AN UNARMED ZONE

Evening Post, Volume CXXII, Issue 14, 16 July 1936, Page 25

AN UNARMED ZONE

WHERE FRONTIERS

MEET

FRANCE AND THE SWISS

A curious example of "demilitarisation"—at the expense of France and to the advantage of Switzerland—has been brought to light by discussions about Germany's reoccupation of the Rhineland (says a writer in the "Christ tian Science Monitor").

Well over a hundred years ago, the French were forbidden to place soldiers or cannon in the little town of Huningue. Just as the French today complain of allowing Strasbourg to be commanded by the German guns, so the Swiss were anxious to keep the French guns at a distance. They obtained on a small scale what the French obtained at Versaillesr-namely, a region in which military works were prohibited.

But while the Germans have, after seventeen years, repudiated the obligations imposed on them, the French" still, after 120 years, abide by the decision of the peacemakers who redrew the map of Europe following the Napoleonic wars. . •

Nevertheless there has been a certain amount of protest. Why should this anomaly persist? Is it not time to revise old treaties which impose such useless disabilities on France? The Swiss, however, are not prepared to abandon any of these privileges lightly.

Basle on the north-west frontier of Switzerland is the city which was chiefly affected by this experiment in "demilitarisation." Klein-Huningen may be regarded as a suburb of Basle, and across the river is the twin Alsatian village whose name has been Frenchified into Huningue. THE COMMON FRONTIER. Before the Rhine runs between the Vosges Mountains and the Black Forest there is a plain from which rise little hills. Here is the common frontier of three countries. On the left bank of the Rhine is France. On the right bank the Swiss and the German borders touch each other.

Alsace was, from 1648, French territory—all except Strasbourg. In 1681 Louis XIV induced the Swiss to withdraw'troops they had maintained in Strasbourg, which was an allied town. Then, to the chagrin of the Swiss, he entered Strasbourg without opposition. To make matters worse, he;fortified Huningue, and the Swiss considered this fortification of Huningue precisely as the French now consider the fortification of the Rhineland, as a perpetual menace to them.

Historians note with irony that a series of much more serious French conquests had not particularly disturbed the Swiss, but that the fortification of Huningue, which had been French for a good generation, was regarded with alarm. For a century and a half this apparently insignificant event preoccupied the Confederation. •

The reason is, of course, simple enough. Military conquests in those days were not in themselves especially important. What was important was the strategic value of the territorial

frontiers established as the result of a. war. Did those frontiers facilitate military offensives? That was the test to which they were subjected! A France had already extended to the Jura and was on the Rhine. That was disquieting to the Confederation. But somehow the construction of the Huningue fortress was found to be still more disquieting. The fortress frowned on Basle and the Swiss gazed, gloomily on the fortress. '

The opportunity of "doing something about it" did not come until after the defeat of Napoleon. The Allies, at the request of Switzerland, ordered that the fortress should be destroyed, and from 1815 onwards Huningue has not had any right to fortifications.. - Here, then, is a spot where three countries virtually meet, which '5s demilitarised." '*■• HAS CHANGED HANDS. It has. changed hands since the £ Ul. e fl s_.' d A emmta«sed" it. In the war of 1870, Alsace was taken from the French, and became German Huningue of course, was included in the transference. Now Germany strictly ob- ?^ VCd, thZ *815 treaty- and refrained ym£ Huningue. After the 1914-18 war Alsace— and Huningue— Vrl\re^° l' ed t0 the .^ench., The fnrl?fl a h^f nse observed the nonfortified character of the little town. That is as it should be, since unless a new treaty specifically deals with a point in the old treaty which it replaces or the old treaty is not deKSft ***«**•■ the provisos of .th.c old treaty are deemed to be operatn?V Th t c Vf|f m« Treaty abohS the Treaty of Frankfurt, and some of the provisions of the 1815 treaty in so B^t a +h y France Gemany. But the provisions affecting Switzerland have not been altered. SwitzerXr not \ t. war' and the «**& of HLuninsue, which, although Frencß was "demilitarised" as a satisfactioh unchlg^ *" *?*«"* femaine'f The Hague Court has decided that fvw£ 6 ■ C?sP ot l boUsh "free zones" which, although French, are under a special Customs regime, without the consent of the Swiss. Presumably tht same law holds in the' case of &£?"« *V S und°ubtedly French, but the "servitude" under which it is & T^ t0J he benefit land and the French must therefore obtain Swiss consent.to its abrogation W^ conditions of war have been totally transformed since 1815- it is still.considered that Switzerland should not forgo the privileges it possesses without the most careful thought as/ to the-consequences. . So the French too, like the Germans, have a demilitarised" zone. It is now of no great importance, and Switzerland is not likely to be invaded by the French. But the existence of an unfortified Huningue is enough to provoke curious controversies which make an interesting pendant to the more vital ■Franco-German discussions on the Rhineland.