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ARMAGEDDON--AND AFTER
BY
W.L. COURTNEY, M.A., LL.D.
LONDON
CHAPMAN & HALL, LTD.
1914
DEDICATED
WITH ALL HUMILITY AND ADMIRATION
TO
THE YOUNG IDEALISTS OF ALL COUNTRIES
WHO WILL NOT ALLOW THE DREAMS OF THEIR
YOUTH TO BE TARNISHED BY THE
EXPERIENCES OF AN
OUTWORN AGE
PREFACE
I dedicate this little book to the young idealists of this and other
countries, for several reasons. They must, obviously, be young, because
their older contemporaries, with a large amount of experience of earlier
conditions, will hardly have the courage to deal with the novel data. I
take it that, after the conclusion of the present war, there will come an
uneasy period of exhaustion and anxiety when we shall be told that those
who hold military power in their hands are alone qualified to act as
saviours of society. That conclusion, as I understand the matter, young
idealists will strenuously oppose. They will be quite aware that all the
conservative elements will be against them; they will appreciate also the
eagerness with which a large number of people will point out that the
safest way is to leave matters more or less alone, and to allow the
situation to be controlled by soldiers and diplomatists. Of course there
is obvious truth in the assertion that the immediate settlement of peace
conditions must, to a large extent, be left in the hands of those who
brought the war to a successful conclusion. But the relief from pressing
anxiety when this horrible strife is over, and the feeling of gratitude to
those who have delivered us must not be allowed to gild and consecrate, as
it were, systems proved effete and policies which intelligent men
recognise as bankrupt. The moment of deliverance will be too unique and
too splendid to be left in the hands of men who have grown, if not
cynical, at all events a little weary of the notorious defects of
humanity, and who are, perhaps naturally, tempted to allow European
progress to fall back into the old well-worn ruts. It is the young men who
must take the matter in hand, with their ardent hopes and their keen
imagination, and only so far as they believe in the possibility of a great
amelioration will they have any chance of doing yeoman service for
humanity.
The dawn of a new era must be plenarily accepted as a wonderful
opportunity for reform. If viewed in any other spirit, the splendours of
the morning will soon give way before the obstinate clouds hanging on the
horizon. In some fashion or other it must be acknowledged that older
methods of dealing with international affairs have been tried and found
wanting. It must be admitted that the ancient principles helped to bring
about the tremendous catastrophe in which we are at present involved, and
that a thorough re-organisation is required if the new Europe is to start
under better auspices. That is why I appeal to the younger idealists,
because they are not likely to be deterred by inveterate prejudices; they
will be only too eager to examine things with a fresh intelligence of
their own. Somehow or other we must get rid of the absurd idea that the
nations of Europe are always on the look out to do each other an injury.
We have to establish the doctrines of Right on a proper basis, and
dethrone that ugly phantom of Might, which is the object of Potsdam
worship. International law must be built up with its proper sanctions; and
virtues, which are Christian and humane, must find their proper place in
the ordinary dealings of states with one another. Much clever dialectics
will probably be employed in order to prove that idealistic dreams are
vain. Young men will not be afraid of such arguments; they will not be
deterred by purely logical difficulties. Let us remember that this war has
been waged in order to make war for the future impossible. If that be the
presiding idea of men's minds, they will keep their reforming course
steadily directed towards ideal ends, patiently working for the
reconstruction of Europe and a better lot for humanity at large.
Once more let me repeat that it is only young idealists who are sufficient
for these things. They may call themselves democrats, or socialists, or
futurists, or merely reformers. The name is unimportant: the main point is
that they must thoroughly examine their creed in the light of their finest
hopes and aspirations. They will not be the slaves of any formulæ, and
they will hold out their right hands to every man--whatever may be the
label he puts on his theories--who is striving in single-minded devotion
for a millennial peace. The new era will have to be of a spiritual,
ethical type. Coarser forms of materialism, whether in thought or life,
will have to be banished, because the scales have at last dropped from our
eyes, and we intend to regard a human being no longer as a thing of
luxury, or wealth, or greedy passions, but as the possessor of a living
soul.
W.L.C.
_November 10, 1914._
* * * * *
I wish to acknowledge my obligation to Mr. H.N. Brailsford's _The War of
Steel and Gold_ (Bell). I do not pretend to agree with all that Mr.
Brailsford says: but I have found his book always interesting, and
sometimes inspiring.
