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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/1804-0.txt b/1804-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..b776e2f --- /dev/null +++ b/1804-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,6344 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of War and the Future, by H. G. Wells + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: War and the Future + +Author: H. G. Wells + +Release Date: March 21, 2006 [EBook #1804] +Last Updated: March 2, 2018 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: UTF-8 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK WAR AND THE FUTURE *** + + + + +Produced by Morgan L. Owens and David Widger + + + + + +WAR AND THE FUTURE + +Italy, France and Britain at War + + +by H. G. Wells + + + + +Contents + + The Passing of the Effigy + + The War in Italy (August, 1916) + I. The Isonzo Front + II. The Mountain War + III. Behind the Front + + The Western War (September, 1916) + I. Ruins + II. The Grades of War + III. The War Landscape + IV. New Arms for Old Ones + V. Tanks + + How People Think About the War + I. Do they Really Think at all? + II. The Yielding Pacifist and the Conscientious Objector + III. The Religious Revival + IV. The Riddle of the British + V. The Social Changes in Progress + VI. The Ending of the War + + + + +THE PASSING OF THE EFFIGY + + +1 + +One of the minor peculiarities of this unprecedented war is the Tour of +the Front. After some months of suppressed information--in which even +the war correspondent was discouraged to the point of elimination--it +was discovered on both sides that this was a struggle in which Opinion +was playing a larger and more important part than it had ever done +before. This wild spreading weed was perhaps of decisive importance; +the Germans at any rate were attempting to make it a cultivated flower. +There was Opinion flowering away at home, feeding rankly on rumour; +Opinion in neutral countries; Opinion getting into great tangles +of misunderstanding and incorrect valuation between the Allies. The +confidence and courage of the enemy; the amiability and assistance of +the neutral; the zeal, sacrifice, and serenity of the home population; +all were affected. The German cultivation of opinion began long +before the war; it is still the most systematic and, because of the +psychological ineptitude of the Germans, it is probably the clumsiest. +The French _Maison de la Presse_ is certainly the best organisation in +existence for making things clear, counteracting hostile suggestion, the +British official organisations are comparatively ineffective; but what +is lacking officially is very largely made up for by the good will +and generous efforts of the English and American press. An interesting +monograph might be written upon these various attempts of the +belligerents to get themselves and their proceedings explained. + +Because there is perceptible in these developments, quite over and +above the desire to influence opinion, a very real effort to get things +explained. It is the most interesting and curious--one might almost +write touching--feature of these organisations that they do not +constitute a positive and defined propaganda such as the Germans +maintain. The German propaganda is simple, because its ends are simple; +assertions of the moral elevation and loveliness of Germany; of the +insuperable excellences of German Kultur, the Kaiser, and Crown Prince, +and so forth; abuse of the “treacherous” English who allied themselves +with the “degenerate” French and the “barbaric” Russians; nonsense about +“the freedom of the seas”--the emptiest phrase in history--childish +attempts to sow suspicion between the Allies, and still more childish +attempts to induce neutrals and simple-minded pacifists of allied +nationality to save the face of Germany by initiating peace +negotiations. But apart from their steady record and reminder of German +brutalities and German aggression, the press organisations of the Allies +have none of this definiteness in their task. The aim of the national +intelligence in each of the allied countries is not to exalt one's own +nation and confuse and divide the enemy, but to get a real understanding +with the peoples and spirits of a number of different nations, an +understanding that will increase and become a fruitful and permanent +understanding between the allied peoples. Neither the English, the +Russians, the Italians, nor the French, to name only the bigger European +allies, are concerned in setting up a legend, as the Germans are +concerned in setting up a legend of themselves to impose upon mankind. +They are reality dealers in this war, and the Germans are effigy +mongers. Practically the Allies are saying each to one another, “Pray +come to me and see for yourself that I am very much the human stuff that +you are. Come and see that I am doing my best--and I think that is +not so very bad a best....” And with that is something else still more +subtle, something rather in the form of, “And please tell me what you +think of me--and all this.” + +So we have this curious byplay of the war, and one day I find Mr. +Nabokoff, the editor of the _Retch_, and Count Alexy Tolstoy, that +writer of delicate short stories, and Mr. Chukovsky, the subtle critic, +calling in upon me after braving the wintry seas to see the British +fleet; M. Joseph Reinach follows them presently upon the same errand; +and then appear photographs of Mr. Arnold Bennett wading in the trenches +of Flanders, Mr. Noyes becomes discreetly indiscreet about what he has +seen among the submarines, and Mr. Hugh Walpole catches things from Mr. +Stephen Graham in the Dark Forest of Russia. All this is quite over and +above such writing of facts at first hand as Mr. Patrick McGill and a +dozen other real experiencing soldiers--not to mention the soldiers' +letters Mr. James Milne has collected, or the unforgettable and +immortal _Prisoner of War_ of Mr. Arthur Green--or such admirable war +correspondents' work as Mr. Philip Gibbs or Mr. Washburne has done. Some +of us writers--I can answer for one--have made our Tour of the Fronts +with a very understandable diffidence. For my own part I did not want +to go. I evaded a suggestion that I should go in 1915. I travel badly, +I speak French and Italian with incredible atrocity, and am an extreme +Pacifist. I hate soldiering. And also I did not want to write anything +“under instruction”. It is largely owing to a certain stiffness in the +composition of General Delme-Radcliffe is resolved that Italy shall not +feel neglected by the refusal of the invitation from the Comando +Supremo by anyone who from the perspective of Italy may seem to be a +representative of British opinion. If Herbert Spencer had been +alive General Radcliffe would have certainly made him come, +travelling-hammock, ear clips and all--and I am not above confessing +that I wish that Herbert Spencer was alive--for this purpose. I found +Udine warm and gay with memories of Mr. Belloc, Lord Northcliffe, Mr. +Sidney Low, Colonel Repington and Dr. Conan Doyle, and anticipating the +arrival of Mr. Harold Cox. So we pass, mostly in automobiles that bump +tremendously over war roads, a cloud of witnesses each testifying after +his manner. Whatever else has happened, we have all been photographed +with invincible patience and resolution under the direction of Colonel +Barberich in a sunny little court in Udine. + +My own manner of testifying must be to tell what I have seen and what +I have thought during this extraordinary experience. It has been my +natural disposition to see this war as something purposeful and epic, +as it is great, as an epoch, as “the War that will end War”--but of +that last, more anon. I do not think I am alone in this inclination to a +dramatic and logical interpretation. The caricatures in the French shops +show civilisation (and particularly Marianne) in conflict with a huge +and hugely wicked Hindenburg Ogre. Well, I come back from this tour with +something not so simple as that. If I were to be tied down to one word +for my impression of this war, I should say that this war is _Queer._ It +is not like anything in a really waking world, but like something in a +dream. It hasn't exactly that clearness of light against darkness or +of good against ill. But it has the quality of wholesome instinct +struggling under a nightmare. The world is not really awake. This vague +appeal for explanations to all sorts of people, this desire to exhibit +the business, to get something in the way of elucidation at present +missing, is extraordinarily suggestive of the efforts of the mind to +wake up that will sometimes occur at a deep crisis. My memory of this +tour I have just made is full of puzzled-looking men. I have seen +thousands of _poilus_ sitting about in cafes, by the roadside, in +tents, in trenches, thoughtful. I have seen Alpini sitting restfully and +staring with speculative eyes across the mountain gulfs towards unseen +and unaccountable enemies. I have seen trainloads of wounded staring +out of the ambulance train windows as we passed. I have seen these dim +intimations of questioning reflection in the strangest juxtapositions; +in Malagasy soldiers resting for a spell among the big shells they were +hoisting into trucks for the front, in a couple of khaki-clad Maoris +sitting upon the step of a horse-van in Amiens station. It is always the +same expression one catches, rather weary, rather sullen, inturned. The +shoulders droop. The very outline is a note of interrogation. They look +up as the privileged tourist of the front, in the big automobile or +the reserved compartment, with his officer or so in charge, +passes--importantly. One meets a pair of eyes that seems to say: +“Perhaps _you_ understand.... + +“In which case---...?” + +It is a part, I think, of this disposition to investigate what makes +everyone collect “specimens” of the war. Everywhere the souvenir forces +itself upon the attention. The homecoming permissionaire brings with +him invariably a considerable weight of broken objects, bits of shell, +cartridge clips, helmets; it is a peripatetic museum. It is as if he +hoped for a clue. It is almost impossible, I have found, to escape these +pieces in evidence. I am the least collecting of men, but I have brought +home Italian cartridges, Austrian cartridges, the fuse of an Austrian +shell, a broken Italian bayonet, and a note that is worth half a franc +within the confines of Amiens. But a large heavy piece of exploded shell +that had been thrust very urgently upon my attention upon the Carso I +contrived to lose during the temporary confusion of our party by the +arrival and explosion of another prospective souvenir in our close +proximity. And two really very large and almost complete specimens of +some species of _Ammonites_ unknown to me, from the hills to the east +of the Adige, partially wrapped in a back number of the _Corriere +della Sera_, that were pressed upon me by a friendly officer, were +unfortunately lost on the line between Verona and Milan through the +gross negligence of a railway porter. But I doubt if they would have +thrown any very conclusive light upon the war. + + +2 + +I avow myself an extreme Pacifist. I am against the man who first takes +up the weapon. I carry my pacifism far beyond the ambiguous little group +of British and foreign sentimentalists who pretend so amusingly to be +socialists in the _Labour Leader_, whose conception of foreign policy is +to give Germany now a peace that would be no more than a breathing time +for a fresh outrage upon civilisation, and who would even make heroes of +the crazy young assassins of the Dublin crime. I do not understand those +people. I do not merely want to stop this war. I want to nail down war +in its coffin. Modern war is an intolerable thing. It is not a thing +to trifle with in this Urban District Council way, it is a thing to +end forever. I have always hated it, so far that is as my imagination +enabled me to realise it; and now that I have been seeing it, sometimes +quite closely for a full month, I hate it more than ever. I never +imagined a quarter of its waste, its boredom, its futility, its +desolation. It is merely a destructive and dispersive instead of a +constructive and accumulative industrialism. It is a gigantic, dusty, +muddy, weedy, bloodstained silliness. It is the plain duty of every man +to give his life and all that he has if by so doing he may help to end +it. I hate Germany, which has thrust this experience upon mankind, as +I hate some horrible infectious disease. The new war, the war on the +modern level, is her invention and her crime. I perceive that on our +side and in its broad outlines, this war is nothing more than a gigantic +and heroic effort in sanitary engineering; an effort to remove German +militarism from the life and regions it has invaded, and to bank it +in and discredit and enfeeble it so that never more will it repeat its +present preposterous and horrible efforts. All human affairs and all +great affairs have their reservations and their complications, but that +is the broad outline of the business as it has impressed itself on my +mind and as I find it conceived in the mind of the average man of the +reading class among the allied peoples, and as I find it understood in +the judgement of honest and intelligent neutral observers. + +It is my unshakeable belief that essentially the Allies fight for a +permanent world peace, that primarily they do not make war but resist +war, that has reconciled me to this not very congenial experience of +touring as a spectator all agog to see, through the war zones. At any +rate there was never any risk of my playing Balaam and blessing the +enemy. This war is tragedy and sacrifice for most of the world, for +the Germans it is simply the catastrophic outcome of fifty years of +elaborate intellectual foolery. Militarism, Welt Politik, and here we +are! What else _could_ have happened, with Michael and his infernal War +Machine in the very centre of Europe, but this tremendous disaster? + +It is a disaster. It may be a necessary disaster; it may teach a lesson +that could be learnt in no other way; but for all that, I insist, it +remains waste, disorder, disaster. + +There is a disposition, I know, in myself as well as in others, to +wriggle away from this verity, to find so much good in the collapse that +has come to the mad direction of Europe for the past half-century as to +make it on the whole almost a beneficial thing. But at most I can find +it in no greater good than the good of a nightmare that awakens the +sleeper in a dangerous place to a realisation of the extreme danger of +his sleep. Better had he been awake--or never there. In Venetia Captain +Pirelli, whose task it was to keep me out of mischief in the war zone, +was insistent upon the way in which all Venetia was being opened up +by the new military roads; there has been scarcely a new road made in +Venetia since Napoleon drove his straight, poplar-bordered highways +through the land. M. Joseph Reinach, who was my companion upon the +French front, was equally impressed by the stirring up and exchange of +ideas in the villages due to the movement of the war. Charles Lamb's +story of the discovery of roast pork comes into one's head with an +effect of repartee. More than ideas are exchanged in the war zone, +and it is doubtful how far the sanitary precautions of the military +authorities avails against a considerable propaganda of disease. A more +serious argument for the good of war is that it evokes heroic qualities +that it has brought out almost incredible quantities of courage, +devotion, and individual romance that did not show in the suffocating +peace time that preceded the war. The reckless and beautiful zeal of +the women in the British and French munition factories, for example, the +gaiety and fearlessness of the common soldiers everywhere; these things +have always been there--like champagne sleeping in bottles in a cellar. +But was there any need to throw a bomb into the cellar? + +I am reminded of a story, or rather of the idea for a story that I +think I must have read in that curious collection of fantasies and +observations, Hawthorne's _Note Book._ It was to be the story of a man +who found life dull and his circumstances altogether mediocre. He had +loved his wife, but now after all she seemed to be a very ordinary human +being. He had begun life with high hopes--and life was commonplace. He +was to grow fretful and restless. His discontent was to lead to some +action, some irrevocable action; but upon the nature of that action I do +not think the _Note Book_ was very clear. It was to carry him in such +a manner that he was to forget his wife. Then, when it was too late, +he was to see her at an upper window, stripped and firelit, a glorious +thing of light and loveliness and tragic intensity.... + +The elementary tales of the world are very few, and Hawthorne's story +and Lamb's story are, after all, only variations upon the same +theme. But can we poor human beings never realise our quality without +destruction? + + +3 + +One of the larger singularities of the great war is its failure to +produce great and imposing personalities, mighty leaders, Napoleons, +Caesars. I would indeed make that the essential thing in my reckoning +of the war. It is a drama without a hero; without countless incidental +heroes no doubt, but no star part. Even the Germans, with a national +predisposition for hero-cults and living still in an atmosphere of +Victorian humbug, can produce nothing better than that timber image, +Hindenburg. + +It is not that the war has failed to produce heroes so much as that +it has produced heroism in a torrent. The great man of this war is the +common man. It becomes ridiculous to pick out particular names. There +are too many true stories of splendid acts in the past two years ever to +be properly set down. The V.C.'s and the palms do but indicate samples. +One would need an encyclopaedia, a row of volumes, of the gloriousness +of human impulses. The acts of the small men in this war dwarf all the +pretensions of the Great Man. Imperatively these multitudinous heroes +forbid the setting up of effigies. When I was a young man I imitated +Swift and posed for cynicism; I will confess that now at fifty and +greatly helped by this war, I have fallen in love with mankind. + +But if I had to pick out a single figure to stand for the finest quality +of the Allies' war, I should I think choose the figure of General +Joffre. He is something new in history. He is leadership without vulgar +ambition. He is the extreme antithesis to the Imperial boomster of +Berlin. He is as it were the ordinary common sense of men, incarnate. He +is the antithesis of the effigy. + +By great good luck I was able to see him. I was delayed in Paris on my +way to Italy, and my friend Captain Millet arranged for a visit to the +French front at Soissons and put me in charge of Lieutenant de Tessin, +whom I had met in England studying British social questions long before +this war. Afterwards Lieutenant de Tessin took me to the great hotel--it +still proclaims “_Restaurant_” in big black letters on the garden +wall--which shelters the General Headquarters of France, and here I +was able to see and talk to Generals Pelle and Castelnau as well as to +General Joffre. They are three very remarkable and very different men. +They have at least one thing in common; it is clear that not one of +them has spent ten minutes in all his life in thinking of himself as +a Personage or Great Man. They all have the effect of being active and +able men doing an extremely complicated and difficult but extremely +interesting job to the very best of their ability. With me they had all +one quality in common. They thought I was interested in what they were +doing, and they were quite prepared to treat me as an intelligent man of +a different sort, and to show me as much as I could understand.... + +Let me confess that de Tessin had had to persuade me to go to +Headquarters. Partly that was because I didn't want to use up even +ten minutes of the time of the French commanders, but much more was it +because I have a dread of Personages. + +There is something about these encounters with personages--as if one was +dealing with an effigy, with something tremendous put up to be seen. +As one approaches they become remoter; great unsuspected crevasses are +discovered. Across these gulfs one makes ineffective gestures. They do +not meet you, they pose at you enormously. Sometimes there is something +more terrible than dignity; there is condescension. They are affable. I +had but recently had an encounter with an imported Colonial statesman, +who was being advertised like a soap as the coming saviour of England. +I was curious to meet him. I wanted to talk to him about all sorts of +things that would have been profoundly interesting, as for example his +impressions of the Anglican bishops. But I met a hoarding. I met a thing +like a mask, something surrounded by touts, that was dully trying--as we +say in London--to “come it” over me. He said he had heard of me. He +had read _Kipps._ I intimated that though I had written _Kipps_ I had +continued to exist--but he did not see the point of that. I said certain +things to him about the difference in complexity between political +life in Great Britain and the colonies, that he was manifestly totally +capable of understanding. But one could as soon have talked with one of +the statesmen at Madame Tussaud's. An antiquated figure. + +The effect of these French commanders upon me was quite different from +my encounter with that last belated adventurer in the effigy line. I +felt indeed that I was a rather idle and flimsy person coming into the +presence of a tremendously compact and busy person, but I had none of +that unpleasant sensation of a conventional role, of being expected to +play the minute worshipper in the presence of the Great Image. I was so +moved by the common humanity of them all that in each case I broke +away from the discreet interpretations of de Tessin and talked to them +directly in the strange dialect which I have inadvertently made for +myself out of French, a disemvowelled speech of epicene substantives and +verbs of incalculable moods and temperaments, “_Entente Cordiale._” The +talked back as if we had met in a club. General Pelle pulled my leg +very gaily with some quotations from an article I had written upon the +conclusion of the war. I think he found my accent and my idioms very +refreshing. I had committed myself to a statement that Bloch has been +justified in his theory that under modern conditions the defensive wins. +There were excellent reasons, and General Pelle pointed them out, for +doubting the applicability of this to the present war. + +Both he and General Castelnau were anxious that I should see a French +offensive sector as well as Soissons. Then I should understand. +And since then I have returned from Italy and I have seen and I do +understand. The Allied offensive was winning; that is to say, it was +inflicting far greater losses than it experienced; it was steadily +beating the spirit out of the German army and shoving it back towards +Germany. Only peace can, I believe, prevent the western war ending in +Germany. And it is the Frenchmen mainly who have worked out how to do +it. + +But of that I will write later. My present concern is with General +Joffre as the antithesis of the Effigy. The effigy, + + “Thou Prince of Peace, + Thou God of War,” + +as Mr. Sylvester Viereck called him, prances on a great horse, wears a +Wagnerian cloak, sits on thrones and talks of shining armour and “unser +Gott.” All Germany gloats over his Jovian domesticities; when I was +last in Berlin the postcard shops were full of photographs of a sort +of procession of himself and his sons, all with long straight noses and +sidelong eyes. It is all dreadfully old-fashioned. General Joffre +sits in a pleasant little sitting-room in a very ordinary little villa +conveniently close to Headquarters. He sits among furniture that has no +quality of pose at all, that is neither magnificent nor ostentatiously +simple and hardy. He has dark, rather sleepy eyes under light eyelashes, +eyes that glance shyly and a little askance at his interlocutor and +then, as he talks, away--as if he did not want to be preoccupied by your +attention. He has a broad, rather broadly modelled face, a soft voice, +the sort of persuasive reasoning voice that many Scotchmen have. I had +a feeling that if he were to talk English he would do so with a Scotch +accent. Perhaps somewhere I have met a Scotchman of his type. He sat +sideways to his table as a man might sit for a gossip in a cafe. + +He is physically a big man, and in my memory he grows bigger and bigger. +He sits now in my memory in a room like the rooms that any decent people +might occupy, like that vague room that is the background of so many +good portraits, a great blue-coated figure with a soft voice and rather +tired eyes, explaining very simply and clearly the difficulties that +this vulgar imperialism of Germany, seizing upon modern science and +modern appliances, has created for France and the spirit of mankind. + +He talked chiefly of the strangeness of this confounded war. It was +exactly like a sanitary engineer speaking of the unexpected difficulties +of some particularly nasty inundation. He made little stiff horizontal +gestures with his hands. First one had to build a dam and stop the rush +of it, so; then one had to organise the push that would send it back. He +explained the organisation of the push. They had got an organisation +now that was working out most satisfactorily. Had I seen a sector? I +had seen the sector of Soissons. Yes, but that was not now an offensive +sector. I must see an offensive sector; see the whole method. Lieutenant +de Tessin must see that that was arranged.... + +Neither he nor his two colleagues spoke of the Germans with either +hostility or humanity. Germany for them is manifestly merely an +objectionable Thing. It is not a nation, not a people, but a nuisance. +One has to build up this great counter-thrust bigger and stronger until +they go back. The war must end in Germany. The French generals have +no such delusions about German science or foresight or capacity as +dominates the smart dinner chatter of England. One knows so well that +detestable type of English folly, and its voice of despair: “They _plan_ +everything. They foresee everything.” This paralysing Germanophobia is +not common among the French. The war, the French generals said, might +take--well, it certainly looked like taking longer than the winter. Next +summer perhaps. Probably, if nothing unforeseen occurred, before a full +year has passed the job might be done. Were any surprises in store? They +didn't seem to think it was probable that the Germans had any surprises +in store.... The Germans are not an inventive people; they are merely a +thorough people. One never knew for certain. + +Is any greater contrast possible than between so implacable, patient, +reasonable--and above all things _capable_--a being as General Joffre +and the rhetorician of Potsdam, with his talk of German Might, of Hammer +Blows and Hacking Through? Can there be any doubt of the ultimate issue +between them? + +There are stories that sound pleasantly true to me about General +Joffre's ambitions after the war. He is tired; then he will be very +tired. He will, he declares, spend his first free summer in making a +tour of the waterways of France in a barge. So I hope it may be. One +imagines him as sitting quietly on the crumpled remains of the last +and tawdriest of Imperial traditions, with a fishing line in the placid +water and a large buff umbrella overhead, the good ordinary man who does +whatever is given to him to do--as well as he can. The power that has +taken the great effigy of German imperialism by the throat is something +very composite and complex, but if we personify it at all it is +something more like General Joffre than any other single human figure I +can think of or imagine. + +If I were to set a frontispiece to a book about this War I would make +General Joffre the frontispiece. + + +4 + +As we swung back along the dusty road to Paris at a pace of fifty +miles an hour and upwards, driven by a helmeted driver with an aquiline +profile fit to go upon a coin, whose merits were a little flawed by a +childish and dangerous ambition to run over every cat he saw upon the +road, I talked to de Tessin about this big blue-coated figure of Joffre, +which is not so much a figure as a great generalisation of certain +hitherto rather obscured French qualities, and of the impression he had +made upon me. And from that I went on to talk about the Super Man, for +this encounter had suddenly crystallised out a set of realisations that +had been for some time latent in my mind. + +How much of what follows I said to de Tessin at the time I do not +clearly remember, but this is what I had in mind. + +The idea of the superman is an idea that has been developed by various +people ignorant of biology and unaccustomed to biological ways of +thinking. It is an obvious idea that follows in the course of half an +hour or so upon one's realisation of the significance of Darwinism. If +man has evolved from something different, he must now be evolving onward +into something sur-human. The species in the future will be different +from the species of the past. So far at least our Nietzsches and Shaws +and so on went right. + +But being ignorant of the elementary biological proposition that +modification of a species means really a secular change in its average, +they jumped to a conclusion--to which the late Lord Salisbury also +jumped years ago at a very memorable British Association meeting--that +a species is modified by the sudden appearance of eccentric individuals +here and there in the general mass who interbreed--preferentially. +Helped by a streak of antic egotism in themselves, they conceived of +the superman as a posturing personage, misunderstood by the vulgar, +fantastic, wonderful. But the antic Personage, the thing I have called +the Effigy, is not new but old, the oldest thing in history, the +departing thing. It depends not upon the advance of the species but upon +the uncritical hero-worship of the crowd. You may see the monster drawn +twenty times the size of common men upon the oldest monuments of Egypt +and Assyria. The true superman comes not as the tremendous personal +entry of a star, but in the less dramatic form of a general increase of +goodwill and skill and common sense. A species rises not by thrusting up +peaks but by the brimming up as a flood does. The coming of the superman +means not an epidemic of personages but the disappearance of the +Personage in the universal ascent. That is the point overlooked by the +megalomaniac school of Nietzsche and Shaw. + +And it is the peculiarity of this war, it is the most reassuring +evidence that a great increase in general ability and critical ability +has been going on throughout the last century, that no isolated +great personages have emerged. Never has there been so much ability, +invention, inspiration, leadership; but the very abundance of good +qualities has prevented our focusing upon those of any one individual. +We all play our part in the realisation of God's sanity in the world, +but, as the strange, dramatic end of Lord Kitchener has served to remind +us, there is no single individual of all the allied nations whose death +can materially affect the great destinies of this war. + +In the last few years I have developed a religious belief that has +become now to me as real as any commonplace fact. I think that mankind +is still as it were collectively dreaming and hardly more awakened to +reality than a very young child. It has these dreams that we express by +the flags of nationalities and by strange loyalties and by irrational +creeds and ceremonies, and its dreams at times become such nightmares as +this war. But the time draws near when mankind will awake and the dreams +will fade away, and then there will be no nationality in all the world +but humanity, and no kind, no emperor, nor leader but the one God of +mankind. This is my faith. I am as certain of this as I was in 1900 that +men would presently fly. To me it is as if it must be so. + +So that to me this extraordinary refusal of the allied nations under +conditions that have always hitherto produced a Great Man to produce +anything of the sort, anything that can be used as an effigy and carried +about for the crowd to follow, is a fact of extreme significance and +encouragement. It seems to me that the twilight of the half gods must +have come, that we have reached the end of the age when men needed a +Personal Figure about which they could rally. The Kaiser is perhaps +the last of that long series of crowned and cloaked and semi-divine +personages which has included Caesar and Alexander and Napoleon the +First--and Third. In the light of the new time we see the emperor-god +for the guy he is. In the August of 1914 he set himself up to be the +paramount Lord of the World, and it will seem to the historian to come, +who will know our dates so well and our feelings, our fatigues and +efforts so little, it will seem a short period from that day to this, +when the great figure already sways and staggers towards the bonfire. + + +5 + +I had the experience of meeting a contemporary king upon this journey. +He was the first king I had ever met. The Potsdam figure--with perhaps +some local exceptions behind the Gold Coast--is, with its collection of +uniforms and its pomps and splendours, the purest survival of the old +tradition of divine monarchy now that the Emperor at Pekin has followed +the Shogun into the shadows. The modern type of king shows a disposition +to intimate at the outset that he cannot help it, and to justify or at +any rate utilise his exceptional position by sound hard work. It is an +age of working kings, with the manners of private gentlemen. The King +of Italy for example is far more accessible than was the late Pierpont +Morgan or the late Cecil Rhodes, and he seems to keep a smaller court. + +I went to see him from Udine. He occupied a moderate-sized country villa +about half an hour by automobile from headquarters. I went over with +General Radcliffe; we drove through the gates of the villa past a single +sentinel in an ordinary infantry uniform, up to the door of the house, +and the number of guards, servants, attendants, officials, secretaries, +ministers and the like that I saw in that house were--I counted very +carefully--four. Downstairs were three people, a tall soldier of the +bodyguard in grey; an A.D.C., Captain Moreno, and Col. Matteoli, the +minister of the household. I went upstairs to a drawing-room of much +the same easy and generalised character as the one in which I had met +General Joffre a few days before. I gave my hat to a second bodyguard, +and as I did so a pleasantly smiling man appeared at the door of the +study whom I thought at first must be some minister in attendance. I did +not recognise him instantly because on the stamps and coins he is always +in profile. He began to talk in excellent English about my journey, +and I replied, and so talking we went into the study from which he had +emerged. Then I realised I was talking to the king. + +Addicted as I am to the cinematograph, in which the standard of study +furniture is particularly rich and high, I found something very cooling +and simple and refreshing in the sight of the king's study furniture. He +sat down with me at a little useful writing table, and after asking me +what I had seen in Italy and hearing what I had seen and what I was to +see, he went on talking, very good talk indeed. + +I suppose I did a little exceed the established tradition of courts +by asking several questions and trying to get him to talk upon certain +points as to which I was curious, but I perceived that he had had to +carry on at least so much of the regal tradition as to control the +conversation. He was, however, entirely un-posed. His talk reminded me +somehow of Maurice Baring's books; it had just the same quick, positive +understanding. And he had just the same detachment from the war as the +French generals. He spoke of it--as one might speak of an inundation. +And of its difficulties and perplexities. + +Here on the Adriatic side there were political entanglements that by +comparison made our western after-the-war problems plain sailing. He +talked of the game of spellicans among the Balkan nationalities. How was +that difficulty to be met? In Macedonia there were Turkish villages that +were Christian and Bulgarians that were Moslem. There were families that +changed the termination of their names from _ski_ to _off_ as Serbian or +Bulgarian prevailed. I remarked that that showed a certain passion for +peace, and that much of the mischief might be due to the propaganda +of the great Powers. I have a prejudice against that blessed Whig +“principle of nationality,” but the King of Italy was not to be drawn +into any statement about that. He left the question with his admission +of its