UNWISE PEACE TREATIES A MENACE TO RIGHTEOUSNESS
In studying certain lessons which should be taught the United States by
this terrible world war, it is not necessary for us to try exactly to
assess or apportion the blame. There are plenty of previous instances
of violation of treaties to be credited to almost all the nations
engaged on one side or the other. We need not try to puzzle out why
Italy and Japan seemingly construed similar treaties of alliance in
diametrically opposite ways; nor need we decide which was justified or
whether both were justified. It is quite immaterial to us, as regards
certain of the lessons taught, whether the treaties alleged to be
violated affect Luxembourg on the one hand or Bosnia on the other,
whether it is the neutrality of China or the neutrality of Belgium that
is violated.
Yet again, we need always to keep in mind that, although it is culpable
to break a treaty, it may be even worse recklessly to make a treaty
which cannot be kept. Recklessness in making promises is the surest
way in which to secure the discredit attaching to the breaking of
promises. A treaty at present usually represents merely promise, not
performance; and it is wicked to promise what will not or cannot be
performed. Genuine good can even now be accomplished by narrowly
limited and defined arbitration treaties which are not all-inclusive,
if they deal with subjects on which arbitration can be accepted. This
nation has repeatedly acted in obedience to such treaties; and great
good has come from arbitrations in such cases as, for example, the
Dogger Bank incident, when the Russian fleet fired on British trawlers
during the Russo-Japanese war. But no good whatever has come from
treaties that represented a sham; and under existing conditions it is
hypocritical for a nation to announce that it will arbitrate questions
of honor or vital interest, and folly to think that opponents will
abide by such treaties. Bad although it is to negotiate such a treaty,
it would be worse to abide by it.
Under these conditions it is mischievous to a degree for a nation to
trust to any treaty of the type now existing to protect it in great
crises. Take the case of China as a living and present-day example.
China has shown herself utterly impotent to defend her neutrality.
Again and again she made this evident in the past. Order was not
well kept at home and above all she was powerless to defend herself
from outside attack. She has not prepared for war. She has kept
utterly unprepared for war. Yet she has suffered more from war, in
our own time, than any military power in the world during the same
period. She has fulfilled exactly the conditions advocated by these
well-meaning persons who for the last five months have been saying
in speeches, editorials, articles for syndicates, and the like that
the United States ought not to keep up battle-ships and ought not to
trust to fortifications nor in any way to be ready or prepared to
defend herself against hostile attack, but should endeavor to secure
peace by being so inoffensive and helpless as not to arouse fear in
others. The well-meaning people who write these editorials and make
these speeches ought to understand that though it is a bad thing for
a nation to arouse fear it is an infinitely worse thing to excite
contempt; and every editor or writer or public man who tells us that we
ought not to have battle-ships and that we ought to trust entirely to
well-intentioned foolish all-inclusive arbitration treaties and abandon
fortifications and not keep prepared, is merely doing his best to bring
contempt upon the United States and to insure disaster in the future.
Nor is China the only case in point. Luxembourg is a case in point.
Korea is a case in point. Korea was utterly inoffensive and helpless.
It neither took nor was capable of taking the smallest aggressive
action against any one. It had no forts, no war-ships, no army worthy
of the name. It excited no fear and no anger. But it did excite
measureless contempt, and therefore it invited aggression.
The point I wish to make is, first, the extreme unwisdom and
impropriety of making promises that cannot be kept, and, second, the
utter futility of expecting that in any save exceptional cases a strong
power will keep a promise which it finds to its disadvantage, unless
there is some way of putting force back of the demand that the treaty
be observed.
America has no claim whatever to superior virtue in this matter. We
have shown an appalling recklessness in making treaties, especially
all-inclusive arbitration treaties and the like, which in time of
stress would not and could not be observed. When such a treaty is not
observed the blame really rests upon the unwise persons who made the
treaty. Unfortunately, however, this apportionment of blame cannot be
made by outsiders. All they can say is that the country concerned--and
I speak of the United States--does not keep faith. The responsibility
for breaking an improper promise really rests with those who make it;
but the penalty is paid by the whole country.