CONTENTS
PAGE
CHAPTER I
PROBLEMS OF THE FUTURE 1
CHAPTER II
LESSONS OF THE PAST 32
CHAPTER III
SOME SUGGESTED REFORMS 63
ARMAGEDDON--AND AFTER
CHAPTER I
PROBLEMS OF THE FUTURE
The newspapers have lately been making large quotations from the poems of
Mr. Rudyard Kipling. They might, if they had been so minded, have laid
under similar contribution the Revelation of St. John the Divine. There,
too, with all the imagery usual in Apocalyptic literature, is to be found
a description of vague and confused fighting, when most of the Kings of
the earth come together to fight a last and desperate battle. The Seven
Angels go forth, each armed with a vial, the first poisoning the earth,
the second the sea, the third the rivers and fountains of waters, the
fourth the sun. Then out of the mouth of the dragon, of the beast, and of
the Antichrist come the lying spirits which persuade the Kings of the
earth to gather all the people for that great day of God Almighty "into a
place called in the Hebrew tongue Armageddon." Translated into our
language the account might very well serve for the modern assemblage of
troops in which nearly all the kingdoms of the earth have to play their
part, with few, and not very important, exceptions. It is almost absurd to
speak of the events of the past three months as though they were merely
incidents in a great and important campaign. There is nothing in history
like them so far as we are aware. In the clash of the two great European
organisations--the Triple Alliance and the Triple Entente--we have all
those wild features of universal chaos which the writer of the Apocalypse
saw with prophetic eye as ushering in the great day of the Lord, and
paving the way for a New Heaven and a New Earth.
A COLOSSAL UPHEAVAL
It is a colossal upheaval. But what sort of New Heaven and New Earth is it
likely to usher in? This is a question which it is hardly too early to
discuss, for it makes a vast difference, to us English in especial, if,
fighting for what we deem to be a just cause, we can look forward to an
issue in the long run beneficial to ourselves and the world. We know the
character of the desperate conflict which has yet to be accomplished
before our eyes. Everything points to a long stern war, which cannot be
completed in a single campaign. Every one knows that Lord Kitchener is
supposed to have prophesied a war of three years, and we can hardly ignore
the opinion of so good a judge. If we ask why, the obvious answer is that
every nation engaged is not fighting for mere victory in battle, nor yet
for extension of territory; but for something more important than these.
They fight for the triumph of their respective ideas, and it will make the
greatest difference to Europe and the world which of the ideas is
eventually conqueror. Supposing the German invasion of France ends in
failure; that, clearly, will not finish the war. Supposing even that
Berlin is taken by the Russians, we cannot affirm that so great an event
will necessarily complete the campaign. The whole of Germany will have to
be invaded and subdued, and that is a process which will take a very long
time even under the most favourable auspices. Or take the opposite
hypothesis. Let us suppose that the Germans capture Paris, and manage by
forced marches to defend their country against the Muscovite incursion.
Even so, nothing is accomplished of a lasting character. France will go on
fighting as she did after 1870, and we shall be found at her side. Or,
assuming the worst hypothesis of all, that France lies prostrate under the
heel of her German conqueror, does any one suppose that Great Britain
will desist from fighting? We know perfectly well that, with the aid of
our Fleet, we shall still be in a position to defy the German invader and
make use of our enormous reserves to wear out even Teutonic obstinacy. The
great sign and seal of this battle to the death is the recent covenant
entered into by the three members of the Triple Entente.[1] They have
declared in the most formal fashion, over the signatures of their three
representatives, Sir Edward Grey, M. Paul Cambon, and Count Benckendorff,
that they will not make a separate peace, that they will continue to act
in unison, and fight, not as three nations, but as one. Perhaps one of the
least expected results of the present conjuncture is that the Triple
Entente, which was supposed to possess less cohesive efficiency than the
rival organisation, has proved, on the contrary, the stronger of the two.
The Triple Alliance is not true to its name. Italy, the third and
unwilling member, still preserves her neutrality, and declares that her
interests are not immediately involved.
[1] Subsequently joined by Japan.
NEVER AGAIN!
In order to attempt to discover the vast changes that are likely to come
as a direct consequence of the present Armageddon, it is necessary to
refer in brief retrospect to some of the main causes and features of the
great European war. Meanwhile, I think the general feeling amongst all
thoughtful men is best expressed in the phrase, "Never again." Never again
must we have to face the possibility of such a world-wide catastrophe.
Never again must it be possible for the pursuit of merely selfish
interests to work such colossal havoc. Never again must we have war as the
only solution of national differences. Never again must all the arts of
peace be suspended while Europe rings to the tramp of armed millions.
