Part 5

And now, as the appetite for blood grows ever stronger--and nothing waxes more fast--we have stories of the treatment of prisoners. Here is a point where our attention should be most concentrated and our action most prompt. It is the just duty which we owe to our own brave soldiers. At present the instances are isolated, and we will hope that they do not represent any general condition. But the stories come from sure sources. There is the account of the brutality which culminated in the death of the gallant motor-cyclist Pearson, the son of Lord Cowdray. There is the horrible story in a responsible Dutch paper, told by an eye-witness, of the torture of three British wounded prisoners in Landen Station on October 9.

The story carries conviction by its detail. Finally, there are the disquieting remarks of German soldiers, repeated by this same witness, as to the British prisoners whom they had shot. The whole lesson of history is that when troops are allowed to start murder one can never say how or when it will stop. It may no longer be part of a deliberate, calculated policy of murder by the German Government. But it has undoubtedly been so in the past, and we cannot say when it will end. Such incidents will, I fear, make peace an impossibility in our generation, for whatever statesmen may write upon paper can never affect the deep and bitter resentment which a war so conducted must leave behind it.

Other German characteristics we can ignore. The consistent, systematic lying of the German Press, or the grotesque blasphemies of the Kaiser, can be met by us with contemptuous tolerance. After all, what is is, and neither falsehood nor bombast will alter it. But this policy of murder deeply affects not only ourselves but the whole framework of civilisation so slowly and painfully built upwards by the human race.

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VII

MADNESS

We have all, I suppose, read and marvelled at the wonderful German "song of hate." This has been so much admired over the water that Prince Ruprecht of Bavaria (who had just stated his bitter hatred of us in a prose army order) distributed copies of the verses to his Bavarians as a stimulant in their long, unsuccessful tussle with our troops at Ypres. In case the reader has forgotten its flavour, I append a typical verse:

"We will never forgo our hate. We have all but a single hate. We love as one, we hate as one, We have one foe and one alone-- ENGLAND."

This sort of thing is, it must be admitted, very painful and odious. It fills us with a mixture of pity and disgust, and we feel as if, instead of a man, we were really fighting with a furious, screaming woman. Germany used to be a very great nation, mentally and morally as well as in material ways, and many of us, even while we fight her, are honestly pained by the depths of degradation into which she has fallen. This shrill scream of hate and constant frenzied ranting against Great Britain may reach its highest note in this poem, but we know that it pervades the whole Press and every class of national thought. It is deliberately fed by lying journals, which publish bogus letters describing the imaginary sufferings of German prisoners, and also by the Government itself, which upon receiving a Socialist report partly favourable to Britain, excised those passages and circulated the rest as a complete document, so as to give the idea that it was wholly condemnatory. Wherever we touch Germany in its present phase, whether it be the Overlord himself with his megalomaniac messages, the princes with their looting of châteaux, the Foreign Office with its trick of stealing American passports for the use of German spies, the army with its absolute brutality, the navy with its tactics of mine-laying in neutral waters, the Press with its grotesque concoctions, the artists with their pictures, which are so base that the decent Germans have themselves at last rebelled against them, or the business men with their assertion that there is less economic disturbance in Germany than in Great Britain--wherever, I say, you touch them you come always upon what is odious and deceitful. A long century will have passed before Germany can wash her hands clean from murder, or purge from her spirit the shadow of this evil time.

If the words of one humble individual could reach across the seas, there are two things upon which I should wish to speak earnestly to a German: the one, our own character, the other, the future which he is deliberately preparing for the Fatherland which he loves. Our papers do get over there, even as theirs come over here, so one may hope it is not impossible that some German may give a thought to what I say, if he is not so bemused by the atmosphere of lies in which his Press has enveloped him that he cannot recognise cold truth when he sees it.

First as to ourselves: we have never been a nation who fought with hatred. It is our ideal to fight in a sporting spirit. It is not that we are less in earnest, but it is that the sporting spirit itself is a thing very largely evolved by us and is a natural expression of our character. We fight as hard as we can, and we like and admire those who fight hard against us so long as they keep within the rules of the game. Let me take an obvious example. One German has done us more harm than any other in this war. He is Captain von Müller of the _Emden_, whose depredations represent the cost of a battleship. Yet an honest sigh of relief went up from us all when we learned that he had not perished with his ship, and if he walked down Fleet Street to-day he would be cheered by the crowd from end to end. Why? Because almost alone among Germans he has played the game as it should be played. It is true that everything that he did was illegal. He had no right to burn uncondemned prizes, and a purist could claim that he was a pirate. But we recognised the practical difficulties of his position; we felt that under the circumstances he had acted like a gentleman, and we freely forgave him any harm that he had done us. With this example before you, my German reader, you cannot say that it is national hatred when we denounce your murderers and brigands in Belgium. If they, too, had acted as gentlemen, we should have felt towards them as to von Müller.