extreme complexity. + +He went on to talk of the strange contrasts of war, of such things as +the indifference of the birds to gunfire and desolation. One day on +the Carso he had been near the newly captured Austrian trenches, and +suddenly from amidst a scattered mass of Austrian bodies a quail had +risen that had struck him as odd, and so too had the sight of a pack of +cards and a wine flask on some newly-made graves. The ordinary life was +a very _obstinate_ thing.... + +He talked of the courage of modern men. He was astonished at the +quickness with which they came to disregard shrapnel. And they were +so quietly enduring when they were wounded. He had seen a lot of the +wounded, and he had expected much groaning and crying out. But unless +a man is hit in the head and goes mad he does not groan or scream! They +are just brave. If you ask them how they feel it is always one of two +things: either they say quietly that they are very bad or else they say +there is nothing the matter.... + +He spoke as if these were mere chance observations, but everyone tells +me that nearly every day the king is at the front and often under fire. +He has taken more risks in a week than the Potsdam War Lord has taken +since the war began. He keeps himself acutely informed upon every aspect +of the war. He was a little inclined to fatalism, he confessed. There +were two stories current of two families of four sons, in each three +had been killed and in each there was an attempt to put the fourth in a +place of comparative safety. In one case a general took the fourth +son in as an attendant and embarked upon a ship that was immediately +torpedoed; in the other the fourth son was killed by accident while he +was helping to carry dinner in a rest camp. From those stories we came +to the question whether the uneducated Italians were more superstitious +than the uneducated English; the king thought they were much less so. +That struck me as a novel idea. But then he thought that English rural +people believe in witches and fairies. + +I have given enough of this talk to show the quality of this king of the +new dispensation. It was, you see, the sort of easy talk one might hear +from fine-minded people anywhere. When we had done talking he came +to the door of the study with me and shook hands and went back to his +desk--with that gesture of return to work which is very familiar and +sympathetic to a writer, and with no gesture of regality at all. + +Just to complete this impression let me repeat a pleasant story about +this king and our Prince of Wales, who recently visited the Italian +front. The Prince is a source of anxiety on these visits; he has a very +strong and very creditable desire to share the ordinary risks of war. +He is keenly interested, and unobtrusively bent upon getting as near +the fighting as line as possible. But the King of Italy was firm upon +keeping him out of anything more than the most incidental danger. “We +don't want any historical incidents here,” he said. I think that might +well become an historical phrase. For the life of the Effigy is a series +of historical incidents. + + +6 + +Manifestly one might continue to multiply portraits of fine people +working upon this great task of breaking and ending the German +aggression, the German legend, the German effigy, and the effigy +business generally; the thesis being that the Allies have no effigy. +One might fill a thick volume with pictures of men up the scale and down +working loyally and devotedly upon the war, to make this point clear +that the essential king and the essential loyalty of our side is the +commonsense of mankind. + +There comes into my head as a picture at the other extreme of this +series, a memory of certain trenches I visited on my last day in +France. They were trenches on an offensive front; they were not those +architectural triumphs, those homes from home, that grow to perfection +upon the less active sections of the great line. They had been first +made by men who had run rapidly forward with spade and rifle, stooping +as they ran, who had dropped into the craters of big shells, who had +organised these chiefly at night and dug the steep ditches sideways to +join up into continuous trenches. Now they were pushing forward saps +into No Man's Land, linking them across, and so continually creeping +nearer to the enemy and a practicable jumping-off place for an attack. +(It has been made since; the village at which I peeped was in our hands +a week later.) These trenches were dug into a sort of yellowish sandy +clay; the dug-outs were mere holes in the earth that fell in upon the +clumsy; hardly any timber had been got up the line; a storm might flood +them at any time a couple of feet deep and begin to wash the sides. +Overnight they had been “strafed” and there had been a number of +casualties; there were smashed rifles about and a smashed-up machine gun +emplacement, and the men were dog-tired and many of them sleeping like +logs, half buried in clay. Some slept on the firing steps. As one +went along one became aware ever and again of two or three pairs of +clay-yellow feet sticking out of a clay hole, and peering down one +saw the shapes of men like rudely modelled earthen images of soldiers, +motionless in the cave. + +I came round the corner upon a youngster with an intelligent face and +steady eyes sitting up on the firing step, awake and thinking. We looked +at one another. There are moments when mind leaps to mind. It is natural +for the man in the trenches suddenly confronted by so rare a beast as +a middle-aged civilian with an enquiring expression, to feel oneself +something of a spectacle and something generalised. It is natural for +the civilian to look rather in the vein of saying, “Well, how do you +take it?” As I pushed past him we nodded slightly with an effect of +mutual understanding. And we said with our nods just exactly what +General Joffre had said with his horizontal gestures of the hand and +what the King of Italy conveyed by his friendly manner; we said to each +other that here was the trouble those Germans had brought upon us and +here was the task that had to be done. + +Our guide to these trenches was a short, stocky young man, a cob; with +a rifle and a tight belt and projecting skirts and a helmet, a queer +little figure that, had you seen it in a picture a year or so before the +war, you would most certainly have pronounced Chinese. He belonged to a +Northumbrian battalion; it does not matter exactly which. As we returned +from this front line, trudging along the winding path through the barbed +wire tangles before the smashed and captured German trench that had been +taken a fortnight before, I fell behind my guardian captain and had +a brief conversation wit this individual. He was a lad in the early +twenties, weather-bit and with bloodshot eyes. He was, he told me, a +miner. I asked my stock question in such cases, whether he would go back +to the old work after the war. He said he would, and then added--with +the events of overnight on his mind: “If A'hm looky.” + +Followed a little silence. Then I tried my second stock remark for such +cases. One does not talk to soldiers at the front in this war of Glory +or the “Empire on which the sun never sets” or “the meteor flag of +England” or of King and Country or any of those fine old headline +things. On the desolate path that winds about amidst the shell craters +and the fragments and the red-rusted wire, with the silken shiver of +passing shells in the air and the blue of the lower sky continually +breaking out into eddying white puffs, it is wonderful how tawdry such +panoplies of the effigy appear. We knew that we and our allies are upon +a greater, graver, more fundamental business than that sort of thing +now. We are very near the waking point. + +“Well,” I said, “it's got to be done.” + +“Aye,” he said, easing the strap of his rifle a little; “it's got to be +done.” + + + + +THE WAR IN ITALY (AUGUST, 1916) + + + + +I. THE ISONZO FRONT + + +1 + +My first impressions of the Italian war centre upon Udine. So far I had +had only a visit to Soissons on an exceptionally quiet day and the +sound of a Zeppelin one night in Essex for all my experience of actual +warfare. But my bedroom at the British mission in Udine roused perhaps +extravagant expectations. There were holes in the plaster ceiling and +wall, betraying splintered laths, holes, that had been caused by a bomb +that had burst and killed several people in the little square outside. +Such excitements seem to be things of the past now in Udine. Udine keeps +itself dark nowadays, and the Austrian sea-planes, which come raiding +the Italian coast country at night very much in the same aimless, +casually malignant way in which the Zeppelins raid England, apparently +because there is nothing else for them to do, find it easier to locate +Venice. + +My earlier rides in Venetia began always with the level roads of the +plain, roads frequently edged by watercourses, with plentiful willows +beside the road, vines and fields of Indian corn and suchlike lush +crops. Always quite soon one came to some old Austrian boundary posts; +almost everywhere the Italians are fighting upon what is technically +enemy territory, but nowhere does it seem a whit less Italian than +the plain of Lombardy. When at last I motored away from Udine to the +northern mountain front I passed through Campo-Formio and saw the +white-faced inn at which Napoleon dismembered the ancient republic +of Venice and bartered away this essential part of Italy into foreign +control. It just gravitates back now--as though there had been no +Napoleon. + +And upon the roads and beside them was the enormous equipment of a +modern army advancing. Everywhere I saw new roads being made, railways +pushed up, vast store dumps, hospitals; everywhere the villages swarmed +with grey soldiers; everywhere our automobile was threading its way +and taking astonishing risks among interminable processions of motor +lorries, strings of ambulances or of mule carts, waggons with timber, +waggons with wire, waggons with men's gear, waggons with casks, waggons +discreetly veiled, columns of infantry, cavalry, batteries _en route._ +Every waggon that goes up full comes back empty, and many wounded were +coming down and prisoners and troops returning to rest. Goritzia had +been taken a week or so before my arrival; the Isonzo had been crossed +and the Austrians driven back across the Carso for several miles; all +the resources of Italy seemed to be crowding up to make good these +gains and gather strength for the next thrust. The roads under all this +traffic remained wonderful; gangs of men were everywhere repairing the +first onset of wear, and Italy is the most fortunate land in the world +for road metal; her mountains are solid road metal, and in this Venetian +plain you need but to scrape through a yard of soil to find gravel. + +One travelled through a choking dust under the blue sky, and above the +steady incessant dusty succession of lorry, lorry, lorry, lorry that +passed one by, one saw, looking up, the tree tops, house roofs, or the +solid Venetian campanile of this or that wayside village. Once as we +were coming out of the great grey portals of that beautiful old relic of +a former school of fortification, Palmanova, the traffic became suddenly +bright yellow, and for a kilometre or so we were passing nothing but +Sicilian mule carts loaded with hay. These carts seem as strange among +the grey shapes of modern war transport as a Chinese mandarin in painted +silk would be. They are the most individual of things, all two-wheeled, +all bright yellow and the same size it is true, but upon each there are +they gayest of little paintings, such paintings as one sees in England +at times upon an ice-cream barrow. Sometimes the picture will present +a scriptural subject, sometimes a scene of opera, sometimes a dream +landscape or a trophy of fruits or flowers, and the harness--now much +out of repair--is studded with brass. Again and again I have passed +strings of these gay carts; all Sicily must be swept of them. + +Through the dust I came to Aquileia, which is now an old cathedral, +built upon the remains of a very early basilica, standing in a space in +a scattered village. But across this dusty space there was carried the +head of the upstart Maximinus who murdered Alexander Severus, and +later Aquileia brought Attila near to despair. Our party alighted; we +inspected a very old mosaic floor which has been uncovered since the +Austrian retreat. The Austrian priests have gone too, and their Italian +successors are already tracing out a score of Roman traces that it was +the Austrian custom to minimise. Captain Pirelli refreshed my historical +memories; it was rather like leaving a card on Gibbon _en route_ for +contemporary history. + +By devious routes I went on to certain batteries of big guns which had +played their part in hammering the Austrian left above Monfalcone across +an arm of the Adriatic, and which were now under orders to shift and +move up closer. The battery was the most unobtrusive of batteries; its +one desire seemed to be to appear a simple piece of woodland in the eye +of God and the aeroplane. I went about the network of railways and paths +under the trees that a modern battery requires, and came presently upon +a great gun that even at the first glance seemed a little less carefully +hidden than its fellows. Then I saw that it was a most ingenious dummy +made of a tree and logs and so forth. It was in the emplacement of a +real gun that had been located; it had its painted sandbags about it +just the same, and it felt itself so entirely a part of the battery that +whenever its companions fired t burnt a flash and kicked up a dust. It +was an excellent example of the great art of camouflage which this war +has developed. + +I went on through the wood to a shady observation post high in a tree, +into which I clambered with my guide. I was able from this position to +get a very good idea of the lie of the Italian eastern front. I was in +the delta of the Isonzo. Directly in front of me were some marshes +and the extreme tip of the Adriatic Sea, at the head of which was +Monfalcone, now in Italian hands. Behind Monfalcone ran the red ridge +of the Carso, of which the Italians had just captured the eastern half. +Behind this again rose the mountains to the east of the Isonzo which +the Austrians still held. The Isonzo came towards me from out of the +mountains, in a great westward curve. Fifteen or sixteen miles away +where it emerged from the mountains lay the pleasant and prosperous town +of Goritzia, and at the westward point of the great curve was Sagrado +with its broken bridge. The battle of Goritzia was really not fought at +Goritzia at all. What happened was the brilliant and bloody storming +of Mounts Podgora and Sabotino on the western side of the river above +Goritzia, and simultaneously a crossing at Sagrado below Goritzia and +a magnificent rush up the plateau and across the plateau of the Carso. +Goritzia itself was not organised for defence, and the Austrians were +so surprised by the rapid storm of the mountains to the north-west of it +and of the Carso to the south-east, that they made no fight in the town +itself. + +As a consequence when I visited it I found it very little +injured--compared, that is, with such other towns as have been fought +through. Here and there the front of a house has been knocked in by +an Austrian shell, or a lamp-post prostrated. But the road bridge had +suffered a good deal; its iron parapet was twisted about by shell bursts +and interwoven with young trees and big boughs designed to screen the +passer-by from the observation of the Austrian gunners upon Monte Santo. +Here and there were huge holes through which one could look down upon +the blue trickles of water in the stony river bed far below. The driver +of our automobile displayed what seemed to me an extreme confidence in +the margins of these gaps, but his confidence was justified. At Sagrado +the bridge had been much more completely demolished; no effort had been +made to restore the horizontal roadway, but one crossed by a sort of +timber switchback that followed the ups and downs of the ruins. + +It is not in these places that one must look for the real destruction +of modern war. The real fight on the left of Goritzia went through the +village of Lucinico up the hill of Podgora. Lucinico is nothing more +than a heap of grey stones; except for a bit of the church wall and the +gable end of a house one cannot even speak of it as ruins. But in one +place among the rubble I saw the splintered top and a leg of a grand +piano. Podgora hill, which was no doubt once neatly terraced and +cultivated, is like a scrap of landscape from some airless, treeless +planet. Still more desolate was the scene upon the Carso to the right +(south) of Goritzia. Both San Martino and Doberdo are destroyed beyond +the limits of ruination. The Carso itself is a waterless upland with but +a few bushy trees; it must always have been a desolate region, but now +it is an indescribable wilderness of shell craters, smashed-up Austrian +trenches, splintered timber, old iron, rags, and that rusty thorny +vileness of man's invention, worse than all the thorns and thickets of +nature, barbed wire. There are no dead visible; the wounded have been +cleared away; but about the trenches and particularly near some of the +dug-outs there was a faint repulsive smell.... + +Yet into this wilderness the Italians are now thrusting a sort of order. +The German is a wonderful worker, they say on the Anglo-French front +that he makes his trenches by way of resting, but I doubt if he can +touch the Italian at certain forms of toil. All the way up to San +Martino and beyond, swarms of workmen were making one of those carefully +graded roads that the Italians make better than any other people. Other +swarms were laying water-pipes. For upon the Carso there are neither +roads nor water, and before the Italians can thrust farther both must be +brought up to the front. + +As we approached San Martino an Austrian aeroplane made its presence +felt overhead by dropping a bomb among the tents of some workmen, in a +little scrubby wood on the hillside near at hand. One heard the report +and turned to see the fragments flying and the dust. Probably they got +someone. And then, after a little pause, the encampment began to spew +out men; here, there and everywhere they appeared among the tents, +running like rabbits at evening-time, down the hill. Soon after and +probably in connection with this signal, Austrian shells began to come +over. They do not use shrapnel because the rocky soil of Italy makes +that unnecessary. They fire a sort of shell that goes bang and releases +a cloud of smoke overhead, and then drops a parcel of high explosive +that bursts on the ground. The ground leaps into red dust and smoke. But +these things are now to be seen on the cinema. Forthwith the men working +on the road about us begin to down tools and make for the shelter +trenches, a long procession going at a steady but resolute walk. Then +like a blow in the chest came the bang of a big Italian gun somewhere +close at hand.... + +Along about four thousand miles of the various fronts this sort of thing +was going on that morning.... + + +2 + +This Carso front is the practicable offensive front of Italy. From the +left wing on the Isonzo along the Alpine boundary round to the Swiss +boundary there is mountain warfare like nothing else in the world; it +is warfare that pushes the boundary backward, but it is mountain warfare +that will not, for so long a period that the war will be over first, +hold out any hopeful prospects of offensive movements on a large scale +against Austria or Germany. It is a short distance as the crow flies +from Rovereto to Munich, but not as the big gun travels. The Italians, +therefore, as their contribution to the common effort, are thrusting +rather eastwardly towards the line of the Julian Alps through Carinthia +and Carniola. From my observation post in the tree near Monfalcone I saw +Trieste away along the coast to my right. It looked scarcely as distant +as Folkestone from Dungeness. The Italian advanced line is indeed +scarcely ten miles from Trieste. But the Italians are not, I think, +going to Trieste just yet. That is not the real game now. They are +playing loyally with the Allies for the complete defeat of the Central +Powers, and that is to be achieved striking home into Austria. Meanwhile +there is no sense in knocking Trieste to pieces, or using Italians +instead of Austrian soldiers to garrison it. + + + + +II. THE MOUNTAIN WAR + + +1 + +The mountain warfare of Italy is extraordinarily unlike that upon any +other front. From the Isonzo to the Swiss frontier we are dealing with +high mountains, cut by deep valleys between which there is usually no +practicable lateral communication. Each advance must have the nature of +an unsupported shove along a narrow channel, until the whole mountain +system, that is, is won, and the attack can begin to deploy in front +of the passes. Geographically Austria has the advantage. She had the +gentler slope of the mountain chains while Italy has the steep side, +and the foresight of old treaties has given her deep bites into what is +naturally Italian territory; she is far nearer the Italian plain +than Italy is near any practicable fighting ground for large forces; +particularly is this the case in the region of the Adige valley and Lake +Garda. + +The legitimate war, so to speak, in this region is a mountaineering war. +The typical position is roughly as follows. The Austrians occupy valley +A which opens northward; the Italians occupy valley B which opens +southward. The fight is for the crest between A and B. The side that +wins that crest gains the power of looking down into, firing into and +outflanking the positions of the enemy valley. In most cases it is the +Italians now who are pressing, and if the reader will examine a map of +the front and compare it with the official reports he will soon realise +that almost everywhere the Italians are up to the head of the southward +valleys and working over the crests so as to press down upon the +Austrian valleys. But in the Trentino the Austrians are still well over +the crest on the southward slopes. When I was in Italy they still held +Rovereto. + +Now it cannot be said that under modern conditions mountains favour +either the offensive or the defensive. But they certainly make +operations far more deliberate than upon a level. An engineered road or +railway in an Alpine valley is the most vulnerable of things; its curves +and viaducts may be practically demolished by shell fire or swept by +shrapnel, although you hold the entire valley except for one vantage +point. All the mountains round about a valley must be won before that +valley is safe for the transport of an advance. But on the other hand a +surprise capture of some single mountain crest and the hoisting of one +gun into position there may block the retreat of guns and material +from a great series of positions. Mountain surfaces are extraordinarily +various and subtle. You may understand Picardy on a map, but mountain +warfare is three-dimensional. A struggle may go on for weeks or months +consisting of apparently separate and incidental skirmishes, and then +suddenly a whole valley organisation may crumble away in retreat +or disaster. Italy is gnawing into the Trentino day by day, and +particularly around by her right wing. At no time I shall be surprised +to see a sudden lunge forward on that front, and hear a tale of guns +and prisoners. This will not mean that she has made a sudden attack, but +that some system of Austrian positions has collapsed under her continual +pressure. + +Such briefly is the _idea_ of mountain struggle. Its realities, I +should imagine, are among the strangest and most picturesque in all this +tremendous world conflict. I know nothing of the war in the east, of +course, but there are things here that must be hard to beat. Happily +they will soon get justice done to them by an abler pen than mine. +I hear that Kipling is to follow me upon this ground; nothing can be +imagined more congenial to his extraordinary power of vivid rendering +than this struggle against cliffs, avalanches, frost and the Austrian. + +To go the Italian round needs, among other things, a good head. +Everywhere it has been necessary to make roads where hitherto there have +been only mule tracks or no tracks at all; the roads are often still in +the making, and the automobile of the war tourist skirts precipices and +takes hairpin bends upon tracks of loose metal not an inch too broad +for the operation, or it floats for a moment over the dizzy edge while +a train of mule transport blunders by. The unruly imagination of man's +heart (which is “only evil continually”) speculates upon what would be +the consequences of one good bump from the wheel of a mule cart. Down +below, the trees that one sees through a wisp of cloud look far too +small and spiky and scattered to hold out much hope for a fallen man +of letters. And at the high positions they are too used to the +vertical life to understand the secret feelings of the visitor from +the horizontal. General Bompiani, whose writings are well known to all +English students of military matters, showed me the Gibraltar he is +making of a great mountain system east of the Adige. + +“Let me show you,” he said, and flung himself on to the edge of the +precipice into exactly the position of a lady riding side-saddle. “You +will find it more comfortable to sit down.” + +But anxious as I am abroad not to discredit my country by unseemly +exhibitions I felt unequal to such gymnastics without a proper rehearsal +at a lower level. I seated myself carefully at a yard (perhaps it was a +couple of yards) from the edge, advanced on my trousers without dignity +to the verge, and so with an effort thrust my legs over to dangle in the +crystalline air. + +“That,” proceeded General Bompiani, pointing with a giddy flourish of +his riding whip, “is Monte Tomba.” + +I swayed and half-extended my hand towards him. But he was still +there--sitting, so to speak, on the half of himself.... I was astonished +that he did not disappear abruptly during his exposition.... + + +2 + +The fighting man in the Dolomites has been perhaps the most wonderful +of all these separate campaigns. I went up by automobile as far as the +clambering new road goes up the flanks of Tofana No. 2; thence for a +time by mule along the flank of Tofana No. 1, and thence on foot to the +vestiges of the famous Castelletto. + +The aspect of these mountains is particularly grim and wicked; they are +worn old mountains, they tower overhead in enormous vertical cliffs +of sallow grey, with the square jointings and occasional clefts and +gullies, their summits are toothed and jagged; the path ascends and +passes round the side of the mountain upon loose screes, which descend +steeply to a lower wall of precipices. In the distance rise other harsh +and desolate-looking mountain masses, with shining occasional scars +of old snow. Far below is a bleak valley of stunted pine trees through +which passes the road of the Dolomites. + +As I ascended the upper track two bandages men were coming down on led +mules. It was mid-August, and they were suffering from frostbite. +Across the great gap between the summits a minute traveller with +some provisions was going up by wire to some post upon the crest. For +everywhere upon the icy pinnacles are observation posts directing the +fire of the big guns on the slopes below, or machine-gun stations, or +little garrisons that sit and wait through the bleak days. Often +they have no link with the world below but a precipitous climb or a +“teleferic” wire. Snow and frost may cut them off absolutely for weeks +from the rest of mankind. The sick and wounded must begin their journey +down to help and comfort in a giddy basket that swings down to the head +of the mule track below. + +Originally all these crests were in Austrian hands; they were stormed +by the Alpini under almost incredible conditions. For fifteen days, for +example, they fought their way up these screes on the flanks of Tofana +No. 2 to the ultimate crags, making perhaps a hundred metres of ascent +each day, hiding under rocks and in holes in the daylight and receiving +fresh provisions and ammunition and advancing by night. They were +subjected to rifle fire, machine-gun fire and bombs of a peculiar sort, +big iron balls of the size of a football filled with explosive that were +just flung down the steep. They dodged flares and star shells. At one +place they went up a chimney that would be far beyond the climbing +powers of any but a very active man. It must have been like storming the +skies. The dead and wounded rolled away often into inaccessible ravines. +Stray skeletons, rags of uniform, fragments of weapons, will add to the +climbing interest of these gaunt masses for many years to come. In this +manner it was that Tofana No. 2 was taken. + +Now the Italians are organising this prize, and I saw winding up far +above me on the steep grey slope a multitudinous string of little things +that looked like black ants, each carrying a small bright yellow egg. +They were mules bringing back balks of timber.... + +But one position held out invincibly; this was the Castelletto, a great +natural fortress of rock standing out at an angle of the mountain +in such a position that it commanded the Italian communications (the +Dolomite road) in the valley below, and rendered all their positions +uncomfortable and insecure. This obnoxious post was practically +inaccessible either from above or below, and it barred the Italians +even from looking into the Val Travenanzes which it defended. It was, in +fact, an impregnable position, and against it was pitted the invincible +5th Group of the Alpini. It was the old problem of the irresistible +force in conflict with the immovable object. And the outcome has been +the biggest military mine in all history. + +The business began in January, 1916, with surveys of the rock in +question. The work of surveying for excavations, never a very simple +one, becomes much more difficult when the site is occupied by hostile +persons with machine guns. In March, as the winter's snows abated, the +boring machinery began to arrive, by mule as far as possible and then by +hand. Altogether about half a kilometre of gallery had to be made to the +mine chamber, and meanwhile the explosive was coming up load by load and +resting first here, then there, in discreetly chosen positions. There +were at the last thirty-five tons of it in the inner chamber. And while +the boring machines bored and the work went on, Lieutenant Malvezzi was +carefully working out the problem of “il massimo effetto dirompimento” + and deciding exactly how to pack and explode his little hoard. On the +eleventh of July, at 3.30, as he rejoices to state in his official +report, “the mine responded perfectly both in respect of the +calculations made and of the practical effects,” that is to say, the +Austrians were largely missing and the Italians were in possession of +the crater of the Castelletto and looking down the Val Travenanzes from +which they had been barred for so long. Within a month things had been +so tidied up, and secured by further excavations and sandbags against +hostile fire, that even a middle-aged English writer, extremely fagged +and hot and breathless, could enjoy the same privilege. All this, you +must understand, had gone on at a level to which the ordinary tourist +rarely climbs, in a rarefied, chest-tightening atmosphere, with wisps of +clouds floating in the clear air below and club-huts close at hand.... + +Among these mountains avalanches are frequent; and they come down +regardless of human strategy. In many cases the trenches cross avalanche +tracks; they and the men in them are periodically swept away and +periodically replaced. They are positions that must be held; if the +Italians will not face such sacrifices, the Austrians will. Avalanches +and frostbite have slain and disabled their thousands; they have +accounted perhaps for as many Italians in this austere and giddy +campaign as the Austrians.... + + +3 + +It seems to be part of the stern resolve of Fate that this, the greatest +of wars, shall be the least glorious; it is manifestly being decided +not by victories but by blunders. It is indeed a history of colossal +stupidities. Among the most decisive of these blunders, second only +perhaps of the blunder of the Verdun attack and far outshining the wild +raid of the British towards Bagdad, was the blunder of the Trentino +offensive. It does not need the equipment of a military expert, it +demands only quite ordinary knowledge and average intelligence, +to realise the folly of that Austrian adventure. There is some +justification for a claim that the decisive battle of the war was fought +upon the soil of Italy. There is still more justification for saying +that it might have been. + +There was only one good point about the Austrian thrust. No one could +have foretold it. And it did so completely surprise the Italians as to +catch them without any prepared line of positions in the rear. On the +very eve of the big Russian offensive, the Austrians thrust eighteen +divisions hard at the Trentino frontier. The Italian posts were then in +Austrian territory; they held on the left wing and the right, but they +were driven by the sheer weight of men and guns in the centre; they lost +guns and prisoners because of the difficulty of mountain retreats to +which I have alluded, and the Austrians pouring through reached not +indeed the plain of Venetia, but to the upland valleys immediately above +it, to Asiago and Arsiero. They probably saw the Venetian plain through +gaps in the hills, but they were still separated from it even at Arsiero +by what are mountains to an English eye, mountains as high as Snowdon. +But the Italians of such beautiful old places and Vicenza, Marostica, +and Bassano could watch the Austrian shells bursting on the last line of +hills above the plain, and I have no doubt they felt extremely uneasy. + +As one motors through these ripe and beautiful towns and through the +rich valleys that link them--it is a smiling land abounding in old +castles and villas, Vicenza is a rich museum of Palladio's architecture +and Bassano is full of irreplaceable painted buildings--one feels that +the things was a narrow escape, but from the military point of view it +was merely an insane escapade. The Austrians had behind them--and some +way behind them--one little strangulated railway and no good pass road; +their right was held at Pasubio, their left was similarly bent back. In +front of them was between twice and three times their number of first +class troops, with an unlimited equipment. If they had surmounted +that last mountain crest they would have come down to almost certain +destruction in the plain. They could never have got back. For a time +it was said that General Cadorna considered that possibility. From the +point of view of purely military considerations, the Trentino offensive +should perhaps have ended in the capitulation of Vicenza. + +I will confess I am glad it did not do so. This tour of the fronts has +made me very sad and weary with a succession of ruins. I can bear no +more ruins unless they are the ruins of Dusseldorf, Cologne, Berlin, +or suchlike modern German city. Anxious as I am to be a systematic +Philistine, to express my preference for Marinetti over the Florentine +British and generally to antagonise aesthetic prigs, I rejoiced over +that sunlit land as one might rejoice over a child saved from beasts. + +On the hills beyond Schio I walked out through the embrasure of a big +gun in a rock gallery, and saw the highest points upon the hillside +to which the Austrian infantry clambered in their futile last attacks. +Below me were the ruins of Arsiero and Velo d'Astico recovered, and +across the broad valley rose Monte Cimone with the Italian trenches +upon its crest and the Austrians a little below to the north. A very +considerable bombardment was going on and it reverberated finely. (It +is only among mountains that one hears anything that one can call the +thunder of guns. The heaviest bombardments I heard in France sounded +merely like Brock's benefit on a much large scale, and disappointed me +extremely.) As I sat and listened to the uproar and watched the shells +burst on Cimone and far away up the valley over Castelletto above +Pedescala, Captain Pirelli pointed out the position of the Austrian +frontier. I doubt if the English people realise that the utmost depth to +which this great Trentino offensive, which exhausted Austria, wasted the +flower of the Hungarian army and led directly to the Galician disasters +and the intervention of Rumania, penetrated into Italian territory was +about six miles. + + + + +III. BEHIND THE FRONT + + +1 + +I have a peculiar affection for Verona and certain things in Verona. +Italians must forgive us English this little streak of impertinent +proprietorship in the beautiful things of their abundant land. It