Never again must spiritual, moral, artistic culture be submerged under a
wave of barbarism. Never again must the Ruler of this Universe be
addressed as the "God of battles." Never again shall a new Wordsworth hail
"carnage" as "God's daughter." The illogicality of it all is too patent.
That everything which we respect and revere in the way of science or
thought, or culture, or music, or poetry, or drama, should be cast into
the melting-pot to satisfy dynastic ambition is a thing too puerile as
well as too appalling to be even considered. And the horror of it all is
something more than our nerves will stand. The best brains and intellects
of Europe, the brightest and most promising youths, all the manhood
everywhere in Europe to be shrivelled and consumed in a holocaust like
this--it is such a reign of the Devil and Antichrist on earth that it must
be banished in perpetuity if civilisation and progress are to endure.
Never again!
UNEXPECTED WAR
How did we get into such a stupid and appalling calamity? Let us think for
a moment. I do not suppose it would be wrong to say that no one ever
expected war in our days. Take up any of the recent books. With the
exception of the fiery martial pamphlets of Germany, the work of a von der
Goltz or a Treitschke, or a Bernhardi, we shall find a general consensus
of opinion that war on a large scale was impossible because too ruinous,
that the very size of the European armaments made war impracticable. Or
else, to take the extreme case of Mr. Norman Angell, the entanglements of
modern finance were said to have put war out of count as an absurdity. We
were a little too hasty in our judgments. It is clear that a single
determined man, if he is powerful enough, may embroil Europe. However
destructive modern armaments may be, and however costly a campaign may
prove, yet there are men who will face the cost and confront the
wholesale destruction of life that modern warfare entails. How pitiful it
is, how strange also, to look back upon the solemn asseveration of the
Kaiser and the Tsar, not so many months ago (Port Baltic, July 1912), that
the division of Europe into the two great confederations known as the
Triple Alliance and the Triple Entente provided a safeguard against
hostilities! We were constantly assured that diplomats were working for a
Balance of Power, such an equilibrium of rival forces that the total
result would be stability and peace. Arbitration, too, was considered by
many as the panacea, to say nothing of the Hague Palace of Peace. And now
we discover that nations may possibly refer to arbitration points of small
importance in their quarrels, but that the greater things which are
supposed to touch national honour and the preservation of national life
are tacitly, if not formally, exempted from the category of arbitrable
disputes. Diplomacy, Arbitration, Palaces of Peace seem equally useless.
PROXIMATE AND ULTIMATE CAUSES
In attempting to understand how Europe has (to use Lord Rosebery's phrase)
"rattled into barbarism" in the uncompromising fashion which we see
before our eyes, we must distinguish between recent operative causes and
those more slowly evolving antecedent conditions which play a
considerable, though not necessarily an obvious part in the result. Recent
operative causes are such things as the murder of the Archduke Franz
Ferdinand at Serajevo, the consequent Austrian ultimatum to Servia, the
hasty and intemperate action of the Kaiser in forcing war, and--from a
more general point of view--the particular form of militarism prevalent in
Germany. Ulterior antecedent conditions are to be found in the changing
history of European States and their mutual relations in the last quarter
of a century; the ambition of Germany to create an Imperial fleet; the
ambition of Germany to have "a place in the sun" and become a large
colonial power; the formation of a Triple Entente following on the
formation of a Triple Alliance; the rivalry between Teuton and Slav; and
the mutations of diplomacy and _Real-politik_. It is not always possible
to keep the two sets of causes, the recent and the ulterior, separate, for
they naturally tend either to overlap or to interpenetrate one another.
German Militarism, for instance, is only a specific form of the general
ambition of Germany, and the Austrian desire to avenge herself on Servia
is a part of her secular animosity towards Slavdom and its protector,
Russia. Nor yet, when we are considering the present _débâcle_ of
civilisation, need we interest ourselves overmuch in the immediate
occasions and circumstances of the huge quarrel. We want to know not how
Europe flared into war, but why. Our object is so to understand the
present imbroglio as to prevent, if we can, the possibility for the future
of any similar world-wide catastrophe.
EUROPEAN DICTATORS
Let us fix our attention on one or two salient points. Europe has often
been accustomed to watch with anxiety the rise of some potent arbiter of
her destinies who seems to arrogate to himself a large personal dominion.
