CHAPTER II

CONDITIONS IN SWITZERLAND ON THE OUTBREAK OF WAR —THE SWISS ARMY

On my arrival in Berne, I found an unusual state of affairs. The Minister and members of his Staff were being besieged by thousands of British visitors in Switzerland clamouring to return to England, every one of whom had to be provided with a special permit or passport. The same thing was happening in a minor degree at the American Legation, where the American Minister and his Staff, like ourselves, had to face the question of difficulty of transport through France and across the Channel.

There were some eight thousand British subjects derelict in Switzerland, many of whom, besides, had momentarily exhausted their financial resources. Mobilization was taking place both in France and Switzerland, and the amount of rolling-stock available for through transit was extremely limited, so that it was clear that many of these visitors would have to remain in Switzerland for a certain length of time.

At this juncture, the Swiss hotel proprietors behaved in a very public-spirited manner. The Swiss banks, owing to the financial crisis temporarily supervening, were unable to cash cheques on England, with the result that visitors, willing as they might be, could not, in many cases, settle their hotel accounts before departure. Realizing the situation, the hotel proprietors not only declared their readiness to accept deferred payment, but further offered their British clientèle the use of their hotels for as long as necessary. This attitude on the part of the proprietors at a moment of extreme difficulty not only reflects credit on themselves, but is one on which our national pride may dwell with pleasure, since it makes clear the confidence inspired by the British visitor abroad.

The financial situation was further complicated by the fact that ready money was practically unobtainable, H.M.'s Minister himself being only allowed by his own bank to draw frs. 50 per week. A solution, however, was soon happily found in a provision in the regulations of the Swiss National Bank to the effect "that if gold be deposited at an authorized centre, the Bank might issue notes against such gold." At the request of the Minister, H.M.'s Government deposited £25,000 at the Swiss Bankverein in London, upon which the Swiss National Bank opened an equivalent credit in notes in favour of the Minister at Berne. Mr. Grant Duff was thus enabled to issue cash in exchange for cheques, and so facilitate the return of stranded British visitors.

Mr. G. P. Skipworth, the representative in Berne of the Westinghouse Brake Company, volunteered to undertake the detailed work in connection with this transportation, which, as a matter of fact, lasted over two months. It suffices to say that it was no light matter to assemble parties of three to four hundred visitors scattered all over Switzerland, and to see them safely off to their satisfaction, if not comfort, whenever through conveyance could be placed at their disposal by the Swiss and French authorities.

Mr. Skipworth was, later on, appointed Assistant Commercial Attaché to the British Legation in Switzerland, a post he still happily occupies.

On taking up my duties in Berne, I made the acquaintance of the heads of the Military and Political Departments, of my Allied colleagues, and also of the Commander-in-Chief of the Swiss Army—General Ulrich Wille—and his Staff.

Based on the territorial system, the Swiss Army, in times of peace, possesses no officer of the rank of General; but on occasions of emergency, the appointment of a General as Commander-in-Chief is at once proceeded with. His choice finally rests with the Federal Assembly. The powers vested in him are of a very comprehensive nature; so comprehensive indeed during this war as to cause no little alarm among some sections of the community. In the emergency created by the declarations of war in August, 1914, the choice of a General Commander-in-Chief lay between Colonel Ulrich Wille, a citizen of the Canton of Zürich, married to a member of the Bismarck family, and Colonel Sprecher v. Bernegg, a citizen of the Canton of the Grisons, married to a member of the family of Von Bülow; and it was some time before the Government finally declared itself in favour of the former, appointing Colonel Sprecher v. Bernegg as his Chief of Staff.

With my Allied colleagues, Colonels Pageot, Gourko, and Golovane, the French and Russian Military Attachés, I maintained the most pleasant relations, and our mutual frank co-operation under sympathetic conditions will ever remain one of my most cherished memories. Colonel Gourko is the son of the Field Marshal Gourko (later Governor-General of Poland), of Shipka Pass fame. He had seen much active service, and is said to have received more wounds than any other officer in the Russian Army. Ever anxious to find himself in the trenches, he succeeded in returning to Russia in 1915, where he fought on several fronts until disabled by wounds, from which I am glad to know he again made a good recovery. Since the Revolution in Russia, he, like so many others, has given no sign of himself, and I have heard nothing further of him. Colonel Pageot returned to the Western Front in 1916, in command of a regiment, and greatly distinguished himself, receiving the "Croix de Guerre avec Palmes," a distinction which gave much pleasure to his former colleagues in Berne.

