THE KEEPER OF THE SEAS
As long ago as 1870 an Irishman pointed out that if the English press
did not abandon the campaign of prejudiced suspicion it was even then
conducting against Germany, the time for an understanding between
Great Britain and the German people would be gone for ever.
It was Charles Lever who delivered this shrewd appreciation of the
onlooker.
Writing from Trieste on August 29th, 1870, to John Blackwood, he
stated:
"Be assured the _Standard_ is making a great blunder by its
anti-Germanism and English opinion has _just now_ a value in Germany
which if the nation be once disgusted with us will be gone for ever."
Lever preserved enough of the Irishman through all his official
connection to see the two sides of a question and appreciate the point
of view of the other man.
What Lever pointed out during the early stages of the Franco-German
war has come to pass. The _Standard_ of forty years ago is the British
press of to-day, with here and there the weak voice of an impotent
Liberalism crying in the wilderness. Germany has, indeed, become
thoroughly disgusted and the hour of reconciliation has long since
gone by. In Lever's time it was now or never; the chance not taken
then would be lost for ever, and the English publicist of to-day
is not in doubt that it is now too late. His heart-searchings need
another formula of expression--no longer a conditional assertion of
doubt, but a positive questioning of impending fact, "is it too soon."
That the growing German navy must be smashed he is convinced, but how
or when to do it he is not so clear.
The situation is not yet quite intolerable, and so, although many urge
an immediate attack before the enemy grows too strong, the old-time
British love of compromise and trust in luck still holds his hand. The
American "alliance" too, may yet come off. The Entente with France,
already of great value, can be developed into something more assuredly
anti-German, and if present-day relations of friendship with the
United States can be but tightened into a mutual committal of both
Powers to a common foreign policy, then the raid on Germany may never
be needed. She can be bottled up without it. No man who studies the
British mind can have any doubt of the fixed trend of British thought.
It can be summed up in one phrase. German expansion is not to be
tolerated. It can only be a threat to or attained at the expense of
British interests. Those interests being world-wide, with the seas
for their raiment nay, with the earth for their footstool--it follows
that wherever Germany may turn for an outlet she is met by the British
challenge: "Not there!" British interests interdict the Old World; the
Monroe Doctrine, maintained, it is alleged by British naval supremacy,
forbids the New.
Let Germany acquire a coaling station, a sanitorium, a health resort,
the ground for a hotel even, on some foreign shore, and "British
interests" spring to attention, English jealousy is aroused. How
long this state of tension can last without snapping could, perhaps,
be best answered in the German naval yards. It is evident that some
7,000,000 of the best educated race in the world, physically strong,
mentally stronger, homogeneous, highly trained, highly skilled,
capable and energetic and obedient to a discipline that rests upon and
is moulded by a lofty conception of patriotism, cannot permanently be
confined to a strictly limited area by a less numerous race, less well
educated, less strong mentally and physically and assuredly less well
trained, skilled and disciplined. Stated thus the problem admits of a
simple answer; and were there no other factor governing the situation,
that answer would have been long since given.
It is not the ethical superiority of the English race that accounts
for their lead, but the favourable geographical situation from which
they have been able to develop and direct their policy of expansion.
England has triumphed mainly from her position. The qualities of
her people have, undoubtedly, counted for much, but her unrivalled
position in the lap of the Atlantic, barring the seaways and closing
the tideways of Central and North-eastern Europe, has counted for
more.
With this key she has opened the world to herself and closed it to her
rivals.
The long wars with France ended in the enhancement of this position by
the destruction of the only rival fleet in being.
Europe, without navies, without shipping became for England a mere
westward projection of Asia, dominated by warlike peoples who
could always be set by the ears and made to fight upon points of
dynastic honour, while England appropriated the markets of mankind.