There was Philip II. There was Louis XIV. There was Napoleon a hundred
years ago. Then, a mere shadow of his great ancestor, there was Napoleon
III. Then, after the Franco-German war, there was Bismarck. Now it is
Kaiser Wilhelm II. The emergence of some ambitious personality naturally
makes Europe suspicious and watchful, and leads to the formation of
leagues and confederations against him. The only thing, however, which
seems to have any power of real resistance to the potential tyrant is not
the manoeuvring of diplomats, but the steady growth of democracy in
Europe, which, in virtue of its character and principles, steadily objects
to the despotism of any given individual, and the arbitrary designs of a
personal will. We had hoped that the spread of democracies in all European
nations would progressively render dynastic wars an impossibility. The
peoples would cry out, we hoped, against being butchered to make a holiday
for any latter-day Cæsar. But democracy is a slow growth, and exists in
very varying degrees of strength in different parts of our continent.
Evidently it has not yet discovered its own power. We have sadly to
recognise that its range of influence and the new spirit which it seeks to
introduce into the world are as yet impotent against the personal
ascendancy of a monarch and the old conceptions of high politics. European
democracy is still too vague, too dispersed, too unorganised, to prevent
the breaking out of a bloody international conflict.
THE PERSONAL FACTOR
Europe then has still to reckon with the personal factor--with all its
vagaries and its desolating ambitions. Let us see how this has worked in
the case before us. In 1888 the present German Emperor ascended the
throne. Two years afterwards, in March 1890, the Pilot was
dropped--Bismarck resigned. The change was something more than a mere
substitution of men like Caprivi and Hohenlohe for the Iron Chancellor.
There was involved a radical alteration in policy. The Germany which was
the ideal of Bismarck's dreams was an exceedingly prosperous
self-contained country, which should flourish mainly because it developed
its internal industries as well as paid attention to its agriculture, and
secured its somewhat perilous position in the centre of Europe by skilful
diplomatic means of sowing dissension amongst its neighbours. Thus
Bismarck discouraged colonial extensions. He thought they might weaken
Germany. On the other hand, he encouraged French colonial policy, because
he thought it would divert the French from their preoccupation with the
idea of _revanche_. He played, more or less successfully, with England,
sometimes tempting her with plausible suggestions that she should join the
Teutonic Empires on the Continent, sometimes thwarting her aims by sowing
dissensions between her and her nearest neighbour, France. But there was
one empire which, certainly, Bismarck dreaded not so much because she was
actually of much importance, but because she might be. That empire was
Russia. The last thing in the world Bismarck desired was precisely that
approximation between France and Russia which ended in the strange
phenomenon of an offensive and defensive alliance between a western
republic and a semi-eastern despotic empire.
KAISER WILHELM
Kaiser Wilhelm II had very different ideals for Germany, and in many
points he simply reversed the policy of Bismarck. He began to develop the
German colonial empire, and in order that it might be protected he did all
in his power to encourage the formation of a large German navy. He even
allowed himself to say that "the future of Germany was on the sea." It was
part of that peculiar form of personal autocracy which the Kaiser
introduced that he should from time to time invent phrases suggestive of
different principles of his policy. Side by side with the assertion that
Germany's future was on the sea, we have the phrases "Germany wants her
place in the sun" and that the "drag" of Teutonic development is "towards
the East." The reality and imminence of "a yellow peril" was another of
his devices for stimulating the efforts of his countrymen. Thus the new
policy was expansion, evolution as a world-power, colonisation; and each
in turn brought him up against the older arrangement of European Powers.
His colonial policy, especially in Africa, led to collisions with both
France and Great Britain. The building of the fleet, the Kiel Canal, and
other details of maritime policy naturally made England very suspicious,
while the steady drag towards the East rendered wholly unavoidable the
conflict between Teutonism and the Slav races. Germany looked,
undoubtedly, towards Asia Minor, and for this reason made great advances
to and many professions of friendship for the Ottoman Empire. Turkey,
indeed, in several phrases was declared to be "the natural ally" of
Germany in the Near East. And if we ask why, the answer nowadays is
obvious. Not only was Turkey to lend herself to the encouragement of
German commercial enterprise in Asia Minor, but she was, in the judgment
of the Emperor, the one power which could in time of trouble make herself
especially obnoxious to Great Britain. She could encourage revolt in
Egypt, and still more, through the influence of Mahommedanism, stir up
disaffection in India.[2]
[2] Turkey has now joined Germany.