Prior to my departure from Thoune, I had been witness to the mobilization of the Swiss Army, and was much impressed by the smoothness with which that operation was conducted. There is nothing which touches more profoundly the life of each individual citizen than the exigencies of the defence of his country. Obligatory service has always been at the basis of the life of the Swiss people from the early dawn of their national history. The primitive cantons, even before 1290, were persuaded of the importance of a preparation for war, a persuasion which succeeding centuries have done much to develop and strengthen. The very first cantonal pacts laid stress on the dispositions regarding military organization, and as early as 1476, the Confederates placed contingents in the field numbering 50,000 fighting men.

The principle of universal service as adapted to present day requirements finds a willing acceptance amongst a people whose instincts, though ultra-democratic, make them realize that their independence rests on the attitude of the Confederation vis-à-vis of her powerful, and sometimes aggressive, neighbours. I have never in my experience of Switzerland heard a word of complaint of the burden borne by the State owing to the obligation entailed by universal service, though anger is deeply felt for the sacrifices imposed upon the country due to the ambitions of those responsible for the Great War.

On the outbreak of war the Confederation manifested their determination to maintain neutrality as against all comers, and, by the mobilization of some 300,000 men, made clear to the belligerents their strength of purpose.

The following table[1] gives a résumé of the gradual evolution of the military organization from the point of view of numbers legislated for at different periods:—

------+---------+----------+-----------+-------------------+------------ Year. | Elite. | Reserve. | Landwehr. | Landsturm | Total | | | | and Complementary | Effectives. | | | | Services. | ------+---------+----------+-----------+-------------------+------------ 1640 | -- | -- | -- | -- | 36,000 1782 | -- | -- | -- | -- | 63,697 1817 | 33,758 | 33,748 | -- | -- | 67,506 1850 | 69,569 | 34,785 | -- | -- | 104,354 1874 | 105,368 | -- | 97,012 | -- | 202,380 1899 | 148,435 | -- | 87,290 | 275,596 | 511,321 1911 | 142,054 | -- | 69,513 | 275,284 | 486,851 ------+---------+----------+-----------+-------------------+------------

The Army is now composed of the whole of the fit male population between the ages of 20 to 48; the Elite being drawn from men of the ages of 20 to 32 years, the Landwehr from 33 to 40 years, the Landsturm from 41 to 48 years. The effectives increase from year to year with the increase of population. As regard instruction, the training of the infantry recruit lasts 65 days, of the cavalry 90 days, of the artillery 75 days, per annum. Repetition courses for the trained soldier take place annually, and vary, according to the branch of the service, from eleven to fourteen days. The Landwehr has a "repetition course" once every four years. The Landsturm is only occasionally called up for a few days at a time at long intervals.

According to Colonel Egli, the expenditure for military purposes for the year 1911 amounted in all to frs. 44,777,894, being 25·9 per cent. of the revenue of the country. The fact that Switzerland is able to maintain a force of nearly half a million men at an expenditure of less than £2,000,000 sterling speaks for itself. The war has, of course, added greatly to the annual Budget. The additional expenditure from 1914 to 1918, owing to mobilization, extra material, higher rates of pay and living, etc., form no small part of the accumulated deficit of the country, which cannot be far short of £40,000,000 sterling, and is steadily increasing.

The Military Regulations are so framed as to interfere in the least possible degree with the civil life of the soldier, and yet, despite the shortness of training, a very fair state of efficiency is reached and maintained.

The Corps of Officers is highly educated, and embraces in its ranks all the best brains of the country. It receives its military instruction at special military schools.

A valuable adjunct to the training of the rank and file is supplied by the Shooting Clubs, of which thousands exist, and as shooting is the one national sport, this important branch of instruction receives special attention.