is +quite open to them to revenge themselves by professing a tenderness for +Liverpool or Leeds. It was, for instance, with a peculiar and +personal indignation that I saw where an Austrian air bomb had killed +five-and-thirty people in the Piazza Erbe. Somehow in that jolly old +place, a place that have very much of the quality of a very pretty and +cheerful old woman, it seemed exceptionally an outrage. And I made a +special pilgrimage to see how it was with that monument of Can Grande, +the equestrian Scaliger with the sidelong grin, for whom I confess a +ridiculous admiration. Can Grande, I rejoice to say, has retired into a +case of brickwork, surmounted by a steep roof of thick iron plates; no +aeroplane exists to carry bombs enough to smash that covering; there he +will smile securely in the darkness until peace comes again. + +All over Venetia the Austrian seaplanes are making the same sort of +idiot raid on lighted places that the Zeppelins have been making over +England. These raids do no effective military work. What conceivable +military advantage can there be in dropping bombs into a marketing +crowd? It is a sort of anti-Teutonic propaganda by the Central Powers to +which they seem to have been incited by their own evil genius. It is +as if they could convince us that there is an essential malignity in +Germans, that until the German powers are stamped down into the mud +they will continue to do evil things. All of the Allies have borne the +thrusting and boasting of Germany with exemplary patience for half a +century; England gave her Heligoland and stood out of the way of her +colonial expansion, Italy was a happy hunting ground for her +business enterprise, France had come near resignation on the score of +Alsace-Lorraine. And then over and above the great outrage of the +war come these incessant mean-spirited atrocities. A great and simple +wickedness it is possible to forgive; the war itself, had it been +fought greatly by Austria and Germany, would have made no such deep and +enduring breach as these silly, futile assassinations have down between +the Austro-Germans and the rest of the civilised world. One great +misdeed is a thing understandable and forgivable; what grows upon the +consciousness of the world is the persuasion that here we fight not a +national sin but a national insanity; that we dare not leave the German +the power to attack other nations any more for ever.... + +Venice has suffered particularly from this ape-like impulse to hurt and +terrorise enemy non-combatants. Venice has indeed suffered from this war +far more than any other town in Italy. Her trade has largely ceased; +she has no visitors. I woke up on my way to Udine and found my train at +Venice with an hour to spare; after much examining and stamping of my +passport I was allowed outside the station wicket to get coffee in the +refreshment room and a glimpse of a very sad and silent Grand Canal. +There was nothing doing; a black despondent remnant of the old crowd +of gondolas browsed dreamily among against the quay to stare at me the +better. The empty palaces seemed to be sleeping in the morning sunshine +because it was not worth while to wake up.... + + +2 + +Except in the case of Venice, the war does not seem as yet to have made +nearly such a mark upon life in Italy as it has in England or provincial +France. People speak of Italy as a poor country, but that is from a +banker's point of view. In some respects she is the richest country on +earth, and in the matter of staying power I should think she is +better off than any other belligerent. She produces food in abundance +everywhere; her women are agricultural workers, so that the interruption +of food production by the war has been less serious in Italy than in any +other part of Europe. In peace time, she has constantly exported labour; +the Italian worker has been a seasonal emigrant to America, north and +south, to Switzerland, Germany and the south of France. The cessation of +this emigration has given her great reserves of man power, so that she +has carried on her admirable campaign with less interference with her +normal economic life than any other power. The first person I spoke to +upon the platform at Modane was a British officer engaged in forwarding +Italian potatoes to the British front in France. Afterwards, on my +return, when a little passport irregularity kept me for half a day in +Modane, I went for a walk with him along the winding pass road that goes +down into France. “You see hundreds and hundreds of new Fiat cars,” he +remarked, “along here--going up to the French front.” + +But there is a return trade. Near Paris I saw scores of thousands of +shells piled high to go to Italy.... + +I doubt if English people fully realise either the economic sturdiness +or the political courage of their Italian ally. Italy is not merely +fighting a first-class war in first-class fashion but she is doing +a big, dangerous, generous and far-sighted thing in fighting at all. +France and England were obliged to fight; the necessity was as plain as +daylight. The participation of Italy demanded a remoter wisdom. In the +long run she would have been swallowed up economically and politically +by Germany if she had not fought; but that was not a thing staring her +plainly in the face as the danger, insult and challenge stared France +and England in the face. What did stare her in the face was not merely a +considerable military and political risk, but the rupture of very close +financial and commercial ties. I found thoughtful men talking everywhere +I have been in Italy of two things, of the Jugo-Slav riddle and of the +question of post war finance. So far as the former matter goes, I think +the Italians are set upon the righteous solution of all such riddles, +they are possessed by an intelligent generosity. They are clearly set +upon deserving Jugo-Slav friendship; they understand the plain necessity +of open and friendly routes towards Roumania. It was an Italian who set +out to explain to me that Fiume must be at least a free port; it +would be wrong and foolish to cut the trade of Hungary off from the +Mediterranean. But the banking puzzle is a more intricate and puzzling +matter altogether than the possibility of trouble between Italian and +Jugo-Slav. + +I write of these things with the simplicity of an angel, but without an +angelic detachment. Here are questions into which one does not so much +rush as get reluctantly pushed. Currency and banking are dry distasteful +questions, but it is clear that they are too much in the hands of +mystery-mongers; it is as much the duty of anyone who talks and writes +of affairs, it is as much the duty of every sane adult, to bring his +possibly poor and unsuitable wits to bear upon these things, as it is +for him to vote or enlist or pay his taxes. Behind the simple ostensible +spectacle of Italy recovering the unredeemed Italy of the Trentino +and East Venetia, goes on another drama. Has Italy been sinking into +something rather hard to define called “economic slavery”? Is she or is +she not escaping from that magical servitude? Before this question has +been under discussion for a minute comes a name--for a time I was really +quite unable to decide whether it is the name of the villain in the +piece or of the maligned heroine, or a secret society or a gold mine, +or a pestilence or a delusion--the name of the _Banca Commerciale +Italiana._ + +Banking in a country undergoing so rapid and vigorous an economic +development as Italy is very different from the banking we simple +English know of at home. Banking in England, like land-owning, has +hitherto been a sort of hold up. There were always borrowers, there were +always tenants, and all that had to be done was to refuse, obstruct, +delay and worry the helpless borrower or would-be tenant until the +maximum of security and profit was obtained. I have never borrowed but +I have built, and I know something of the extreme hauteur of property of +England towards a man who wants to do anything with land, and with +money I gather the case is just the same. But in Italy, which already +possessed a sunny prosperity of its own upon mediaeval lines, the banker +has had to be suggestive and persuasive, sympathetic and helpful. These +are unaccustomed attitudes for British capital. The field has been far +more attractive to the German banker, who is less of a proudly impassive +usurer and more of a partner, who demands less than absolute security +because he investigates more industriously and intelligently. This great +bank, the Banca Commerciale Italiana, is a bank of the German type: to +begin with, it was certainly dominated by German directors; it was a +bank of stimulation, and its activities interweave now into the whole +fabric of Italian commercial life. But it has already liberated +itself from German influence, and the bulk of its capital is Italian. +Nevertheless I found discussion ranging about firstly what the Banca +Commerciale essentially _was_, secondly what it might _become_, thirdly +what it might _do_, and fourthly what, if anything, had to be done to +it. + +It is a novelty to an English mind to find banking thus mixed up with +politics, but it is not a novelty in Italy. All over Venetia there are +agricultural banks which are said to be “clerical.” I grappled with this +mystery. “How are they clerical?” I asked Captain Pirelli. “Do they lend +money on bad security to clerical voters, and on no terms whatever +to anti-clericals?” He was quite of my way of thinking. “_Pecunia non +olet_,” he said; “I have never yet smelt a clerical fifty lira note.”... +But on the other hand Italy is very close to Germany; she wants easy +money for development, cheap coal, a market for various products. The +case against the Germans--this case in which the Banca Commerciale +Italiana appears, I am convinced unjustly, as a suspect--is that they +have turned this natural and proper interchange with Italy into the +acquisition of German power. That they have not been merely easy +traders, but patriotic agents. It is alleged that they used their +early “pull” in Italian banking to favour German enterprises and German +political influence against the development of native Italian business; +that their merchants are not bona-fide individuals, but members of +a nationalist conspiracy to gain economic controls. The German is a +patriotic monomaniac. He is not a man but a limb, the worshipper of a +national effigy, the digit of an insanely proud and greedy Germania, and +here are the natural consequences. + +The case of the individual Italian compactly is this: “We do not like +the Austrians and Germans. These Imperialisms look always over the Alps. +Whatever increases German influence here threatens Italian life. The +German is a German first and a human being afterwards.... But on the +other hand England seems commercially indifferent to us and France has +been economically hostile...” + +“After all,” I said presently, after reflection, “in that matter of +_Pecunia non olet_; there used to be fusses about European loans in +China. And one of the favourite themes of British fiction and drama +before the war was the unfortunate position of the girl who accepted a +loan from the wicked man to pay her debts at bridge.” + +“Italy,” said Captain Pirelli, “isn't a girl. And she hasn't been +playing bridge.” + +I incline on the whole to his point of view. Money is facile +cosmopolitan stuff. I think that any bank that settles down in Italy is +going to be slowly and steadily naturalised Italian, it will become more +and more Italian until it is wholly Italian. I would trust Italy to make +and keep the Banca Commerciale Italiana Italian. I believe the Italian +brain is a better brain than the German article. But still I heard +people talking of the implicated organisation as if it were engaged in +the most insidious duplicities. “Wait for only a year or so after the +war,” said one English authority to me, “and the mask will be off and it +will be frankly a 'Deutsche Bank' once more.” They assure me that +then German enterprises will be favoured again, Italian and Allied +enterprises blockaded and embarrassed, the good understanding of +Italians and English poisoned, entirely through this organisation.... + +The reasonable uncommercial man would like to reject all this last sort +of talk as “suspicion mania.” So far as the Banca Commerciale Italiana +goes, I at least find that easy enough; I quote that instance simply +because it is a case where suspicion has been dispelled, but in +regard to a score of other business veins it is not so easy to dispel +suspicion. This war has been a shock to reasonable men the whole world +over. They have been forced to realise that after all a great number +of Germans have been engaged in a crack-brained conspiracy against the +non-German world; that in a great number of cases when one does business +with a German the business does not end with the individual German. We +hated to believe that a business could be tainted by German partners or +German associations. If now we err on the side of over-suspicion, it is +the German's little weakness for patriotic disingenuousness that is most +to blame.... + +But anyhow I do not think there is much good in a kind of witch-smelling +among Italian enterprises to find the hidden German. Certain things are +necessary for Italian prosperity and Italy must get them. The Italians +want intelligent and helpful capital. They want a helpful France. +They want bituminous coal for metallurgical purposes. They want cheap +shipping. The French too want metallurgical coal. It is more important +for civilisation, for the general goodwill of the Allies and for Great +Britain that these needs should be supplied than that individual British +money-owners or ship-owners should remain sluggishly rich by insisting +upon high security or high freights. The control of British coal-mining +and shipping is in the national interests--for international +interests--rather than for the creation of that particularly passive, +obstructive, and wasteful type of wealth, the wealth of the mere +profiteer, is as urgent a necessity for the commercial welfare of France +and Italy and the endurance of the Great Alliance as it is for the +well-being of the common man in Britain. + + +3 + +I left my military guide at Verona on Saturday afternoon and reached +Milan in time to dine outside Salvini's in the Galleria Vittorio +Emanuele, with an Italian fellow story-writer. The place was as full as +ever; we had to wait for a table. It is notable that there were still +great numbers of young men not in uniform in Milan and Turin and Vicenza +and Verona; there was no effect anywhere of a depletion of men. The +whole crowded place was smouldering with excitement. The diners +looked about them as they talked, some talked loudly and seemed to be +expressing sentiments. Newspaper vendors appeared at the intersection +of the arcades, uttering ambiguous cries, and did a brisk business of +flitting white sheets among the little tables. + +“To-night,” said my companion, “I think we shall declare war upon +Germany. The decision is being made.” + +I asked intelligently why this had not been done before. I forget the +precise explanation he gave. A young soldier in uniform, who had been +dining at an adjacent table and whom I had not recognised before as a +writer I had met some years previously in London, suddenly joined in our +conversation, with a slightly different explanation. I had been carrying +on a conversation in slightly ungainly French, but now I relapsed into +English. + +But indeed the matter of that declaration of war is as plain as +daylight; the Italian national consciousness has not at first that +direct sense of the German danger that exists in the minds of the three +northern Allies. To the Italian the traditional enemy is Austria, and +this war is not primarily a war for any other end than the emancipation +of Italy. Moreover we have to remember that for years there has been +serious commercial friction between France and Italy, and considerable +mutual elbowing in North Africa. Both Frenchmen and Italians are +resolute to remedy this now, but the restoration of really friendly +and trustful relations is not to be done in a day. It has been an +extraordinary misfortune for Great Britain that instead of boldly taking +over her shipping from its private owners and using it all, regardless +of their profit, in the interests of herself and her allies, her +government has permitted so much of it as military and naval needs have +not requisitioned to continue to ply for gain, which the government +itself has shared by a tax on war profits. The Anglophobe elements in +Italian public life have made the utmost of this folly or laxity in +relation more particularly to the consequent dearness of coal in Italy. +They have carried on an amazingly effective campaign in which this +British slackness with the individual profiteer, is represented as if +it were the deliberate greed of the British state. This certainly +contributed very much to fortify Italy's disinclination to slam the door +on the German connection. + +I did my best to make it clear to my two friends that so far from +England exploiting Italy, I myself suffered in exactly the same way +as any Italian, through the extraordinary liberties of our shipping +interest. “I pay as well as you do,” I said; “the shippers' blockade of +Great Britain is more effective than the submarines'. My food, my coal, +my petrol are all restricted in the sacred name of private property. +You see, capital in England has hitherto been not an exploitation but +a hold-up. We are learning differently now.... And anyhow, Mr. Runciman +has been here and given Italy assurances....” + +In the train to Modane this old story recurred again. It is imperative +that English readers should understand clearly how thoroughly these +little matters have been _worked_ by the enemy. + +Some slight civilities led to a conversation that revealed the Italian +lady in the corner as an Irishwoman married to an Italian, and also +brought out the latent English of a very charming elderly lady opposite +to her. She had heard a speech, a wonderful speech from a railway train, +by “the Lord Runciman.” He had said the most beautiful things about +Italy. + +I did my best to echo these beautiful things. + +Then the Irishwoman remarked that Mr. Runciman had not satisfied +everybody. She and her husband had met a minister--I found afterwards +he was one of the members of the late Giolotti government--who had been +talking very loudly and scornfully of the bargain Italy was making with +England. I assured her that the desire of England was simply to give +Italy all that she needed. + +“But,” said the husband casually, “Mr. Runciman is a shipowner.” + +I explained that he was nothing of the sort. It was true that he came +of a shipowning family--and perhaps inherited a slight tendency to +see things from a shipowning point of view--but in England we did not +suspect a man on such a score as that. + +“In Italy I think we should,” said the husband of the Irish lady. + + +4 + +This incidental discussion is a necessary part of my impression of Italy +at war. The two western allies and Great Britain in particular have to +remember Italy's economic needs, and to prepare to rescue them from the +blind exploitation of private profit. They have to remember these needs +too, because, if they are left out of the picture, then it becomes +impossible to understand the full measure of the risk Italy has faced in +undertaking this war for an idea. With a Latin lucidity she has counted +every risk, and with a Latin idealism she has taken her place by the +side of those who fight for a liberal civilisation against a Byzantine +imperialism. + +As I came out of the brightly lit Galleria Vittorio Emanuele into the +darkened Piazza del Duomo I stopped under the arcade and stood looking +up at the shadowy darkness of that great pinnacled barn, that marble +bride-cake, which is, I suppose, the last southward fortress of the +Franco-English Gothic. + +“It was here,” said my host, “that we burnt the German stuff.” + +“What German stuff?” + +“Pianos and all sorts of things. From the shops. It is possible, +you know, to buy things too cheaply--and to give too much for the +cheapness.” + + + + +THE WESTERN WAR (SEPTEMBER, 1916) + + + + +I. RUINS + + +1 + +If I had to present some particular scene as typical of the peculiar +vileness and mischief wrought by this modern warfare that Germany has +elaborated and thrust upon the world, I do not think I should choose as +my instance any of those great architectural wrecks that seem most to +impress contemporary writers. I have seen the injuries and ruins of the +cathedrals at Arras and Soissons and the wreckage of the great church +at Saint Eloi, I have visited the Hotel de Ville at Arras and seen +photographs of the present state of the Cloth Hall at Ypres--a building +I knew very well indeed in its days of pride--and I have not been very +deeply moved. I suppose that one is a little accustomed to Gothic ruins, +and that there is always something monumental about old buildings; it is +only a question of degree whether they are more or less tumble-down. I +was far more desolated by the obliteration of such villages as Fricourt +and Dompierre, and by the horrible state of the fields and gardens +round about them, and my visit to Arras railway station gave me all the +sensations of coming suddenly on a newly murdered body. + +Before I visited the recaptured villages in the zone of the actual +fighting, I had an idea that their evacuation was only temporary, +that as soon as the war line moved towards Germany the people of the +devastated villages would return to build their houses and till their +fields again. But I see now that not only are homes and villages +destroyed almost beyond recognition, but the very fields are destroyed. +They are wildernesses of shell craters; the old worked soil is buried +and great slabs of crude earth have been flung up over it. No ordinary +plough will travel over this frozen sea, let along that everywhere +chunks of timber, horrible tangles of rusting wire, jagged fragments of +big shells, and a great number of unexploded shells are entangled in the +mess. Often this chaos is stained bright yellow by high explosives, and +across it run the twisting trenches and communication trenches eight, +ten, or twelve feet deep. These will become water pits and mud pits into +which beasts will fall. It is incredible that there should be crops from +any of this region of the push for many years to come. There is no shade +left; the roadside trees are splintered stumps with scarcely the spirit +to put forth a leaf; a few stunted thistles and weeds are the sole +proofs that life may still go on. + +The villages of this wide battle region are not ruined; they are +obliterated. It is just possible to trace the roads in them, because +the roads have been cleared and repaired for the passing of the guns +and ammunition. Fricourt is a tangle of German dug-outs. One dug-out +in particular there promises to become a show place. It must be the +masterpiece of some genius for dug-outs; it is made as if its makers +enjoyed the job; it is like the work of some horrible badger among +the vestiges of what were pleasant human homes. You are taken down a +timbered staircase into its warren of rooms and passages; you are shown +the places under the craters of the great British shells, where the wood +splintered but did not come in. (But the arrival of those shells must +have been a stunning moment.) There are a series of ingenious bolting +shafts set with iron climbing bars. In this place German officers and +soldiers have lived continually for nearly two years. This war is, +indeed, a troglodytic propaganda. You come up at last at the far end +into what was once a cellar of a decent Frenchman's home. + +But there are stranger subterranean refuges than that at Fricourt. At +Dompierre the German trenches skirted the cemetery, and they turned the +dead out of their vaults and made lurking places of the tombs. I walked +with M. Joseph Reinach about this place, picking our way carefully +amidst the mud holes and the wire, and watched the shells bursting away +over the receding battle line to the west. The wreckage of the graves +was Durereqsue. And here would be a fragment of marble angle and here +a split stone with an inscription. Splinters of coffins, rusty iron +crosses and the petals of tin flowers were trampled into the mud, amidst +the universal barbed wire. A little distance down the slope is a brand +new cemetery, with new metal wreaths and even a few flowers; it is +a disciplined array of uniform wooden crosses, each with its list of +soldiers' names. Unless I am wholly mistaken in France no Germans will +ever get a chance for ever more to desecrate that second cemetery as +they have done its predecessor. + +We walked over the mud heaps and litter that had once been houses +towards the centre of Dompierre village, and tried to picture to +ourselves what the place had been. Many things are recognisable in +Dompierre that have altogether vanished at Fricourt; for instance, +there are quire large triangular pieces of the church wall upstanding +at Dompierre. And a mile away perhaps down the hill on the road towards +Amiens, the ruins of the sugar refinery are very distinct. A sugar +refinery is an affair of big iron receptacles and great flues and pipes +and so forth, and iron does not go down under gun fire as stone or brick +does. The whole fabric wars rust, bent and twisted, gaping with shell +holes, that raggedest display of old iron, but it still kept its general +shape, as a smashed, battered, and sunken ironclad might do at the +bottom of the sea. + +There wasn't a dog left of the former life of Dompierre. There was not +even much war traffic that morning on the worn and muddy road. The guns +muttered some miles away to the west, and a lark sang. But a little way +farther on up the road was an intermediate dressing station, rigged up +with wood and tarpaulins, and orderlies were packing two wounded men +into an ambulance. The men on the stretchers were grey faced, as though +they had been trodden on by some gigantic dirty boot. + +As we came back towards where our car waited by the cemetery I heard +the jingle of a horseman coming across the space behind us. I turned and +beheld one of the odd contrasts that seem always to be happening in +this incredible war. This man was, I suppose, a native officer of some +cavalry force from French north Africa. He was a handsome dark brown +Arab, wearing a long yellow-white robe and a tall cap about which ran +a band of sheepskin. He was riding one of those little fine lean horses +with long tails that I think are Barbary horses, his archaic saddle rose +fore and aft of him, and the turned-up toes of his soft leather boots +were stuck into great silver stirrups. He might have ridden straight +out of the Arabian nights. He passed thoughtfully, picking his way +delicately among the wire and the shell craters, and coming into +the road, broke into a canter and vanished in the direction of the +smashed-up refinery. + + +2 + +About such towns as Rheims or Arras or Soissons there is an effect of +waiting stillness like nothing else I have ever experienced. At Arras +the situation is almost incredible to the civilian mind. The British +hold the town, the Germans hold a northern suburb; at one point near the +river the trenches are just four metres apart. This state of tension has +lasted for long months. + +Unless a very big attack is contemplated, I suppose there is no +advantage in an assault; across that narrow interval we should only +get into trenches that might be costly or impossible to hold, and so it +would be for the Germans on our side. But there is a kind of etiquette +observed; loud vulgar talking on either side of the four-metre gap leads +at once to bomb throwing. And meanwhile on both sides guns of various +calibre keep up an intermittent fire, the German guns register--I think +that is the right term--on the cross of Arras cathedral, the British +guns search lovingly for the German batteries. As one walks about the +silent streets one hears, “_Bang_---Pheeee---woooo” and then +far away “_dump._” One of ours. Then presently back comes +“Pheeee---woooo---_Bang!_” One of theirs. + +Amidst these pleasantries, the life of the town goes on. _Le Lion +d'Arras_, an excellent illustrated paper, produces its valiant sheets, +and has done so since the siege began. + +The current number of _Le Lion d'Arras_ had to report a local German +success. Overnight they had killed a gendarme. There is to be a public +funeral and much ceremony. It is rare for anyone now to get killed; +everything is so systematised. + +You may buy postcards with views of the destruction at various angles, +and send them off with the Arras postmark. The town is not without a +certain business activity. There is, I am told, a considerable influx +of visitors of a special sort; they wear khaki and lead the troglodytic +life. They play cards and gossip and sleep in the shadows, and may not +walk the streets. I had one glimpse of a dark crowded cellar. Now and +then one sees a British soldier on some special errand; he keeps to the +pavement, mindful of the spying German sausage balloon in the air. The +streets are strangely quite and grass grows between the stones. + +The Hotel de Ville and the cathedral are now mostly heaps of litter, +but many streets of the town have suffered very little. Here and there +a house has been crushed and one or two have been bisected, the front +reduced to a heap of splinters and the back halves of the rooms left +so that one sees the bed, the hanging end of the carpet, the clothes +cupboard yawning open, the pictures still on the wall. In one place +a lamp stands on a chest of drawers, on a shelf of floor cut off +completely from the world below.... Pheeee---woooo---_Bang!_ One would +be irresistibly reminded of a Sunday afternoon in the city of London, if +it were not for those unmeaning explosions. + +I went to the station, a dead railway station. A notice-board requested +us to walk around the silent square on the outside pavement and not +across it. The German sausage balloon had not been up for days; it had +probably gone off to the Somme; the Somme was a terrible vortex just +then which was sucking away the resources of the whole German line; but +still discipline is discipline. The sausage might come peeping up at any +moment over the station roof, and so we skirted the square. Arras was +fought for in the early stages of the war; two lines of sand-bagged +breastworks still run obliquely through the station; one is where the +porters used to put luggage upon cabs and one runs the length of the +platform. The station was a fine one of the modern type, with a glass +roof whose framework still remains, though the glass powders the floor +and is like a fine angular gravel underfoot. The rails are rails of +rust, and cornflowers and mustard and tall grasses grow amidst the +ballast. The waiting-rooms have suffered from a shell or so, but there +are still the sofas of green plush, askew, a little advertisement hung +from the wall, the glass smashed. The ticket bureau is as if a giant had +scattered a great number of tickets, mostly still done up in bundles, to +Douai, to Valenciennes, to Lens and so on. These tickets are souvenirs +too portable to resist. I gave way to that common weakness. + +I went out and looked up and down the line; two deserted goods trucks +stood as if they sheltered under a footbridge. The grass poked out +through their wheels. The railway signals seemed uncertain in their +intimations; some were up and some were down. And it was as still and +empty as a summer afternoon in Pompeii. No train has come into Arras for +two long years now. + +We lunched in a sunny garden with various men who love Arras but are +weary of it, and we disputed about Irish politics. We discussed the +political future of Sir F. E. Smith. We also disputed whether there was +an equivalent in English for _embusque._ Every now and then a shell came +over--an aimless shell. + +A certain liveliness marked our departure from the town. Possibly the +Germans also listen for the rare infrequent automobile. At any rate, as +we were just starting our way back--it is improper to mention the exact +point from which we started--came “Pheeee---woooo.” Quite close. But +there was no _Bang!_ One's mind hung expectant and disappointed. It was +a dud shell. + +And then suddenly I became acutely aware of the personality of our +chauffeur. It was not his business to talk to us, but he turned his +head, showed a sharp profile, wry lips and a bright excited eye, and +remarked, “_That_ was a near one--anyhow.” He then cut a corner over +the pavement and very nearly cut it through a house. He bumped us over +a shell hole and began to toot his horn. At every gateway, alley, and +cross road on this silent and empty streets of Arras and frequently in +between, he tooted punctiliously. (It is not proper to sound motor horns +in Arras.) I cannot imagine what the listening Germans made of it. We +passed the old gates of that city of fear, still tooting vehemently, and +then with shoulders eloquent of his feelings, our chauffeur abandoned +the horn altogether and put his whole soul into the accelerator.... + + +3 + +Soissons was in very much the same case as Arras. There was the same +pregnant silence in her streets, the same effect of waiting for the +moment which draws nearer and nearer, when the brooding German lines +away there will be full of the covert activities of retreat, when the +streets of the old town will stir with the joyous excitement of the +conclusive advance. + +The organisation of Soissons for defence is perfect. I may not describe +it, but think of whatever would stop and destroy an attacking party or +foil the hostile shell. It is there. Men have had nothing else to do and +nothing else to think of for two years. I crossed the bridge the English +made in the pursuit after the Marne, and went into the first line +trenches and peeped towards the invisible enemy. To show me exactly +where to look a seventy-five obliged with a shell. In the crypt of the +Abbey of St. Medard near by it--it must provoke the Germans bitterly to +think that all the rest of the building vanished ages ago--the French +boys sleep beside the bones of King Childebert the Second. They shelter +safely in the prison of Louis the Pious. An ineffective shell from a +German seventy-seven burst in the walled garden close at hand as I came +out from those thousand-year-old memories again. + +The cathedral at Soissons had not been nearly so completely smashed up +as the one at Arras; I doubt if it has been very greatly fired into. +There is a peculiar beauty in the one long vertical strip of blue sky +between the broken arches in the chief gap where the wall has tumbled +in. And the people are holding on in many cases exactly as they are +doing in Arras; I do not know whether it is habit or courage that is +most apparent in this persistence. About the chief place of the town +there are ruined houses, but some invisible hand still keeps the grass +of the little garden within bounds and has put out a bed of begonias. In +Paris I met a charming American writer, the wife of a French artist, the +lady who wrote _My House on the Field of Honour._ She gave me a queer +little anecdote. On account of some hospital work she had been allowed +to visit Soissons--a rare privilege for a woman--and she stayed the +night in a lodging. The room into which she was shown was like any other +French provincial bedroom, and after her Anglo-Saxon habit she walked +straight to the windows to open them. + +They looked exactly like any other French bedroom windows, with neat, +clean white lace curtains across them. The curtains had been put there, +because they were the proper things to put there. + +“Madame,” said the hostess, “need not trouble to open the glass. There +is no more glass in Soissons.” + +But there were curtains nevertheless. There was all the precise delicacy +of the neatly curtained home life of France. + +And she told me too of the people at dinner, and how as the little +serving-maid passed about a proud erection of cake and conserve and +cream, came the familiar “Pheeee---woooo---_Bang!