The Fight for Ruthenia Ruthenia, or Sub-Carpathian Russia, the beautiful
and poverty-stricken area in the extreme south-east of Czecho- slovakia, has been elevated into one of the danger-points of Europe by the settlement at Munich, which encouraged the Hungarians to claim Czechoslovak territory on the same basis as Germans. On the Hungarian frontier there have been continual clashes, with many casualties, between the Czech troops and Hungarian Freikorps. Hungary has not sufficient strength, militarily or diplomatically, to .obtain her demands by force, and for that reason the negotiations with Czecho- slovakia have been protracted to a point exasperating to Hungarian tempers. A just settlement could probably be obtained by a cession of the rich plains, with their Magyar population, the mountainous areas being retained within the autonomous Ruthenian State. But the mountains are depen- dent economically on the plains, and the Hungarians will not be satisfied with less than gives them a common frontier with Poland. But such a settlement would both cut off Germany's approach to Rumania through Ruthenia, and prevent the establishment of a State which could be used by Germany in support of Ukrainian nationalism. The conflict between these ambitions greatly strengthens Czechoslovakia's hand in the negotiations with Hungary and gives Ruthenia a greater chance of survival in substantially its present form than may be completely justifiable on ethnographical grounds.
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