Part 8

Another cause of hatred in Germany, amounting to a mad rage which made them see red, was the use of coloured troops in the French zone of occupation. Under the name of “The Black Horror,” German propaganda exaggerated and falsified the hideous aspects of this last humiliation to their pride. It was asserted that masses of African negroes had been let loose in the Rhineland to assault white women and brutalise white men. The French denied that they were using any black troops, and this was perhaps technically true, although I saw with my own eyes Seneghalese negroes on the banks of the Rhine. But they were not fighting troops. They were transport men, lorry drivers, and ambulance drivers, in the blue uniform and steel hat of the French _poilu_. I saw the inhabitants of Bonn shudder and sicken at the sight of them. But it was true that the French did employ large numbers of Moroccan soldiers in German towns. They were not black, they were not even “nearly black,” and in race they belonged to the same Mediterranean peoples from which the French themselves have sprung. But that made no difference in German psychology, and I sympathise with their detestation of being controlled and put under the menace of Moroccan troops who, whatever shade their colour and historical ancestry, do not belong to our European type of civilisation, such as it is, and should not be put in military power over European populations. The British use of Indian troops in the white man’s war, and the American use of black battalions, were, in my judgment, similar errors which may cost us dear. But it was more than an error to use Moroccans in time of peace among German citizens who resented their presence as a shameful insult. These things are beyond argument. They belong to the realm of instinct. It was handing the Germans another cause of hatred.

BRITISH POLICY AND FRENCH SUSPICION

Most people in England watched all these things with disapproval and dismay. Gradually, as time went on, they drew further away from the French policy in Europe. It seemed to them bad business and bad morality. From a business point of view a great number of hard-headed people in Great Britain could see no sense in demanding payments from Germany beyond her power to pay, and in holding her by the throat so tightly that in any case she could not pay. Unemployment and bad trade in Great Britain were seen to be directly caused by this situation in Germany, which at one time had been England’s second best customer. It was not only the direct trade between Germany and England that had declined, but it was the indirect effect of Germany’s economic downfall all round the world. If Germany bought less wool from Australia and less grain from Canada, then Australia and Canada bought less manufactured goods from Great Britain. If Germany were not trading profitably with Holland, Denmark, and Sweden, then those countries could not buy the same quantity of British goods. Germany was the axle-tree of the great wheel of European trade which had broken its spokes and lay in the ditch. Until the old waggon was on the road again England would not recover her commerce. The French cried: “What about our devastated regions? Who will pay for reconstruction if the Germans are not forced to do so?” The English shrugged their shoulders and said: “What about our devastated trade in Liverpool, Manchester, Glasgow, London, and a hundred other cities where men are out of work?”

Less than ten years after the beginning of that struggle in which the youth of these two countries had fought side by side for the same purpose, and with the same ideals, there was a friction between England and France which obliterated the memory of that common sacrifice in many minds and created suspicion, dislike and political hostility.

The French Press and people abused the British for their materialism. “That nation of shopkeepers!” they cried. “They can think of nothing but their trade interests. They would sell their soul or their best comrade for a mess of pottage!” They forgot that they also were out for financial interests, that their policy was dictated by the desire to get reparations out of Germany. And although England advanced commercial reasons for relieving the pressure on Germany, she had other reasons which to the French seemed sheer hypocrisy, the most sickening cant. The English people and their sister nations do not like kicking an enemy when he is down, nor treading on his face when he lies prostrate. The old traditions of sport, strong even in the Cockney mind, bid them shake hands with the other fellow when he has been counted out after a knock-out blow. They do not believe in “hugging hate.” They have an instinctive sense of fair play. It is not too much to say that these were the overwhelming reasons in the minds of the average Englishman which made him dislike the entry into the Ruhr and the Poincaré policy of “keeping the Germans down.”

LLOYD GEORGE AND POINCARÉ

There was another reason, deep in many minds of humble folk and great statesmen. They looked back to the War with loathing and horror. They desired to support some better way of argument in international disputes, so that there need be no “next war,” worse than the last, between the same combination of Powers. They believed in the spirit of the League of Nations as the only way by which that next war might be avoided. They were hostile to any Power which seemed to thwart the progress of that spirit. They believed that the policy of Poincaré was contrary to the establishment of good will among nations. They believed that it was hurtful to future peace and leading inevitably to a war of revenge. For that reason millions of people in Great Britain looked upon Poincaré and for all he stood as the greatest menace in the world.

Lloyd George was one of them. After the signing of the Peace Treaty and a jingo election in which his followers appealed to the lowest passions of the people, that extraordinary man, with his nimble mind, his rapid vision, his instinctive Liberalism, his sincere belief in righteousness (overlaid by the cunning and craft of political necessities), led him into a crusade on behalf of a world settlement by conciliation and compromise.