If you look back in British history, you will find that this absence of hatred has always been characteristic of us. When Soult came to London after the Napoleonic wars, he was cheered through the City. After the Boer War, Botha, de Wet, and Delarey had a magnificent reception. We did not know that one of them was destined to prove a despicable and perjured traitor. They had been good fighters, the fight was done, we had shaken hands--and we cheered them. All British prize-fights ended with the shaking of hands. Though the men could no longer see each other, they were led up and their hands were joined. When a combatant refuses to do this, it has always been looked upon as unmanly, and we say that bad blood has been left behind. So in war we have always wished to fight to a finish and then be friends, whether we had won or lost.

Now, this is just what we should wish to do with Germany, and it is what Germany is rapidly making impossible. She has, in our opinion, fought a brave but a thoroughly foul fight. And now she uses every means to excite a bitter hatred which shall survive the war. The Briton is tolerant and easy-going in times of peace--too careless, perhaps, of the opinion of other nations. But at present he is in a most alert and receptive mood, noting and remembering very carefully every word that comes to him as to the temper of the German people and the prospects of the future. He is by no means disposed to pass over all these announcements of permanent hatred. On the contrary, he is evidently beginning, for the first time since Napoleon's era, to show something approaching to hatred in return. He--and "he" stands for every Briton across the seas as well as for the men of the Islands--makes a practical note of it all, and it will not be forgotten, but will certainly bear very definite fruits. The national thoughts do not come forth in wild poems of hate, but they none the less are gloomy and resentful, with the deep, steady resentment of a nation which is slow to anger.

And now, my problematical German reader, I want you to realise what this is going to mean to you after the war. Whether you win or lose--and we have our own very certain opinion as to which it will be--Germany will still remain as a great independent State. She may be a little trimmed at the edges, and she may also find herself with some awkward liabilities; but none the less she will be a great kingdom or republic--as the Fates may will. She will turn her hand to trade and try to build up her fortunes once more--for even if we suppose her to be the victor, she still cannot live for ever on plunder, and must turn herself to honest trade, while if she loses her trade will be more precious to her than ever. But what will her position be when that time has come?

It will be appalling. No other word can express it. No legislation will be needed to keep German goods out of the whole British Empire, which means more than a quarter of the globe. Anything with that mark might as well have a visible cholera bacillus upon it for the chance it will have of being handled after this war. That is already certain, and it is the direct outcome of the madness which has possessed Germany in her frantic outcry of hatred. What chance they have of business with France, Russia, or Japan they know best themselves; but the British Empire, with that wide trade toleration which has long been her policy (and for which she has had so little gratitude), would have speedily forgiven Germany and opened her markets to her. Now it is not for many a long year that this can be so--not on account of the war, but on account of the bitterness which Germany has gone out of her way to import into the contest. It is idle to say that in that case we should lose our exports to Germany. Even if it were so, it would not in the least affect the sentiments of the retail sellers and buyers in this country, whose demands regulate the wholesale trade. But as a matter of fact, what Germany buys from the British Empire is the coal, wool, etc., which are the raw materials of her industry, with which she cannot possibly dispense.

