Paris 1919 - Margaret Macmillan [194]
Lloyd George and Clemenceau were equally annoyed. “I told Orlando,” said Clemenceau, “that he thought I was the sainted King Stanislas of Poland who, when he was bitten by a dog, not only pardoned the animal but gave him a chunk of cheese in addition. Well, my name is Georges, not Stanislas. I am not giving cheese to the boys who scampered away from Caporetto. I shall live up to our treaty pledge, and in addition I shall convey a frank expression of my profound contempt. But I shall give no extras.” Clemenceau privately asked the Italians to back down.42 The Italians reiterated that the Treaty of London must be kept.
Wilson, not surprisingly, failed to produce a compromise. With his experts reminding him of his remark on the way over to Europe—“Tell me what’s right and I’ll fight for it”—he was digging in his heels. He repeatedly assured those close to him that he was not going to let the Italians get Fiume. When Baker, who saw him almost every evening, reported that he had told an Italian delegate that if Italy chose to leave the conference over Fiume, then the United States would feel under no obligation to continue its economic aid, Wilson replied: “That is exactly what you should have said.”43
A meeting on April 14 between Wilson and Orlando was, according to the Italians, “very stormy.” Wilson described it to House as one of the worst experiences of his life, comparable to the time when he had had to listen to the mother of a student he had expelled from Princeton tell him that her son was about to have an operation and would probably die. Wilson gave Orlando a memorandum in which he said he had made the German peace on the basis of the Fourteen Points and that he could not now make the peace with Austria on a different one. Orlando told his delegation that the memorandum left no room for discussion.44
On April 19, the Saturday before Easter, what were to be six solid days of discussions began. The Italians, almost at once, talked of Passion Week. “I am indeed a new Christ,” said Orlando, “and must suffer my passion for the salvation of my country.” He threatened to leave, whatever the consequences. “I understand the tragic solemnity of this moment. Italy will suffer from this decision. For her, it is only a question of choosing between two deaths.” Lloyd George asked: “On account of Fiume? On account of a city where there are 24,000 Italians and where, if you count the population of the suburbs, the Italian majority is very doubtful?” He begged the Italians to think of what would happen if the Americans responded by pulling out. “I do not know how Europe can get back on its feet if the United States does not stay with us and help us to oil the machinery.” 45
Wilson urged the Italians to think in new terms. “In America there is disgust with the old order of things; but not only in America: the whole world is weary of it.” The Italians were unmoved. As Sonnino told Wilson, “after a war requiring such enormous sacrifices, in which Italy has had 500,000 killed and 900,000 disabled, it is not conceivable that we should return to a worse situation than before the war; certain islands on the Dalmatian coast were conceded to us even by Austria-Hungary to secure our neutrality. You would not even grant us these; that could not be explained to the Italian people.” He regretted negotiating Italy’s entry into the war on the