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The Czecho-Slovaks, owing to their geographic position and past traditions, and owing to their advanced civilisation, may be fully relied upon as the pioneers of peace and stability in Central Europe. The Czecho-Slovak State will probably have a common frontier with Rumania.
When war broke out, the Czecho-Slovaks all over the world felt it their duty to prove by deeds that their place was on the side of the Entente.
Since they could not think of revolting, the Czecho-Slovaks at home tried to paralyse the power of Austria in every way. Not only individuals but also Czech banks and other institutions refused to subscribe to the war loans. Their newspapers published official reports with reluctance, and between the lines laid stress on news unfavourable to Austria so as to keep up the spirit of the people.
Professor Masaryk clearly saw that Austria aimed at the conquest of the Balkans and intended at all costs to crush Serbia. In 1911 new elections to the Reichsrat took place with the following result for the Czechs: They demanded full independence for Bohemia, some of them laying greater stress on her historical rights, some on the natural right of Czecho-Slovaks to liberty.
Lansing issued the following statement: "The Czecho-Slovak peoples having taken up arms against the German and Austro-Hungarian empires, and having placed in the field organised armies, which are waging war against those empires under officers of their own nationality and in accordance with the rules and practices of civilised nations, and Czecho-Slovaks having in the prosecution of their independence in the present war confided the supreme political authority to the Czecho-Slovak National Council, the Government of the United States recognises that a state of belligerency exists between the Czecho-Slovaks thus organised and the German and Austro-Hungarian empires.
Soukup and Klofac, delivered long speeches in which they emphasised the solidarity of the three Western Slav nations, the Poles, Czecho-Slovaks and Yugoslavs, and their identical claims for liberty and independence. Dr. Soukup declared that "Socialism is to-day a great factor not only in Bohemia, but in the whole world."
Lansing issued the following statement: "The Secretary of State desires to announce that the proceedings of the Congress of Oppressed Nationalities of Austria-Hungary which was held in Rome in April have been followed with great interest by the Government of the United States, and that the nationalist aspirations of the Czecho-Slovaks and Jugoslavs have the earnest sympathy of this government."
"It also recognises the Czecho-Slovak National Council as a de facto belligerent government, clothed with proper authority to direct the military and political affairs of the Czecho-Slovaks.
The Jugo-Slavs, like the Czecho-Slovaks, appeared in modern times as a nation which had lost its native nobility and had been reduced to a disarmed, untutored, and enserfed peasantry. In the absence of these leaders, the nation turned to its clergy who in order to retain their hold on the peasantry must needs ever remain national.
In Siberia they defeated a considerable force of German-Magyar ex-prisoners in Krasnoyarsk and Omsk and established themselves firmly in Udinsk. On June 29, 15,000 Czecho-Slovaks under General Diderichs, after handing an ultimatum to the Bolsheviks at Vladivostok, occupied the city without much resistance. Only at one spot fighting took place and some 160 Bolsheviks were killed.
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