_” + +“That must have been the Seminaire,” said someone. + +As one speaks of the weather or a passing cart. + +“It was in the Rue de la Bueire, M'sieur,” the little maid asserted with +quiet conviction, poising the trophy of confectionery for Madame Huard +with an unshaking hand. + +So stoutly do the roots of French life hold beneath the tramplings of +war. + + + + +II. THE GRADES OF WAR + + +1 Soissons and Arras when I visited them were samples of the deadlock +war; they were like Bloch come true. The living fact about war so far +is that Bloch has not come true--_yet._ I think in the end he will come +true, but not so far as this war is concerned, and to make that clear +it is necessary to trouble the reader with a little disquisition upon +war--omitting as far as humanly possible all mention of Napoleon's +campaigns. + +The development of war has depended largely upon two factors. One of +these is invention. New weapons and new methods have become available, +and have modified tactics, strategy, the relative advantage of offensive +and defensive. The other chief factor in the evolution of the war has +been social organisation. As Machiavelli points out in his _Art of War_, +there was insufficient social stability in Europe to keep a properly +trained and disciplined infantry in the field from the passing of the +Roman legions to the appearance of the Swiss footmen. He makes it very +clear that he considers the fighting of the Middle Ages, though frequent +and bloody, to be a confused, mobbing sort of affair, and politically +and technically unsatisfactory. The knight was an egotist in armour. +Machiavelli does small justice to the English bowmen. It is interesting +to note that Switzerland, that present island of peace, was regarded by +him as the mother of modern war. Swiss aggression was the curse of the +Milanese. That is a remark by the way; our interest here is to note that +modern war emerges upon history as the sixteenth century unfolds, as +an affair in which the essential factor is the drilled and trained +infantryman. The artillery is developing as a means of breaking the +infantry; cavalry for charging them when broken, for pursuit and +scouting. To this day this triple division of forces dominates soldiers' +minds. The mechanical development of warfare has consisted largely in +the development of facilities for enabling or hindering the infantry +to get to close quarters. As that has been made easy or difficult the +offensive or the defensive has predominated. + +A history of military method for the last few centuries would be a +record of successive alternate steps in which offensive and defensive +contrivances pull ahead, first one and then the other. Their relative +fluctuations are marked by the varying length of campaigns. From the +very outset we have the ditch and the wall; the fortified place upon a +pass or main road, as a check to the advance. Artillery improves, then +fortification improves. The defensive holds its own for a long period, +wars are mainly siege wars, and for a century before the advent of +Napoleon there are no big successful sweeping invasions, no marches +upon the enemy capital and so on. There were wars of reduction, wars +of annoyance. Napoleon developed the offensive by seizing upon the +enthusiastic infantry of the republic, improving transport and mobile +artillery, using road-making as an aggressive method. In spite of the +successful experiment of Torres Vedras and the warning of Plevna the +offensive remained dominant throughout the nineteenth century. + +But three things were working quietly towards the rehabilitation of the +defensive; firstly the increased range, accuracy and rapidity of rifle +fire, with which we may include the development of the machine gun; +secondly the increasing use of the spade, and thirdly the invention of +barbed wire. By the end of the century these things had come so far into +military theory as to produce the great essay of Bloch, and to surprise +the British military people, who are not accustomed to read books or +talk shop, in the Boer war. In the thinly populated war region of South +Africa the difficulties of forcing entrenched positions were largely met +by outflanking, the Boers had only a limited amount of barbed wire +and could be held down in their trenches by shrapnel, and even at the +beginning of the present war there can be little doubt that we and +our Allies were still largely unprepared for the full possibilities of +trench warfare, we attempted a war of manoeuvres, war at about the grade +to which war had been brought in 1898, and it was the Germans who first +brought the war up to date by entrenching upon the Aisne. We had, of +course, a few aeroplanes at that time, but they were used chiefly as a +sort of accessory cavalry for scouting; our artillery was light and our +shell almost wholly shrapnel. + +Now the grades of warfare that have been developed since the present +war began, may be regarded as a series of elaborations and counter +elaborations of the problem which begins as a line of trenches behind +wire, containing infantry with rifles and machine guns. Against this an +infantry attack with bayonet, after shrapnel fails. This we will call +Grade A. To this the offensive replies with improved artillery, and +particularly with high explosive shell instead of shrapnel. By this the +wire is blown away, the trench wrecked and the defender held down as +the attack charges up. This is Grade B. But now appear the dug-out +elaborating the trench and the defensive battery behind the trench. The +defenders, under the preliminary bombardment, get into the dug-outs +with their rifles and machine guns, and emerge as fresh as paint as +the attack comes up. Obviously there is much scope for invention and +contrivance in the dug-out as the reservoir of counter attacks. Its +possibilities have been very ably exploited by the Germans. Also the +defensive batteries behind, which have of course the exact range of the +captured trench, concentrate on it and destroy the attack at the moment +of victory. The trench falls back to its former holders under this fire +and a counter attack. Check again for the offensive. Even if it can +take, it cannot hold a position under these conditions. This we will +call Grade A2; a revised and improved A. What is the retort from +the opposite side? Obviously to enhance and extend the range of the +preliminary bombardment behind the actual trench line, to destroy +or block, if it can, the dug-outs and destroy or silence the counter +offensive artillery. If it can do that, it can go on; otherwise Bloch +wins. + +If fighting went on only at ground level Bloch would win at this stage, +but here it is that the aeroplane comes in. From the ground it would +be practically impossible to locate the enemies' dug-outs, secondary +defences, and batteries. But the aeroplane takes us immediately into a +new grade of warfare, in which the location of the defender's secondary +trenches, guns, and even machine-gun positions becomes a matter of +extreme precision--provided only that the offensive has secured command +of the air and can send his aeroplanes freely over the defender lines. +Then the preliminary bombardment becomes of a much more extensive +character; the defender's batteries are tackled by the overpowering fire +of guns they are unable to locate and answer; the secondary dug-outs and +strong places are plastered down, a barrage fire shuts off support +from the doomed trenches, the men in these trenches are held down by a +concentrated artillery fire and the attack goes up at last to hunt +them out of the dug-outs and collect the survivors. Until the attack is +comfortably established in the captured trench, the fire upon the old +counter attack position goes on. This is the grade, Grade B2, to which +modern warfare has attained upon the Somme front. The appearance of +the Tank has only increased the offensive advantage. There at present +warfare rests. + +There is, I believe, only one grade higher possible. The success of B2 +depends upon the completeness of the aerial observation. The invention +of an anti-aircraft gun which would be practically sure of hitting and +bringing down an aeroplane at any height whatever up to 20,000 feet, +would restore the defensive and establish what I should think must be +the final grade of war, A3. But at present nothing of the sort exists +and nothing of the sort is likely to exist for a very long time; at +present hitting an aeroplane by any sort of gun at all is a rare and +uncertain achievement. Such a gun is not impossible and therefore we +must suppose such a gun will some day be constructed, but it will be of +a novel type and character, unlike anything at present in existence. +The grade of fighting that I was privileged to witness on the Somme, the +grade at which a steady successful offensive is possible, is therefore, +I conclude, the grade at which the present war will end. + + +2 + +But now having thus spread out the broad theory of the business, let me +go on to tell some of the actualities of the Somme offensive. They key +fact upon both British and French fronts was the complete ascendancy of +the Allies aeroplanes. It is the necessary preliminary condition for +the method upon which the great generals of the French army rely in this +sanitary task of shoving the German Thing off the soil of Belgium and +France back into its own land. A man who is frequently throwing out +prophecies is bound to score a few successes, and one that I may +legitimately claim is my early insistence upon that fact that the +equality of the German aviator was likely to be inferior to that of his +French or British rival. The ordinary German has neither the flexible +quality of body, the quickness of nerve, the temperament, nor the mental +habits that make a successful aviator. This idea was first put into my +head by considering the way in which Germans walk and carry themselves, +and by nothing the difference in nimbleness between the cyclists in the +streets of German and French towns. It was confirmed by a conversation I +had with a German aviator who was also a dramatist, and who came to +see me upon some copyright matter in 1912. He broached the view that +aviation would destroy democracy, because he said only aristocrats make +aviators. (He was a man of good family.) With a duke or so in my mind I +asked him why. Because, he explained, a man without aristocratic quality +in tradition, cannot possibly endure the “high loneliness” of the air. +That sounded rather like nonsense at the time, and then I reflected that +for a Prussian that might be true. There may be something in the German +composition that does demand association and the support of pride +and training before dangers can be faced. The Germans are social +and methodical, the French and English are by comparison chaotic and +instinctive; perhaps the very readiness for a conscious orderliness +that makes the German so formidable upon the ground, so thorough and +fore-seeking, makes him slow and unsure in the air. At any rate the +experiences of this war have seemed to carry out this hypothesis. The +German aviators will not as a class stand up to those of the Allies. +They are not nimble in the air. Such champions as they have produced +have been men of one trick; one of their great men, Immelmann--he was +put down by an English boy a month or so ago--had a sort of hawk's +swoop. He would go very high and then come down at his utmost pace at +his antagonist, firing his machine gun at him as he came. If he missed +in this hysterical lunge, he went on down.... This does not strike the +Allied aviator as very brilliant. A gentleman of that sort can sooner or +later be caught on the rise by going for him over the German lines. + +The first phase, then, of the highest grade offensive, the ultimate +development of war regardless of expense, is the clearance of the air. +Such German machines as are up are put down by fighting aviators. These +last fly high; in the clear blue of the early morning they look exactly +like gnats; some trail a little smoke in the sunshine; they take +their machine guns in pursuit over the German lines, and the German +anti-aircraft guns, the Archibalds, begin to pattern the sky about them +with little balls of black smoke. From below one does not see men nor +feel that men are there; it is as if it were an affair of midges. Close +after the fighting machines come the photographic aeroplanes, with +cameras as long as a man is high, flying low--at four or five thousand +feet that is--over the enemy trenches. The Archibald leaves these latter +alone; it cannot fire a shell to explode safely so soon after firing; +but they are shot at with rifles and machine guns. They do not mind +being shot at; only the petrol tank and the head and thorax of the pilot +are to be considered vital. They will come back with forty or fifty +bullet holes in the fabric. They will go under this fire along the +length of the German positions exposing plate after plate; one machine +will get a continuous panorama of many miles and then come back straight +to the aerodrome to develop its plates. + +There is no waste of time about the business, the photographs are +developed as rapidly as possible. Within an hour and a half after the +photographs were taken the first prints are going back into the bureau +for the examination of the photographs. Both British and French air +photographs are thoroughly scrutinised and marked. + +An air photograph to an inexperienced eye is not a very illuminating +thing; one makes our roads, blurs of wood, and rather vague buildings. +But the examiner has an eye that has been in training; he is a picked +man; he has at hand yesterday's photographs and last week's photographs, +marked maps and all sorts of aids and records. If he is a Frenchman he +is only too happy to explain his ideas and methods. Here, he will point +out, is a little difference between the German trench beyond the wood +since yesterday. For a number of reasons he thinks that will be a new +machine gun emplacement; here at the centre of the farm wall they have +been making another. This battery here--isn't it plain? Well, it's a +dummy. The grass in front of it hasn't been scorched, and there's been +no serious wear on the road here for a week. Presently the Germans will +send one or two waggons up and down that road and instruct them to make +figures of eight to imitate scorching on the grass in front of the gun. +We know all about that. The real wear on the road, compare this and this +and this, ends here at this spot. It turns off into the wood. There's a +sort of track in the trees. Now look where the trees are just a little +displaced! (This lens is rather better for that.) _That's_ one gun. You +see? Here, I will show you another.... + +That process goes on two or three miles behind the front line. Very +clean young men in white overalls do it as if it were a labour of love. +And the Germans in the trenches, the German gunners, _know it is going +on._ They know that in the quickest possible way these observations of +the aeroplane that was over them just now will go to the gunners. The +careful gunner, firing by the map and marking by aeroplane, kite balloon +or direct observation, will be getting onto the located guns and machine +guns in another couple of hours. The French claim that they have located +new batteries, got their _tir de demolition_ upon them in and destroyed +them within five hours. The British I told of that found it incredible. +Every day the French print special maps showing the guns, sham guns, +trenches, everything of significance behind the German lines, showing +everything that has happened in the last four-and-twenty hours. It is +pitiless. It is indecent. The map-making and printing goes on in the +room next and most convenient to the examination of the photographs. +And, as I say, the German army knows of this, and knows that it cannot +prevent it because of its aerial weakness. That knowledge is not the +last among the forces that is crumpling up the German resistance upon +the Somme. + +I visited some French guns during the _tir de demolition_ phase. I +counted nine aeroplanes and twenty-six kite balloons in the air at the +same time. There was nothing German visible in the air at all. + +It is a case of eyes and no eyes. + +The French attack resolves itself into a triple system of gunfire. First +for a day or so, or two or three days, there is demolition fire to smash +up all the exactly located batteries, organisation, supports, behind the +front line enemy trenches; then comes barrage fire to cut off supplies +and reinforcements; then, before the advance, the hammering down +fire, “heads down,” upon the trenches. When at last this stops and the +infantry goes forward to rout out the trenches and the dug-outs, they +go forward with a minimum of inconvenience. The first wave of attack +fights, destroys, or disarms the surviving Germans and sends them back +across the open to the French trenches. They run as fast as they can, +hands up, and are shepherded farther back. The French set to work to +turn over the captured trenches and organise themselves against any +counter attack that may face the barrage fire. + +That is the formula of the present fighting, which the French have +developed. After an advance there is a pause, while the guns move up +nearer the Germans and fresh aeroplane reconnaissance goes on. Nowhere +on this present offensive has a German counter attack had more than the +most incidental success; and commonly they have had frightful losses. +Then after a few days of refreshment and accumulation, the Allied attack +resumes. + +That is the perfected method of the French offensive. I had the pleasure +of learning its broad outlines in good company, in the company of M. +Joseph Reinach and Colonel Carence, the military writer. Their talk +together and with me in the various messes at which we lunched was for +the most part a keen discussion of every detail and every possibility +of the offensive machine; every French officer's mess seems a little +council upon the one supreme question in France, _how to do it best._ +M. Reinach has made certain suggestions about the co-operation of the +French and British that I will discuss elsewhere, but one great theme +was the constitution of “the ideal battery.” For years French military +thought has been acutely attentive to the best number of guns for +effective common action, and has tended rather to the small battery +theory. My two companies were playing with the idea that the ideal +battery was a battery of one big gun, with its own aeroplane and kite +balloon marking for it. + +The British seem to be associated with the adventurous self-reliance +needed in the air. The British aeroplanes do not simply fight the +Germans out of the sky; they also make themselves an abominable nuisance +by bombing the enemy trenches. For every German bomb that is dropped by +aeroplane on or behind the British lines, about twenty go down on +the heads of the Germans. British air bombs upon guns, stores and +communications do some of the work that the French effect by their +systematic demolition fire. + +And the British aviator has discovered and is rapidly developing an +altogether fresh branch of air activity in the machine-gun attack at a +very low altitude. Originally I believe this was tried in western Egypt, +but now it is being increasingly used upon the British front in France. +An aeroplane which comes down suddenly, travelling very rapidly, to +a few hundred feet, is quite hard to hit, even if it is not squirting +bullets from a machine gun as it advances. Against infantry in the open +this sort of thing is extremely demoralising. It is a method of attack +still in its infancy, but there are great possibilities for it in the +future, when the bending and cracking German line gives, as ultimately +it must give if this offensive does not relax. If the Allies persist in +their pressure upon the western front, if there is no relaxation in the +supply of munitions from Britain and no lapse into tactical stupidity, a +German retreat eastward is inevitable. + +Now a cavalry pursuit alone may easily come upon disaster, cavalry can +be so easily held up by wire and a few machine guns. I think the Germans +have reckoned on that and on automobiles, probably only the decay of +their _morale_ prevents their opening their lines now on the chance of +the British attempting some such folly as a big cavalry advance, but +I do not think the Germans have reckoned on the use of machine guns in +aeroplanes, supported by and supporting cavalry or automobiles. At the +present time I should imagine there is no more perplexing consideration +amidst the many perplexities of the German military intelligence than +the new complexion put upon pursuit by these low level air developments. +It may mean that in all sorts of positions where they had counted +confidently on getting away, they may not be able to get away--from +the face of a scientific advance properly commanding and using modern +material in a dexterous and intelligent manner. + + + + +III. THE WAR LANDSCAPE + + +1 + +I saw rather more of the British than of the French aviators because +of the vileness of the weather when I visited the latter. It is quite +impossible for me to institute comparisons between these two services. I +should think that the British organisation I saw would be hard to beat, +and that none but the French could hope to beat it. On the Western front +the aviation has been screwed up to a very much higher level than on +the Italian line. In Italy it has not become, as it has in France, the +decisive factor. The war on the Carso front in Italy--I say nothing of +the mountain warfare, which is a thing in itself--is in fact still in +the stage that I have called B. It is good warfare well waged, but not +such an intensity of warfare. It has not, as one says of pianos and +voices, the same compass. + +This is true in spite of the fact that the Italians along of all the +western powers have adopted a type of aeroplane larger and much more +powerful than anything except the big Russian machines. They are not at +all suitable for any present purpose upon the Italian front, but at +a later stage, when the German is retiring and Archibald no longer +searches the air, they would be invaluable on the western front because +of their enormous bomb or machine gun carrying capacity. “But sufficient +for the day is the swat thereof,” as the British public schoolboy says, +and no doubt we shall get them when we have sufficiently felt the need +for them. The big Caproni machines which the Italians possess are of 300 +h.p. and will presently be of 500 h.p. One gets up a gangway into them +was one gets into a yacht; they wave a main deck, a forward machine gun +deck and an aft machine gun; one may walk about in them; in addition +to guns and men they carry a very considerable weight of bombs beneath. +They cannot of course beget up with the speed nor soar to the height +of our smaller aeroplanes; it is as carriers in raids behind a force of +fighting machines that they should find their use. + +The British establishment I visited was a very refreshing and reassuring +piece of practical organisation. The air force of Great Britain has +had the good fortune to develop with considerable freedom from old army +tradition; many of its officers are ex-civil engineers and so forth; +Headquarters is a little shy of technical direction; and all this in +a service that is still necessarily experimental and plastic is to the +good. There is little doubt that, given a release from prejudice, +bad associations and the equestrian tradition, British technical +intelligence and energy can do just as well as the French. Our problem +with our army is not to create intelligence, there is an abundance of +it, but to release it from a dreary social and official pressure. The +air service ransacks the army for men with technical training and sees +that it gets them, there is a real keenness upon the work, and the men +in these great mobile hangars talk shop readily and clearly. + +I have already mentioned and the newspapers have told abundantly of +the pluck, daring, and admirable work of our aviators; what is still +untellable in any detail is the energy and ability of the constructive +and repairing branch upon whose efficiency their feats depend. Perhaps +the most interesting thing I saw in connection with the air work was +the hospital for damaged machines and the dump to which those hopelessly +injured are taken, in order that they may be disarticulated and all that +is sound in them used for reconstruction. How excellently this work +is being done may be judged from the fact that our offensive in July +started with a certain number of aeroplanes, a number that would +have seemed fantastic in a story a year before the war began. These +aeroplanes were in constant action; they fought, they were shot down, +they had their share of accidents. Not only did the repair department +make good every loss, but after three weeks of the offensive the army +was fighting with fifty more machines than at the outset. One goes +through a vast Rembrandtesque shed opening upon a great sunny field, in +whose cool shadows rest a number of interesting patients; captured and +slightly damaged German machines, machines of our own with scars of +battle upon them, one or two cases of bad landing. The star case came +over from Peronne. It had come in two days ago. + +I examined this machine and I will tell the state it was in, but I +perceive that what I have to tell will read not like a sober statement +of truth but like strained and silly lying. The machine had had a direct +hit from an Archibald shell. The propeller had been clean blown away; so +had the machine gun and all its fittings. The engines had been stripped +naked and a good deal bent about. The timber stay over the aviator had +been broken, so that it is marvellous the wings of the machine did not +just up at once like the wings of a butterfly. The solitary aviator had +been wounded in the face. He had then come down in a long glide into the +British lines, and made a tolerable landing.... + + +2 + +One consequence of the growing importance of the aeroplane in warfare is +the development of a new military art, the art of camouflage. Camouflage +is humbugging disguise, it is making things--and especially in this +connection, military things--seem not what they are, but something +peaceful and rural, something harmless and quite uninteresting to +aeroplane observers. It is the art of making big guns look like +haystacks and tents like level patches of field. + +Also it includes the art of making attractive models of guns, camps, +trenches and the like that are not bona-fide guns, camps, or trenches at +all, so that the aeroplane bomb-dropper and the aeroplane observer may +waste his time and energies and the enemy gunfire be misdirected. +In Italy I saw dummy guns so made as to deceive the very elect at a +distance of a few thousand feet. The camouflage of concealment aims +either at invisibility or imitation; I have seen a supply train look +like a row of cottages, its smoke-stack a chimney, with the tops of sham +palings running along the back of the engine and creepers painted up +its sides. But that was a flight of the imagination; the commonest +camouflage is merely to conceal. Trees are brought up and planted +near the object to be hidden, it is painted in the same tones as its +background, it is covered with an awning painted to look like grass or +earth. I suppose it is only a matter of development before a dummy cow +or so is put up to chew the cud on the awning. + +But camouflage or no camouflage, the bulk of both the French and British +forces in the new won ground of the great offensive lay necessarily in +the open. Only the big guns and the advanced Red Cross stations had got +into pits and subterranean hiding places. The advance has been too rapid +and continuous for the armies to make much of a toilette as they halted, +and the destruction and the desolation of the country won afforded few +facilities for easy concealment. Tents, transport, munitions, these all +indicated an army on the march--at the rate of half a mile in a week or +so, to Germany. If the wet and mud of November and December have for a +time delayed that advance, the force behind has but accumulated for the +resumption of the thrust. + + +3 + +A journey up from the base to the front trenches shows an interesting +series of phases. One leaves Amiens, in which the normal life threads +its way through crowds of resting men in khaki and horizon blue, in +which staff officers in automobiles whisk hither and thither, in which +there are nurses and even a few inexplicable ladies in worldly costume, +in which restaurants and cafes are congested and busy, through which +there is a perpetual coming and going of processions of heavy vans to +the railway sidings. One dodges past a monstrous blue-black gun going +up to the British front behind two resolute traction engines--the +three sun-blistered young men in the cart that trails behind lounge in +attitudes of haughty pride that would shame the ceiling gods of Hampton +Court. One passes through arcades of waiting motor vans, through arcades +of waiting motor vans, through suburbs still more intensely khaki or +horizon blue, and so out upon the great straight poplar-edged road--to +the front. Sometimes one laces through spates of heavy traffic, +sometimes the dusty road is clear ahead, now we pass a vast aviation +camp, now a park of waiting field guns, now an encampment of cavalry. +One turns aside, and abruptly one is in France--France as one knew it +before the war, on a shady secondary road, past a delightful chateau +behind its iron gates, past a beautiful church, and then suddenly we are +in a village street full of stately Indian soldiers. + +It betrays no military secret to say that commonly the rare tourist to +the British offensive passes through Albert, with its great modern red +cathedral smashed to pieces and the great gilt Madonna and Child +that once surmounted the tower now, as everyone knows, hanging out +horizontally in an attitude that irresistibly suggests an imminent dive +upon the passing traveller. One looks right up under it. + +Presently we begin to see German prisoners. The whole lot look entirely +contented, and are guarded by perhaps a couple of men in khaki. These +German prisoners do not attempt to escape, they have not the slightest +desire for any more fighting, they have done their bit, they say, honour +is satisfied; they give remarkably little trouble. A little way further +on perhaps we pass their cage, a double barbed-wire enclosure with a few +tents and huts within. + +A string of covered waggons passes by. I turn and see a number of men +sitting inside and looking almost as cheerful as a beanfeast in Epping +Forest. They make facetious gestures. They have a subdued sing-song going +on. But one of them looks a little sick, and then I notice not very +obtrusive bandages. “Sitting-up cases,” my guide explains. + +These are part of the casualties of last night's fight. + +The fields on either side are now more evidently in the war zone. +The array of carts, the patches of tents, the coming and going of men +increases. But here are three women harvesting, and presently in a +cornfield are German prisoners working under one old Frenchman. Then +the fields become trampled again. Here is a village, not so very much +knocked about, and passing through it we go slowly beside a long column +of men going up to the front. We scan their collars for signs of some +familiar regiment. These are new men going up for the first time; there +is a sort of solemn elation in many of their faces. + +The men coming down are usually smothered in mud or dust, and unless +there has been a fight they look pretty well done up. They stoop under +their equipment, and some of the youngsters drag. One pleasant thing +about this coming down is the welcome of the regimental band, which is +usually at work as soon as the men turn off from the high road. I hear +several bands on the British front; they do much to enhance the general +cheerfulness. On one of these days of my tour I had the pleasure of +seeing the ---th Blankshires coming down after a fight. As we drew +near I saw that they combined an extreme muddiness with an unusual +elasticity. They all seemed to be looking us in the face instead of +being too fagged to bother. Then I noticed a nice grey helmet dangling +from one youngster's bayonet, in fact his eye directed me to it. A man +behind him had a black German helmet of the type best known in English +illustrations; then two more grey appeared. The catch of helmets was +indeed quite considerable. Then I perceived on the road bank above +and marching parallel with this column, a double file of still muddier +Germans. Either they wore caps or went bare-headed. There were no +helmets among them. We do not rob our prisoners but--a helmet is a +weapon. Anyhow, it is an irresistible souvenir. + +Now and then one sees afar off an ammunition dump, many hundreds of +stacks of shells--without their detonators as yet--being unloaded from +railway trucks, transferred from the broad gauge to the narrow gauge +line, or loaded onto motor trolleys. Now and then one crosses a railway +line. The railway lines run everywhere behind the British front, the +construction follows the advance day by day. They go up as fast as the +guns. One's guide remarks as the car bumps over the level +crossing, “That is one of Haig's railways.” It is an aspect of the +Commander-in-Chief that has much impressed and pleased the men. And at +last we begin to enter the region of the former Allied trenches, we pass +the old German front line, we pass ruined houses, ruined fields, and +thick patches of clustering wooden crosses and boards where the dead +of the opening assaults lie. There are no more reapers now, there is no +more green upon the fields, there is no green anywhere, scarcely a tree +survives by the roadside, but only overthrown trunks and splintered +stumps; the fields are wildernesses of shell craters and coarse weeds, +the very woods are collections of blasted stems and stripped branches. +This absolutely ravaged and ruined battlefield country extends now along +the front of the Somme offensive for a depth of many miles; across it +the French and British camps and batteries creep forward, the stores, +the dumps, the railways creep forward, in their untiring, victorious +thrust against the German lines. Overhead hum and roar the aeroplanes, +away towards the enemy the humped, blue sausage-shaped kite balloons +brood thoughtfully, and from this point and that, guns, curiously +invisible until they speak, flash suddenly and strike their one short +hammer-blow of sound. + +Then one sees an enemy shell drop among the little patch of trees on +the crest to the right, and kick up a great red-black mass of smoke and +dust. We see it, and then we hear the whine of its arrival and at last +the bang. The Germans are blind now, they have lost the air, they are +firing by guesswork and their knowledge of the abandoned territory. + +“They think they have got divisional headquarters there,” someone +remarks.... “They haven't. But they keep on.” + +In this zone where shells burst the wise automobile stops and tucks +itself away as inconspicuously as possible close up to a heap of ruins. +There is very little traffic on the road now except for a van or so that +hurries up, unloads, and gets back as soon as possible. Mules and men +are taking the stuff the rest of the journey. We are in a flattened +village, all undermined by dug-outs that were in the original German +second line. We report ourselves to a young troglodyte in one of these, +and are given a guide, and so set out on the last part of the journey +to the ultimate point, across the land of shell craters and barbed +wire litter and old and new trenches. We have all put on British steel +helmets, hard but heavy and inelegant head coverings. I can write little +that is printable about these aesthetic crimes. The French and German +helmets are noble and beautiful things. These lumpish _pans._.. + +They ought to be called by the name of the man who designed them. + +Presently we are advised to get into a communication trench. It is not +a very attractive communication trench, and we stick to our track across +the open. Three or four shells shiver overhead, but we decide they are +British shells, going out. We reach a supporting trench in which men are +waiting in a state of nearly insupportable boredom for the midday +stew, the one event of interest in a day-long vigil. Here we are told +imperatively to come right in at once, and we do. + +All communication trenches are tortuous and practically endless. On +an offensive front they have vertical sides of unsupported earth and +occasional soakaways for rain, covered by wooden gratings, and they go +on and on and on. At rare intervals they branch, and a notice board says +“To Regent Street,” or “To Oxford Street,” or some such lie. It is all +just trench. For a time you talk, but talking in single file soon palls. +You cease to talk, and trudge. A great number of telephone wires come +into the trench and cross and recross it. You cannot keep clear of them. +Your helmet pings against them and they try to remove it. Sometimes you +have to stop and crawl under wires. Then you wonder what the trench is +like in really wet weather. You hear a shell burst at no great distance. +You pass two pages of _The Strand Magazine._ Perhaps thirty yards on +you pass a cigarette end. After these sensational incidents the trench +quiets down again and continues to wind endlessly--just a sandy, +extremely narrow vertical walled trench. A giant crack. + +At last you reach the front line trench. On an offensive sector it has +none of the architectural interest of first line trenches at such places +as Soissons or Arras. It was made a week or so ago by joining up shell +craters, and if all goes