Читать книгу The Anglo-Saxon Century and the Unification of the English-Speaking People - John R. Dos Passos - Страница 8

In a little less than four years, the entire relations of the nations of the world to each other have changed. Old maps have become obsolete and valueless. The plans of diplomacy have been upset. All international combinations have been {9} frustrated, and the nice calculations and adjustments of European statesmen are, by the unexpected results of the two, in some of their aspects, insignificant wars, thrown into confusion and perplexity, if not for ever destroyed. The diplomatic slate has been sponged clean, and new alliances and international copartnerships must be written on it.

Does it not seem plain, therefore, in the shifting of places and combinations, that the British Empire and the United States are to be the chief factors in the new historical scenes of the twentieth century?

The world is now, in a practical sense, owned or controlled by five nations: the British Empire, the United States of America, Russia, Germany, and France. China, preliminary to an eventual division of her territories, has become a ward of the preceding powers, and unless, perchance by some miracle, she steals the thunder of modern Jove, and arms her hordes with fashionable artillery and ammunition,—a most unlikely prospect, except in accord with and under the tutelage of Russia,—she can no longer be numbered as a factor in international affairs. Japan, Austria, Hungary, Turkey, Italy, Spain, Portugal, Switzerland, Belgium, Holland, Norway and Sweden, and the other small sovereignties of the world are mere satellites, revolving around these great political planets, and in due course of time destined to be attached to one or the other of them, or at least so close in sympathy with their principles {10} as to render concert of action between them inevitable.