during the transition period while our State was in course of construction, to the effect that Marshal Foch should remain Commander-in-Chief of our armies on all fronts. On December 17th I submitted the matter to Clemenceau in writing, and on February 14, 1919, I signed a convention with France which was to hold good as long as Marshal Foch remained Commander-in-Chief of all Allied armies.
Finally, I turned my attention to the problem of maintaining the food supply at home with Allied help, and to the preparations for the Peace Conference. The problem of the food supply at this juncture was of vital importance to the new State, since it closely involved the maintenance of order and the protection of large areas from Bolshevism. The French Government and all the Allied representatives who were officially deputed for this purpose granted me, by progressive stages, full authority in these matters, so that little by little, with the help of our troops, I was able to contribute substantially towards the organization of the import of essential food-stuffs via Hamburg and Trieste. In these two ports the Allied Governments established missions which at that critical period rendered valuable services to our people at home.
The Americans in Paris, who were dealing with the provisioning of Czechoslovakia on behalf of the Allied authorities, showed themselves extremely considerate towards us, but in accordance with their instructions they demanded that from what we had or received we should render assistance also to the Germans and Austrians wherever there was a risk of Bolshevism, principally in Vienna. This was entirely in our own interests. I was anxious to show that the orderly elements prevailed amongst us, and I did not want the differences with our neighbours to loom too large at the moment of victory. I therefore made a point of promoting our help to Vienna also by means of food supplies. I further aimed at reducing to a minimum any friction which was likely to arise over our minorities and in connection with Slovakia.
As regards preparations for the Peace Conference, I began to make them at Paris in the early days of December; and in accordance with what I had arranged on this subject with our delegates at Geneva I instructed Prague also to begin preparations. The thoughts of the Allied circles in Paris were concentrated entirely on the Conference as soon as the Armistice had been signed, and if it was not convened until January, the