In conference after conference, with splendid courage, with untiring zeal, with broad and liberal views, with an honest desire to bring Europe back to health by fair play all round and business methods, he endeavoured to settle the differences between France and England over this question of Germany, to scale down the German payments so that they were possible and not impossible, to give France security, to bring Russia back into the family of nations, to make some reasonable arrangement for inter-allied debts, and to adopt a scheme of general demobilisation in Europe which would relieve its peoples from crushing burdens and prepare the way of peace. However one may criticise the character and quality of Lloyd George, history will, I think, give him enormous credit for that great endeavour to secure the peace of the world. At every conference he was thwarted by France, whose difficulties and dangers could not be reconciled by any of these plans, who regarded them all as treachery to her people.

Briand concluded an agreement by which he released Germany of certain obligations in return for a limited guarantee of French security by British alliance in the case of a new aggressive war from Germany. And with that document in his pocket Briand lost his job in France. Poincaré succeeded him as the representative of French nationalism, the military point of view, the unrelenting will of the majority of French people to exact their full pound of flesh from Germany at all costs. From that time onwards until the downfall of Lloyd George himself the situation between France and England was controlled by the diplomatic intercourse between Lloyd George and Poincaré which developed into a personal duel of hostile views. In every case Poincaré had the best of the argument on lines of pure logic and abstract justice. It was right that Germany should pay for all the damage she had done. Was France to pay?... In every conference Poincaré stone-walled Lloyd George’s attempt at compromise, by which logic should give way a little to general interest and the military safety of France to a world pact of peace.

Then Lloyd George fell. By a frightful paradox his fall was partly due to a call for war. The man who was passionate for the peace of the world, who had given his health and risked his political career in the cause of the pacification of Europe, raised a fiery torch to the people—which fell like a damp squib in a cold sea. It was after the tragedy of Greece.

For some reasons not yet fully known to history, Lloyd George had fallen under the spell of Venizelos and his friends. Greece had been given a new Empire in Asia Minor and Thrace at the expense of the Turk, who had been utterly crushed by British armies. He turned a deaf ear to all critics who prophesied that the character of the Greeks would not be equal to these new responsibilities.

THE DOWNFALL OF GREECE

Meanwhile in Constantinople, where I happened to be, our Military Mission was getting anxious. A new leader had arisen among the Turks named Mustapha Kemal Pasha. Established at Angora, with a Committee of Turkish Nationalists, he defied the terms of peace imposed upon his people, refused to acknowledge the decree of a Sultan in the hands of the inter-allied force, rallied to his standard every Turkish patriot, raised a new army, filled Constantinople with his spies and agents, and proclaimed a “Holy War” of Islam. He vowed to recapture Smyrna, to liberate Constantinople, and to take possession of Thrace.

The Greek troops before Smyrna were confident, as I saw them, of holding their lines against the Turk. The Greek Commander-in-Chief, whom I interviewed, was ready to break the Turkish lines “as though on parade.” Lloyd George gave them the moral support of emotional words, and they were very grateful to him, and believed that England was behind him. The world knows what happened. Its conscience must still burn at times as it hears the cries of terror and anguish on that quayside at Smyrna when the Turkish irregulars set fire to the Christian quarters and massacred men, women and children, while British and American warships stood by, with their officers and men staring through that pall of smoke and its rending fire, listening to the shrieks beyond.

The Turks advanced to the Ismid Peninsula overlooking the Dardanelles. They advanced to the very lines which the British troops—young boys mostly—held at Chanak. Beyond that they could not go without a war with Great Britain, which hung by a thread day after day and week after week. The French, whose politicians and public opinion were sympathetic to the Turks, and who were incredibly jealous of British influence in Egypt, Palestine and Mesopotamia—an old source of enmity stirred up again in military minds—withdrew their own troops from Chanak, and left the British troops isolated. They made it perfectly clear, very courteously, but very firmly, that they would not engage in war against Turkey. It is certain that the French people after all their loss of blood and years of strife would have refused to support such a war. In any case, they preferred the Turks to the Greeks, and were glad of the Greek defeat.