AN AGGRESSIVE POLICY
And now let us watch this policy in action in recent events. In 1897
Germany demanded reparation from China for the recent murder of two German
missionaries. Troops were landed at Kiao-chau Bay, a large pecuniary
indemnity of about £35,000 was refused, and Kiao-chau itself with the
adjacent territory was ceded to Germany. That was a significant
demonstration of the Emperor's determination to make his country a
world-power, so that, as was stated afterwards, nothing should occur in
the whole world in which Germany would not have her say. Meanwhile, in
Europe itself event after event occurred to prove the persistent character
of German aggressiveness. On March 31, 1905, the German Emperor landed at
Tangier, in order to aid the Sultan of Morocco in his demand for a
Conference of the Powers to check the military dispositions of France. M.
Delcassé, France's Foreign Minister, demurred to this proposal, asserting
that a Conference was wholly unnecessary. Thereupon Prince Bülow used
menacing language, and Delcassé resigned in June 1905. The Conference of
Algeçiras was held in January 1906, in which Austria proved herself "a
brilliant second" to Germany. Two years afterwards, in 1908, came still
further proofs of Germany's ambition. Austria annexed Bosnia and
Herzegovina. Russia immediately protested; so did most of the other Great
Powers. But Germany at once took up the Austrian cause, and stood "in
shining armour" side by side with her ally. Inasmuch as Russia was, in
1908, only just recovering from the effects of her disastrous war with
Japan, and was therefore in no condition to take the offensive, the Triple
Alliance gained a distinct victory. Three years later occurred another
striking event. In July 1911 the world was startled by the news that the
German gunboat _Panther_, joined shortly afterwards by the cruiser
_Berlin_, had been sent to Agadir. Clearly Berlin intended to reopen the
whole Moroccan question, and the tension between the Powers was for some
time acute. Nor did Mr. Lloyd George make it much better by a fiery speech
at the Mansion House on July 21, which considerably fluttered the
Continental dovecots. The immediate problem, however, was solved by the
cession of about one hundred thousand square miles of territory in the
Congo basin by France to Germany in compensation for German acquiescence
in the French protectorate over Morocco. I need not, perhaps, refer to
other more recent events. One point, however, must not be omitted. The
issue of the Balkan wars in 1912 caused a distinct disappointment to both
Germany and Austria. Turkey's defeat lessened the importance of the
Ottoman Empire as an ally. Austria had to curb her desires in the
direction of Salonica. And the enemies who had prevented the realisation
of wide Teutonic schemes were Servia and her protector, Russia. From this
time onwards Austria waited for an opportunity to avenge herself on
Servia, while Germany, in close union with her ally, began to study the
situation in relation to the Great Northern Empire in an eminently
bellicose spirit.
MILITARISM
Now that we have the proper standpoint from which to watch the general
tendency of events like these, we can form some estimate of the nature of
German ambition and the results of the personal ascendancy of the Kaiser.
We speak vaguely of militarism. Fortunately, we have a very valuable
document to enable us to understand what precisely German militarism
signifies. General von Bernhardi's _Germany and the Next War_ is one of
the most interesting, as well as most suggestive, of books, intended to
illustrate the spirit of German ambition. Bernhardi writes like a
soldier. Such philosophy as he possesses he has taken from Nietzsche. His
applications of history come from Treitschke. He has persuaded himself
that the main object of human life is war, and the higher the nation the
more persistently must it pursue preparations for war. Hence the best men
in the State are the fighting men. Ethics and religion, so far as they
deprecate fighting and plead for peace, are absolutely pernicious. Culture
does not mean, as we hoped and thought, the best development of scientific
and artistic enlightenment, but merely an all-absorbing will-power, an
all-devouring ambition to be on the top and to crush every one else. The
assumption throughout is that the German is the highest specimen of
humanity. Germany is especially qualified to be the leader, and the only
way in which it can become the leader is to have such overwhelming
military power that no one has any chance of resisting. Moreover, all
methods are justified in the sacred cause of German culture--duplicity,
violence, the deliberate sowing of dissensions between possible rivals,
incitements of Asiatics to rise against Europeans. All means are to be
adopted to win the ultimate great victory, and, of course, when the
struggle comes there must be no misplaced leniency to any of the inferior
races who interpose between Germany and her legitimate place in the
sun.[3] The ideal is almost too naïve and too ferocious to be conceived by
ordinary minds. Yet here it all stands in black and white. According to
Bernhardi's volume German militarism means at least two things. First the
suppression of every other nationality except the German; second the
suppression of the whole civilian element in the population under the heel
of the German drill-sergeant. Is it any wonder that the recent war has
been conducted by Berlin with such appalling barbarism and ferocity?
[3] _Germany and the Next War_, by F. von Bernhardi. See especially Chap.