Thenceforth, for the best part of a century, while Europe was spent
in what, to the superior Britain were tribal conflicts, the seas and
coasts of the world lay open to the intrusions of his commerce, his
colonists, his finance, until there was seemingly nothing left outside
the two Americas worth laying hands on. This highly favoured maritime
position depends, however, upon an unnamed factor, the unchallenged
possession and use of which by England has been the true foundation
of her imperial greatness. Without Ireland there would be to-day
no British Empire. The vital importance of Ireland to England is
understood, but never proclaimed by every British statesman. To subdue
that western and ocean-closing island and to exploit its resources,
its people and, above all its position, to the sole advantage of the
eastern island, has been the set aim of every English Government from
the days of Henry VIII onwards. The vital importance of Ireland to
Europe is not and has not been understood by any European statesman.
To them it has not been a European island, a vital and necessary
element of European development, but an appanage of England, an island
beyond an island, a mere geographical expression in the titles of the
conqueror. Louis XIV, came nearest, perhaps, of European rulers to
realizing its importance in the conflict of European interests when
he sought to establish James II on its throne as rival to the monarch
of Great Britain and counterpoise to the British sovereignty in
the western seas. Montesquieu alone of French writers grasped the
importance of Ireland in the international affairs of his time, and he
blames the vacillation of Louis, who failed to put forth his strength,
to establish James upon the throne of Ireland and thus by a successful
act of perpetual separation to _affaiblir le voisin_. Napoleon,
too late, in St. Helena, realized his error: "Had I gone to Ireland
instead of to Egypt the Empire of England was at an end."
With these two utterances of the French writer and of the French ruler
we begin and end the reference of Ireland to European affairs which
continental statecraft has up to now emitted, and so far has failed to
apply.
To-day there is probably no European thinker (although Germany
produced one in recent times), who, when he faces the over-powering
supremacy of Great Britain's influence in world affairs and the
relative subordination of European rights to the asserted interests
of that small island, gives a thought to the other and smaller island
beyond its shores. And yet the key to British supremacy lies there.
Perhaps the one latter day European who perceived the true relation of
Ireland to Great Britain was Neibuhr.
"Should England," he said, "not change her conduct, Ireland may still
for a long period belong to her, but not always; and the loss of that
country is the death day, not only to her greatness, but of her very
existence."
I propose to point out as briefly as may be possible in dealing
with so unexpected a proposition, that the restoration of Ireland to
European life lies at the bottom of all successful European effort to
break the bonds that now shackle every continental people that would
assert itself and extend its ideals, as opposed to British interests,
outside the limits of Europe.
It may be well first to define "British interests" and to show that
these are not necessarily synonymous with European interests. British
interests are: first, the control of all the seas of all the world--in
full military and commercial control. If this be not challenged peace
is permitted: to dispute it seriously means war.
Next in order of British interests stands the right of pre-emption to
all healthy, fertile, "unoccupied" lands of the globe not already in
possession of a people capable of seriously disputing invasion, with
the right of reversion to such other regions as may, from time to
time prove commercially desirable or financially exploitable, whether
suitable for British colonization or not.
In a word, British interests assume that the future of the world shall
be an English-speaking future. It is clear that sooner or later the
British colonies, so called, must develop into separate nationalities,
and that the link of a common crown cannot bind them forever. But, as
Sir Wilfred Laurier said at the recent Imperial Conference: "We bring
you British institutions"--English language, English law, English
trade, English supremacy, in a word--this is the ideal reserved for
mankind and summed up in words "British interests."
Turn where you will these interests are in effective occupation, and
whether it be Madeira, Teneriffe, Agadir, Tahiti, Bagdad, the unseen
flag is more potent to exclude the non-British intruder than the
visible standard of the occupying tenant. England is the landlord of
civilization, mankind her tenantry, and the earth her estate. If this
be not a highly exaggerated definition of British interests, and in
truth it is but a strongly coloured chart of the broad outline of
the design, then it is clear that Europe has a very serious problem
to face if European civilization and ideals, as differing from the
British type, are to find a place for their ultimate expansion in any
region favoured by the sun.