well we move into the German trench along by +the line of scraggy trees, at which we peep discreetly, to-morrow night. +We can peep discreetly because just at present our guns are putting +shrapnel over the enemy at the rate of about three shells a minute, the +puffs follow each other up and down the line, and no Germans are staring +out to see us. + +The Germans “strafed” this trench overnight, and the men are tired and +sleepy. Our guns away behind us are doing their best now to give them +a rest by strafing the Germans. One or two men are in each forward sap +keeping a look out; the rest sleep, a motionless sleep, in the earthy +shelter pits that have been scooped out. One officer sits by a telephone +under an earth-covered tarpaulin, and a weary man is doing the toilet of +a machine gun. We go on to a shallow trench in which we must stoop, and +which has been badly knocked about.... Here we have to stop. The road to +Berlin is not opened up beyond this point. + +My companion on this excursion is a man I have admired for years and +never met until I came out to see the war, a fellow writer. He is a +journalist let loose. Two-thirds of the junior British officers I met +on this journey were really not “army men” at all. One finds that the +apparent subaltern is really a musician, or a musical critic, or an +Egyptologist, or a solicitor, or a cloth manufacturer, or a writer. At +the outbreak of the war my guide dyed his hair to conceal its tell-tale +silver, and having been laughed to scorn by the ordinary recruiting +people, enlisted in the sportsmen's battalion. He was wounded, and then +the authorities discovered that he was likely to be of more use with a +commission and drew him, in spite of considerable resistance, out of the +firing line. To which he always returns whenever he can get a visitor +to take with him as an excuse. He now stood up, fairly high and clear, +explaining casually that the Germans were no longer firing, and showed +me the points of interest. + +I had come right up to No Man's Land at last. It was under my chin. The +skyline, the last skyline before the British could look down on Bapaume, +showed a mangy wood and a ruined village, crouching under repeated +gobbings of British shrapnel. “They've got a battery just there, and +we're making it uncomfortable.” No Man's Land itself is a weedy space +broken up by shell craters, with very little barbed wire in front of us +and very little in front of the Germans. “They've got snipers in most of +the craters, and you see them at twilight hopping about from one to the +other.” We have very little wire because we don't mean to stay for very +long in this trench, but the Germans have very little wire because they +have not been able to get it up yet. They never will get it up now.... + +I had been led to believe that No Man's Land was littered with the +unburied dead, but I saw nothing of the sort at this place. There had +been no German counter attack since our men came up here. But at one +point as we went along the trench there was a dull stench. “Germans, I +think,” said my guide, though I did not see how he could tell. + +He looked at his watch and remarked reluctantly, “If you start at once, +you may just do it.” + +I wanted to catch the Boulogne boat. It was then just past one in +the afternoon. We met the stew as we returned along the communication +trench, and it smelt very good indeed.... We hurried across the great +spaces of rusty desolation upon which every now and again a German shell +was bursting.... + +That night I was in my flat in London. I had finished reading the +accumulated letters of some weeks, and I was just going comfortably to +bed. + + + + +IV. NEW ARMS FOR OLD ONES + + +1 + +Such are the landscapes and method of modern war. It is more difficult +in its nature from war as it was waged in the nineteenth century than +that was from the nature of the phalanx or the legion. The nucleus +fact--when I talked to General Joffre he was very insistent upon +this point--is still as ever the ordinary fighting man, but all the +accessories and conditions of his personal encounter with the fighting +man of the other side have been revolutionised in a quarter of a +century. The fighting together in a close disciplined order, shoulder +to shoulder, which has held good for thousands of years as the best and +most successful fighting, has been destroyed; the idea of _breaking_ +infantry formation as the chief offensive operation has disappeared, the +cavalry charge and the cavalry pursuit are as obsolete as the cross-bow. +The modern fighting man is as individualised as a half back or a centre +forward in a football team. Personal fighting has become “scrapping” + again, an individual adventure with knife, club, bomb, revolver or +bayonet. In this war we are working out things instead of thinking them +out, and these enormous changes are still but imperfectly apprehended. +The trained and specialised military man probably apprehends them as +feebly as anyone. + +This is a thing that I want to state as emphatically as possible. It is +the pith of the lesson I have learnt at the front. The whole method of +war has been so altered in the past five and twenty years as to make +it a new and different process altogether. Much the larger part of this +alteration has only become effective in the last two years. Everyone is +a beginner at this new game; everyone is experimenting and learning. + +The idea has been put admirably by _Punch._ That excellent picture +of the old-fashioned sergeant who complains to his officer of the new +recruit; “'E's all right in the trenches, Sir; 'e's all right at a +scrap; but 'e won't never make a soldier,” is the quintessence of +everything I am saying here. And were there not the very gravest doubts +about General Smuts in British military circles because he had “had no +military training”? A Canadian expressed the new view very neatly on +being asked, in consequence of a deficient salute, whether he wanted to +be a soldier, by saying, “Not I! I want to be a fighter!” + +The professional officer of the old dispensation was a man specialised +in relation to one of the established “arms.” He was an infantryman, a +cavalryman, a gunner or an engineer. It will be interesting to trace the +changes that have happened to all these arms. + +Before this war began speculative writers had argued that infantry drill +in close formation had now no fighting value whatever, that it was no +doubt extremely necessary for the handling, packing, forwarding and +distribution of men, but that the ideal infantry fighter was now a +highly individualised and self-reliant man put into a pit with a machine +gun, and supported by a string of other men bringing him up supplies and +ready to assist him in any forward rush that might be necessary. + +The opening phases of the war seemed to contradict this. It did not +at first suit the German game to fight on this most modern theory, +and isolated individual action is uncongenial to the ordinary German +temperament and opposed to the organised social tendencies of German +life. To this day the Germans attack only in close order; they are +unable to produce a real modern infantry for aggressive purposes, and it +is a matter of astonishment to military minds on the English side that +our hastily trained new armies should turn out to be just as good at +the new fighting as the most “seasoned troops.” But there is no reason +whatever why they should not be. “Leading,” in the sense of going +ahead of the men and making them move about mechanically at the word of +command, has ceased. On the British side our magnificent new subalterns +and our equally magnificent new non-commissioned officers play the part +of captains of football teams; they talk their men individually into +an understanding of the job before them; they criticise style and +performance. On the French side things have gone even farther. Every man +in certain attacks has been given a large scale map of the ground over +which he has to go, and has had his own individual job clearly marked +and explained to him. All the Allied infantrymen tend to become +specialised, as bombers, as machine-gun men, and so on. The +unspecialised common soldier, the infantryman who has stood and marched +and moved in ranks and ranks, the “serried lines of men,” who are the +main substance of every battle story for the last three thousand years, +are as obsolete as the dodo. The rifle and bayonet very probably are +becoming obsolete too. Knives and clubs and revolvers serve better in +the trenches. The krees and the Roman sword would be as useful. The fine +flourish of the bayonet is only possible in the rare infrequent open. +Even the Zulu assegai would serve as well. + +The two operations of the infantry attack now are the rush and the +“scrap.” These come after the artillery preparation. Against the rush, +the machine gun is pitted. The machine gun becomes lighter and more and +more controllable by one man; as it does so the days of the rifle draw +to a close. Against the machine gun we are now directing the “Tank,” + which goes ahead and puts out the machine gun as soon as it begins to +sting the infantry rush. We are also using the swooping aeroplane with a +machine gun. Both these devices are of British origin, and they promise +very well. + +After the rush and the scrap comes the organisation of the captured +trench. “Digging in” completes the cycle of modern infantry fighting. +You may consider this the first or the last phase of an infantry +operation. It is probably at present the least worked-out part of the +entire cycle. Here lies the sole German superiority; they bunch and +crowd in the rush, they are inferior at the scrap, but they do dig like +moles. The weakness of the British is their failure to settle down. They +like the rush and the scrap; they press on too far, they get outflanked +and lost “in the blue”; they are not naturally clever at the excavating +part of the work, and they are not as yet well trained in making +dug-outs and shelter-pits rapidly and intelligently. They display most +of the faults that were supposed to be most distinctively French before +this war came to revolutionise all our conceptions of French character. + + +2 + +Now the operations of this modern infantry, which unlike any preceding +infantry in the history of war does not fight in disciplined formations +but as highly individualised specialists, are determined almost +completely by the artillery preparation. Artillery is now the most +essential instrument of war. You may still get along with rather bad +infantry; you may still hold out even after the loss of the aerial +ascendancy, but so soon as your guns fail you approach defeat. +The backbone process of the whole art of war is the manufacture in +overwhelming quantities, the carriage and delivery of shell upon the +vulnerable points of the enemy's positions. That is, so to speak, +the essential blow. Even the infantryman is now hardly more than the +residuary legatee after the guns have taken their toll. + +I have now followed nearly every phase in the life history of a shell +from the moment when it is a segment of steel bar just cut off, to the +moment when it is no more than a few dispersed and rusting rags and +fragments of steel--pressed upon the stray visitor to the battlefield as +souvenirs. All good factories are intensely interesting places to visit, +but a good munition factory is romantically satisfactory. It is as +nearly free from the antagonism of employer and employed as any factory +can be. The busy sheds I visited near Paris struck me as being the most +living and active things in the entire war machine. Everywhere else I +saw fitful activity, or men waiting. I have seen more men sitting about +and standing about, more bored inactivity, during my tour than I have +ever seen before in my life. Even the front line trenches seem to +slumber; the Angel of Death drowses over them, and moves in his sleep +to crush out men's lives. The gunfire has an indolent intermittence. +But the munition factories grind on night and day, grinding against +the factories in Central Europe, grinding out the slow and costly and +necessary victory that should end aggressive warfare in the world for +ever. + +It would be very interesting if one could arrange a meeting between +any typical Allied munition maker on the one hand, and the Kaiser and +Hindenburg, those two dominant effigies of the German nationalists' +dream of “world might.” Or failing that, Mr. Dyson might draw the +encounter. You imagine these two heroic figures got up for the +interview, very magnificent in shining helms and flowing cloaks, +decorations, splendid swords, spurs. “Here,” one would say, “is the +power that has held you. You were bolstered up very loyally by the Krupp +firm and so forth, you piled up shell, guns, war material, you hoped to +snatch your victory before the industrialisation and invention of the +world could turn upon you. But you failed. You were not rapid enough. +The battle of the Marne was your misfortune. And Ypres. You lost some +chances at Ypres. Two can play at destructive industrialism, and now +we out-gun you. We are piling up munitions now faster than you. The +essentials of this Game of the War Lord are idiotically simple, but it +was not of our choosing. It is now merely a question of months before +you make your inevitable admission. This is no war to any great +commander's glory. This gentleman in the bowler hat is the victor, Sire; +not you. Assisted, Sire, by these disrespectful-looking factory girls in +overalls.” + +For example, there is M. Citroen. Before the war I understand he made +automobiles; after the war he wants to turn to and make automobiles +again. For the duration of the war he makes shell. He has been +temporarily diverted from constructive to destructive industrialism. He +did me the honours of his factory. He is a compact, active man in dark +clothes and a bowler hat, with a pencil and notebook conveniently at +hand. He talked to me in carefully easy French, and watched my face with +an intelligent eye through his pince-nez for the signs of comprehension. +Then he went on to the next point. + +He took me through every stage of his process. In his office he showed +me the general story. Here were photographs of certain vacant fields +and old sheds--“this place”--he indicated the altered prospect from the +window--“at the outbreak of the war.” He showed me a plan of the first +undertaking. “Now we have rather over nine thousand workpeople.” + +He showed me a little row of specimens. “These we make for Italy. These +go to Russia. These are the Rumanian pattern.” + +Thence to the first stage, the chopping up of the iron bars, the +furnace, the punching out of the first shape of the shell; all this is +men's work. I had seen this sort of thing before in peace ironworks, +but I saw it again with the same astonishment, the absolute precision +of movement on the part of the half-naked sweating men, the calculated +efficiency of each worker, the apparent heedlessness, the real +certitude, with which the blazing hot cylinder is put here, dropped +there, rolls to its next appointed spot, is chopped up and handed on, +the swift passage to the cooling crude, pinkish-purple shell shape. Down +a long line one sees in perspective a practical symmetry, of furnace +and machine group and the shells marching on from this first series +of phases to undergo the long succession of operations, machine after +machine, across the great width of the shed in which eighty per cent +of the workers are women. There is a thick dust of sounds in the air, a +rumble of shafting, sudden thuddings, clankings, and M. Citroen has +to raise his voice. He points out where he has made little changes in +procedures, cut out some wasteful movement.... He has an idea and makes +a note in the ever-ready notebook. + +There is a beauty about all these women, there is extraordinary grace in +their finely adjusted movements. I have come from an after-lunch coffee +upon the boulevards and from watching the ugly fashion of our time; +it is a relief to be reminded that most women can after all be +beautiful--if only they would not “dress.” these women wear simple +overalls and caps. In the cap is a rosette. Each shed has its own colour +of rosette. + +“There is much esprit de corps here,” says M. Citroen. + +“And also,” he adds, showing obverse as well as reverse of the world's +problem of employment and discipline, “we can see at once if a woman is +not in her proper shed.” + +Across the great sheds under the shafting--how fine it must look at +night!--the shells march, are shaped, cut, fitted with copper bands, +calibrated, polished, varnished.... + +Then we go on to another system of machines in which lead is reduced to +plastic ribbons and cut into shrapnel bullets as the sweetstuff +makers pull out and cut up sweetstuff. And thence into a warren of hot +underground passages in which run the power cables. There is not a cable +in the place that is not immediately accessible to the electricians. We +visit the dynamos and a vast organisation of switchboards.... + +These things are more familiar to M. Citroen than they are to me. He +wants me to understand, but he does not realise that I would like a +little leisure to wonder. What is interesting him just now, because it +is the newest thing, is his method of paying his workers. He lifts +a hand gravely: “I said, what we must do is abolish altogether the +counting of change.” + +At a certain hour, he explained, came pay-time. The people had done; it +was to his interest and their that they should get out of the works +as quickly as possible and rest and amuse themselves. He watched them +standing in queues at the wickets while inside someone counted; so many +francs, so many centimes. It bored him to see this useless, tiresome +waiting. It is abolished. Now at the end of each week the worker goes +to a window under the initial of his name, and is handed a card on which +these items have been entered: + +Balance from last week. So many hours at so much. Premiums. + +The total is so many francs, so many centimes. This is divided into +the nearest round number, 100, 120, 80 francs as the case may be, and a +balance of the odd francs and centimes. The latter is carried forward to +the next week's account. At the bottom of the card is a tear-off coupon +with a stamp, coloured to indicate the round sum, green, let us say, for +100, blue for 130 francs. This is taken to a wicket marked 100 or 130 as +the case may be, and there stands a cashier with his money in piles of +100 or 130 francs counted ready to hand; he sweeps in the coupon, sweeps +out the cash. “_Next!_” + +I became interested in the worker's side of this organisation. I insist +on seeing the entrances, the clothes-changing places, the lavatories, +and so forth of the organisation. As we go about we pass a string of +electric trolleys steered by important-looking girls, and loaded with +shell, finished as far as these works are concerned and on their way +to the railway siding. We visit the hospital, for these works demand a +medical staff. It is not only that men and women faint or fall ill, but +there are accidents, burns, crushings, and the like. The war casualties +begin already here, and they fall chiefly among the women. I saw a +wounded woman with a bandaged face sitting very quietly in the corner. + +The women here face danger, perhaps not quite such obvious danger as the +women who, at the next stage in the shell's career, make and pack the +explosives in their silk casing, but quite considerable risk. And they +work with a real enthusiasm. They know they are fighting the Bloches as +well as any men. Certain of them wear Russian decorations. The women of +this particular factory have been thanked by the Tsar, and a number of +decorations were sent by him for distribution among them. + + +3 + +The shell factory and the explosives shed stand level with the drill +yard as the real first stage in one of the two essential _punches_ in +modern war. When one meets the shell again it is being unloaded from the +railway truck into an ammunition dump. And here the work of control is +much more the work of a good traffic manager than of the old-fashioned +soldier. + +The dump I best remember I visited on a wet and windy day. Over a great +space of ground the sidings of the rail-head spread, the normal gauge +rail-head spread out like a fan and interdigitated with the narrow gauge +lines that go up practically to the guns. And also at the sides camions +were loading, and an officer from the Midi in charge of one of these was +being dramatically indignant at five minutes' delay. Between these +two sets of lines, shells were piled of all sizes, I should think some +hundreds of thousands of shells altogether, wet and shining in the rain. +French reservists, soldiers from Madagascar, and some Senegalese were +busy at different points loading and unloading the precious freights. +A little way from me were despondent-looking German prisoners handling +timber. All this dump was no more than an eddy as it were in the path +of the shell from its birth from the steel bars near Paris to the +accomplishment of its destiny in the destruction or capture of more +Germans. + +And next the visitor meets the shell coming up upon a little trolley to +the gun. He sees the gunners, as drilled and precise as the men he saw +at the forges, swing out the breech block and run the shell, which +has met and combined with its detonators and various other industrial +products since it left the main dump, into the gun. The breech +closes like a safe door, and hides the shell from the visitor. It is +“good-bye.” He receives exaggerated warning of the danger to his ears, +stuffs his fingers into them, and opens his mouth as instructed, hears a +loud but by no means deafening report, and sees a spit of flame near the +breech. Regulations of a severe character prevent his watching from an +aeroplane the delivery of the goods upon the customers opposite. + +I have already described the method of locating enemy guns and so forth +by photography. Many of the men at this work are like dentists rather +than soldiers; they are busy in carefully lit rooms, they wear white +overalls, they have clean hands and laboratory manners. The only really +romantic figure in the whole of this process, the only figure that has +anything of the old soldierly swagger about him still, is the aviator. +And, as one friend remarked to me when I visited the work of the +British flying corps, “The real essential strength of this arm is the +organisation of its repairs. Here is one of the repair vans through +which our machine guns go. It is a motor workshop on wheels. But at any +time all this park, everything, can pack up and move forward like +Barnum and Bailey's Circus. The machine guns come through this shop in +rotation; they go out again, cleaned, repaired, made new again. Since we +got all that working we have heard nothing of a machine gun jamming in +any air fight at all.”... + +The rest of the career of the shell after it has left the gun one must +imagine chiefly from the incoming shell from the enemy. You see suddenly +a flying up of earth and stones and anything else that is movable in the +neighbourhood of the shell-burst, the instantaneous unfolding of a dark +cloud of dust and reddish smoke, which comes very quickly to a certain +size and then begins slowly to fray out and blow away. Then, after +seeing the cloud of the burst you hear the hiss of the shell's approach, +and finally you are hit by the sound of the explosion. This is the +climax and end of the life history of any shell that is not a dud +shell. Afterwards the battered fuse may serve as some journalist's +paper-weight. The rest is scrap iron. + +Such is, so to speak, the primary process of modern warfare. I will +not draw the obvious pacifist moral of the intense folly of human +concentration upon such a process. The Germans willed it. We Allies +have but obeyed the German will for warfare because we could not do +otherwise, we have taken up this simple game of shell delivery, and we +are teaching them that we can play it better, in the hope that so we +and the world may be freed from the German will-to-power and all its +humiliating and disgusting consequences henceforth for ever. Europe +now is no more than a household engaged in holding up and if possible +overpowering a monomaniac member. + + +4 + +Now the whole of this process of the making and delivery of a shell, +which is the main process of modern warfare, is one that can be far +better conducted by a man accustomed to industrial organisation or +transit work than by the old type of soldier. This is a thing that +cannot be too plainly stated or too often repeated. Germany nearly won +this way because of her tremendously modern industrial resources; but +she blundered into it and she is losing it because she has too many men +in military uniform and because their tradition and interests were to +powerful with her. All the state and glories of soldiering, the bright +uniforms, the feathers and spurs, the flags, the march-past, the +disciplined massed advance, the charge; all these are as needless and +obsolete now in war as the masks and shields of an old-time Chinese +brave. Liberal-minded people talk of the coming dangers of militarism in +the face of events that prove conclusively that professional militarism +is already as dead as Julius Caesar. What is coming is not so much the +conversion of men into soldiers as the socialisation of the economic +organisation of the country with a view to both national and +international necessities. We do not want to turn a chemist or +a photographer into a little figure like a lead soldier, moving +mechanically at the word of command, but we do want to make his +chemistry or photography swiftly available if the national organisation +is called upon to fight. + +We have discovered that the modern economic organisation is in itself a +fighting machine. It is so much so that it is capable of taking on and +defeating quite easily any merely warrior people that is so rash as to +pit itself against it. Within the last sixteen years methods of fighting +have been elaborated that have made war an absolutely hopeless adventure +for any barbaric or non-industrialised people. In the rush of larger +events few people have realised the significance of the rapid squashing +of the Senussi in western Egypt, and the collapse of De Wet's rebellion +in South Africa. Both these struggles would have been long, tedious +and uncertain even in A.D. 1900. This time they have been, so to speak, +child's play. + +Occasionally into the writer's study there come to hand drifting +fragments of the American literature upon the question of +“preparedness,” and American papers discussing the Mexican situation. In +none of these is there evident any clear realisation of the fundamental +revolution that has occurred in military methods during the last two +years. It looks as if a Mexican war, for example, was thought of as an +affair of rather imperfectly trained young men with rifles and horses +and old-fashioned things like that. A Mexican war on that level might be +as tedious as the South African war. But if the United States preferred +to go into Mexican affairs with what I may perhaps call a 1916 autumn +outfit instead of the small 1900 outfit she seems to possess at present, +there is no reason why America should not clear up any and every Mexican +guerilla force she wanted to in a few weeks. + +To do that she would need a plant of a few hundred aeroplanes, for the +most part armed with machine guns, and the motor repair vans and so +forth needed to go with the aeroplanes; she would need a comparatively +small army of infantry armed with machine guns, with motor transport, +and a few small land ironclads. Such a force could locate, overtake, +destroy and disperse any possible force that a country in the present +industrial condition of Mexico could put into the field. No sort of +entrenchment or fortification possible in Mexico could stand against +it. It could go from one end of the country to the other without serious +loss, and hunt down and capture anyone it wished.... + +The practical political consequence of the present development of +warfare, of the complete revolution in the conditions of warfare since +this century began, is to make war absolutely hopeless for any +peoples not able either to manufacture or procure the very complicated +appliances and munitions now needed for its prosecution. Countries like +Mexico, Bulgaria, Serbia, Afghanistan or Abyssinia are no more capable +of going to war without the connivance and help of manufacturing states +than horses are capable of flying. And this makes possible such a +complete control of war by the few great states which are at the +necessary level of industrial development as not the most Utopian of us +have hitherto dared to imagine. + + +5 + +Infantrymen with automobile transport, plentiful machine guns, Tanks and +such-like accessories; that is the first Arm in modern war. The factory +hand and all the material of the shell route from the factory to the gun +constitute the second Arm. Thirdly comes the artillery, the guns and the +photographic aeroplanes working with the guns. Next I suppose we +must count sappers and miners as a fourth Arm of greatly increased +importance. The fifth and last combatant Arm is the modern substitute +for cavalry; and that also is essentially a force of aeroplanes +supported by automobiles. Several of the French leaders with whom I +talked seemed to be convinced that the horse is absolutely done with in +modern warfare. There is nothing, they declared, that cavalry ever did +that cannot now be done better by aeroplane. + +This is something to break the hearts of the Prussian junkers and +of old-fashioned British army people. The hunt across the English +countryside, the preservation of the fox as a sacred animal, the race +meeting, the stimulation of betting in all classes of the public; all +these things depend ultimately upon the proposition that the “breed +of horses” is of vital importance to the military strength of Great +Britain. But if the arguments of these able French soldiers are sound, +the cult of the horse ceases to be of any more value to England than the +elegant activities of the Toxophilite Society. Moreover, there has +been a colossal buying of horses for the British army, a tremendous +organisation for the purchase and supply of fodder, then employment +of tens of thousands of men as grooms, minders and the like, who would +otherwise have been in the munition factories or the trenches. + +To what possible use can cavalry be put? Can it be used in attack? +Not against trenches; that is better done by infantrymen following up +gunfire. Can it be used against broken infantry in the open? Not if the +enemy has one or two machine guns covering their retreat. Against expose +infantry the swooping aeroplane with a machine gun is far more deadly +and more difficult to hit. Behind it your infantry can follow to receive +surrenders; in most circumstances they can come up on cycles if it is +a case of getting up quickly across a wide space. Similarly for +pursuit the use of wire and use of the machine gun have abolished the +possibility of a pouring cavalry charge. The swooping aeroplane does +everything that cavalry can do in the way of disorganising the enemy, +and far more than it can do in the way of silencing machine guns. It can +capture guns in retreat much more easily by bombing traction engines +and coming down low and shooting horses and men. An ideal modern +pursuit would be an advance of guns, automobiles full of infantry, motor +cyclists and cyclists, behind a high screen of observation aeroplanes +and a low screen of bombing and fighting aeroplanes. Cavalry _might_ +advance across fields and so forth, but only as a very accessory part of +the general advance.... + +And what else is there for the cavalry to do? + +It may be argued that horses can go over country that is impossible for +automobiles. That is to ignore altogether what has been done in this war +by such devices as caterpillar wheels. So far from cavalry being able to +negotiate country where machines would stick and fail, mechanism can now +ride over places where any horse would flounder. + +I submit these considerations to the horse-lover. They are not my +original observations; they have been put to me and they have convinced +me. Except perhaps as a parent of transport mules I see no further part +henceforth for the horse to play in war. + + +6 + +The form and texture of the coming warfare--if there is still warfare +to come--are not yet to be seen in their completeness upon the modern +battlefield. One swallow does not make a summer, nor a handful of +aeroplanes, a “Tank” or so, a few acres of shell craters, and a village +here and there, pounded out of recognition, do more than foreshadow +the spectacle of modernised war on land. War by these developments has +become the monopoly of the five great industrial powers; it is their +alternative to end or evolve it, and if they continue to disagree, then +it must needs become a spectacle of majestic horror such as no man +can yet conceive. It has been wise of Mr. Pennell therefore, who has +recently been drawing his impressions of the war upon stone, to make +his pictures not upon the battlefield, but among the huge industrial +apparatus that is thrusting behind and thrusting up through the war of +the gentlemen in spurs. He gives us the splendours and immensities of +forge and gun pit, furnace and mine shaft. He shows you how great they +are and how terrible. Among them go the little figures of men, robbed of +all dominance, robbed of all individual quality. He leaves it for you to +draw the obvious conclusion that presently, if we cannot contrive to +put an end to war, blacknessess like these, enormities and flares +and towering threats, will follow in the track of the Tanks and come +trampling over the bickering confusion of mankind. + +There is something very striking in these insignificant and incidental +men that Mr. Pennell shows us. Nowhere does a man dominate in all these +wonderful pictures. You may argue perhaps that that is untrue to the +essential realities; all this array of machine and workshop, all this +marshalled power and purpose, has been the creation of inventor and +business organiser. But are we not a little too free with that word +“_creation_”? Falstaff was a “creation” perhaps, or the Sistine sibyls; +there we have indubitably an end conceived and sought and achieved; but +did these inventors and business organisers do more than heed certain +unavoidable imperatives? Seeking coal they were obliged to mine in a +certain way; seeking steel they had to do this and this and not that and +that; seeking profit they had to obey the imperative of the economy. So +little did they plan their ends that most of these manufacturers speak +with a kind of astonishment of the deadly use to which their works are +put. They find themselves making the new war as a man might wake out of +some drugged condition to find himself strangling his mother. + +So that Mr. Pennell's sketchy and transient human figures seem +altogether right to me. He sees these forges, workshops, cranes and the +like, as inhuman and as wonderful as cliffs or great caves or icebergs +or the stars. They are a new aspect of the logic of physical necessity +that made all these older things, and he seizes upon the majesty and +beauty of their dimensions with an entire impartiality. And they are +as impartial. Through all these lithographs runs one present motif, the +motif of the supreme effort of western civilisation to save itself and +the world from the dominance of the reactionary German Imperialism of +modern science. The pictures are arranged to shape out the life of a +shell, from the mine to the great gun; nothing remains of their +history to show except the ammunition dump, the gun in action and the +shell-burst. Upon this theme all these great appearances are strung +to-day. But to-morrow they may be strung upon some other and nobler +purpose. These gigantic beings of which the engineer is the master +and slave, are neither benevolent nor malignant. To-day they produce +destruction, they are the slaves of the spur; to-morrow we hope they +will bridge and carry and house and help again. + +For that peace we struggle against the dull inflexibility of the German +Will-to-Power. + + + + +V. TANKS + + +1 + +It is the British who have produced the “land ironclad” since I returned +from France, and used it apparently with very good effect. I felt no +little chagrin at not seeing them there, because I have a peculiar +interest in these contrivances. It would be more than human not to +claim a little in this matter. I described one in a story in _The Strand +Magazine_ in 1903, and my story could stand in parallel columns beside +the first account of these monsters in action given by Mr. Beach Thomas +or Mr. Philip Gibbs. My friend M. Joseph Reinach has successfully +passed off long extracts from my story as descriptions of the Tanks upon +British officers who had just seen them. The filiation was indeed