which is afraid and assumes that it can become larger through authoritarian measures, and this it get rid of fear. The Czechoslovakist ideology enabled the Czechs to (temporarily) successfully complete the long-standing efforts to incorporate Slovakia. They believed that democracy would legitimize the annexation of extensive German, Hungarian and Polish areas. Belonging to an essentially democratic state structure should be both an honor for these ethnic groups and a sufficient substitute for the fact that they have to live outside their nation states or, in the case of the Slovaks, that they are not allowed to take the management of their affairs into their own hands . "
The factual consequence, however, led to the exact opposite of what the Czechs had expected from it. Because the instability and uncertainty of the new state structure have increased, so that "at the hour of the trial (...) all annexed groups turned against this" and caused its ruin .
These territorial expansion tendencies had already been registered in 1919 by the American diplomat Hugh S. Gibson (1883–1954) when he noted:
“ (...) Of all the people whom we saw in the course of our journey, the Czechs deemed to have the most ability and common sense, the best organization, and the best leaders. They seem, however, to have been seized lately with a strong attack of imperialism , and a desire to dominate central Europe. This was evident in frank conversations with President Masaryk, the Prime Minister, Dr. Karel Kramář , and many others (...). ”
The historian Eva Hahn stated in 1995 that Masaryk was aware of "how important it was for the Czechs and Czechoslovakia to live together with the Germans". But he paid remarkably little attention to the Germans. He was prevented from doing this by the idea of democracy as a majority rule. The Slovaks would have experienced similar neglect. Václav Havel , who sees himself in Masaryk's tradition, continued and national stereotypes prevented him from preventing the Slovaks from breaking away from the common state. He was not able to “respond to specific Slovak complaints and demands, and with his global-nationalizing perspectives he angered the Slovaks rather than helping to reduce their aversion to the common state. For example, when he described the Slovaks as 'backward' compared to the Czechs ”.
expenditure
- TG Masaryk: Nová Evropa, stanovisko slovanské . Prague: Dubský, 1920
- TG Masaryk: The new Europe: the Slav standpoint . London, 1918
- TG Masaryk: The new Europe: the Slav standpoint . Washington, 1918
- TG Masaryk: L'Europe nouvelle . Imprimé comme manuscrit. Paris: Impr. Slave, 1918
- TG Masaryk: The new Europe: the Slavic point of view . Authorized translation from Czech by Emil Saudek . Berlin: CA Schwetschke & Son, 1922
- Tomáš G. Masaryk: Nowa Europa: Słowjanske stojnišćo . Translation of Jurij Wićaz . Bautzen: Nakładom Serbomila Tuchoŕskeho, 1922
literature
- Radan Hain: State Theory and State Law in TG Masaryk's World of Ideas. Schulthess, Zurich 1999, ISBN 3-7255-3913-8 (also dissertation at the University of Zurich, 1999).
- Frank Henschel: Central Europe against the new Europe. A comparison of the writings of Friedrich Naumann and Tomas Garrigue Masaryk. Grin , 2008, ISBN 3-640-17148-9 .
- Jörg K. Hoensch , History of Bohemia. From the Slavic conquest to the present. 3rd edition, CH Beck, Munich 1997, ISBN 3-406-41694-2 , p. 410.
- Dirk van Laak : About everything in the world. German imperialism in the 19th and 20th centuries. CH Beck, Munich 2005, ISBN 978-3-406-52824-8 (detailed information on Central Europe).
- Erwin Viefhaus: The minority issue and the emergence of the minority protection treaties at the Paris Peace Conference 1919. A study on the history of the nationality problem in the 19th and 20th centuries. Textor, Frankfurt am Main 2008 (first published in 1960), ISBN 3-938402-14-8 .
Web links
Individual evidence
- ^ The translator Emil Saudek in the preliminary remark to the German edition in September 1922, reviewed by Masaryk, in: Tomáš Garrigue Masaryk: Das neue Europa. The Slavic point of view. Volk und Welt, Berlin 1991, p. 5, ISBN 3-353-00809-8 . - The following page numbers in the table of contents correspond to this edition.
- ↑ Masaryk (1991), p. 6.
- ↑ In 1886 he was in correspondence with Lagarde: Ulrich Sieg, Germany's prophet. Paul de Lagarde and the origins of modern anti-Semitism , Carl Hanser: München 2007, p. 222; ISBN 978-3-446-20842-1 . He also exchanged ideas with Constantin Frantz (Masaryk [1991], p. 13 f.).
- ↑ See Ulrich Sieg (2007), pp. 62, 174, 205.
- ↑ Between 1913 and 1916, for example, “ Berlin-Bagdad. New goals in Central European politics ”, published by the managing director of the Pan-German Association, Albert Ritter, under the pseudonym Konrad von Winterstetten. He called for the establishment of a federation of states “across Central and Southeastern Europe” from Berlin to Baghdad. The German Reich needs this union as a sales area, as a raw material base and as a settlement area. The most vulnerable are the political interests of the German Reich in south-eastern Europe, the cutting off of the Balkan route means blockade and starvation for “Central Europe”. (Cf. Konrad von Winterstetten. ( Memento of the original from January 2, 2010 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Also Horst founder, History of the German Colonies , 5th edition, UTB: Stuttgart 2004, p. 106; ISBN 3-8252-1332-3 .)
- ↑ See " The Peace Dictates of Saint Germain, Versailles, and Trianon ."
- ↑ See biography ( memento of the original from August 26, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ See " The Czechs and the Problem of the Small People "
- ↑ Quoted in Erwin Viefhaus, The Minority Issue and the Origin of Minority Protection Treaties at the Paris Peace Conference in 1919. A study on the history of the nationality problem in the 19th and 20th centuries , Textor Verlag: Frankfurt am Main 2008 (first 1960), ISBN 3-938402- 14-8 , p. 4 f.
- ↑ The “Czech Question” from Masaryk to Havel , p. 6 f.