The actual conflict of European interests in Morocco is a fair
illustration of English methods.[1]
[Footnote 1: This was written in August, 1911.]
In the past France was the great antagonist, but since she is to-day
no longer able to seriously dispute the British usufruct of the
overseas world she is used (and rewarded) in the struggle now
maintained to exclude Germany at all costs from the arena. Were France
still dangerous she would never have been allowed to go to Algeciras,
or from Algeciras to Fez. She has uses, however, in the anti-German
prize ring and so Morocco is the price of her hire. That Germany
should presume to inspect the transaction or claim a share in the
settlement has filled the British mind with profound indignation, the
echoes of which are heard rumbling round the world from the Guildhall
to Gaboon and from the Congo to Tahiti. The mere press rumour that
France might barter Tahiti for German goods filled the British
newspaper world with supermundane wrath. That France should presume
to offer or Germany should accept a French Pacific island in part
discharge of liabilities contracted at Algeciras was a threat to
British interests. Tahiti in the hands of a decadent republic, the
greatest if you will, but still one of the dying nations, is a thing
to be borne with, but Tahiti possibly in the hands of Germany becomes
at once a challenge and a threat.
And so we learn that "Australasia protests" to the Home Government
at the mere rumour that France may choose to part with one of her
possessions to win German goodwill in Morocco. Neither France nor
Germany can be permitted to be a free agent in a transaction that
however regarded as essential to their own interests might affect,
even by a shadow on the sea, the world orbit of British interests.
These interests it will be noted have reached such a stage of
development as to require that all foreign States that cannot be used
as tools, or regarded as agencies, must be treated as enemies. Germany
with her growing population, her advancing industries, her keen
commercial ability, and her ever expanding navy has become the enemy
of civilization. Far too strong to be openly assailed on land she must
at all costs be pent up in Central Europe and by a ring-fence of armed
understandings prohibited from a wider growth that would certainly
introduce a rival factor to those British institutions and that world
language that are seriously if not piously meditated as the ordained
future for mankind.
For English mentality is such that whatever England does is divinely
ordained, and whether she stamps out a nation or merely sinks a ship
the hymn of action is "Nearer My God, to Thee." In a recent deputation
to King George V it will be remembered that certain British religious
bodies congratulated that monarch on the third centenary of the
translation into English of the Bible.
Both the addresses of the subjects, eminent, religious and cultured
men, and the sovereign's reply were highly informative of the mental
attitude of this extraordinary people. The Bible, it appeared, was the
"greatest possession of the English race." "The British Bible" was the
first and greatest of British investments and upon the moral dividends
derived from its possession was founded the imperial greatness of this
Island Empire. That other peoples possessed the Bible and had even
translated it before England was not so much as hinted at. That the
Bible was Greek and Hebrew in origin was never whispered. It began and
ended with the English Authorised Version. The British Bible was the
Bible that counted. It was the Bible upon which the sun never sets,
the Bible that had blown Indian mutineers from its muzzle in
the 'fifties and was prepared to-day to have a shot at any other
mutineers, Teuton or Turk, who dared to dispute its claim that the
meek shall inherit the earth. The unctuous rectitude that converts the
word of God into wadding for a gun is certainly a formidable opponent,
as Cromwell proved. To challenge English supremacy becomes not merely
a threat to peace, it is an act of sacrilege. And yet this world-wide
empire broad based upon the British Bible and the English navy, and
maintained by a very inflexible interpretation of the one and a very
skilful handling of the other, rests upon a sunk foundation that is
older than both and will surely bring both to final shipwreck.
The British Empire is founded not upon the British Bible or the
British dreadnought but upon Ireland. The empire that began upon an
island, ravaged, sacked and plundered shall end on an island, "which
whether it proceed from the very genius of the soil, or the influence
of the stars, or that Almighty God hath not yet appointed the time of
her reformation, or that He reserveth her in this unquiet state still
for some secret scourge which shall by her come unto England, it is
hard to be known but yet much to be feared." Thus Edmund Spenser
340 years ago, whose muse drew profit from an Irish estate (one of
the first fruits of empire) and who being a poet had imagination
to perceive that a day of payment must some day be called and that
the first robbed might be the first to repay. The Empire founded on
Ireland by Henry and Elizabeth Tudor has expanded into mighty things.