quite +traceable. They were my grandchildren--I felt a little like King Lear +when first I read about them. Yet let me state at once that I was +certainly not their prime originator. I took up an idea, manipulated +it slightly, and handed it on. The idea was suggested to me by the +contrivances of a certain Mr. Diplock, whose “ped-rail” notion, the +notion of a wheel that was something more than a wheel, a wheel that +would take locomotives up hill-sides and over ploughed fields, was +public property nearly twenty years ago. Possibly there were others +before Diplock. To the Ped-rail also Commander Murray Sueter, one of the +many experimentalists upon the early tanks, admits his indebtedness, +and it would seem that Mr. Diplock was actually concerned in the earlier +stage of the tanks. + +Since my return I have been able to see the Tank at home, through the +courtesy of the Ministry of Munitions. They have progressed far beyond +any recognisable resemblance to the initiatives of Mr. Diplock; they +have approximated rather to the American caterpillar. As I suspected +when first I heard of these devices, the War Office and the old army +people had practically nothing to do with their development. They took +to it very reluctantly--as they have taken to every novelty in this +war. One brilliant general scrawled over an early proposal the entirely +characteristic comment that it was a pity the inventor could not use his +imagination to better purpose. (That foolish British trick of sneering +at “imagination” has cost us hundreds of thousands of useless casualties +and may yet lose us the war.) Tanks were first mooted at the front about +a year and a half ago; Mr. Winston Churchill was then asking questions +about their practicability; he filled many simple souls with terror; +they thought him a most dangerous lunatic. The actual making of the +Tanks arose as an irregular side development of the armoured-car branch +of the Royal Naval Air Service work. The names most closely associated +with the work are (I quote a reply of Dr. Macnamara's in the House of +Commons) Mr. d'Eyncourt, the Director of Naval Construction, Mr. W. O. +Tritton, Lieut. Wilson, R.N.A.S., Mr. Bussell, Lieut. Stern, R.N.A.S., +who is now Colonel Stern, Captain Symes, and Mr. F. Skeens. There are +many other claims too numerous to mention in detail. + +But however much the Tanks may disconcert the gallant Colonel Newcomes +who throw an air of restraint over our victorious front, there can be no +doubt that they are an important as well as a novel development of the +modern offensive. Of course neither the Tanks nor their very obvious +next developments going to wrest the decisive pre-eminence from the +aeroplane. The aeroplane remains now more than ever the instrument of +victory upon the western front. Aerial ascendancy, properly utilised, is +victory. But the mobile armoured big gun and the Tank as a machine-gun +silencer must enormously facilitate an advance against the blinded +enemy. Neither of them can advance against properly aimed big gun fire. +That has to be disposed of before they make their entrance. It remains +the function of the aeroplane to locate the hostile big guns and +to direct the _tir de demolition_ upon them before the advance +begins--possibly even to bomb them out. But hitherto, after the +destruction of driving back of the defender's big guns has been +effected, the dug-out and the machine gun have still inflicted heavy +losses upon the advancing infantry until the fight is won. So soon as +the big guns are out, the tanks will advance, destroying machine guns, +completing the destruction of the wire, and holding prisoners immobile. +Then the infantry will follow to gather in the sheaves. +Multitudinously produced and--I write it with a defiant eye on Colonel +Newcome--_properly handled_, these land ironclads are going to do very +great things in shortening the war, in pursuit, in breaking up the +retreating enemy. Given the air ascendancy, and I am utterly unable to +imagine any way of conclusively stopping or even greatly delaying an +offensive thus equipped. + + +2 + +The young of even the most horrible beasts have something piquant and +engaging about them, and so I suppose it is in the way of things that +the land ironclad which opens a new and more dreadful and destructive +phase in the human folly of warfare, should appear first as if it were a +joke. Never has any such thing so completely masked its wickedness under +an appearance of genial silliness. The Tank is a creature to which one +naturally flings a pet name; the five or six I was shown wandering, +rooting and climbing over obstacles, round a large field near X, were as +amusing and disarming as a little of lively young pigs. + +At first the War Office prevented the publication of any pictures or +descriptions of these contrivances except abroad; then abruptly the +embargo was relaxed, and the press was flooded with photographs. The +reader will be familiar now with their appearance. They resemble +large slugs with an underside a little like the flattened rockers of +a rocking-horse, slugs between 20 and 40 feet long. They are like +flat-sided slugs, slugs of spirit, who raise an enquiring snout, like +the snout of a dogfish, into the air. They crawl upon their bellies in +a way that would be tedious to describe to the general reader and +unnecessary to describe to the enquiring specialists. They go over the +ground with the sliding speed of active snails. Behind them trail two +wheels, supporting a flimsy tail, wheels that strike one as incongruous +as if a monster began kangaroo and ended doll's perambulator. (These +wheels annoy me.) They are not steely monsters; they are painted with +drab and unassuming colours that are fashionable in modern warfare, so +that the armour seems rather like the integument of a rhinoceros. At the +sides of the head project armoured checks, and from above these stick +out guns that look like stalked eyes. That is the general appearance of +the contemporary tank. + +It slides on the ground; the silly little wheels that so detract from +the genial bestiality of its appearance dandle and bump behind it. It +swings about its axis. It comes to an obstacle, a low wall let us say, +or a heap of bricks, and sets to work to climb it with its snout. It +rears over the obstacle, it raises its straining belly, it overhangs +more and more, and at last topples forward; it sways upon the heap and +then goes plunging downwards, sticking out the weak counterpoise of its +wheeled tail. If it comes to a house or a tree or a wall or such-like +obstruction it rams against it so as to bring all its weight to bear +upon it--it weighs _some_ tons--and then climbs over the debris. I saw +it, and incredulous soldiers of experience watched it at the same time, +cross trenches and wallow amazingly through muddy exaggerations of small +holes. Then I repeated the tour inside. + +Again the Tank is like a slug. The slug, as every biological student +knows, is unexpectedly complicated inside. The Tank is as crowded +with inward parts as a battleship. It is filled with engines, guns and +ammunition, and in the interstices men. + +“You will smash your hat,” said Colonel Stern. “No; keep it on, or else +you will smash your head.” + +Only Mr. C. R. W. Nevinson could do justice to the interior of a Tank. +You see a hand gripping something; you see the eyes and forehead of +an engineer's face; you perceive that an overall bluishness beyond the +engine is the back of another man. “Don't hold that,” says someone; “it +is too hot. Hold on to that.” The engines roar, so loudly that I doubt +whether one could hear guns without; the floor begins to slope and +slopes until one seems to be at forty-five degrees or thereabouts; then +the whole concern swings up and sways and slants the other way. You have +crossed a bank. You heel sideways. Through the door which has been left +open you see the little group of engineers, staff officers and naval men +receding and falling away behind you. You straighten up and go up hill. +You halt and begin to rotate. Through the open door, the green field, +with its red walls, rows of worksheds and forests of chimneys in +the background, begins a steady processional movement. The group of +engineers and officers and naval men appears at the other side of the +door and farther off. Then comes a sprint down hill. You descend and +stretch your legs. + +About the field other Tanks are doing their stunts. One is struggling in +an apoplectic way in the mud pit with a cheek half buried. It noses its +way out and on with an air of animal relief. + +They are like jokes by Heath Robinson. One forgets that these things +have already saved the lives of many hundreds of our soldiers and +smashed and defeated thousands of Germans. + +Said one soldier to me: “In the old attacks you used to see the British +dead lying outside the machine-gun emplacements like birds outside a +butt with a good shot inside. _Now_, these things walk through.” + + +3 + +I saw other things that day at X. The Tank is only a beginning in a new +phase of warfare. Of these other things I may only write in the most +general terms. + +But though Tanks and their collaterals are being made upon a very +considerable scale in X, already I realised as I walked through gigantic +forges as high and marvellous as cathedrals, and from workshed to +workshed where gun carriages, ammunition carts and a hundred such things +were flowing into existence with the swelling abundance of a river that +flows out of a gorge, that as the demand for the new developments +grows clear and strong, the resources of Britain are capable still of +a tremendous response. _If only we do not rob these great factories and +works of their men._ + +Upon this question certain things need to be said very plainly. The +decisive factor in the sort of war we are now waging is production and +right use of mechanical material; victory in this war depends now +upon three things: the aeroplane, the gun, and the Tank developments. +These--and not crowds of men--are the prime necessity for a successful +offensive. Every man we draw from munition making to the ranks brings +our western condition nearer to the military condition of Russia. In +these things we may be easily misled by military “experts” We have to +remember that the military “expert” is a man who learnt his business +before 1914, and that the business of war has been absolutely +revolutionised since 1914; the military expert is a man trained to think +of war as essentially an affair of cavalry, infantry in formation, and +field guns, whereas cavalry is entirely obsolete, infantry no longer +fights in formation, and the methods of gunnery have been entirely +changed. The military man I observe still runs about the world in spurs, +he travels in trains in spurs, he walks in spurs, he thinks in terms of +spurs. He has still to discover that it is about as ridiculous as if he +were to carry a crossbow. I take it these spurs are only the outward and +visible sign of an inward obsolescence. The disposition of the military +“expert” is still to think too little of machinery and to demand too +much of the men. Behind our front at the time of my visit there were, +for example, many thousands of cavalry, men tending horses, men engaged +in transporting bulky fodder for horses and the like. These men were +doing about as much in this war as if they had been at Timbuctoo. Every +man who is taken from munition making at X to spur-worshipping in khaki, +is a dead loss to the military efficiency of the country. Every man that +is needed or is likely to be needed for the actual operations of +modern warfare can be got by combing out the cavalry, the brewing +and distilling industries, the theatres and music halls, and the like +unproductive occupations. The under-staffing of munition works, the +diminution of their efficiency by the use of aged and female labour, is +the straight course to failure in this war. + +In X, in the forges and machine shops, I saw already too large a +proportion of boys and grey heads. + +War is a thing that changes very rapidly, and we have in the Tanks only +the first of a great series of offensive developments. They are bound to +be improved, at a great pace. The method of using them will change very +rapidly. Any added invention will necessitate the scrapping of old types +and the production of the new patterns in quantity. It is of supreme +necessity to the Allies if they are to win this war outright that the +lead in inventions and enterprise which the British have won over the +Germans in this matter should be retained. It is our game now to press +the advantage for all it is worth. We have to keep ahead to win. We +cannot do so unless we have unstinted men and unstinted material to +produce each new development as its use is realised. + +Given that much, the Tank will enormously enhance the advantage of the +new offensive method on the French front; the method that is of gun +demolition after aerial photography, followed by an advance; it is a +huge addition to our prospect of decisive victory. What does it do? +It solves two problems. The existing Tank affords a means of advancing +against machine-gun fire and of destroying wire and machine guns without +much risk of loss, so soon as the big guns have done their duty by the +enemy guns. And also behind the Tank itself, it is useless to conceal, +lies the possibility of bringing up big guns and big gun ammunition, +across nearly any sort of country, as fast as the advance can press +forward. Hitherto every advance has paid a heavy toll to the machine +gun, and every advance has had to halt after a couple of miles or so +while the big guns (taking five or six days for the job) toiled up to +the new positions. + + +4 + +It is impossible to restrain a note of sharp urgency from what one has +to say about these developments. The Tanks remove the last technical +difficulties in our way to decisive victory and a permanent peace; they +also afford a reason for straining every nerve to bring about a decision +and peace soon. At the risk of seeming an imaginative alarmist I would +like to point out the reasons these things disclose for hurrying this +war to a decision and doing our utmost to arrange the world's affairs +so as to make another war improbable. Already these serio-comic Tanks, +weighing something over twenty tons or so, have gone slithering around +and sliding over dead and wounded men. That is not an incident for +sensitive minds to dwell upon, but it is a mere little child's play +anticipation of what the big land ironclads _that are bound to come if +there is no world pacification_, are going to do. + +What lies behind the Tank depends upon this fact; there is no definable +upward limit of mass. Upon that I would lay all the stress possible, +because everything turns upon that. + +You cannot make a land ironclad so big and heavy but that you cannot +make a caterpillar track wide enough and strong enough to carry it +forward. Tanks are quite possible that will carry twenty-inch or +twenty-five inch guns, besides minor armament. Such Tanks may be +undesirable; the production may exceed the industrial resources of +any empire to produce; but there is no inherent impossibility in such +things. There are not even the same limitations as to draught and +docking accommodation that sets bounds to the size of battleships. It +follows, therefore, as a necessary deduction that if the world's affairs +are so left at the end of the war that the race of armaments continues, +that Tank will develop steadily into a tremendous instrument of warfare, +driven by engines of scores of thousands of horse-power, tracking on +a track scores of hundreds of yards wide and weighing hundreds or +thousands of tons. Nothing but a world agreement not to do so can +prevent this logical development of the land ironclad. Such a structure +will make wheel-ruts scores of feet deep; it will plough up, devastate +and destroy the country it passes over altogether. + +For my own part I never imagined the land ironclad idea would get loose +into war. I thought that the military intelligence was essentially +unimaginative and that such an aggressive military power as Germany, +dominated by military people, would never produce anything of the sort. +I thought that this war would be fought out without Tanks and that then +war would come to an end. For of course it is mere stupidity that makes +people doubt the ultimate ending of war. I have been so far justified +in these expectations of mine, that it is not from military sources that +these things have come. They have been thrust upon the soldiers from +without. But now that they are loose, now that they are in war, we have +to face their full possibilities, to use our advantage in them and press +on to the end of the war. In support of a photo-aero directed artillery, +even our present Tanks can be used to complete an invisible offensive. +We shall not so much push as ram. It is doubtful if the Germans can get +anything of the sort into action before six months are out. We ought to +get the war on to German soil before the Tanks have grown to more than +three or four times their present size. Then it will not matter so much +how much bigger they grow. It will be the German landscape that will +suffer. + +After one has seen the actual Tanks it is not very difficult to close +one's eyes and figure the sort of Tank that may be arguing with Germany +in a few months' time about the restoration of Belgium and Serbia and +France, the restoration of the sunken tonnage, the penalties of the +various Zeppelin and submarine murders, the freedom of seas and land +alike from piracy, the evacuation of all Poland including Posen and +Cracow, and the guarantees for the future peace of Europe. The machine +will be perhaps as big as a destroyer and more heavily armed and +equipped. It will swim over and through the soil at a pace of ten or +twelve miles an hour. In front of it will be corn, land, neat woods, +orchards, pasture, gardens, villages and towns. It will advance upon its +belly with a swaying motion, devouring the ground beneath it. Behind it +masses of soil and rock, lumps of turf, splintered wood, bits of houses, +occasional streaks of red, will drop from its track, and it will leave +a wake, six or seven times as wide as a high road, from which all soil, +all cultivation, all semblance to cultivated or cultivatable land will +have disappeared. It will not even be a track of soil. It will be a +track of subsoil laid bare. It will be a flayed strip of nature. In the +course of its fighting the monster may have to turnabout. It will then +halt and spin slowly round, grinding out an arena of desolation with +a diameter equal to its length. If it has to retreat and advance again +these streaks and holes of destruction will increase and multiply. +Behind the fighting line these monsters will manoeuvre to and fro, +destroying the land for all ordinary agricultural purposes for ages to +come. The first imaginative account of the land ironclad that was ever +written concluded with the words, “They are the _reductio ad absurdum_ +of war.” They are, and it is to the engineers, the ironmasters, the +workers and the inventive talent of Great Britain and France that we +must look to ensure that it is in Germany, the great teacher of war, +that this demonstration of war's ultimate absurdity is completed. + +For forty years Frankenstein Germany invoked war, turned every +development of material and social science to aggressive ends, and at +last when she felt the time was ripe she let loose the new monster that +she had made of war to cow the spirit of mankind. She set the thing +trampling through Belgium. She cannot grumble if at last it comes home, +stranger and more dreadful even than she made it, trampling the German +towns and fields with German blood upon it and its eyes towards Berlin. + +This logical development of the Tank idea may seem a gloomy prospect for +mankind. But it is open to question whether the tremendous development +of warfare that has gone on in the last two years does after all open a +prospect of unmitigated gloom. There has been a good deal of cheap and +despondent sneering recently at the phrase, “The war that will end war.” + It is still possible to maintain that that may be a correct description +of this war. It has to be remembered that war, as the aeroplane and +the Tank have made it, has already become an impossible luxury for any +barbaric or uncivilised people. War on the grade that has been achieved +on the Somme predicates an immense industrialism behind it. Of all the +States in the world only four can certainly be said to be fully capable +of sustaining war at the level to which it has now been brought upon the +western front. These are Britain, France, Germany, and the United States +of America. Less certainly equal to the effort are Italy, Japan, Russia, +and Austria. These eight powers are the only powers _capable of warfare +under modern conditions._ Five are already Allies and one is incurably +pacific. There is no other power or people in the world that can go to +war now without the consent and connivance of these great powers. If +we consider their alliances, we may count it that the matter rests now +between two groups of Allies and one neutral power. So that while on +the one hand the development of modern warfare of which the Tank is the +present symbol opens a prospect of limitless senseless destruction, it +opens on the other hand a prospect of organised world control. This +Tank development must ultimately bring the need of a real permanent +settlement within the compass of the meanest of diplomatic +intelligences. A peace that will restore competitive armaments has now +become a less desirable prospect for everyone than a continuation of the +war. Things were bad enough before, when the land forces were still in +a primitive phase of infantry, cavalry and artillery, and when the only +real race to develop monsters and destructors was for sea power. But the +race for sea power before 1914 was mere child's play to the breeding +of engineering monstrosities for land warfare that must now follow any +indeterminate peace settlement. I am no blind believer in the wisdom of +mankind, but I cannot believe that men are so insensate and headstrong +as to miss the plain omens of the present situation. + +So that after all the cheerful amusement the sight of a Tank causes may +not be so very unreasonable. These things may be no more than one of +those penetrating flashes of wit that will sometimes light up and dispel +the contentions of an angry man. If they are not that, then they are the +grimmest jest that ever set men grinning. Wait and see, if you do not +believe me. + + + + +HOW PEOPLE THINK ABOUT THE WAR + + + + +I. DO THEY REALLY THINK AT ALL? + +All human affairs are mental affairs; the bright ideas of to-day are the +realities of to-morrow. The real history of mankind is the history of +how ideas have arisen, how they have taken possession of men's minds, +how they have struggled, altered, proliferated, decayed. There is +nothing in this war at all but a conflict of ideas, traditions, and +mental habits. The German Will clothed in conceptions of aggression and +fortified by cynical falsehood, struggles against the fundamental sanity +of the German mind and the confused protest of mankind. So that the most +permanently important thing in the tragic process of this war is the +change of opinion that is going on. What are people making of it? Is it +producing any great common understandings, any fruitful unanimities? + +No doubt it is producing enormous quantities of cerebration, but is it +anything more than chaotic and futile cerebration? We are told all +sorts of things in answer to that, things without a scrap of evidence +or probability to support them. It is, we are assured, turning people to +religion, making them moral and thoughtful. It is also, we are assured +with equal confidence, turning them to despair and moral disaster. It +will be followed by (1) a period of moral renascence, and (2) a debauch. +It is going to make the workers (1) more and (2) less obedient and +industrious. It is (1) inuring men to war and (2) filling them with a +passionate resolve never to suffer war again. And so on. I propose now +to ask what is really happening in this matter? How is human opinion +changing? I have opinions of my own and they are bound to colour my +discussion. The reader must allow for that, and as far as possible I +will remind him where necessary to make his allowance. + +Now first I would ask, is any really continuous and thorough +mental process going on at all about this war? I mean, is there any +considerable number of people who are seeing it as a whole, taking it in +as a whole, trying to get a general idea of it from which they can form +directing conclusions for the future? Is there any considerable number +of people even trying to do that? At any rate let me point out first +that there is quite an enormous mass of people who--in spite of the fact +that their minds are concentrated on aspects of this war, who are at +present hearing, talking, experiencing little else than the war--are +nevertheless neither doing nor trying to do anything that deserves to +be called thinking about it at all. They may even be suffering quite +terribly by it. But they are no more mastering its causes, reasons, +conditions, and the possibility of its future prevention than a monkey +that has been rescued in a scorching condition from the burning of a +house will have mastered the problem of a fire. It is just happening to +and about them. It may, for anything they have learnt about it, happen +to them again. + +A vast majority of people are being swamped by the spectacular side of +the business. It was very largely my fear of being so swamped myself +that made me reluctant to go as a spectator to the front. I knew that my +chances of being hit by a bullet were infinitesimal, but I was extremely +afraid of being hit by some too vivid impression. I was afraid that I +might see some horribly wounded man or some decayed dead body that would +so scar my memory and stamp such horror into me as to reduce me to a +mere useless, gibbering, stop-the-war-at-any-price pacifist. Years ago +my mind was once darkened very badly for some weeks with a kind of fear +and distrust of life through a sudden unexpected encounter one tranquil +evening with a drowned body. But in this journey in Italy and France, +although I have had glimpses of much death and seen many wounded men, +I have had no really horrible impressions at all. That side of the +business has, I think, been overwritten. The thing that haunts me most +is the impression of a prevalent relapse into extreme untidiness, of +a universal discomfort, of fields, and of ruined houses treated +disregardfully.... But that is not what concerns us now in this +discussion. What concerns us now is the fact that this war is producing +spectacular effects so tremendous and incidents so strange, so +remarkable, so vivid, that the mind forgets both causes and consequences +and simply sits down to stare. + +For example, there is this business of the Zeppelin raids in England. It +is a supremely silly business; it is the most conclusive demonstration +of the intellectual inferiority of the German to the Western European +that is should ever have happened. There was the clearest _a priori_ +case against the gas-bag. I remember the discussions ten or twelve years +ago in which it was established to the satisfaction of every reasonable +man that ultimately the “heavier than air” machine (as we called it +then) must fly better than the gas-bag, and still more conclusively +that no gas-bag was conceivable that could hope to fight and defeat +aeroplanes. Nevertheless the German, with that dull faith of his in mere +“Will,” persisted along his line. He knew instinctively that he could +not produce aviators to meet the Western European; all his social +instincts made him cling to the idea of a great motherly, almost +sow-like bag of wind above him. At an enormous waste of resources +Germany has produced these futile monsters, that drift in the darkness +over England promiscuously dropping bombs on fields and houses. They +are now meeting the fate that was demonstrably certain ten years ago. +If they found us unready for them it is merely that we were unable to +imagine so idiotic an enterprise would ever be seriously sustained and +persisted in. We did not believe in the probability of Zeppelin raids +any more than we believed that Germany would force the world into war. +It was a thing too silly to be believed. But they came--to their certain +fate. In the month after I returned from France and Italy, no less than +four of these fatuities were exploded and destroyed within thirty miles +of my Essex home.... There in chosen phrases you have the truth about +these things. But now mark the perversion of thought due to spectacular +effect. + +I find over the Essex countryside, which has been for more than a year +and a half a highway for Zeppelins, a new and curious admiration for +them that has arisen out of these very disasters. Previously they were +regarded with dislike and a sort of distrust, as one might regard a +sneaking neighbour who left his footsteps in one's garden at night. But +the Zeppelins of Billericay and Potter's Bar are--heroic things. (The +Cuffley one came down too quickly, and the fourth one which came down +for its crew to surrender is despised.) I have heard people describe the +two former with eyes shining with enthusiasm. + +“First,” they say, “you saw a little round red glow that spread. Then +you saw the whole Zeppelin glowing. Oh, it was _beautiful!_ Then it +began to turn over and come down, and it flames and pieces began to +break away. And then down it came, leaving flaming pieces all up the +sky. At last it was a pillar of fire eight thousand feet high.... +Everyone said, 'Ooooo!' And then someone pointed out the little +aeroplane lit up by the flare--such a leetle thing up there in +the night! It is the greatest thing I have ever seen. Oh! the most +wonderful--most wonderful!” + +There is a feeling that the Germans really must after all be a splendid +people to provide such magnificent pyrotechnics. + +Some people in London the other day were pretending to be shocked by an +American who boasted that he had been in “two _bully_ bombardments,” + but he was only saying what everyone feels more or less. We are at +a spectacle that--as a spectacle--our grandchildren will envy. I +understand now better the story of the man who stared at the sparks +raining up from his own house as it burnt in the night and whispered +“_Lovely! Lovely!_” + +The spectacular side of the war is really an enormous distraction from +thought. And against thought there also fights the native indolence of +the human mind. The human mind, it seems, was originally developed to +think about the individual; it thinks reluctantly about the species. +It takes refuge from that sort of thing if it possibly can. And so +the second great preventive of clear thinking is the tranquillising +platitude. + +The human mind is an instrument very easily fatigued. Only a few +exceptions go on thinking restlessly--to the extreme exasperation of +their neighbours. The normal mind craves for decisions, even wrong or +false decisions rather than none. It clutches at comforting falsehoods. +It loves to be told, “_There_, don't you worry. That'll be all right. +That's _settled._” This war has come as an almost overwhelming challenge +to mankind. To some of us it seems as it if were the Sphynx proffering +the alternative of its riddle or death. Yet the very urgency of this +challenge to think seems to paralyse the critical intelligence of very +many people altogether. They will say, “This war is going to produce +enormous changes in everything.” They will then subside mentally with a +feeling of having covered the whole ground in a thoroughly safe manner. +Or they will adopt an air of critical aloofness. They will say, “How +is it possible to foretell what may happen in this tremendous sea of +change?” And then, with an air of superior modesty, they will go on +doing--whatever they feel inclined to do. Many others, a degree less +simple in their methods, will take some entirely partial aspect, arrive +at some guesswork decision upon that, and then behave as though that met +every question we have to face. Or they will make a sort of admonitory +forecast that is conditional upon the good behaviour of other people. +“Unless the Trade Unions are more reasonable,” they will say. Or, +“Unless the shipping interest is grappled with and controlled.” Or, +“Unless England wakes up.” And with that they seem to wash their hands +of further responsibility for the future. + +One delightful form of put-off is the sage remark, “Let us finish the +war first, and then let us ask what is going to happen after it.” One +likes to think of the beautiful blank day after the signing of the peace +when these wise minds swing round to pick up their deferred problems.... + +I submit that a man has not done his duty by himself as a rational +creature unless he has formed an idea of what is going on, as one +complicated process, until he has formed an idea sufficiently definite +for him to make it the basis of a further idea, which is his own +relationship to that process. He must have some notion of what the +process is going to do to him, and some notion of what he means to do, +if he can, to the process. That is to say, he must not only have an idea +how the process is going, but also an idea of how he wants it to go. It +seems so natural and necessary for a human brain to do this that it is +hard to suppose that everyone has not more or less attempted it. But +few people, in Great Britain at any rate, have the habit of frank +expression, and when people do not seem to have made out any of these +things for themselves there is a considerable element of secretiveness +and inexpressiveness to be allowed for before we decide that they have +not in some sort of fashion done so. Still, after all allowances have +been made, there remains a vast amount of jerry-built and ready-made +borrowed stuff in most of people's philosophies of the war. The systems +of authentic opinion in this world of thought about the war are like +comparatively rare thin veins of living mentality in a vast world of +dead repetitions and echoed suggestions. And that being the case, it is +quite possible that history after the war, like history before the war, +will not be so much a display of human will and purpose as a resultant +of human vacillations, obstructions, and inadvertences. We shall still +be in a drama of blind forces following the line of least resistance. + +One of the people who is often spoken of as if he were doing an enormous +amount of concentrated thinking is “the man in the trenches.” We are +told--by gentlemen writing for the most part at home--of the most +extraordinary things that are going on in those devoted brains, how they +are getting new views about the duties of labour, religion, morality, +monarchy, and any other notions that the gentleman at home happens to +fancy and wished to push. Now that is not at all the impression of the +khaki mentality I have reluctantly accepted as correct. For the most +part the man in khaki is up against a round of tedious immediate duties +that forbid consecutive thought; he is usually rather crowded and not +very comfortable. He is bored. + +The real horror of modern war, when all is said and done, is the +boredom. To get killed our wounded may be unpleasant, but it is at +any rate interesting; the real tragedy is in the desolated fields, the +desolated houses, the desolated hours and days, the bored and desolated +minds that hang behind the melee and just outside the melee. The +peculiar beastliness of the German crime is the way the German war cant +and its consequences have seized upon and paralysed the mental movement +of Western Europe. Before 1914 war was theoretically unpopular in every +European country; we thought of it as something tragic and dreadful. +Now everyone knows by experience that it is something utterly dirty and +detestable. We thought it was the Nemean lion, and we have found it +is the Augean stable. But being bored by war and hating war is quite +unproductive _unless you are thinking about its nature and causes +so thoroughly that you will presently be able to take hold of it and +control it and end it._ It is no good for everyone to say unanimously, +“We will have no more war,” unless you have thought out how to avoid it, +and mean to bring that end about. It is as if everyone said, “We will +have no more catarrh,” or “no more flies,” or “no more east wind.” And +my point is that the immense sorrows at home in every European country +and the vast boredom of the combatants are probably not really producing +any effective remedial mental action at all, and will not do so unless +we get much more thoroughly to work upon the thinking-out process. + +In such talks as I could get with men close up to the front I found +beyond this great boredom and attempts at distraction only very +specialised talk about changes in the future. Men were keen upon +questions of army promotion, of the future of conscription, of the +future of the temporary officer, upon the education of boys in relation +to army needs. But the war itself was bearing them all upon its way, +as unquestioned and uncontrolled as if it were the planet on which they +lived. + + + + +II. THE YIELDING PACIFIST AND THE CONSCIENTIOUS OBJECTOR + + +1 Among the minor topics that people are talking about behind the +western fronts is the psychology of the Yielding Pacifist and the +Conscientious Objector. Of course, we are all pacifists nowadays; I know +of no one who does not want not only to end this war but to put an end +to war altogether, except those blood-red terrors Count Reventlow, Mr. +Leo Maxse--how he does it on a vegetarian dietary I cannot imagine!