V, "World-Power or Downfall." Other works which may be consulted are
Professor J.A. Cramb's _Germany and England_ (esp. pp. 111-112) and
Professor Usher's _Pan-Germanism_.
THE EVILS OF AUTOCRACY
Our inquiry so far has led to two conclusions. We have discovered by
bitter experience that a personal ascendancy, such as the German Emperor
wields, is in the highest degree perilous to the interests of peace: and
that a militarism such as that which holds in its thrall the German Empire
is an open menace to intellectual culture and to Christian ethics. But we
must not suppose that these conclusions are only true so far as they apply
to the Teutonic race, and that the same phenomena observed elsewhere are
comparatively innocuous. Alas! autocracy in any and every country seems to
be inimical to the best and highest of social needs, and militarism,
wherever found, is the enemy of pacific social development. Let us take a
few instances at haphazard of the danger of the personal factor in
European politics. There is hardly a person to be found nowadays who
defends the Crimean war, or indeed thinks that it was in any sense
inevitable. Yet if there was one man more than another whose personal will
brought it about, it was--not Lord Aberdeen who ought to have been
responsible--but Lord Stratford de Redcliffe. "The great Eltchi," as he
was called, was our Ambassador at Constantinople, a man of uncommon
strength of will, which, as is often the case with these powerful natures,
not infrequently degenerated into sheer obstinacy. He had made up his mind
that England was to support Turkey and fight with Russia, and inasmuch as
Louis Napoleon, for the sake of personal glory, had similar opinions,
France as well as England was dragged into a costly and quite useless war.
Napoleon III has already figured among those aspiring monarchs who wish
"to sit in the chair of Europe." It was his personal will once more which
sent the unhappy Maximilian to his death in Mexico, and his personal
jealousy of Prussia which launched him in the fatal enterprise "à Berlin"
in 1870. In the latter case we find another personal influence, still more
sinister--that of the Empress Eugénie, whose capricious ambition and
interference in military matters directly led to the ruinous disaster of
Sedan. The French people, who had to suffer, discovered it too late.
"Quicquid delirant reges plectuntur Achivi." Or take another more recent
instance. Who was responsible for the Russo-Japanese war? Not Kuropatkin,
assuredly, nor yet the Russian Prime Minister, but certain of the Grand
Dukes and probably the Tsar himself, who were interested in the forests of
the Yalu district and had no mind to lose the money they had invested in a
purely financial operation. The truth is that modern Europe has no room
for "prancing Pro-consuls," and no longer takes stock in autocrats. They
are, or ought to be, superannuated, out of date. To use an expressive
colloquialism they are "a back number." The progress of the world demands
the development of peoples; it has no use for mediæval monarchies like
that of Potsdam. One of the things we ought to banish for ever is the
horrible idea that whole nations can be massacred and civilisation
indefinitely postponed to suit the individual caprice of a bragging and
self-opinionated despot who calls himself God's elect. Now that we know
the ruin he can cause, let us fight shy of the Superman, and the whole
range of ideas which he connotes.
THE MILITARY CASTE
Militarism is another of our maladies. Here we must distinguish with some
care. A military spirit is one thing: militarism is another. It is
probable that no nation is worthy to survive which does not possess a
military spirit, or, in other words, the instinct to defend itself and its
liberties against an aggressor. It is a virtue which is closely interfused
with high moral qualities--self-respect, a proper pride,
self-reliance--and is compatible with real modesty and sobriety of mind.
But militarism has nothing ethical about it. It is not courage, but sheer
pugnacity and quarrelsomeness, and as exemplified in our modern history it
means the dominion of a clique, the reign of a few self-opinionated
officials. That these individuals should possess only a limited
intelligence is almost inevitable. Existing for the purposes of war, they
naturally look at everything from an oblique and perverted point of view.
They regard nations, not as peaceful communities of citizens, but as
material to be worked up into armies. Their assumption is that war, being
an indelible feature in the history of our common humanity, must be
ceaselessly prepared for by the piling up of huge armaments and weapons of
destruction. Their invariable motto is that if you wish for peace you must
prepare for war--"si vis pacem, para bellum"--a notoriously false
apophthegm, because armaments are provocative, not soothing, and the man
who is a swash-buckler invites attack. It is needless to say that
thousands of military men do not belong to this category: no one dreads
war so much as the man who knows what it means. I am not speaking of
individuals, I am speaking of a particular caste, military officials in
the abstract, if you like to put it so, who, because their business is
war, have not the slightest idea what the pacific social development of a
people really means. Militarism is simply a one-sided, partial point of
view, and to enforce that upon a nation is as though a man with a
pronounced squint were to be accepted as a man of normal vision. We have
seen what it involves in Germany. In a less offensive form, however, it
exists in most states, and its root idea is usually that the civilian as
such belongs to a lower order of humanity, and is not so important to the
State as the officer who discharges vague and for the most part useless
functions in the War Office.[4] It is a swollen, over-developed militarism
that has got us into the present mess, and one of our earliest concerns,
when the storm is over, must be to put it into its proper place. Let him
who uses the sword perish by the sword.