There are certain respects in which I think the United States can
fairly claim to stand ahead of most nations in its regard for
international morality. For example, last spring when we took Vera
Cruz, there were individuals within the city who fired at our troops in
exactly the same fashion as that which is alleged to have taken place
in Louvain. But it never for one moment entered the heads of our people
to destroy Vera Cruz. In the same way, when we promised freedom to
Cuba, we kept our promise, and after establishing an orderly government
in Cuba withdrew our army and left her as an independent power;
performing an act which, as far as I know, is entirely without parallel
in the dealings of stronger with weaker nations.
In the same way our action in San Domingo, when we took and
administered her customs houses, represented a substantial and
efficient achievement in the cause of international peace which stands
high in the very honorable but scanty list of such actions by great
nations in dealing with their less fortunate sisters. In the same way
our handling of the Panama situation, both in the acquisition of the
canal, in its construction, and in the attitude we have taken toward
the dwellers on the Isthmus and all the nations of mankind, has been
such as to reflect signal honor on our people. In the same way we
returned the Chinese indemnity, because we deemed it excessive, just
as previously we had returned a money indemnity to Japan. Similarly
the disinterestedness with which we have administered the Philippines
for the good of the Philippine people is something upon which we have a
right to pride ourselves and shows the harm that would have been done
had we not taken possession of the Philippines.
But, unfortunately, in dealing with schemes of universal peace and
arbitration, we have often shown an unwillingness to fulfil proper
promises which we had already made by treaty, coupled with a reckless
willingness to make new treaties with all kinds of promises which
were either improper and ought not to be kept or which, even if
proper, could not and would not be kept. It has again and again proved
exceedingly difficult to get Congress to appropriate money to pay some
obligation which under treaty or arbitration or the like has been
declared to be owing by us to the citizens of some foreign nation.
Often we have announced our intention to make sweeping arbitration
treaties or agreements at the very time when by our conduct we were
showing that in actual fact we had not the slightest intention of
applying them with the sweeping universality we promised. In these
cases we were usually, although not always, right in our refusal
to apply the treaties, or rather the principles set forth in the
treaties, to the concrete case at issue; but we were utterly wrong,
we were, even although perhaps unintentionally, both insincere and
hypocritical, when at the same time we made believe we intended that
these principles would be universally applied. This was particularly
true in connection with the universal arbitration treaties which our
government unsuccessfully endeavored to negotiate some three years
ago. Our government announced at that time that we intended to enter
into universal arbitration treaties under which we would arbitrate
everything, even including questions of honor and of vital national
interest. At the very time that this announcement was made and the
negotiation of the treaties begun, the government in case after case
where specific performance of its pledges was demanded responded with
a flat refusal to do the very thing it had announced its intention of
doing.
Recently, there have been negotiated in Washington thirty or forty
little all-inclusive arbitration or so-called “peace” treaties, which
represent as high a degree of fatuity as is often achieved in these
matters. There is no likelihood that they will do us any great material
harm because it is absolutely certain that we would not pay the
smallest attention to them in the event of their being invoked in any
matter where our interests were seriously involved; but it would do us
moral harm to break them, even although this were the least evil of
two evil alternatives. It is a discreditable thing that at this very
moment, with before our eyes such proof of the worthlessness of the
neutrality treaties affecting Belgium and Luxembourg, our nation should
be negotiating treaties which convince every sensible and well-informed
observer abroad that we are either utterly heedless in making promises
which cannot be kept or else willing to make promises which we have no
intention of keeping. What has just happened shows that such treaties
are worthless except to the degree that force can and will be used in
backing them.
There are some well-meaning people, misled by mere words, who doubtless
think that treaties of this kind do accomplish something. These good
and well-meaning people may feel that I am not zealous in the cause
of peace. This is the direct reverse of the truth. I abhor war. In
common with all other thinking men I am inexpressibly saddened by the
dreadful contest now waging in Europe. I put peace very high as an
agent for bringing about righteousness. But if I must choose between
righteousness and peace I choose righteousness. Therefore, I hold
myself in honor bound to do anything in my power to advance the cause
of the peace of righteousness throughout the world. I believe we can
make substantial advances by international agreement in the line
of achieving this purpose and in this book I state in outline just
what I think can be done toward this end. But I hold that we will do
nothing and less than nothing unless, pending the accomplishment of
this purpose, we keep our own beloved country in such shape that war
shall not strike her down; and, furthermore, unless we also seriously
consider what the defects have been in the existing peace, neutrality,
and arbitration treaties and in the attitude hitherto assumed by the
professional pacificists, which have rendered these treaties such
feeble aids to peace and the ultrapacificist attitude a positive
obstacle to peace.