To Lloyd George, in England, these Turkish victories were heavy blows. His honour was engaged to Greece. He believed that British honour was engaged, though certainly his pro-Greek policy had never gained the support and enthusiasm of public opinion. He hated the thought of seeing the Turk in power again at Constantinople. He had incited the Greek Army to attack. The horror at Smyrna made his blood run cold. It was Winston Churchill, without waiting for Parliamentary sanction, who raised the fiery cross and sent an emotional appeal for help to all the Dominions. It was received at first in stony silence, and then with deadly hostility. Neither Canada nor Australia would send a man to fight in a new war. They had done enough; they were not interested. At home in England and Scotland there was no support for a new war. There was a fierce outcry in the Press. The nation refused to envisage war, for any reason. They were sick of war. They could not afford it in men or money after years of colossal sacrifice.

The war did not happen, thanks a good deal to General Sir Charles Harington, commanding in Constantinople. Cool as ice in the face of extreme provocation, determined to keep the peace by every method of statesmanship, unless his men were actually attacked, it was his fine chivalry, his diplomatic wisdom with the Turkish Generals and statesmen, which resulted in an Armistice hanging on a hair-trigger. Lord Curzon patched up a peace which gave to the Turks most of what they claimed and more than they ought to have had in humanity and justice. The expulsion of the Christian communities from Asia Minor was one of the most infernal tragedies of history, hushed up in the British and European Press because it hurt the conscience of too many of us. The flight of the Greek refugees still calls to God for pity....

What a world—ten years after!

THE DENIAL OF DEMOCRACY

When I went about Europe I was dismayed by the denial of all mental progress towards a state of peace. Physically there was a slow recovery from war. Morally there was a reaction in many countries to black passion, militarism, and ideas of Force. Austria-Hungary and Germany were swinging right back to the old traditions of nationalism. They saw no way of freedom except by future war. They desired vengeance—against the French. They were talking of calling back their Emperors. In Germany the Crown Prince came home as a “private citizen” ready for a call to the throne at some not distant date. The war which was to make the world safe for democracy had been followed by a peace in which democracy was repudiated by many leaders and by public opinion in many countries. “I do not believe in democracy,” Herr Streseman told me in Berlin. The Italian Fascists under Mussolini did not believe in democracy, nor in Parliamentary institutions, nor in free speech. They bludgeoned men who disagreed with their ideas and methods or poured castor oil down their throats. They saved Italy from anarchy, which was a good deed, but Mussolini, the autocrat, was quite willing to play the anarchist against international laws, and did so when he flouted the League of Nations and bombarded Corfu. Students of world affairs, thoughtful observers like Sir Edward Grey and General Smuts, men not given to exaggerated speech and morbid fears, expressed their alarm at the state of Europe ten years after the outbreak of the world war, and confessed that it seemed to be slipping downhill towards general catastrophe.

THE REVIVAL OF HOPE

Since then something has happened to change the outlook of Europe and renew the hopes of peace. It is the London Agreement by which Germany, France, Great Britain, Belgium, and Italy agreed on Saturday, August 16—ten years and fourteen days after the beginning of the world war—to accept the chief provisions of the Dawes Report for the restoration of German credit by international loans and to establish a business settlement of the reparations problem with German consent. As Ramsay MacDonald, Labour Prime Minister, said at the conclusion of the London Conference, this agreement was “the first Peace Treaty” since the end of the world conflict, “because we sign it with a feeling that we have turned our backs on the terrible years of war and war mentality.”

Three great events in the political world led up to this new hope of peace and progress. The first was the friendly co-operation of the United States in the endeavour to find a business solution on the subject of German reparations. The second was the advent of a Labour Government in England. The third was the downfall of Poincaré, owing to a change of view in France which put Herriot into power as an opponent of the Poincaré school of thought.

AMERICAN IDEALISM

In the United States of America there had been a great searching of soul, turmoil, and even anguish of thought since the downfall and death of President Wilson. Although mass opinion had hardened against any European “entanglement” and any place in the League of Nations by which they would have to assume definite responsibilities, there was always an intellectual and combatant minority which protested against extreme “isolation” and a complete denial of co-operation with European nations for the sake of World Peace. In three separate lecture-tours in America, the last one from coast to coast, I saw something of the tug-of-war in the mind of the American people between the desire to escape from Europe and the wish to take a full share, even the world’s leadership, in the reconstruction of civilisation and its progress towards the brotherhood of nations. On my second visit I saw a rising tide of idealism in favour of international service. On my third visit it was beating up still higher against walls of national selfishness, indifference and hostility. A great deal of the idealism was vague, verbose, unpractical, and without any definite goal. It was spread by the women’s clubs, increasing in political activity and importance. It was expressed by many writers and lecturers, including those who had seen most of the war. It was discussed, heatedly, at every dinner table and at every “party” where well-read men and women gathered for conversation. Many financiers and business men, looking at foreign affairs with cold science, backed up the arguments of the idealists by saying that the United States ought to help to “straighten out Europe” for the sake of world trade and world peace. Many Generals and United States officers denounced war as an accursed thing, and prophesied the destruction of civilisation if another world war happened. Kinship with England, sympathy with France, made some Americans of the old stock sick at the thought of their national “selfishness”; though still, I think, the mass of the people were indifferent and bored and tired with regard to Europe and its troubles. But the idealists, the women, the pacifists, the internationalists, the financiers, prodded up the indifference and brought pressure to bear on their Government. No “entanglements” certainly, but some policy of association with efforts for world peace. The Harding Administration, elected to keep America out of Europe, was timid and hesitating, but had goodwill, and heard these voices at the door.