--and +our wild-eyed desperados of _The Morning Post._ But most of the people +I meet, and most of the people I met on my journey, are pacifists like +myself who want to _make_ peace by beating the armed man until he gives +in and admits the error of his ways, disarming him and reorganising the +world for the forcible suppression of military adventures in the future. +They want belligerency put into the same category as burglary, as a +matter of forcible suppression. The Yielding Pacifist who will accept +any sort of peace, and the Conscientious Objector who will not fight at +all, are not of that opinion. + +Both Italy and France produce parallel types to those latter, but it +would seem that in each case England displays the finer developments. +The Latin mind is directer than the English, and its standards--shall +I say?--more primitive; it gets more directly to the fact that here are +men who will not fight. And it is less charitable. I was asked quite a +number of times for the English equivalent of an _embusque._ “We don't +generalise,” I said, “we treat each case on its merits!” + +One interlocutor near Udine was exercised by our Italian Red Cross work. + +“Here,” he said, “are sixty or seventy young Englishmen, all fit for +military service.... Of course they go under fire, but it is not like +being junior officers in the trenches. Not one of them has been killed +or wounded.” + +He reflected. “One, I think, has been decorated,” he said.... + +My French and Italian are only for very rough common jobs; when it came +to explaining the Conscientious Objector sympathetically they broke +down badly. I had to construct long parenthetical explanations of +our antiquated legislative methods to show how it was that the +“conscientious objector” had been so badly defined. The foreigner does +not understand the importance of vague definition in British life. +“Practically, of course, we offered to exempt anyone who conscientiously +objected to fight or serve. Then the Pacifist and German people started +a campaign to enrol objectors. Of course every shirker, every coward and +slacker in the country decided at once to be a conscientious objector. +Anyone but a British legislator could have foreseen that. Then we +started Tribunals to wrangle with the objectors about their _bona +fides._ Then the Pacifists and the Pro-Germans issued little leaflets +and started correspondence courses to teach people exactly how to lie to +the Tribunals. Trouble about freedom of the pamphleteer followed. I had +to admit--it has been rather a sloppy business. The people who made the +law knew their own minds, but we English are not an expressive people.” + +These are not easy things to say in Elementary (and slightly Decayed) +French or in Elementary and Corrupt Italian. + +“But why do people support the sham conscientious objector and issue +leaflets to help him--when there is so much big work clamouring to be +done?” + +“That,” I said, “is the Whig tradition.” + +When they pressed me further, I said: “I am really the questioner. I +am visiting _your_ country, and you have to tell _me_ things. It is +not right that I should do all the telling. Tell me all about Romain +Rolland.” + +And so I pressed them about the official socialists in Italy and the +Socialist minority in France until I got the question out of the net +of national comparisons and upon a broader footing. In several +conversations we began to work out in general terms the psychology of +those people who were against the war. But usually we could not get to +that; my interlocutors would insist upon telling me just what they would +like to do or just what they would like to see done to stop-the-war +pacifists and conscientious objectors; pleasant rather than fruitful +imaginative exercises from which I could effect no more than +platitudinous uplifts. + +But the general drift of such talks as did seem to penetrate the +question was this, that among these stop-the-war people there are really +three types. First there is a type of person who hates violence and +the infliction of pain under any circumstances, and who have a mystical +belief in the rightness (and usually the efficacy) of non-resistance. +These are generally Christians, and then their cardinal text is the +instruction to “turn the other cheek.” Often they are Quakers. If they +are consistent they are vegetarians and wear _Lederlos_ boots. They do +not desire police protection for their goods. They stand aloof from all +the force and conflict of life. They have always done so. This is an +understandable and respectable type. It has numerous Hindu equivalents. +It is a type that finds little difficulty about exemptions--provided the +individual has not been too recently converted to his present habits. +But it is not the prevalent type in stop-the-war circles. Such genuine +ascetics do not number more than a thousand or so, all three of our +western allied countries. The mass of the stop-the-war people is made up +quite other elements. + + +2 + +In the complex structure of the modern community there are two groups +or strata or pockets in which the impulse of social obligation, the +gregarious sense of a common welfare, is at its lowest; one of these is +the class of the Resentful Employee, the class of people who, without +explanation, adequate preparation or any chance, have been shoved at an +early age into uncongenial work and never given a chance to escape, and +the other is the class of people with small fixed incomes or with small +salaries earnt by routine work, or half independent people practising +some minor artistic or literary craft, who have led uneventful, +irresponsible lives from their youth up, and never came at any point +into relations of service to the state. This latter class was more +difficult to define than the former--because it is more various within +itself. My French friends wanted to talk of the “Psychology of the +Rentier.” I was for such untranslatable phrases as the “Genteel Whig,” + or the “Donnish Liberal.” But I lit up an Italian--he is a Milanese +manufacturer--with “these Florentine English who would keep Italy in a +glass case.” “I know,” he said. Before I go on to expand this congenial +theme, let me deal first with the Resentful Employee, who is a much +more considerable, and to me a much more sympathetic, figure in European +affairs. I began life myself as a Resentful Employee. By the extremest +good luck I have got my mind and spirit out of the distortions of that +cramping beginning, but I can still recall even the anger of those old +days. + +He becomes an employee between thirteen and fifteen; he is made to do +work he does not like for no other purpose that he can see except the +profit and glory of a fortunate person called his employer, behind whom +stand church and state blessing and upholding the relationship. He is +not allowed to feel that he has any share whatever in the employer's +business, or that any end is served but the employer's profit. He cannot +see that the employer acknowledges any duty to the state. Neither church +nor state seems to insist that the employer has any public function. +At no point does the employee come into a clear relationship of mutual +obligation with the state. There does not seem to be any way out for the +employee from a life spent in this subordinate, toilsome relationship. +He feels put upon and cheated out of life. He is without honour. If +he is a person of ability or stubborn temper he struggles out of his +position; if he is a kindly and generous person he blames his “luck” and +does his work and lives his life as cheerfully as possible--and so live +the bulk of our amazing European workers; if he is a being of great +magnanimity he is content to serve for the ultimate good of the race; if +he has imagination, he says, “Things will not always be like this,” + and becomes a socialist or a guild socialist, and tries to educate the +employer to a sense of reciprocal duty; but if he is too human for any +of these things, then he begins to despise and hate the employer and the +system that made him. He wants to hurt them. Upon that hate it is easy +to trade. + +A certain section of what is called the Socialist press and the +Socialist literature in Europe is no doubt great-minded; it seeks to +carve a better world out of the present. But much of it is socialist +only in name. Its spirit is Anarchistic. Its real burthen is not +construction but grievance; it tells the bitter tale of the employee, it +feeds and organises his malice, it schemes annoyance and injury for the +hated employer. The state and the order of the world is confounded with +the capitalist. Before the war the popular so-called socialist press +reeked with the cant of rebellion, the cant of any sort of rebellion. +“I'm a rebel,” was the silly boast of the young disciple. “Spoil +something, set fire to something,” was held to be the proper text for +any girl or lad of spirit. And this blind discontent carried on into +the war. While on the one hand a great rush of men poured into the army +saying, “Thank God! we can serve our country at last instead of some +beastly profiteer,” a sourer remnant, blind to the greater issues of +the war, clung to the reasonless proposition, “the state is only for +the Capitalist. This war is got up by Capitalists. Whatever has to be +done--_we are rebels._” + +Such a typical paper as the British _Labour Leader_, for example, may +be read in vain, number after number, for any sound and sincere +constructive proposal. It is a prolonged scream of extreme +individualism, a monotonous repetition of incoherent discontent with +authority, with direction, with union, with the European effort. It +wants to do nothing. It just wants effort to stop--even at the price of +German victory. If the whole fabric of society in western Europe were to +be handed over to those pseudo-socialists to-morrow, to be administered +for the common good, they would fly the task in terror. They would make +excuses and refuse the undertaking. They do not want the world to go +right. The very idea of the world going right does not exist in their +minds. They are embodied discontent and hatred, making trouble, and that +is all they are. They want to be “rebels”--to be admired as “rebels”. + +That is the true psychology of the Resentful Employee. He is a +de-socialised man. His sense of the State has been destroyed. + +The Resentful Employees are the outcome of our social injustices. They +are the failures of our social ad educational systems. We may regret +their pitiful degradation, we may exonerate them from blame; none the +less they are a pitiful crew. I have seen the hardship of the trenches, +the gay and gallant wounded. I do a little understand what our soldiers, +officers and men alike, have endured and done. And though I know I ought +to allow for all that I have stated, I cannot regard these conscientious +objectors with anything but contempt. Into my house there pours a dismal +literature rehearsing the hardships of these men who set themselves +up to be martyrs for liberty; So and So, brave hero, has been sworn +at--positively sworn at by a corporal; a nasty rough man came into +the cell of So and So and dropped several h's; So and So, refusing to +undress and wash, has been undressed and washed, and soap was rubbed +into his eyes--perhaps purposely; the food and accommodation are not of +the best class; the doctors in attendance seem hasty; So and So was put +into a damp bed and has got a nasty cold. Then I recall a jolly vanload +of wounded men I saw out there.... + +But after all, we must be just. A church and state that permitted +these people to be thrust into dreary employment in their early 'teens, +without hope or pride, deserves such citizens as these. The marvel +is that there are so few. There are a poor thousand or so of these +hopeless, resentment-poisoned creatures in Great Britain. Against five +willing millions. The Allied countries, I submit, have not got nearly +all the conscientious objectors they deserve. + + +3 + +If the Resentful Employee provides the emotional impulse of the +resisting pacifist, whose horizon is bounded by his one passionate +desire that the particular social system that has treated him so ill +should collapse and give in, and its leaders and rulers be humiliated +and destroyed, the intellectual direction of a mischievous pacifism +comes from an entirely different class. + +The Genteel Whig, though he differs very widely in almost every other +respect from the Resentful Employee, has this much in common, that he +has never been drawn into the whirl of collective life in any real and +assimilative fashion. This is what is the matter with both of them. +He is a little loose, shy, independent person. Except for eating and +drinking--in moderation, he has never done anything real from the day +he was born. He has frequently not even faced the common challenge of +matrimony. Still more frequently is he childless, or the daring parent +of one particular child. He has never traded nor manufactured. He has +drawn his dividends or his salary with an entire unconsciousness of any +obligations to policemen or navy for these punctual payments. Probably +he has never ventured even to reinvest his little legacy. He is acutely +aware of possessing an exceptionally fine intelligence, but he is +entirely unconscious of a fundamental unreality. Nothing has ever +occurred to him to make him ask why the mass of men were either not +possessed of his security or discontented with it. The impulses that +took his school friends out upon all sorts of odd feats and adventures +struck him as needless. As he grew up he turned with an equal distrust +from passion or ambition. His friends went out after love, after +adventure, after power, after knowledge, after this or that desire, and +became men. But he noted merely that they became fleshly, that effort +strained them, that they were sometimes angry or violent or heated. He +could not but feel that theirs were vulgar experiences, and he sought +some finer exercise for his exceptional quality. He pursued art or +philosophy or literature upon their more esoteric levels, and realised +more and more the general vulgarity and coarseness of the world about +him, and his own detachment. The vulgarity and crudity of the things +nearest him impressed him most; the dreadful insincerity of the Press, +the meretriciousness of success, the loudness of the rich, the baseness +of common people in his own land. The world overseas had by comparison +a certain glamour. Except that when you said “United States” to him he +would draw the air sharply between his teeth and beg you not to... + +Nobody took him by the collar and shook him. + +If our world had considered the advice of William James and insisted +upon national service from everyone, national service in the drains or +the nationalised mines or the nationalised deep-sea fisheries if not +in the army or navy, we should not have had any such men. If it had +insisted that wealth and property are no more than a trust for the +public benefit, we should have had no genteel indispensables. These +discords in our national unanimity are the direct consequence of our bad +social organisation. We permit the profiteer and the usurer; they evoke +the response of the Reluctant Employee, and the inheritor of their +wealth becomes the Genteel Whig. + +But that is by the way. It was of course natural and inevitable that the +German onslaught upon Belgium and civilisation generally should strike +these recluse minds not as a monstrous ugly wickedness to be resisted +and overcome at any cost, but merely as a nerve-racking experience. Guns +were going off on both sides. The Genteel Whig was chiefly conscious +of a repulsive vast excitement all about him, in which many people did +inelegant and irrational things. They waved flags--nasty little flags. +This child of the ages, this last fruit of the gigantic and tragic tree +of life, could no more than stick its fingers in its ears as say, +“Oh, please, do _all_ stop!” and then as the strain grew intenser and +intenser set itself with feeble pawings now to clamber “Au-dessus de la +Melee,” and now to--in some weak way--stop the conflict. (“Au-dessus +de la Melee”--as the man said when they asked him where he was when the +bull gored his sister.) The efforts to stop the conflict at any price, +even at the price of entire submission to the German Will, grew more +urgent as the necessity that everyone should help against the German +Thing grew more manifest. + +Of all the strange freaks of distressed thinking that this war has +produced, the freaks of the Genteel Whig have been among the most +remarkable. With an air of profound wisdom he returns perpetually to +his proposition that there are faults on both sides. To say that is his +conception of impartiality. I suppose that if a bull gored his sister he +would say that there were faults on both sides; his sister ought not +to have strayed into the field, she was wearing a red hat of a highly +provocative type; she ought to have been a cow and then everything would +have been different. In the face of the history of the last forty years, +the Genteel Whig struggles persistently to minimise the German outrage +upon civilisation and to find excuses for Germany. He does this, not +because he has any real passion for falsehood, but because by training, +circumstance, and disposition he is passionately averse from action +with the vulgar majority and from self-sacrifice in a common cause, and +because he finds in the justification of Germany and, failing that, in +the blackening of the Allies to an equal blackness, one line of defence +against the wave of impulse that threatens to submerge his private +self. But when at last that line is forced he is driven back upon others +equally extraordinary. You can often find simultaneously in the same +Pacifist paper, and sometimes even in the utterances of the same writer, +two entirely incompatible statements. The first is that Germany is so +invincible that it is useless to prolong the war since no effort of the +Allies is likely to produce any material improvement in their position, +and the second is that Germany is so thoroughly beaten that she is now +ready to abandon militarism and make terms and compensations entirely +acceptable to the countries she has forced into war. And when finally +facts are produced to establish the truth that Germany, though still +largely wicked and impenitent, is being slowly and conclusively beaten +by the sanity, courage and persistence of the Allied common men, then +the Genteel Whig retorts with his last defensive absurdity. He invents a +national psychology for Germany. Germany, he invents, loves us and wants +to be our dearest friend. Germany has always loved us. The Germans are +a loving, unenvious people. They have been a little mislead--but nice +people do not insist upon that fact. But beware of beating Germany, +beware of humiliating Germany; then indeed trouble will come. Germany +will begin to dislike us. She will plan a revenge. Turning aside from +her erstwhile innocent career, she may even think of hate. What are our +obligations to France, Italy, Serbia and Russia, what is the happiness +of a few thousands of the Herero, a few millions of the Belgians--whose +numbers moreover are constantly diminishing--when we might weigh them +against the danger, the most terrible danger, of incurring _permanent +German hostility?..._ + +A Frenchman I talked to knew better than that. “What will happen to +Germany,” I asked, “if we are able to do so to her and so; would she +take to dreams of a _Revanche?_” + +“She will take to Anglomania,” he said, and added after a flash of +reflection, “In the long run it will be the worse for you.” + + + + +III. THE RELIGIOUS REVIVAL + + +1 + +One of the indisputable things about the war, so far as Britain and +France go--and I have reason to believe that on a lesser scale things +are similar in Italy--is that it has produced a very great volume of +religious thought and feeling. About Russia in these matters we hear +but little at the present time, but one guesses at parallelism. People +habitually religious have been stirred to new depths of reality and +sincerity, and people are thinking of religion who never thought of +religion before. But as I have already pointed out, thinking and feeling +about a matter is of no permanent value unless something is _thought +out_, unless there is a change of boundary or relationship, and it an +altogether different question to ask whether any definite change is +resulting from this universal ferment. If it is not doing so, then the +sleeper merely dreams a dream that he will forget again.... + +Now in no sort of general popular mental activity is there so much froth +and waste as in religious excitements. This has been the case in all +periods of religious revival. The number who are rather impressed, who +for a few days or weeks take to reading their Bibles or going to a new +place of worship or praying or fasting or being kind and unselfish, is +always enormous in relation to the people whose lives are permanently +changed. The effort needed if a contemporary is to blow off the froth, +is always very considerable. + +Among the froth that I would blow off is I think most of the tremendous +efforts being made in England by the Anglican church to attract +favourable attention to itself _apropos_ of the war. I came back from +my visit to the Somme battlefields to find the sylvan peace of Essex +invaded by a number of ladies in blue dresses adorned with large +white crosses, who, regardless of the present shortage of nurses, were +visiting every home in the place on some mission of invitation whose +details remained obscure. So far as I was able to elucidate this +project, it was in the nature of a magic incantation; a satisfactory end +of the war was to be brought about by convergent prayer and religious +assiduities. The mission was shy of dealing with me personally, although +as a lapsed communicant I should have thought myself a particularly +hopeful field for Anglican effort, and it came to my wife and myself +merely for our permission and countenance in an appeal to our domestic +servants. My wife consulted the household; it seemed very anxious to +escape from that appeal, and as I respect Christianity sufficiently +to detest the identification of its services with magic processes, the +mission retired--civilly repulsed. But the incident aroused an uneasy +curiosity in my mind with regard to the general trend of Anglican +teaching and Anglican activities at the present time. The trend of my +enquiries is to discover the church much more incoherent and much less +religious--in any decent sense of the word--than I had supposed it to +be. + +Organisation is the life of material and the death of mental and +spiritual processes. There could be no more melancholy exemplification +of this than the spectacle of the Anglican and Catholic churches at the +present time, one using the tragic stresses of war mainly for pew-rent +touting, and the other paralysed by its Austrian and South German +political connections from any clear utterance upon the moral issues of +the war. Through the opening phases of the war the Established Church +of England was inconspicuous; this is no longer the case, but it may be +doubted whether the change is altogether to its advantage. To me this +is a very great disappointment. I have always had a very high opinion of +the intellectual values of the leading divines of both the Anglican and +Catholic communions. The self-styled Intelligentsia of Great Britain +is all too prone to sneer at their equipment; but I do not see how +any impartial person can deny that Father Bernard Vaughn is in mental +energy, vigour of expression, richness of thought and variety of +information fully the equal of such an influential lay publicist as +Mr. Horatio Bottomley. One might search for a long time among prominent +laymen to find the equal of the Bishop of London. Nevertheless it is +impossible to conceal the impression of tawdriness that this latter +gentleman's work as head of the National Mission has left upon my mind. +Attired in khaki he has recently been preaching in the open air to the +people of London upon Tower Hill, Piccadilly, and other conspicuous +places. Obsessed as I am by the humanities, and impressed as I have +always been by the inferiority of material to moral facts, I would +willingly have exchanged the sight of two burning Zeppelins for this +spectacle of ecclesiastical fervour. But as it is, I am obliged to trust +to newspaper reports and the descriptions of hearers and eye-witnesses. +They leave to me but little doubt of the regrettable superficiality of +the bishop's utterances. + +We have a multitude of people chastened by losses, ennobled by a common +effort, needing support in that effort, perplexed by the reality of evil +and cruelty, questioning and seeking after God. What does the National +Mission offer? On Tower Hill the bishop seems to have been chiefly busy +with a wrangling demonstration that ten thousand a year is none too +big a salary for a man subject to such demands and expenses as his +see involves. So far from making anything out of his see he was, he +declared, two thousand a year to the bad. Some day, when the church +has studied efficiency, I suppose that bishops will have the leisure +to learn something about the general state of opinion and education in +their dioceses. The Bishop of London was evidently unaware of the almost +automatic response of the sharp socialists among his hearers. Their +first enquiry would be to learn how he came by that mysterious extra two +thousand a year with which he supplemented his stipend. How did he earn +_that?_ And if he didn't earn it---! And secondly, they would probably +have pointed out to him that his standard of housing, clothing, diet and +entertaining was probably a little higher than theirs. It is really no +proof of virtuous purity that a man's expenditure exceeds his income. +And finally some other of his hearers were left unsatisfied by his +silence with regard to the current proposal to pool all clerical +stipends for the common purposes of the church. It is a reasonable +proposal, and if bishops must dispute about stipends instead of +preaching the kingdom of God, then they are bound to face it. The sooner +they do so, the more graceful will the act be. From these personal +apologetics the bishop took up the question of the exemption, at the +request of the bishops, of the clergy from military service. It is +one of our contrasts with French conditions--and it is all to the +disadvantage of the British churches. + +In his Piccadilly contribution to the National Mission of Repentance and +Hope the bishop did not talk politics but sex. He gave his hearers the +sort of stuff that is handed out so freely by the Cinema Theatres, White +Slave Traffic talk, denunciations of “Night Hawks”--whatever “Night +Hawks” may be--and so on. One this or another occasion the bishop--he +boasts that he himself is a healthy bachelor--lavished his eloquence +upon the Fall in the Birth Rate, and the duty of all married people, +from paupers upward, to have children persistently. Now sex, like diet, +is a department of conduct and a very important department, but _it +isn't religion!_ The world is distressed by international disorder, by +the monstrous tragedy of war; these little hot talks about indulgence +and begetting have about as much to do with the vast issues that concern +us as, let us say, a discussion of the wickedness of eating very new and +indigestible bread. It is talking round and about the essential issue. +It is fogging the essential issue, which is the forgotten and neglected +kingship of God. The sin that is stirring the souls of men is the sin of +this war. It is the sin of national egotism and the devotion of men to +loyalties, ambitions, sects, churches, feuds, aggressions, and divisions +that are an outrage upon God's universal kingdom. + + +2 + +The common clergy of France, sharing the military obligations and the +food and privations of their fellow parishioners, contrast very vividly +with the home-staying types of the ministries of the various British +churches. I met and talked to several. Near Frise there were some barge +gunboats--they have since taken their place in the fighting, but then +they were a surprise--and the men had been very anxious to have their +craft visited and seen. The priest who came after our party to see if +he could still arrange that, had been decorated for gallantry. Of course +the English too have their gallant chaplains, but they are men of the +officer caste, they are just young officers with peculiar collars; not +men among men, as are the French priests. + +There can be no doubt that the behaviour of the French priests in this +war has enormously diminished anti-clerical bitterness in France. There +can be no doubt that France is far more a religious country than it +was before the war. But if you ask whether that means any return to the +church, any reinstatement of the church, the answer is a doubtful +one. Religion and the simple priest are stronger in France to-day; the +church, I think, is weaker. + +I trench on no theological discussion when I record the unfavourable +impression made upon all western Europe by the failure of the Holy +Father to pronounce definitely upon the rights and wrongs of the war. +The church has abrogated its right of moral judgement. Such at least +seemed to be the opinion of the Frenchmen with whom I discussed a +remarkable interview with Cardinal Gasparri that I found one morning in +_Le Journal._ + +It was not the sort of interview to win the hearts of men who were ready +to give their lives to set right what they believe to be the greatest +outrage that has ever been inflicted upon Christendom, that is to +say the forty-three years of military preparation and of diplomacy by +threats that culminated in the ultimatum to Serbia, the invasion of +Belgium and the murder of the Vise villagers. It was adorned with a +large portrait of “Benoit XV.,” looking grave and discouraging over his +spectacles, and the headlines insisted it was “_La Pensee du Pape._” + Cross-heads sufficiently indicated the general tone. One read: + +_“Le Saint Siege impartial... Au-dessus de la bataille....”_ The good +Cardinal would have made a good lawyer. He had as little to say about +God and the general righteousness of things as the Bishop of London. But +he got in some smug reminders of the severance of diplomatic relations +with the Vatican. Perhaps now France will be wiser. He pointed out +that the Holy See in its Consistorial Allocution of January 22nd, 1915, +invited the belligerents to observe the rules of war. Could anything +more be done than that? Oh!--in the general issue of the war, if you +want a judgement on the war as a whole, how is it possible that the +Vatican to decide? Surely the French know that excellent principle of +justice, _Audiatur et altera pars_, and how under existing circumstances +can the Vatican do that...? The Vatican is cut off from communication +with Austria and Germany. The Vatican has been deprived of its temporal +power and local independence (another neat point).... + +So France is bowed out. When peace is restored, the Vatican will perhaps +be able to enquire if there was a big German army in 1914, if German +diplomacy was aggressive from 1875 onward, if Belgium was invaded +unrighteously, if (Catholic) Austria forced the pace upon (non-Catholic) +Russia. But now--now the Holy See must remain as impartial as an +unbought mascot in a shop window.... + +The next column of _Le Journal_ contained an account of the Armenian +massacres; the blood of the Armenian cries out past the Holy Father to +heaven; but then Armenians are after all heretics, and here again the +principle of _Audiatur et altera pars_ comes in. Communications are not +open with the Turks. Moreover, Armenians, like Serbs, are worse than +infidels; they are heretics. Perhaps God is punishing them.... + +_Audiatur et altera pars_, and the Vatican has not forgotten the +infidelity and disrespect of both France and Italy in the past. These +are the things, it seems, that really matter to the Vatican. Cardinal +Gasparri's portrait, in the same issue of _Le Journal_, displays a +countenance of serene contentment, a sort of incarnate “Told-you-so.” + +So the Vatican lifts its pontifical skirts and shakes the dust of +western Europe off its feet. + +It is the most astounding renunciation in history. + +Indubitably the Christian church took a wide stride from the kingship of +God when it placed a golden throne for the unbaptised Constantine in +the midst of its most sacred deliberations at Nicaea. But it seems to +me that this abandonment of moral judgements in the present case by the +Holy See is an almost wider step from the church's allegiance to God.... + + +3 + +Thought about the great questions of life, thought and reasoned +direction, this is what the multitude demands mutely and weakly, and +what the organised churches are failing to give. They have not the +courage of their creeds. Either their creeds are intellectual flummery +or they are the solution to the riddles with which the world is +struggling. But the churches make no mention of their creeds. They +chatter about sex and the magic effect of church attendance and simple +faith. If simple faith is enough, the churches and their differences are +an imposture. Men are stirred to the deepest questions about life and +God, and the Anglican church, for example, obliges--as I have described. + +It is necessary to struggle against the unfavourable impression made by +these things. They must not blind us to the deeper movement that is in +progress in a quite considerable number of minds in England and France +alike towards the realisation of the kingdom of God. + +What I conceive to be the reality of the religious revival is to be +found in quarters remote from the religious professionals. Let me give +but one instance of several that occur to me. I met soon after my return +from France a man who has stirred my curiosity for years, Mr. David +Lubin, the prime mover in the organisation of the International +Institute of Agriculture in Rome. It is a movement that has always +appealed to my imagination. The idea is to establish and keep up to date +a record of the food supplies in the world with a view to the ultimate +world control of food supply and distribution. When its machinery has +developed sufficiently to a control in the interests of civilisation of +many other staples besides foodstuffs. It is in fact the suggestion and +beginning of the economic world peace and the economic world state, just +as the Hague Tribunal is the first faint sketch of a legal world state. +The King of Italy has met Mr. Lubin's idea with open hands. (It was +because of this profoundly interesting experiment that in a not very +widely known book of mine, _The World Set Free_ (May, 1914), in which I +represented a world state as arising out of Armageddon, I made the +first world conference meet at Brissago in Italian Switzerland under the +presidency of the King of Italy.) So that when I found I could meet Mr. +Lubin I did so very gladly. We lunched together in a pretty little room +high over Knightsbridge, and talked through an afternoon. + +He is a man rather after the type of Gladstone; he could be made to look +like Gladstone in a caricature, and he has that compelling quality of +intense intellectual excitement which was one of the great factors in +the personal effectiveness of Gladstone. He is a Jew, but until I had +talked to him for some time that fact did not occur to me. He is in very +ill health, he has some weakness of the heart that grips him and holds +him at times white and silent. + +At first we talked of his Institute and its work. Then we came to +shipping and transport. Whenever one talks now of human affairs one +comes presently to shipping and transport generally. In Paris, in Italy, +when I returned to England, everywhere I found “cost of carriage” + was being discovered to be a question of fundamental importance. Yet +transport, railroads and shipping, these vitally important services in +the world's affairs, are nearly everywhere in private hands and run +for profit. In the case of shipping they are run for profit on such +antiquated lines that freights vary from day to day and from hour to +hour. It makes the business of food supply a gamble. And it need not be +a gamble. + +But that is by the way in the present discussion. As we talked, the +prospect broadened out from a prospect of the growing and distribution +of food to a general view of the world becoming one economic community. + +I talked of various people I had been meeting in the previous few weeks. +“So many of us,” I said, “seem to be drifting away from the ideas of +nationalism and faction and policy, towards something else which is +larger. It is an idea of a right way of doing things for human purposes, +independently of these limited and localised references. Take such +things as international hygiene for example, take _this_ movement. We +are feeling our way towards a bigger rule.” + +“The rule of Righteousness,” said Mr. Lubin. + +I told him that I had been coming more and more to the idea--not as a +sentimentality or a metaphor, but as the ruling and directing idea, the +structural idea, of all one's political and social activities--of the +whole world as one state and community and of God as the King of that +state. + +“But _I_ say that,” cried Mr. Lubin, “I have put my name to that. +And--it is _here!