[4] Thus it was the Military party in Bulgaria which drove her to the
disastrous second Balkan war, and the Military party in Austria which
insisted on the ultimatum to Servia.
DIPLOMACY
And I fear that there is another ancient piece of our international
strategy which has been found wanting. I approach with some hesitation the
subject of diplomacy, because it contains so many elements of value to a
state, and has given so many opportunities for active and original minds.
Its worst feature is that its operations have to be conducted in secret:
its best is that it affords a fine exemplification of the way in which the
history and fortunes of states are--to their advantage--dependent upon
the initiative of gifted and patriotic individuals. But if we look back
over the history of recent years, we shall discover that diplomacy has not
fulfilled its especial mission. According to a well-known cynical dictum a
diplomatist is a man who is paid to lie for his country. And, indeed, it
is one of the least gracious aspects of the diplomatic career that it
seems necessarily to involve the use of a certain amount of chicanery and
falsehood, the object being to jockey opponents by means of skilful ruses
into a position in which they find themselves at a disadvantage. Clearly,
however, there are better aims than these for diplomacy--one aim in
particular, which is the preservation of peace. A diplomat is supposed to
have failed if the result of his work leads to war. It is not his business
to bring about war. Any king or prime minister or general can do that,
very often with conspicuous ease. A diplomat is a skilful statesman
versed in international politics, who makes the best provision he can for
the interests of his country, carefully steering it away from those rocks
of angry hostility on which possibly his good ship may founder.
BALANCE OF POWER
Now what has diplomacy done for us during the last few years? It has
formed certain understandings and alliances between different states; it
has tried to safeguard our position by creating sympathetic bonds with
those nations who are allied to us in policy. It has also attempted to
produce that kind of "Balance of Power" in Europe which on its own showing
makes for peace. This Balance of Power, so often and so mysteriously
alluded to by the diplomatic world, has become a veritable fetish. Perhaps
its supreme achievement was reached when two autocratic monarchs--the Tsar
of Russia and the German Emperor--solemnly propounded a statement, as we
have seen, at Port Baltic that the Balance of Power, as distributed
between the Triple Alliance and the Triple Entente, had proved itself
valuable in the interests of European peace. That was only two years ago,
and the thing seems a mockery now. If we examine precisely what is meant
by a Balance of Power, we shall see that it presupposes certain conditions
of animosity and attempts to neutralise them by the exhibition of superior
or, at all events, equivalent forces. A Balance of Power in the
continental system assumes, for all practical purposes, that the nations
of Europe are ready to fly at each other's throats, and that the only way
to deter them is to make them realise how extremely perilous to themselves
would be any such military enterprise. Can any one doubt that this is the
real meaning of the phrase? If we listen to the Delphic oracles of
diplomacy on this subject of the Balance of Power, we shall understand
that in nine cases out of ten a man invoking this phrase means that he
wants the Balance of Power to be favourable to himself. It is not so much
an exact equipoise that he desires, as a certain tendency of the scales to
dip in his direction. If Germany feels herself weak she not only
associates Austria and Italy with herself, but looks eastward to get the
assistance of Turkey, or, perhaps, attempts--as it so happens without any
success--to create sympathy for herself in the United States of America.
If, on the other hand, France feels herself in danger, she not only forms
an alliance with Russia, but also an entente with England and, on the
principle that the friends of one's friends ought to be accepted, produces
a further entente between England and Russia. England, on her part, if for
whatever reason she feels that she is liable to attack, goes even so far
as to make an alliance with an Asiatic nation--Japan--in order to
safeguard her Asiatic interests in India. Thus, when diplomatists invoke
the necessity of a Balance of Power, they are really trying to work for a
preponderance of power on their side. It is inevitable that this should be
so. An exact Balance of Power must result in a stalemate.