The truth is that the advocates of world-wide peace, like all
reformers, should bear in mind Josh Billings’s astute remark that “it
is much easier to be a harmless dove than a wise serpent.” The worthy
pacificists have completely forgotten that the Biblical injunction is
two-sided and that we are bidden not only to be harmless as doves but
also to be wise as serpents. The ultrapacificists have undoubtedly been
an exceedingly harmless body so far as obtaining peace is concerned.
They have exerted practically no influence in restraining wrong,
although they have sometimes had a real and lamentable influence in
crippling the forces of right and preventing them from dealing with
wrong. An appreciable amount of good work has been done for peace
by genuine lovers of peace, but it has not been done by the feeble
folk of the peace movement, loquacious but impotent, who are usually
unfortunately prominent in the movement and who excite the utter
derision of the great powers of evil.
Sincere lovers of peace who are wise have been obliged to face the fact
that it is often a very complicated thing to secure peace without the
sacrifice of righteousness. Furthermore, they have been obliged to face
the fact that generally the only way to accomplish anything was by not
trying to accomplish too much.
The complicated nature of the problem is shown by the fact that whereas
the real friends of righteousness believe that our duty to peace ought
to be fulfilled by protesting against--and doubtless if necessary doing
more than merely protest against--the violation of the rights secured
to Belgium by treaty, the professional pacificists nervously point
out that such a course would expose us to accusations of abandoning
our “neutrality.” In theory these pacificists admit it to be our duty
to uphold the Hague treaties of which we were among the signatory
powers; but they are against effective action to uphold them, for they
are pathetic believers in the all-sufficiency of signatures, placed
on bits of paper. They have pinned their faith to the foolish belief
that everything put in these treaties was forthwith guaranteed to all
mankind. In dealing with the rights of neutrals Article 10 of Chapter
1 explicitly states that if the territory of a neutral nation is
invaded the repelling of such invasion by force shall not be esteemed a
“hostile” act on the part of the neutral nation. Unquestionably under
this clause Belgium has committed no hostile act. Yet, this sound
declaration of morality, in a treaty that the leading world-powers have
signed, amounts to precisely and exactly nothing so far as the rights
of poor Belgium are concerned, because there is no way provided of
enforcing the treaty and because the American government has decided
that it can keep at peace and remain neutral only by declining to do
what, according to the intention of the Hague treaty, it would be
expected to do in securing peace for Belgium. In practice the Hague
treaties have proved and will always prove useless while there is no
sanction of force behind them. For the United States to proffer “good
offices” to the various powers entering such a great conflict as the
present one accomplishes not one particle of good; to refer them, when
they mutually complain of wrongs, to a Hague court which is merely
a phantom does less than no good. The Hague treaties can accomplish
nothing, and ought not to have been entered into, unless in such a
case as this of Belgium there is willingness to take efficient action
under them. There could be no better illustration of how extremely
complicated and difficult a thing it is in practice instead of in
theory to make even a small advance in the cause of peace.
I believe that international opinion can do something to arrest wrong;
but only if it is aroused and finds some method of clear and forceful
expression. For example, I hope that it has been aroused to the
point of preventing any repetition at the expense of Brussels of the
destruction which has befallen Louvain. The peaceful people of Brussels
now live in dread of what may happen to them if the Germans should
evacuate the city. In such an event it is possible that half a dozen
fanatics, or half a dozen young roughs of the “Apache” type, in spite
of everything that good citizens may do, will from some building fire
on the retiring soldiers. In such case the offenders ought to be and
must be treated with instant and unsparing rigor, and those clearly
guilty of aiding or shielding them should also be so treated. But if
in such case Brussels is in whole or in part destroyed as Louvain
was destroyed, those destroying it will be guilty of a capital crime
against civilization; and it is heartily to be regretted that civilized
nations have not devised some method by which the collective power of
civilization can be used to prevent or punish such crimes. In every
great city there are plenty of reckless or fanatical or downright
evil men eagerly ready to do some act which is abhorrent to the vast
majority of their fellows; and it is wicked to punish with cruel
severity immense multitudes of innocent men, women, and children for
the misdeeds of a few rascals or fanatics. Of course, it is eminently
right to punish by death these rascals or fanatics themselves.