But the pity of it all! We might have had a straight, honest fight, and at the end of it we might have conceded that the German people had been innocently misled, by their military caste and their Press, into the idea that their country was being attacked, and so were themselves guiltless in the matter. They, on their side, might at last have understood that Britain had been placed in such a position by her guarantees to Belgium that it was absolutely impossible that she could stand out of the war. With these mutual concessions, some sort of friendship could possibly have been restored, for it is no one's interest, and least of all ours, that the keystone should be knocked right out of the European arch. But all this has been rendered impossible by these hysterical screamers of hate, and by those methods of murder on land, sea, and in air with which the war has been conducted. Hate is a very catching emotion, and when it translates itself into action it soon glows on either side of the North Sea. With neither race, to use Carlyle's simile, does it blaze like the quick-flaming stubble, but with both it will smoulder like the slow red peat. Are there not even now strong, sane men in Germany who can tell these madmen what they are sowing for the next generation and the one that comes after it? It is not that we ask them to abate the resistance of their country. It is understood that this is a fight to the end. That is what we desire. But let them stand up and fight without reviling; let them give punishment without malice and receive it without wincing; let their press cease from lying, and their prophets from preaching hatred--then, lose or win, there may still be some chance for their future. But, alas! the mischief is already, I fear, too deep. When the seeds are sown, it is hard to check the harvest. Let the impartial critic consider von Müller of the _Emden_, and then, having surveyed our Press and that of Germany, let him say with whom lies the blame.

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VIII

GREAT BRITAIN AND THE NEXT WAR[4]

[4] Published, _Fortnightly Review_, February 1913.

This essay is of some interest, as it was written two years before the war, and was one of the first attempts to make the public realise the importance of Bernhardi's notorious book. The author follows it by an unpublished essay called "Afterthoughts," in which he examines how far his reading of the future has been justified by the event.

I am a member of the Anglo-German Society for the improvement of the relations between the two countries, and I have never seriously believed in the German menace. Frequently I have found myself alone in a company of educated Englishmen in my opinion that it was non-existent--or at worst greatly exaggerated. This conclusion was formed upon two grounds. The first was, that I knew it to be impossible that we could attack Germany save in the face of monstrous provocation. By the conditions of our government, even if those in high places desired to do such a thing, it was utterly impracticable, for a foreign war could not be successfully carried on by Great Britain unless the overwhelming majority of the people approved of it. Our foreign, like our home, politics are governed by the vote of the proletariat. It would be impossible to wage an aggressive war against any Power if the public were not convinced of its justice and necessity. For this reason we could not attack Germany. On the other hand, it seemed to be equally unthinkable that Germany should attack us. One fails to see what she could possibly hope to gain by such a proceeding. She had enemies already upon her eastern and western frontiers, and it was surely unlikely that she would go out of her way to pick a quarrel with the powerful British Empire. If she made war and lost it, her commerce would be set back and her rising colonial empire destroyed. If she won it, it was difficult to see where she could hope for the spoils. We could not give her greater facilities for trade than she has already. We could not give her habitable white colonies, for she would find it impossible to take possession of them in the face of the opposition of the inhabitants. An indemnity she could never force from us. Some coaling stations and possibly some tropical colonies, of which latter she already possesses abundance, were the most that she could hope for. Would such a prize as that be worth the risk attending such a war? To me it seemed that there could be only one answer to such a question.

It still seems to me that this reasoning is sound. I still think that it would be an insane action for Germany deliberately to plan an attack upon Great Britain. But unfortunately an attack delivered from mistaken motives is as damaging as any other attack, and the mischief is done before the insanity of it is realised. If I now believe such an attack to be possible, and it may be imminent, it is because I have been studying _Germany and the Next War_, by General von Bernhardi.

A book written by such a man cannot be set aside as the mere ravings of a Pan-Germanic Anglophobe. So far as appears, he is not a Pan-German at all. There is no allusion to that Germania _irredente_ which is the dream of that party. He is a man of note, and the first living authority in Germany upon some matters of military science. Does he carry the same weight when he writes of international politics and the actual use of those mighty forces which he has helped to form? We will hope not. But when a man speaks with the highest authority upon one subject, his voice cannot be entirely disregarded upon a kindred one. Besides, he continually labours, and with success, to make the reader understand that he is the direct modern disciple of that main German line of thought which traces from Frederick through Bismarck to the present day. He moves in circles which actually control the actions of their country in a manner to which we have no equivalent. For all these reasons, his views cannot be lightly set aside, and should be most carefully studied by Britons. We know that we have no wish for war, and desire only to be left alone. Unfortunately, it takes two to make peace, even as it takes two to make a quarrel. There is a very clear statement here that the quarrel is imminent, and that we must think of the means, military, naval, and financial, by which we may meet it. Since von Bernhardi's book may not be accessible to every reader of this article, I will begin by giving some idea of the situation as it appears to him, and of the course of action which he foreshadows and recommends.