England deprived of Ireland resumes her natural proportions, those of
a powerful kingdom. Still possessing Ireland she is always an empire.
For just as Great Britain bars the gateways of northern and west
central Europe, to hold up at will the trade and block the ports of
every coast from the Baltic to the Bay of Biscay, so Ireland stands
between Britain and the greater seas of the west and blocks for
her the highways of the ocean. An Ireland strong, independent and
self-contained, a member of the European family of nations, restored
to her kindred, would be the surest guarantee for the healthy
development of European interests in those regions whence they are
to-day excluded by the anti-European policy of England.
The relation of Ireland to Great Britain has been in no wise
understood on the continent. The policy of England has been for
centuries to conceal the true source of her supplies and to prevent
an audit of transactions with the remoter island. As long ago as the
reign of Elizabeth Tudor this shutting off of Ireland from contact
with Europe was a settled point of English policy. The three "German
Earls" with letters from the Queen who visited Dublin in 1572 were
prevented by the Lord Deputy from seeing for themselves anything
beyond the walls of the city.[2]
[Footnote 2: This time-honoured British precept--that foreigners
should not see for themselves the workings of English rule in
Ireland--finds frequent expression in the Irish State Papers. In
a letter from Dublin Castle of August, 1572, from the Lord Deputy
Fitzwilliam to Burghley Elizabeth's chief Minister, we are told that
the "three German Earls" with "their conductor," Mr. Rogers, have
arrived. The Viceroy adds, as his successors have done up to the
present day: "According to Your Lordship's direction they shall
travell as little way into the cuntry as I can."]
To represent the island as a poverty striken land inhabited by a
turbulent and ignorant race whom she has with unrewarded solicitude
sought to civilise, uplift and educate has been a staple of England's
diplomatic trade since modern diplomacy began. To compel the trade of
Ireland to be with herself alone; to cut off all direct communication
between Europe and this second of European islands until no channel
remained save through Britain; to enforce the most abject political
and economic servitude one people ever imposed upon another; to
exploit all Irish resources, lands, ports, people, wealth, even her
religion, everything in fine that Ireland held, to the sole profit
and advancement of England, and to keep all the books and rigorously
refuse an audit of the transaction has been the secret but determined
policy of England.
We have read lately something of Mexican peonage, of how a people
can be reduced to a lawless slavery, their land expropriated, their
bodies enslaved, their labour appropriated, and how the nexus of this
fraudulent connection lies in a falsified account. The hacenade holds
the peon by a debt bondage. His palace in Mexico City, or on the sisal
plains of Yucatan is reared on the stolen labour of a people whose
bondage is based on a lie. The hacenade keeps the books and debits
the slave with the cost of the lash that scourges him into the fields.
Ireland is the English peon, the great peon of the British Empire.
The books and the palaces are in London but the work and the wealth
have come from peons on the Irish Estate. The armies that overthrew
Napoleon; the fleets that swept the navies of France and Spain from
the seas were recruited from this slave pen of English civilisation.
During the last 100 years probably 2,000,000 Irishmen have
been drafted into the English fleets and armies from a land
purposely drained of its food. Fully the same number, driven by
executive-controlled famines have given cheap labour to England and
have built up her great industries, manned her shipping, dug her
mines, and built her ports and railways while Irish harbours silted up
and Irish factories closed down. While England grew fat on the crops
and beef of Ireland, Ireland starved in her own green fields and
Irishmen grew lean in the strife of Europe.
While a million Irishmen died of hunger on the most fertile plains
of Europe, English Imperialism drew over one thousand million pounds
sterling for investment in a world policy from an island that was
represented to that world as too poor to even bury its dead. The
profit to England from Irish peonage cannot be assessed in terms of
trade, or finance, or taxation. It far transcends Lord MacDonnell's
recent estimate at Belfast of £320,000,000--"an Empire's ransom," as
he bluntly put it.
