28 DECEMBER 1918, Page 1

NEWS OF THE WEEK.

111HE condition of Russia and the proper relation of the Allies towards that distracted country are perhaps the most puzzling problems of the moment. They are certainly the most obscure. These problems must be resolutely and at once faced by the Allies and the United States. It is not too much to say that until the Russian question is settled there is no hope of a safe general peace. A large part of the world that must be included in the "new order" is at present in such a state that no stable edifice can be set up on it. Many unfair critics here are arguing that Allied troops went into Russia in the most wanton manner, and that we are gradually drifting into another war on a grand scale entirely through our own fault. In justice to the Government it must be said that nothing could be further from the truth. The Allied troops went into Russia to fight Germany, to save the very large supplies (the property of the Allies) which would have been seized by Germany when Russia collapsed, and to help our friends, the Czecho-Slovaks, who were being treacherously attacked by the Bolsheviks.