NAVAL DISARMAMENT

It was President Harding, with Charles Hughes as his Foreign Secretary, who summoned the Conference on Naval Disarmament, and carried it through with triumphant success, due not a little to the hearty co-operation of the British Government through its representative, Lord Balfour. That limitation of naval armaments was really the first step towards world peace, though many steps must follow before peace is secure. It did at least one enormous thing in history. It stopped the possibility of a competition in naval strength between Great Britain and the United States which, if it had happened, would not only have been a crushing burden to the taxpayers but would have led inevitably to suspicion and hostility between our two nations. The agreement of Japan was also a check to a rivalry in naval power which would have produced explosive forces and passions. The agreement did not stop the possibility of naval warfare, but it killed its inevitability.

The conclusion of that conference re-inspired the idealists. It encouraged them to further efforts to stimulate public opinion. Mr. Charles Hughes suggested an economic conference in Europe which resulted eighteen months later in the acceptance of the Dawes Report. The women’s clubs, the peace associations, many of the leaders of American thought, became more and more distressed at the state of things in Europe, more and more convinced that only by American participation, at least in moral and economic spheres, could Europe solve its problems on lines of reasonable compromise.

AMERICAN SYMPATHY WITH FRANCE

The majority of Americans undoubtedly were in favour of the occupation of the Ruhr. They regarded Germany as a fraudulent debtor. They believed in the “strong hand.” They had no patience, or very little, with the British view, which seemed weak and sentimental. Only the German-Americans, the Pacifists and the Socialists, with here and there bankers and business men and “intellectuals,” believed that France was not giving Germany a fair chance, was thrusting Europe back into the mud and was violating the spirit of the League of Nations. This view changed a little, though imperceptibly, when France had entered the Ruhr and had failed to extract anything solid from that nation. Even the warmest sympathisers with the French point of view became a little tired of Poincaré’s “No, no,” to all arguments on behalf of compromise, and of his nationalistic utterances. American opinion, still hostile to Germany in the mass—more intolerant of German character, and more convinced of her exclusive war guilt than the British people who had suffered so hideously—swung away from the Poincaré policy, at least to the point of belief that the occupation of the Ruhr was no solution of the problem but only a method of enforcing a solution that had still to be found; and time was short. Germany’s policy of inflation, that colossal fraud, had collapsed. Her money was waste paper, her credit gone, her capacity to pay indemnities extinguished—for a time. Some international scheme, divorced from politics, conducted on strict business lines, must get at the real facts and impose a settlement, or Europe as well as Germany would go down in chaos, not without repercussion in the United States.

THE DAWES REPORT

It was with the will of the people and an earnest desire to co-operate in this enquiry and report, that the American Government appointed General Dawes to the international committee which investigated the state of German finance and recommended a plan of action. It was another step towards American co-operation in the arrangement of world peace, and the beginning at least of a settlement in Europe based on business methods and common sense.

The Dawes Report cut like a clean wind through all sophistries, fantasies, illusions, and passions. It stated the realities, to France as well as to Germany.... Germany was a bankrupt State with great assets and immense potential energy. France and other countries could get heavy payments in course of time—if Germany were given industrial liberty and a loan to stabilise her monetary system, in securities which were good. Otherwise, they would get nothing. Take it or leave it. There were the facts.

The acceptance and working of the Report which disillusioned both France and Germany, and excited bitter opposition in both countries, was dependent on one incalculable element—goodwill on all sides. The German nationalists denounced it as an outrage, French nationalists as a surrender; Poincaré was prepared to discuss it subject to many reservations, including the occupation of the Ruhr and the military control of the Rhineland Railways. Not in that political atmosphere between the two nations was there a ghost of a chance for the Dawes Report.

But then two other events happened in the political world which by a kind of miracle changed the mental atmosphere of Europe, at least sufficiently to secure the adoption of the new scheme. They were the advent of the Labour Government in Great Britain and the downfall of Poincaré.

THE SOCIAL REVOLUTION IN ENGLAND