Ordeal by Battle

Peace is the greatest of British interests 3 Peaceful intentions will not ensure peace 4 Futility of Pacifism 6 Causes of wars in general 8 Causes of the American Civil War 10 I...

July-August 1914 13 Reality or illusion 15 The Serajevo murders 16 Austria and Servia 17 English efforts to preserve peace 18 Mobilisation in Germany and Russia 19 Questions of...

Why did war occur? 22 Servia did not want war 22 Neither did Russia or France 23 Nor Belgium or England 25 Austria wanted war with Servia alone 26 Germany encouraged Austria to...

Was war inevitable? 36 Not if England had been prepared morally and materially 37 Previous apprehensions of war 38 Peculiar characteristics of German animosity 39 British public...

Who actually caused the conflagration? 42 Influence of the Professors, Press, and People of Germany 43 Influence of the Court, Army, and Bureaucracy 44 Various political charact...

Hero-worship and sham super-men 53 The Blunders of Bureaucracy 55 As to the time-table of the war 55 As to the quality of the French Army 55 As to the opinion of the world 56 As...

Great events do not proceed from small causes 69 German hatred of England 70 This is the German people's war 71 Their illusion that England brought it about 73 Difficulties in t...

National dreams 87 1789 and after 87 The first German dream--Union 88 How it was realised 89 What the world thought of it 90 Material development in Germany 91 The peace policy...

Nightmares and illusions 94 Grievances against England, France, and Russia 96 The second German dream--Mastery of the World 97 Absorption of Belgium, Holland, and Denmark 98 The...

Qualities of the German vision 106 Symmetry and vastness are dangerous ideals 107 Frederick the Great and Bismarck 108 German predisposition to follow dreamers 108 Grotesque pro...

Germany goes in search of an ethical basis 113 Special grievances against France and England 114 German thinkers recast Christian morals 115 Heinrich von Treitschke 116 _The pri...

German education a drill system 127 Intellectuals are ranged on the government side 129 Eighteenth-century France and modern Germany 129 Contrast between their bureaucracies 130...

Intelligence and enterprise of the Germans 149 They are nevertheless devoted to their own institutions 150 German system is not reactionary but the reverse 151 Experts are honou...

Two issues between England and Germany 167 Democracy cannot endure unless capable of self-defence 168 Democracy good and bad 169 Self-criticism may be carried too far 171 The tw...

In this war Democracy is fighting for its existence 181 Against highly organised materialism 183 The opening of the twentieth century 186 Spirit of constitutional change 188 Dis...

Situation at the death of Queen Victoria 207 Comfort and security are not synonymous 208 Two problems absorbed public attention 209 Social and Constitutional Reform 209 A third...

The aim of British policy 223 Organised and unorganised defences 223 Policy depends on armaments, armaments on policy 225 Difficulty of keeping these principles in mind 226 Dipl...

Security required that we should take account of Europe 241 German aim--the suzerainty of Western Europe 243 Maintenance of the _Balance of Power_ 244 This is the unalterable co...

The British 'Expeditionary Force' 252 Numbers as a test of adequacy 253 Relations of Italy with Germany and Austria in event of war 254 Troops for defence of coasts and neutral...

Changes between August 1911 and August 1914 269 Sensational German increases in 1913 took full effect within a year 270 Inability of France to counter this effort unaided 270 Fr...

Why should we suspect Germany of evil intentions? 277 The German Fleet was a challenge to British security 278 Candour of German publicists 278 British Government finds comfort...

Public opinion puzzled by military problems 309 The nation's growing anxiety and distrust (1909-1914) 310 Army affairs a shuttlecock in the political game 312 'The blood taxes'...

The _Regular Army_ 317 Three classes of reserves 318 The _Army Reserve_ 318 The _Special Reserve_ 319 The _Territorial Army_ 320 The numbers of trained soldiers immediately avai...

The Manchester speech (October 22, 1912) 332 Liberal denunciation and Unionist coolness 332 Attack concentrated on three passages 333 Two of these have been proved true by event...

All Lord Roberts's warnings were proved true 350 Many people nevertheless still believed that the voluntary system was a success 351 Lord Kitchener as Secretary of State for War...

Industrial congestion at the outbreak of war 358 Need for looking far ahead and organising production of war material 359 The danger of labour troubles 360 Outcry about shortage...

The first need was men 364 A call for volunteers the only way of meeting it 364 The second need was a system to provide men as required over the period of the war 365 No system...

British methods of recruiting in normal times 382 _The Conscription of Hunger_ 382 The cant of the voluntary principle 384 The 'economic' fallacy 385 The fallacy of underrating...

Bugbears 401 Conflict of 'opinion' with 'the facts' 402 An army is no defence unless it is available for service abroad 402 The Industrial Epoch (1832-1886) 403 Its grudging att...

The objects of this book 421 Criticism of naval and military strategy is no part of its purpose 422 Nor the ultimate political settlement of Europe 424 Nor an inquisition into '...