He begins his argument by the uncompromising statement that war is a good thing in itself. All advance is founded upon struggle. Each nation has a right, and indeed a duty, to use violence where its interests are concerned and there is a tolerable hope of success. As to the obvious objection that such a doctrine bears no possible relation to Christianity, he is not prepared to admit the validity of the Christian ethics in international practice. In an ingenious passage he even attempts to bring the sanction of Christianity to support his bellicose views. He says:--

"Again, from the Christian standpoint, we arrive at the same conclusion. Christian morality is based, indeed, on the law of love. 'Love God above all things, and thy neighbour as thyself.' This law can claim no significance for the relations of one country to another, since its application to politics would lead to a conflict of duties. The love which a man showed to another country as such would imply a want of love for his own countrymen. Such a system of politics must inevitably lead men astray. Christian morality is personal and social, and in its nature cannot be political. Its object is to promote morality of the individual, in order to strengthen him to work unselfishly in the interests of the community. It tells us to love our individual enemies, but does not remove the conception of enmity."

Having thus established the general thesis that a nation should not hesitate to declare war where a material advantage may be the reward, he sets out very clearly what are some of the causes for war which Germany can see before her. The following passages throw a light upon them:--

"Strong, healthy, and flourishing nations increase in numbers. From a given moment they require a continual expansion of their frontiers, they require new territory for the accommodation of their surplus population. Since almost every part of the globe is inhabited, new territory must, as a rule, be obtained at the cost of its possessors--that is to say, by conquest, which thus becomes a law of necessity."

Again:--

"Lastly, in all times the right of conquest by war has been admitted. It may be that a growing people cannot win colonies from uncivilised races, and yet the State wishes to retain the surplus population which the mother country can no longer feed. Then the only course left is to acquire the necessary territory by war. Thus the instinct of self-preservation leads inevitably to war, and the conquest of foreign soil. It is not the possessor, but the victor, who then has the right."

And he concludes:--

"Arbitration treaties must be peculiarly detrimental to an aspiring people, which has not yet reached its political and national zenith, and is bent on expanding its power in order to play its part honourably in the civilised world."

And adds:--

"It must be borne in mind that a peaceful decision by an arbitration court can never replace in its effects and consequences a warlike decision, even as regards the State in whose favour it is pronounced."

To many of us it would seem a legitimate extension of the author's argument if we said that it would have a virile and bracing effect upon our characters if, when we had a grievance against our neighbour, we refrained from taking it into the law courts, but contented ourselves with breaking his head with a club. However, we are concerned here not so much with the validity of the German general's arguments as with their practical application so far as they affect ourselves.

Brushing aside the peace advocates, the writer continues: "To such views, the off-spring of a false humanity, the clear and definite answer must be made that, under certain circumstances, it is not only the right but the moral and political duty of the statesman to bring about a war. The acts of the State cannot be judged by the standard of individual morality." He quotes Treitschke: "The Christian duty of sacrifice for something higher does not exist for the State, for there is nothing higher than it in the world's history--consequently it cannot sacrifice itself to something higher." One would have hoped that a noble ideal and a moral purpose were something higher, but it would be vain to claim that any country, ourselves included, have ever yet lived fully up to the doctrine. And yet some conscious striving, however imperfect, is surely better than such a deliberate negation.

Having laid down these general propositions of the value of war, and of the non-existence of international moral obligations, General von Bernhardi then proceeds to consider very fully the general position of Germany and the practical application of those doctrines. Within the limits of this essay I can only give a general survey of the situation as seen by him. War is necessary for Germany. It should be waged as soon as is feasible, as certain factors in the situation tell in favour of her enemies. The chief of these factors are the reconstruction of the Russian fleet, which will be accomplished within a few years, and the preparation of a French native colonial force, which would be available for European hostilities. This also, though already undertaken, will take some years to perfect. Therefore, the immediate future is Germany's best opportunity.

In this war Germany places small confidence in Italy as an ally, since her interests are largely divergent, but she assumes complete solidarity with Austria. Austria and Germany have to reckon with France and Russia. Russia is slow in her movements, and Germany, with her rapid mobilisation, should be able to throw herself upon France without fear of her rear. Should she win a brilliant victory at the outset, Russia might refuse to compromise herself at all, especially if the quarrel could be so arranged that it would seem as if France had been the aggressor. Before the slow Slavonic mind had quite understood the situation and set her unwieldy strength in motion, her ally might be struck down, and she face to face with the two Germanic Powers, which would be more than a match for her.