Kindly people who know little of life and nothing whatever of the
great forces of international rivalry have exposed the cause of peace
to ridicule by believing that serious wars could be avoided through
arbitration treaties, peace treaties, neutrality treaties, and the
action of the Hague court, without putting force behind such treaties
and such action. The simple fact is that none of these existing
treaties and no function of the Hague court hitherto planned and
exercised have exerted or could exert the very smallest influence in
maintaining peace when great conflicting international passions are
aroused and great conflicting national interests are at stake. It
happens that wars have been more numerous in the fifteen years since
the first Hague conference than in the fifteen years prior to it. It
was Russia that called the first and second Hague conferences, and in
the interval she fought the war with Japan and is now fighting a far
greater war. We bore a prominent part at the Hague conferences; but if
the Hague court had been in existence in 1898 it could not have had the
smallest effect upon our war with Spain; and neither would any possible
arbitration treaty or peace treaty have had any effect. At the present
moment Great Britain owes its immunity from invasion purely to its navy
and to the fact that that navy has been sedulously exercised in time
of peace so as to prepare it for war. Great Britain has always been
willing to enter into any reasonable--and into some unreasonable--peace
and arbitration treaties; but her fate now would have been the fate
of Belgium and would not have been hindered in the smallest degree by
these treaties, if she had not possessed a first-class navy. The navy
has done a thousand times more for her peace than all the arbitration
treaties and peace treaties of the type now existing that the wit of
man could invent. I believe that national agreement in the future
can do much toward minimizing the chance for war; but it must be by
proceeding along different lines from those hitherto followed and in
an entirely different spirit from the ultrapacificist or professional
peace-at-any-price spirit.
The Hague court has served a very limited, but a useful, purpose. Some,
although only a small number, of the existing peace and arbitration
treaties have served a useful purpose. But the purpose and the service
have been strictly limited. Issues often arise between nations which
are not of first-class importance, which do not affect their vital
honor and interest, but which, if left unsettled, may eventually cause
irritation that will have the worst possible results. The Hague court
and the different treaties in question provide instrumentalities for
settling such disputes, where the nations involved really wish to
settle them but might be unable to do so if means were not supplied.
This is a real service and one well worth rendering. These treaties
and the Hague court have rendered such service again and again in time
past. It has been a misfortune that some worthy people have anticipated
too much and claimed too much in reference to them, for the failure
of the excessive claims has blinded men to what they really have
accomplished. To expect from them what they cannot give is merely
short-sighted. To assert that they will give what they cannot give is
mischievous. To promise that they will give what they cannot give is
not only mischievous but hypocritical; and it is for this reason that
such treaties as the thirty or forty all-inclusive arbitration or peace
treaties recently negotiated at Washington, although unimportant, are
slightly harmful.
The Hague court has proved worthless in the present gigantic crisis.
There is hardly a Hague treaty which in the present crisis has not
in some respect been violated. However, a step toward the peaceful
settlement of questions at issue between nations which are not vital
and which do not mark a serious crisis has been accomplished on certain
occasions in the past by the action of the Hague court and by rational
and limited peace or arbitration treaties. Our business is to try to
make this court of more effect and to enlarge the class of cases where
its actions will be valuable. In order to do this, we must endeavor to
put an international police force behind this international judiciary.
At the same time we must refuse to do or say anything insincere.
Above all, we must refuse to be misled into abandoning the policy of
efficient self-defense, by any unfounded trust that the Hague court,
as now constituted, and peace or arbitration treaties of the existing
type, can in the smallest degree accomplish what they never have
accomplished and never can accomplish. Neither the existing Hague
court nor any peace treaties of the existing type will exert even the
slightest influence in saving from disaster any nation that does not
preserve the virile virtues and the long-sightedness that will enable
it by its own might to guard its own honor, interest, and national
life.