TRIESTE’S FUTURE

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXXV, Issue 22621, 26 April 1948, Page 5

TRIESTE’S FUTURE

EUROPE’S TEST GROUND DEMOCRACIES AND RUSSIA MELBOURNE, March 18. Trieste for a year has been regarded behind the scenes as one of the testing points of Europe—a testing ground where the ideologies of the democracies and of Russia have met. . Now the democracies Britain. France, and the United States —propose to hand Trieste back to ItalyWhen Italy and Yugoslavia both claimed Trieste after tne war, the democracies made it a free town, and detached it from Italy when they drew up the Italian peace treaty. Marshal Tito, Yugoslavia’s dictator, pumped in communism. The democracies taught Liberalism: but Trieste was split and could not manage its own affairs. The Italians of Trieste wanted to be left alone, to forget the bitterness, to become again the people of a slowlymoving big town that was an important Adriatic port . Strategically, Trieste is of great importance. It stands in Italian ground at the top of the Adriatic, and from it the whole Danubian basin may be approached Whoever holds Trieste holds a base striking into Central Europe And, conversely, whoever holds Trieste holds a base striking from Central Europe, down the Adriatic, past Italv on one side and Yugoslavia and Greece on the other, and into the Mediterranean. To the Russians. Trieste is one of the keystones in the domination Moscow is trying to force further west over the Danubian basin. Its commercial value to Czechoslovakia, which Russia has iust subjugated, is enormous. And if Russia tor Yugoslavia) held Trieste, it would hold a valve to the trade of Central Europe. Before the Italian Treaty was drawn up and Trieste created a "free” city, Russia argued for weeks that it should go to Yugoslavia, where Tito was confirming his dictatorship. The official announcement by the American State Department of the proposal to hand Trieste back to Italy says that abundant evidence shows that the Yugoslav zone has been completely absorbed into Yugoslavia, and that, under these circumstances, the democracies cannot guarantee protection of the basic rights of the people of Trieste. Secondly. Trieste has been offered as a bonus in the Italian elections. And. thirdly, Russia is on the spot. If she opposes return to Trieste to Italy, she will alienate Italians and will lose influence in Italy. If she does not oppose it, she will alienate Yugoslavia and perhaps weaken Tito.