CHANGE OF POLICY
Observe what has happened to Great Britain during recent years. When she
was ruled by that extremely clear-headed though obstinate statesman, Lord
Salisbury, she remained, at his advice, outside the circle of continental
entanglements and rejoiced in what was known as a policy of "Splendid
Isolation." It was, of course, a selfish policy. It rested on sound
geographical grounds, because, making use of the fortunate accident that
Great Britain is an island, it suggested that she could pursue her own
commercial career and, thanks to the English Channel, let the whole of the
rest of the world go hang. Such a position could not possibly last, partly
because Great Britain is not only an island, but also an empire scattered
over the seven seas; partly because we could not remain alien from those
social and economic interests which necessarily link our career with
continental nations. So we became part of the continental system, and it
became necessary for us to choose friends and partners and mark off other
peoples as our enemies. It might have been possible a certain number of
years ago for us to join the Triple Alliance. At one time Prince Bülow
seemed anxious that we should do so, and Mr. Chamberlain on our side was
by no means unwilling. But gradually we discovered that Germany was
intensely jealous of us as a colonial power and as a great sea-power, and
for this reason, as well as for others, we preferred to compose our
ancient differences with France and promote an understanding between
English and French as the nearest of neighbours and the most convenient of
allies. Observe, however, that every step in the process was a challenge,
and a challenge which the rival aimed at could not possibly ignore. The
conclusion of the French Entente Cordiale in 1904, the launching of the
_Dreadnought_ in 1906, the formation of the Russian agreement in 1907, and
certain changes which we made in our own army were obviously intended as
warnings to Germany that we were dangerous people to attack.[5] Germany
naturally sought reprisals in her fashion, and gradually Europe was
transformed into a huge armed camp, divided into two powerful
organisations which necessarily watched each other with no friendly gaze.
[5] See _The War of Steel and Gold_, by H.N. Brailsford (Bell)--opening
chapter on "The Balance of Power."
BALANCE OR CONCERT?
I do not say that the course of events could possibly have been altered.
When once we became part of the continental system, it was necessary for
us to choose between friends and enemies. I only say that if diplomacy
calls itself an agency for preventing war, it cannot be said to be
altogether successful. Its famous doctrine of a Balance of Power is in
reality a mere phrase. If one combination be represented as X and the
other as Y, and X increases itself up to X^2, it becomes necessary that Y
should similarly increase itself to Y^2, a process which, clearly, does
not make for peace. I should imagine that the best of diplomatists are
quite aware of this. Indeed, there seems reason to suppose that Sir Edward
Grey, owing to definite experience in the last two years, not only
discovered the uselessness of the principle of a Balance of Power, but did
his best to substitute something entirely different--the Concert of
Europe. All the negotiations he conducted during and after the two Balkan
wars, his constant effort to summon London Conferences and other things,
were intended to create a Concert of European Powers, discussing amongst
themselves the best measures to secure the peace of the world. Alas! the
whole of the fabric was destroyed, the fair prospects hopelessly clouded
over, by the intemperate ambition of the Kaiser, who, just because he
believed that the Balance of Power was favourable to himself, that Russia
was unready, that France was involved in serious domestic trouble, that
England was on the brink of civil war, set fire to the magazine and
engineered the present colossal explosion.
CONTROL OF FOREIGN POLICY
One cannot feel sure that diplomacy as hitherto recognised will be able,
or, indeed, ought to be able, to survive the shock. In this country, as in
others, diplomacy has been considered a highly specialised science, which
can only be conducted by trained men and by methods of entire secrecy. As
a mere matter of fact, England has far less control over her foreign
policy than any of the continental Powers. In Germany foreign affairs come
before the Reichstag, in France they are surveyed by the Senate, in
America there is a special department of the Senate empowered to deal
with foreign concerns. In Great Britain there is nothing of the kind.
Parliament has practically no control whatsoever over foreign affairs, it
is not even consulted in the formation of treaties and arrangements with
other nations. Nor yet has the Cabinet any real control, because it must
act together as a whole, and a determined criticism of a foreign secretary
means the resignation of the Government. Fortunately, our diplomacy has
been left for the most part in very able hands. Nevertheless, it is surely
a paradox that the English people should know so little about foreign
affairs as to be absolutely incapable of any control in questions that
affect their life or death. Democracy, though it is supposed to be
incompetent to manage foreign relations, could hardly have made a worse
mess of it than the highly-trained Chancelleries. When the new Europe
arises out of the ashes of the old, it is not very hazardous to prophesy
that diplomacy, with its secret methods, its belief in phrases and
abstract principles, and its assumption of a special professional
knowledge, will find the range of its powers and the sphere of its
authority sensibly curtailed.