Then _Apollyon_ strodled quite over the whole breadth of the way, and said, I am void of fear in this matter, prepare thyself to die; for I swear by my infernal Den, that thou s...

It is a considerable number of years since the most distinguished Tory statesman of his time impressed upon his fellow-countrymen as a maxim of policy, that _Peace is the greate...

When war came, it came suddenly. A man who had happened to fall sick of a fever on St. Swithin's day 1914, but was so far on the way to convalescence four weeks later as to desi...

Such is the chronological order of events; but on the face of it, it explains little of the underlying causes of this conflagration. Why with the single exception of Italy had a...

likely, as in times past, to become the 'cockpit of Europe.' She was asked to allow the free passage of the Germanic forces. She was promised restoration of her independence and...

The East has been drawn into the circle of this war as well as the West, the New World as well as the Old; nor can any man feel certain, or even hopeful, that the conflagration...

Although in a technical sense the present war was brought on by Austrian diplomacy, no one, in England at least, is inclined to rate the moral responsibility of that empire at t...

In the world's play-house there are a number of prominent and well-placed seats, which the instinct of veneration among mankind insists on reserving for Super-men; and as mankin...

In the foregoing pages an attempt has been made to consider the series of events which immediately preceded the recent outbreak of war. But the most complete account of moves an...

FAITHFUL: What! Why he objected against Religion itself; he said it was a pitiful low sneaking business for a Man to mind Religion; he said that a tender conscience was an unman...

All nations dream--some more than others; while some are more ready than others to follow their dreams into action. Nor does the prevalence, or even the intensity, of these nati...

With the dismissal of Bismarck in 1890, Germany entered upon a new phase. Then once again her people began to dream, and this time furiously. They had conquered in war. They had...

The German project of empire is a gorgeous fabric. The weft of it is thread of gold, but the warp of it has been dipped in the centaur's blood. It is the pride of its possessor;...

The dream of German expansion, as year by year it took firmer hold upon the popular imagination, produced, as might have been expected, a desire that it might be realised. From...

The thoroughness and efficiency of the Germans are admitted even by hostile critics. In the practical sphere they have excelled in military preparations, in the encouragement of...

A German might fairly contend that British criticism of his moral ideas and political system is tainted throughout by ignorance and prejudice, and that all our talk of autocracy...

The Freiherr's discourse raises a large number of questions, some of them unarguable. Others again are too much so; for if once started upon, argument with regard to them need n...

I saw then in my dream that he went on _thus_, even until he came at a bottom, where he saw, a little out of the way, three Men fast asleep with Fetters upon their heels.

It is not true to say that this is a war between the rival principles of democracy and autocracy. A too great absorption in our own particular sector of the situation has led ce...

At the death of Queen Victoria the development of the British Commonwealth entered upon a new phase. The epoch which followed has no precedent in our own previous experience as...

In the post-Victorian epoch, which we have been engaged in considering, the aim of British foreign policy may be summed up in one word--Security. It was not aggression; it was n...

During the whole period of rather more than thirteen years--which has been referred to in previous pages as the post-Victorian epoch, and which extended roughly from January 190...

The full gravity of the Agadir incident, though apparent to other nations, was never realised by the people of this country. The crisis arose suddenly in July 1911. Six weeks la...

Such was the position of affairs at July 1911, as it appeared to the eyes of people who--during the ensuing period--endeavoured to arrive at an understanding of the problem with...

It may be said--up to the very outbreak of war it was said very frequently--that the mere power and opportunity to make an outrageous attack are nothing without the will to do s...

Now I saw still in my Dream, that they went on until they were come to the place that _Simple_ and _Sloth_ and _Presumption_ lay and slept in, when _Christian_ went by on Pilgri...

Many people who were not in the habit of concerning themselves with party politics endeavoured, during the autumn of 1911, and from that time forward, to straighten out their id...

Leaving out of account those troops which were recruited and maintained in India, the Dominions, and the Dependencies, the actual number of British regulars employed in garrison...

Lord Roberts addressed many meetings in favour of National Service during the years which followed his return from South Africa in 1905; but the first of his speeches to arrest...

Lord Roberts had been seeking for seven years to persuade the nation to realise that it was threatened by a great danger; that it was unprepared to encounter the danger; that by...

As regards the business world the position at this time[1] was a singularly difficult one. Within a few days of the outbreak of war, orders from all parts of the globe were fort...

If Lord Kitchener is not to be held primarily responsible for the delay in providing war material, just as little is he to be blamed for the methods of recruiting. For he had to...

of their own private interests--must be prepared to do what the leader of the nation orders them to do. {374} This was fully recognised in August, September, October, and Novemb...

If 'National Service,' or 'Conscription,' has actually become necessary already, or may conceivably become so before long, it seems worth while to glance at some of the consider...

Prior to the present war the chief bugbears encountered by Lord Roberts, and indeed by all others whose aim it was to provide this country with an army numerically fit to suppor...

If in the foregoing pages the Liberal party has come in for the larger share of criticism, the reason is, that during the ten critical years, while dangers were drawing to a hea...