The disorganization which immediately resulted in the economic and industrial life of Switzerland on the outbreak of war, became a matter of great concern to the Government, who, under their first impression of the World War, feared that economic ruin might become inevitable. It looked as though the business of the hotels, in which enormous capital has been invested, would cease to exist, whilst the future of hundreds of thousands of skilled artisans and mechanics would be imperilled. Foreign markets would certainly find their purchasing power greatly reduced, and there was every likelihood of a shortage in the half-finished products received from Germany and Austria, which finally reached foreign markets after receiving at the hands of the Swiss workmen that finish which gave them so great a part of their value. The future was painted in the blackest of colours, but the outcome has differed greatly from the first crude picture.

Never in the history of the peasant have such large profits been made as during the last four years. The hotel industry has no doubt been crippled, but it has been kept alive by the not inconsiderable influx of wealthy refugees from Central Europe and neutral countries, and the hospitalization of some 30,000 French, British, Belgian, and German Interned prisoners of war. The watch and clock, automobile, electric, and other mechanical industries, have made good by devoting their attention to the manufacture of munitions or other war requisites, in which the exceptional skill of the Swiss artisan has proved of inestimable worth. The dye industry has been developed to such an extent, that Switzerland may confidently expect to retain a portion of this trade in competition with Germany in the future.

The war will, I would fain believe and hope, have given to Swiss economics an elasticity and adaptability of which they stood in need, and from many points of view will not have proved that unmixed evil foreseen by her pessimists under the influence of their first fears.

German industrial circles have watched this development with misgivings, and are busily taking precautionary measures to turn it to their advantage by the loan of capital, by the infiltration of expert management into all those concerns in which they foresee rivalry, and often by the purchase outright of commercial undertakings likely to be useful in supplementing the work of the Fatherland in the economic struggle it will have to face after the war.

It is a matter of common knowledge that sympathies in Switzerland were divided at the outbreak of hostilities, the French and Italian speaking cantons having a decided bias in favour of the Allies, and the German cantons one in favour of the other side. After the early successes of the Germans, the opinion was generally held that Germany would press the war to a conclusion so rapidly, that England would not be able to make her weight felt in time to avert a calamity. Swiss military circles, however, did not wholly share this view, as the following account of a conversation, which in August, 1914, I had with a well-known Swiss officer of standing shows. This conversation appeared to me at the time all the more interesting as my informant was a Professor of Military History, and, judging by his name, might have been expected to have his views coloured by German sympathies. He spoke in the following sense:— "Now that England has thrown in her lot with France and Russia, the combination will probably be too great for Germany and her Allies, but the struggle will be a bitter one. Remember the Seven Years' War, and what Prussia was capable of in opposition to a host of enemies. You will have many surprises; Switzerland, however, will welcome the weakening of Germany, provided she is not completely crushed. A weakening of Germany would be useful to us Swiss, for we see a great danger to ourselves in the economic dominance she is obtaining in our country. Any relaxation in that respect will be to our advantage."

The events of the last four years have done much to change feeling in the German-speaking cantons, inasmuch as the invasion of Belgium, the employment of poison gas, the sinking of the _Lusitania_, the brutality of the submarine campaign, the destruction of Serbia, the harshness shown to Roumania, have made an unfavourable impression on all classes of the population. German propaganda has also thoroughly awakened the country to the danger it was incurring from the stranglehold which German financiers and industrials were establishing upon her economic life.

The revolutionary fiasco in Russia also, in no small degree, affected public opinion. As a republican nation possessed with the ideal of the rights of smaller nations to dispose of themselves, they feared and abhorred the Russian form of government as represented by Czarism; and this, no doubt, had a good deal to do with the way in which they regarded Germany as a protector and a bulwark against the submergence of Europe by a Slav wave. That danger now removed, they probably feel Germany's support may be more easily dispensed with; and with a weakened Germany they foresee the possibility of re-organizing their economic life free from the trammels of an overbearing neighbour. The crushing of Germany, however, would, they think, mean economic ruin to them; and at this they draw the line.

[1] From _L'Armée Suisse_, by Colonel C. H. Egli, Colonel d'Etat-Major Général, 1913.