Trampling in Trieste
Ever since Marshal Tito repudiated the Cominform, the question of Trieste has been like an undetonated bomb in a pile of post-war rubble. So long as Yugoslavia belonged to the East, the West need not approach it and it represented no immediate danger to them. They could, and did, support Italy's claims with little expectation that they could ever be met but with open arms for all the popularity that that could earn them with the Italian electorate. When Yugoslavia abandoned the East there was Marshal Tito to be considered as well as Signor de Gasperi. But Tito was weak; he needed dollars, and his northern and eastern frontiers were threatened by his late friends. Italy, in the meantime, had found a new political stability. Thus, for five years, both claimants have accepted the de facto division of the territory of Trieste. They have made no serious attempt to demand a permanent solution which satisfied all their national aspirations, and the United States, Britain and France have escaped the obligation either to deny or to press their declaration of March, 1948, that the whole of Trieste belonged to Italy by right. Now Tito is comparatively sure of his dollars, and his frontiers are under slightly less pressure. This appears to have encouraged him to trample on the rubble, at a moment when the political fate of Italy is once again uncertain. The result has been a minor but not yet fatal explosion. A permanent settlement for Trieste, acceptable both to Italy and to Yugoslavia, would be an excellent thing; if it were accompanied by an opening of communications to the north, it would assist the economy of Austria and south-central Europe as well as remove a source of political tension in the Adriatic. But a permanent settle- ment is not essential any more than it is at present practicable, so long as a unilateral settlement by violence is not attempted. The immediate business of the Western Powers, therefore, is to ensure that a settlement by violence—a device not unknown in the history of Trieste—is not now going to be imposed either by Marshal Tito, or by Signor Pella under provocation by Marshal Tito.
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