Thus the great waterways of Germany are handed over to foreign bodies with the widest powers; and much of the local and domestic business of Hamburg, Magdeburg, Dresden, Stettin, Frankfurt, Breslan, and Ulm will be subject to a foreign jurisdiction.  It is almost as though the Powers of Continental Europe were to be placed in a majority on the Thames Conservancy or the Port of London.

Certain minor provisions follow lines which in our survey of the Treaty are now familiar.  Under Annex III. of the Reparation Chapter Germany is to cede up to 20 per cent of her inland navigation tonnage.  Over and above this she must cede such proportion of her river craft upon the Elbe, the Oder, the Niemen, and the Danube as an American arbitrator may determine, “due regard being had to the legitimate needs of the parties concerned, and particularly to the shipping traffic during the five years preceding the war,” the craft so ceded to be selected from those most recently built.[72] The same course is to be followed with German vessels and tugs on the Rhine and with German property in the port of Rotterdam.[73] Where the Rhine flows between France and Germany, France is to have all the rights of utilizing the water for irrigation or for power and Germany is to have none;[74] and all the bridges are to be French property as to their whole length.[75] Finally the administration of the purely German Rhine port of Kehl lying on the eastern bank of the river is to be united to that of Strassburg for seven years and managed by a Frenchman to be nominated by the new Rhine Commission.

Thus the Economic Clauses of the Treaty are comprehensive, and little has been overlooked which might impoverish Germany now or obstruct her development in future.  So situated, Germany is to make payments of money, on a scale and in a manner to be examined in the next chapter.

FOOTNOTES: 

[7] The precise force of this reservation is discussed in detail in Chapter V.

[8] I also omit those which have no special relevance to the German Settlement.  The second of the Fourteen Points, which relates to the Freedom of the Seas, is omitted because the Allies did not accept it.  Any italics are mine.

[9] Part VIII.  Annex III. (1).

[10] Part VIII.  Annex III. (3).

[11] In the years before the war the average shipbuilding output of Germany was about 350,000 tons annually, exclusive of warships.

[12] Part VIII.  Annex III. (5).

[13] Art. 119.

[14] Arts. 120 and 257.

[15] Art. 122.

[16] Arts. 121 and 297(b).  The exercise or non-exercise of this option of expropriation appears to lie, not with the Reparation Commission, but with the particular Power in whose territory the property has become situated by cession or mandation.

[17] Art. 297 (h) and para. 4 of Annex to Part X. Section IV.