Not an Empire's ransom but the sum of an Empire's achievement, the
cost of an Empire's founding, and to-day the chief bond of an Empire's
existence. Detach Ireland from the map of the British Empire and
restore it to the map of Europe and that day England resumes her
native proportions and Europe assumes its rightful stature in the
empire of the world. Ireland can only be restored to the current of
European life, from which she has so long been purposely withheld by
the act of Europe. What Napoleon perceived too late may yet be the
purpose and achievement of a congress of nations. Ireland, I submit,
is necessary to Europe, is essential to Europe, to-day she is retained
against Europe, by a combination of elements hostile to Europe and
opposed to European influence in the world. Her strategic importance
is a factor of supreme weight to Europe and is to-day used in the
scales against Europe. Ireland is appropriated and used, not to the
service of European interests but to the extension of anti-European
interests. The _arbitium mundi_ claimed and most certainly exercised
by England is maintained by the British fleet, and until that power
is effectively challenged and held in check it is idle to talk of
European influence outside of certain narrow continental limits.
The power of the British fleet can never be permanently restrained
until Ireland is restored to Europe. Germany has of necessity become
the champion of European interests as opposed to the world domination
of England and English-speaking elements. She is to-day a dam, a great
reservoir rapidly filling with human life that must some day find an
outlet. England instead of wisely digging channels for the overflow
has hardened her heart, like Pharaoh, and thinks to prevent it or
to so divert the stream that it shall be lost and drunk up in the
thirsty sands of an ever expanding Anglo-Saxondom. German laws, German
language, German civilization are to find no ground for replenishing,
no soil to fertilize and make rich.
I believe this to be not only the set policy of England, but to
be based on the temperamental foundations of the English character
itself, from which that people could not, even if they would, depart.
The lists are set. The English mind, the English consciousness are
such, that to oppose German influence in the world is to this people
a necessity. They oppose by instinct, against argument, in the face
of reason, they will do it blindly come what may and at all costs, and
they will do it to the end.
Their reasoning, if reason exists in what is after all a matter of
primal instinct, might find expression somewhat as follows:
"German influence cannot but be hostile to British interests. The
two peoples are too much alike. The qualities that have made England
great they possess in a still greater degree. Given a fair field and
no favour they are bound to beat us. They will beat us out of every
market in the world, and we shall be reduced ultimately to a position
like that of France to-day. Better fight while we are still die
stronger. Better hinder now ere it be too late. We have bottled up
before and destroyed our adversaries by delay, by money, by alliances.
To tolerate a German rivalry is to found a German empire and to
destroy our own."
Some such obscure argument as this controls the Englishman's reasoning
when he faces the growing magnitude of the Teutonic people. A bitter
resentment, with fear at the bottom, a hurried clanging of bolt and
rivet in the belt of a new warship and a muffled but most diligent
hammering at the rivets of an ever building American Alliance--the
real Dreadnought this, whose keel was laid sixteen years ago and whose
slow, secret construction has cost the silent swallowing of many a
cherished British boast.
English Liberalism might desire a different sort of reckoning with
Germany, but English Liberalism is itself a product of the English
temperament, and however it may sigh, by individuals, for a better
understanding between the two peoples, in the mass, it is a part of
the national purpose and a phase of the national mind and is driven
relentlessly to the rivets and the hammering, the "Dreadnoughts"
in being and that mightier Dreadnought yet to be, the Anglo-Saxon
Alliance which Germany must fight if she is to get out.
Doubtless she has already a naval policy and the plans for a naval
war, for the fight will be settled on the sea, but the fate will be
determined on an island.
The Empire that has grown from an island and spread with the winds and
the waves to the uttermost shores will fight and be fought for on the
water and will be ended where it began, on an island.
That island, I believe, will be Ireland and not Great Britain.