The Terms of Peace.
I shall never forget the grand march of the Allies through Berlin, and
the sealing of the Treaty of Peace.
There had been much delay regarding what the Terms of Peace should be.
Great Britain was the stumbling block.
Eighty years before, Washington Irving wrote of "John Bull":--
"Though no one fights with more obstinacy to carry a contested point,
yet when the battle is over and he comes to reconciliation, he is so
much taken up with the mere shaking of hands, that he is apt to let
his antagonists pocket all they have been fighting about."
England proved that once again in South Africa, for after fighting five
years with the Boers, she actually gave them what they were fighting
for--their independence.
With Germany she was inclined to be generous, but the French, Belgian
and Russian delegates urged firmness, and the Terms of Peace were
finally settled.
It was estimated that the actual expenditure of the Allies was
L1,180,000,000, and the loss in shipping L250,000,000, a total loss of
L1,430,000,000.
Germany and Austria had to hand over to the Allies the whole of their
Navies to be held for the protection of the world's peace, and each
nation had to pay an indemnity of L1,000,000,000. The German prisoners
had to be kept in Belgium for nine months to repair damage done to
Belgian towns. The boundaries of France and Belgium were to be extended
to the Rhine. Holland was to be absorbed by a joint protectorate that
took in the Schleswig-Holstein Peninsula. Poland was to go back to
Russia, Servia and Italy being allotted the shorelines of the Adriatic.
The Dardanelles was to be an open, undefended waterway. Bulgaria was to
absorb Turkey in Europe, Russia obtaining further concessions in
Caucasia.
There were other details of the terms that need not be here mentioned.
But on the 1st day of December, 1915, the Treaty of Berlin confirmed
them.
There was little demonstration in Germany. The new political party in
power, the Humanists, had already agreed to disarmament; so the first
part of the treaty did not trouble. The policy of "universal
brotherhood" subdued any qualms that might have arisen regarding loss of
territory. Regarding the indemnity: it could be met by imposing a heavy
income tax on all incomes over 3000 marks (L150). By this means the
Humanists would make the capitalists pay for the war.
The Humanist Government readily accepted the demand of the Allies that
the German prisoners should not be returned to Germany for nine months.
They were drafted into great work-camps in Belgium, and were put to
replacing bridges, reconstructing buildings, and making good all they
had devastated.
I remember at the time, how the world jeered at the so-called "Humanist"
Government in Germany, because it so readily agreed to the harsh
treatment of the "Sons who fought for the German Empire." But the Berlin
officials were wise. For nine months an army of 800,000 men were being
fed and kept at the Allies' expense. That mob was thus prevented from
returning to an overstocked manufacturing nation. They were being held
back to give their country nine months' opportunity to "put its house in
order."