_” + +He struggled up, seized an Old Testament that lay upon a side table. +He stood over it and rapped its cover. “It is _here_,” he said, looking +more like Gladstone than ever, “in the Prophets.” + + +4 + +That is all I mean to tell at present of that conversation. + +We talked of religion for two hours. Mr. Lubin sees things in terms of +Israel and I do not. For all that we see things very much after the same +fashion. That talk was only one of a number of talks about religion +that I have had with hard and practical men who want to get the world +straighter than it is, and who perceive that they must have a leadership +and reference outside themselves. That is why I assert so confidently +that there is a real deep religious movement afoot in the world. But +not one of those conversations could have gone on, it would have ceased +instantly, if anyone bearing the uniform and brand of any organised +religious body, any clergyman, priest, mollah, of suchlike advocate of +the ten thousand patented religions in the world, had come in. He would +have brought in his sectarian spites, his propaganda of church-going, +his persecution of the heretic and the illegitimate, his ecclesiastical +politics, his taboos, and his doctrinal touchiness.... That is why, +though I perceive there is a great wave of religious revival in the +world to-day, I doubt whether it bodes well for the professional +religions.... + +The other day I was talking to an eminent Anglican among various other +people and someone with an eye to him propounded this remarkable view. + +“There are four stages between belief and utter unbelief. There are +those who believe in God, those who doubt like Huxley the Agnostic, +those who deny him like the Atheists but who do at least keep his place +vacant, and lastly those who have set up a Church in his place. That is +the last outrage of unbelief.” + + + + +IV. THE RIDDLE OF THE BRITISH + + +All the French people I met in France seemed to be thinking and talking +about the English. The English bring their own atmosphere with them; +to begin with they are not so talkative, and I did not find among +them anything like the same vigour of examination, the same resolve to +understand the Anglo-French reaction, that I found among the French. +In intellectual processes I will confess that my sympathies are +undisguisedly with the French; the English will never think nor talk +clearly until the get clerical “Greek” and sham “humanities” out of +their public schools and sincere study and genuine humanities in; our +disingenuous Anglican compromise is like a cold in the English head, +and the higher education in England is a training in evasion. This is +an always lamentable state of affairs, but just now it is particularly +lamentable because quite tremendous opportunities for the good of +mankind turn on the possibility of a thorough and entirely frank mutual +understanding between French, Italians, and English. For years there +has been a considerable amount of systematic study in France of English +thought and English developments. Upon almost any question of current +English opinion and upon most current English social questions, the +best studies are in French. But there has been little or no reciprocal +activity. The English in France seem to confine their French studies to +_La Vie Parisienne._ It is what they have been led to expect of French +literature. + +There can be no doubt in any reasonable mind that this war is binding +France and England very closely together. They dare not quarrel for the +next fifty years. They are bound to play a central part in the World +League for the Preservation of Peace that must follow this struggle. +There is no question of their practical union. It is a thing that must +be. But it is remarkable that while the French mind is agog to apprehend +every fact and detail it can about the British, to make the wisest +and fullest use of our binding necessities, that strange English +“incuria”--to use the new slang--attains to its most monumental in this +matter. + +So there is not much to say about how the British think about the +French. They do not think. They feel. At the outbreak of the war, when +the performance of France seemed doubtful, there was an enormous feeling +for France in Great Britain; it was like the formless feeling one has +for a brother. It was as if Britain had discovered a new instinct. If +France had crumpled up like paper, the English would have fought on +passionately to restore her. That is ancient history now. Now the +English still feel fraternal and fraternally proud; but in a mute way +they are dazzled. Since the German attack on Verdun began, the French +have achieved a crescendo. None of us could have imagined it. It did not +seem possible to very many of us at the end of 1915 that either France +or Germany could hold on for another year. There was much secret +anxiety for France. It has given place now to unstinted confidence and +admiration. In their astonishment the British are apt to forget the +impressive magnitude of their own effort, the millions of soldiers, the +innumerable guns, the endless torrent of supplies that pour into France +to avenge the little army of Mons. It seems natural to us that we should +so exert ourselves under the circumstances. I suppose it is wonderful, +but, as a sample Englishman, I do not feel that it is at all wonderful. +I did not feel it wonderful even when I saw the British aeroplanes +lording it in the air over Martinpuich, and not a German to be seen. +Since Michael would have it so, there, at last, they were. + +There was a good deal of doubt in France about the vigour of the British +effort, until the Somme offensive. All that had been dispelled in August +when I reached Paris. There was not the shadow of a doubt remaining +anywhere of the power and loyalty of the British. These preliminary +assurances have to be made, because it is in the nature of the French +mind to criticise, and it must not be supposed that criticisms of detail +and method affect the fraternity and complete mutual confidence which is +the stuff of the Anglo-French relationship. + + +2 + +Now first the French have been enormously astonished by the quality of +the ordinary British soldiers in our new armies. One Colonial colonel +said something almost incredible to me--almost incredible as coming +as from a Frenchman; it was a matter to solemn for any compliments or +polite exaggerations; he said in tones of wonder and conviction, “_They +are as good as ours._” It was his acme of all possible praise. + +That means any sort of British soldier. Unless he is assisted by a kilt +the ordinary Frenchman is unable to distinguish between one sort of +British soldier and another. He cannot tell--let the ardent nationalist +mark the fact!--a Cockney from an Irishman or the Cardiff from the Essex +note. He finds them all extravagantly and unquenchably cheerful and with +a generosity--“like good children.” There his praise is a little tinged +by doubt. The British are reckless--recklessness in battle a Frenchman +can understand, but they are also reckless about to-morrow's bread and +whether the tent is safe against a hurricane in the night. He is struck +too by the fact that they are much more vocal than the French troops, +and that they seem to have a passion for bad lugubrious songs. There he +smiles and shrugs his shoulders, and indeed what else can any of us +do in the presence of that mystery? At any rate the legend of the +“phlegmatic” Englishman has been scattered to the four winds of heaven +by the guns of the western front. The men are cool in action, it is +true; but for the rest they are, by the French standards, quicksilver. + +But I will not expand further upon the general impression made by the +English in France. Philippe Millet's _En Liaison avec les Anglais_ gives +in a series of delightful pictures portraits of British types from the +French angle. There can be little doubt that the British quality, genial +naive, plucky and generous, has won for itself a real affection in +France wherever it has had a chance to display itself.... + +But when it comes to British methods then the polite Frenchman's +difficulties begin. Translating hints into statements and guessing at +reservations, I would say that the French fall very short of admiration +of the way in which our higher officers set about their work, they +are disagreeably impressed by a general want of sedulousness and close +method in our leading. They think we economise brains and waste +blood. They are shocked at the way in which obviously incompetent or +inefficient men of the old army class are retained in their positions +even after serious failures, and they were profoundly moved by the bad +staff work and needlessly heavy losses of our opening attacks in July. +They were ready to condone the blunderings and flounderings of the 1915 +offensive as the necessary penalties of an “amateur” army, they had had +to learn their own lesson in Champagne, but they were surprised to +find how much the British had still to learn in July, 1916. The British +officers excuse themselves because, they plead, they are still +amateurs. “That is no reason,” says the Frenchman, “why they should be +amateurish.” + +No Frenchman said as much as this to me, but their meaning was as plain +as daylight. I tackled one of my guides on this matter; I said that it +was the plain duty of the French military people to criticise British +military methods sharply if they thought they were wrong. “It is not +easy,” he said. “Many British officers do not think they have anything +to learn. And English people do not like being told things. What could +we do? We could hardly send a French officer or so to your headquarters +in a tutorial capacity. You have to do things in your own way.” When +I tried to draw General Castelnau into this dangerous question by +suggesting that we might borrow a French general or so, he would say +only, “There is only one way to learn war, and that is to make war.” + When it was too late, in the lift, I thought of the answer to that. +There is only one way to make war, and that is by the sacrifice of +incapables and the rapid promotion of able men. If old and tried types +fail now, new types must be sought. But to do that we want a standard of +efficiency. We want a conception of intellectual quality in performance +that is still lacking.... + +M. Joseph Reinach, in whose company I visited the French part of the +Somme front, was full of a scheme, which he has since published, for the +breaking up and recomposition of the French and British armies into a +series of composite armies which would blend the magnificent British +manhood and material with French science and military experience. He +pointed out the endless advantages of such an arrangement; the stimulus +of emulation, the promotion of intimate fraternal feeling between the +peoples of the two countries. “At present,” he said, “no Frenchman ever +sees an Englishman except at Amiens or on the Somme. Many of them still +have no idea of what the English are doing....” + +“Have I ever told you the story of compulsory Greek at Oxford and +Cambridge?” I asked abruptly. + +“What has that to do with it?” + +“Or how two undistinguished civil service commissioners can hold up the +scientific education of our entire administrative class?” + +M. Reinach protested further. + +“Because you are proposing to loosen the grip of a certain narrow and +limited class upon British affairs, and you propose it as though it were +a job as easy as rearranging railway fares or sending a van to Calais. +That is the problem that every decent Englishman is trying to solve +to-day, every man of that Greater Britain which has supplied these five +million volunteers, these magnificent temporary officers and all this +wealth of munitions. And the oligarchy is so invincibly fortified! Do +you think it will let in Frenchmen to share its controls? It will +not even let in Englishmen. It holds the class schools; the class +universities; the examinations for our public services are its class +shibboleths; it is the church, the squirearchy, the permanent army +class, permanent officialdom; it makes every appointment, it is the +fountain of honour; what it does not know is not knowledge, what it +cannot do must not be done. It rules India ignorantly and obstructively; +it will wreck the empire rather than relinquish its ascendancy in +Ireland. It is densely self-satisfied and instinctively monopolistic. It +is on our backs, and with it on our backs we common English must bleed +and blunder to victory.... And you make this proposal!” + + +3 + +The antagonistic relations of the Anglican oligarchy with the greater +and greater-spirited Britain that thrust behind it in this war +are probably paralleled very closely in Germany, probably they are +exaggerated in Germany with a bigger military oligarchy and a relatively +lesser civil body under it. This antagonism is the oddest outcome of the +tremendous _de-militarisation_ of war that has been going on. In France +it is probably not so marked because of the greater flexibility and +adaptability of the French culture. + +All military people--people, that is, professionally and primarily +military--are inclined to be conservative. For thousands of years the +military tradition has been a tradition of discipline. The conception of +the common soldier has been a mechanically obedient, almost dehumanised +man, of the of officer a highly trained autocrat. In two years all this +has been absolutely reversed. Individual quality, inventive organisation +and industrialism will win this war. And no class is so innocent of +these things as the military caste. Long accustomed as they are to the +importance of moral effect they put a brave face upon the business; +they save their faces astonishingly, but they are no longer guiding and +directing this war, they are being pushed from behind by forces they +never foresaw and cannot control. The aeroplanes and great guns have +bolted with them, the tanks begotten of naval and civilian wits, shove +them to victory in spite of themselves. + +Wherever I went behind the British lines the officers were going about +in spurs. These spurs at last got on my nerves. They became symbolical. +They became as grave an insult to the tragedy of the war as if they were +false noses. The British officers go for long automobile rides in spurs. +They walk about the trenches in spurs. Occasionally I would see a horse; +I do not wish to be unfair in this matter, there were riding horses +sometimes within two or three miles of the ultimate front, but they were +rarely used. + +I do not say that the horse is entirely obsolescent in this war. In +was nothing is obsolete. In the trenches men fight with sticks. In the +Pasubio battle the other day one of the Alpini silenced a machine gun +by throwing stones. In the West African campaign we have employed troops +armed with bows and arrows, and they have done very valuable work. But +these are exceptional cases. The military use of the horse henceforth +will be such an exceptional case. It is ridiculous for these spurs still +to clink about the modern battlefield. What the gross cost of the spurs +and horses and trappings of the British army amount to, and how many men +are grooming and tending horses who might just as well be ploughing +and milking at home, I cannot guess; it must be a total so enormous as +seriously to affect the balance of the war. + +And these spurs and their retention are only the outward and visible +symbol of the obstinate resistance of the Anglican intelligence to +the clear logic of the present situation. It is not only the external +equipment of our leaders that falls behind the times; our political +and administrative services are in the hands of the same desolatingly +inadaptable class. The British are still wearing spurs in Ireland; they +are wearing them in India; and the age of the spur has passed. At the +outset of this war there was an absolute cessation of criticism of the +military and administrative castes; it is becoming a question whether +we may not pay too heavily in blundering and waste, in military and +economic lassitude, in international irritation and the accumulation of +future dangers in Ireland, Egypt, India, and elsewhere, for an apparent +absence of internal friction. These people have no gratitude for tacit +help, no spirit of intelligent service, and no sense of fair play to the +outsider. The latter deficiency indeed they call _esprit de corps_ and +prize it as if it were a noble quality. + +It becomes more and more imperative that the foreign observer should +distinguish between this narrower, older official Britain and +the greater newer Britain that struggles to free itself from the +entanglement of a system outgrown. There are many Englishmen who would +like to say to the French and Irish and the Italians and India, who +indeed feel every week now a more urgent need of saying, “Have patience +with us.” The Riddle of the British is very largely solved if you will +think of a great modern liberal nation seeking to slough an exceedingly +tough and tight skin.... + +Nothing is more illuminating and self-educational than to explain one's +home politics to an intelligent foreigner enquirer; it strips off all +the secondary considerations, the allusiveness, the merely tactical +considerations, the allusiveness, the merely tactical considerations. +One sees the forest not as a confusion of trees but as something with +a definite shape and place. I was asked in Italy and in France, “Where +does Lord Northcliffe come into the British system--or Lloyd George? +Who is Mr. Redmond? Why is Lloyd George a Minister, and why does not +Mr. Redmond take office? Isn't there something called an ordnance +department, and why is there a separate ministry of munitions? Can Mr. +Lloyd George remove an incapable general?...” + +I found it M. Joseph Reinach particularly penetrating and persistent. +It is an amusing but rather difficult exercise to recall what I tried +to convey to him by way of a theory of Britain. He is by no means an +uncritical listener. I explained that there is an “inner Britain,” + official Britain, which is Anglican or official Presbyterian, which at +the outside in the whole world cannot claim to speak for twenty million +Anglican or Presbyterian communicants, which monopolises official +positions, administration and honours in the entire British empire, +dominates the court, and, typically, is spurred and red-tabbed. (It was +just at this time that the spurs were most on my nerves.) + +This inner Britain, I went on to explain, holds tenaciously to its +positions of advantage, from which it is difficult to dislodge it +without upsetting the whole empire, and it insists upon treating +the rest of the four hundred millions who constitute that empire as +outsiders, foreigners, subject races and suspected persons. + +“To you,” I said, “it bears itself with an appearance of faintly +hostile, faintly contemptuous apathy. It is still so entirely insular +that it shudders at the thought of the Channel Tunnel. This is the +Britain which irritates and puzzles you so intensely--that you are quite +unable to conceal these feelings from me. Unhappily it is the Britain +you see most of. Well, outside this official Britain is 'Greater +Britain'--the real Britain with which you have to reckon in the +future.” (From this point a faint flavour of mysticism crept into +my dissertation. I found myself talking with something in my voice +curiously reminiscent of those liberal Russians who set themselves to +explain the contrasts and contradictions of “official” Russia and “true” + Russia.) “This Greater Britain,” I asserted, “is in a perpetual conflict +with official Britain, struggling to keep it up to its work, shoving it +towards its ends, endeavouring in spite of its tenacious mischievousness +of the privileged to keep the peace and a common aim with the French and +Irish and Italians and Russians and Indians. It is to that outer Britain +that those Englishmen you found so interesting and sympathetic, Lloyd +George and Lord Northcliffe, for example, belong. It is the Britain of +the great effort, the Britain of the smoking factories and the torrent +of munitions, the Britain of the men and subalterns of the new armies, +the Britain which invents and thinks and achieves, and stands now +between German imperialism and the empire of the world. I do not want to +exaggerate the quality of greater Britain. If the inner set are narrowly +educated, the outer set if often crudely educated. If the inner set is +so close knit as to seem like a conspiracy, the outer set is so +loosely knit as to seem like a noisy confusion. Greater Britain is only +beginning to realise itself and find itself. For all its crudity there +is a giant spirit in it feeling its way towards the light. It has quite +other ambitions for the ending of the war than some haggled treaty of +alliance with France and Italy; some advantage that will invalidate +German competition; it begins to realise newer and wider sympathies, +possibilities of an amalgamation of interests and community of aim that +is utterly beyond the habits of the old oligarchy to conceive, beyond +the scope of that tawdry word 'Empire' to express....” + +I descended from my rhetoric to find M. Reinach asking how and when this +greater Britain was likely to become politically effective. + + + + +V. THE SOCIAL CHANGES IN PROGRESS + + +1 + +“Nothing will be the same after the war.” This is one of the consoling +platitudes with which people cover over voids of thought. They utter +it with an air of round-eyed profundity. But to ask in reply, “Then how +will things be different?” is in many cases to rouse great resentment. +It is almost as rude as saying, “Was that thought of yours really a +thought?” + +Let us in this chapter confine ourselves to the social-economic +processes that are going on. So far as I am able to distinguish among +the things that are being said in these matters, they may be classified +out into groups that centre upon several typical questions. There is +the question of “How to pay for the war?” There is the question of the +behaviour of labour after the war. “Will there be a Labour Truce or a +violent labour struggle?” There is the question of the reconstruction of +European industry after the war in the face of an America in a state +of monetary and economic repletion through non-intervention. My present +purpose in this chapter is a critical one; it is not to solve problems +but to set out various currents of thought that are flowing through +the general mind. Which current is likely to seize upon and carry human +affairs with it, is not for our present speculation. + +There seem to be two distinct ways of answering the first of the +questions I have noted. They do not necessarily contradict each other. +Of course the war is being largely paid for immediately out of the +accumulated private wealth of the past. We are buying off the “hold-up” + of the private owner upon the material and resources we need, and paying +in paper money and war loans. This is not in itself an impoverishment of +the community. The wealth of individuals is not the wealth of nations; +the two things may easily be contradictory when the rich man's wealth +consists of land or natural resources or franchises or privileges the +use of which he reluctantly yields for high prices. The conversion of +held-up land and material into workable and actively used material in +exchange for national debt may be indeed a positive increase in the +wealth of the community. And what is happening in all the belligerent +countries is the taking over of more and more of the realities of wealth +from private hands and, in exchange, the contracting of great masses of +debt to private people. The nett tendency is towards the disappearance +of a reality holding class and the destruction of realities in warfare, +and the appearance of a vast _rentier_ class in its place. At the end +of the war much material will be destroyed for evermore, transit, food +production and industry will be everywhere enormously socialised, and +the country will be liable to pay every year in interest, a sum of money +exceeding the entire national expenditure before the war. From the point +of view of the state, and disregarding material and moral damages, that +annual interest is the annual instalment of the price to be paid for the +war. + +Now the interesting question arises whether these great belligerent +states may go bankrupt, and if so to what extent. States may go bankrupt +to the private creditor without repudiating their debts or seeming to +pay less to him. They can go bankrupt either by a depreciation of their +currency or--without touching the gold standard--through a rise in +prices. In the end both these things work out to the same end; the +creditor gets so many loaves or pairs of boots or workman's hours of +labour for his pound _less_ than he would have got under the previous +conditions. One may imagine this process of price (and of course wages) +increase going on to a limitless extent. Many people are inclined to +look to such an increase in prices as a certain outcome of the war, and +just so far as it goes, just so far will the burthen of the _rentier_ +class, their call, tat is, for goods and services, be lightened. This +expectation is very generally entertained, and I can see little reason +against it. The intensely stupid or dishonest “labour” press, however, +which in the interests of the common enemy misrepresents socialism and +seeks to misguide labour in Great Britain, ignores these considerations, +and positively holds out this prospect of rising prices as an alarming +one to the more credulous and ignorant of its readers. + +But now comes the second way of meeting the after-the-war obligations. +This second way is by increasing the wealth of the state and by +increasing the national production to such an extent that the payment of +the _rentier_ class will not be an overwhelming burthen. Rising prices +bilk the creditor. Increased production will check the rise in prices +and get him a real payment. The outlook for the national creditor seems +to be that he will be partly bilked and partly paid; how far he will be +bilked and how far depends almost entirely upon this possible increase +in production; and there is consequently a very keen and quite +unprecedented desire very widely diffused among intelligent and active +people, holding War Loan scrip and the like, in all the belligerent +countries, to see bold and hopeful schemes for state enrichment pushed +forward. The movement towards socialism is receiving an impulse from a +new and unexpected quarter, there is now a _rentier_ socialism, and it +is interesting to note that while the London _Times_ is full of schemes +of great state enterprises, for the exploitation of Colonial state +lands, for the state purchase and wholesaling of food and many natural +products, and for the syndication of shipping and the great staple +industries into vast trusts into which not only the British but the +French and Italian governments may enter as partners, the so-called +socialist press of Great Britain is chiefly busy about the draughts in +the cell of Mr. Fenner Brockway and the refusal of Private Scott +Duckers to put on his khaki trousers. _The New Statesman_ and the Fabian +Society, however, display a wider intelligence. + +There is a great variety of suggestions for this increase of public +wealth and production. Many of them have an extreme reasonableness. The +extent to which they will be adopted depends, no doubt, very largely +upon the politician and permanent official, and both these classes are +prone to panic in the presence of reality. In spite of its own interests +in restraining a rise in prices, the old official “salariat” is likely +to be obstructive to any such innovations. It is the resistance of spurs +and red tabs to military innovations over again. This is the resistance +of quills and red tape. On the other hand the organisation of Britain +for war has “officialised” a number of industrial leaders, and created +a large body of temporary and adventurous officials. They may want +to carry on into peace production the great new factories the war has +created. At the end of the war, for example, every belligerent country +will be in urgent need of cheap automobiles for farmers, tradesmen, and +industrial purposes generally, America is now producing such automobiles +at a price of eighty pounds. But Europe will be heavily in debt to +America, her industries will be disorganised, and there will therefore +be no sort of return payment possible for these hundreds of thousands of +automobiles. A country that is neither creditor nor producer cannot be +an importer. Consequently though those cheap tin cars may be stacked +as high as the Washington Monument in America, they will never come to +Europe. On the other hand the great shell factories of Europe will be +standing idle and ready, their staffs disciplined and available, for +conversion to the new task. The imperative common sense of the position +seems to be that the European governments should set themselves straight +away to out-Ford Ford, and provide their own people with cheap road +transport. + +But here comes in the question whether this common-sense course is +inevitable. Suppose the mental energy left in Europe after the war is +insufficient for such a constructive feat as this. There will certainly +be the obstruction of official pedantry, the hold-up of this vested +interest and that, the greedy desire of “private enterprise” to exploit +the occasion upon rather more costly and less productive lines, the +general distrust felt by ignorant and unimaginative people of a new way +of doing things. The process after all may not get done in the obviously +wise way. This will not mean that Europe will buy American cars. It will +be quite unable to buy American cars. It will be unable to make anything +that America will not be able to make more cheaply for itself. But it +will mean that Europe will go on without cheap cars, that is to say +it will go on a more sluggishly and clumsily and wastefully at a lower +economic level. Hampered transport means hampered production of other +things, and in increasing inability to buy abroad. And so we go down and +down. + +It does not follow that because a course is the manifestly right and +advantageous course for the community that it will be taken. I am +reminded of this by a special basket in my study here, into which I +pitch letters, circulars, pamphlets and so forth as they come to hand +from a gentleman named Gattie, and his friends Mr. Adrian Ross, Mr. Roy +Horniman, Mr. Henry Murray and others. His particular project is the +construction of a Railway Clearing House for London. It is an absolutely +admirable scheme. It would cut down the heavy traffic in the streets of +London to about one-third; it would enable us to run the goods traffic +of England with less than half the number of railway trucks we now +employ; it would turn over enormous areas of valuable land from their +present use as railway goods yards and sidings; it would save time +in the transit of goods and labour in their handling. It is a quite +beautifully worked out scheme. For the last eight or ten years this +group of devoted fanatics has been pressing this undertaking upon an +indifferent country with increasing vehemence and astonishment at that +indifference. The point is that its adoption, though it would be of +general benefit, would be of no particular benefit to any leading man +or highly placed official. On the other hand it would upset all sorts +of individuals who are in a position to obstruct it quietly--and they +do so. Meaning no evil. I dip my hand in the accumulation and extract +a leaflet by the all too zealous Mr. Murray. In it he denounces various +public officials by name as he cheats and scoundrels, and invites a +prosecution for libel. + +In that fashion nothing will ever get done. There is no prosecution, +but for all that I do not agree with Mr. Murray about the men he names. +These gentlemen are just comfortable gentlemen, own brothers to these +old generals of ours who will not take off their spurs. They are +probably quite charming people except that they know nothing of that +Fear of God which searches by heart. Why should they bother? + +So many of these after-the-war problems bring one back to the +question of how far the war has put the Fear of God into the hearts of +responsible men. There is really no other reason in existence that I +can imagine why they should ask themselves the question, “Have I done my +best?” and that still more important question, “Am I doing my best now?” + And so while I hear plenty of talk about the great reorganisations that +are to come after the war, while there is the stir of doubt among the +_rentiers_ whether, after all, they will get paid, while the unavoidable +stresses and sacrifices of the war are making many people question the +rightfulness of much that they did as a matter of course, and of much +that they took for granted, I perceive there is also something dull +and not very articulate in this European world, something resistant and +inert, that is like the obstinate rolling over of a heavy sleeper after +he has been called upon to get up. “Just a little longer.... Just for +_my_ time.” + +One thought alone seems to make these more intractable people anxious. +I thrust it in as my last stimulant when everything else has failed. +“There will be _frightful_ trouble with labour after the war,” I say. + +They try to persuade themselves that military discipline is breaking in +labour.... + + +2 + +What does British labour think of the outlook after the war? + +As a distinctive thing British labour does not think. “Class-conscious +labour,” as the Marxists put it, scarcely exists in Britain. The only +convincing case I ever met was a bath-chairman of literary habits +Eastbourne. The only people who are, as a class, class-conscious in +the British community are the Anglican gentry and their fringe of the +genteel. Everybody else is “respectable.” The mass of British workers +find their thinking in the ordinary halfpenny papers or in _John Bull._ +The so-called labour papers are perhaps less representative of British +Labour than any other section of the press; the _Labour Leader_, for +example, is the organ of such people as Bertrand Russell, Vernon Lee, +Morel, academic _rentiers_ who know about as much as of the labour side +of industrialism as they do of cock-fighting. All the British peoples +are racially willing and good-tempered people, quite ready to be led +by those they imagine to be abler than themselves. They make the most +cheerful and generous soldiers in the whole world, without insisting +upon that democratic respect which the Frenchman exacts. They do not +criticise and they do not trouble themselves much about the general plan +of operations, so long as they have confidence in the quality and good +will of their leading. But British soldiers will of their loading. But +British soldiers will hiss a general when they think he is selfish, +unfeeling, or a muff. And the socialist propaganda has imported ideas +of public service into private employment. Labour in Britain has been +growing increasingly impatient of bad or selfish industrial leadership. +Labour trouble in Great Britain turns wholly upon the idea crystallised +in the one word “profiteer.” Legislation and regulation of hours of +labour, high wages, nothing will keep labour quiet in Great Britain if +labour thinks it is being exploited for private gain. + +Labour feels very suspicious of private gain. For that suspicion a +certain rather common type of employer is mainly to blame. Labour +believes that employers is mainly to blame. Labour believes that +employers as a class cheat workmen as a class, plan to cheat them of +their full share in the common output, and drive hard bargains. It +believes that private employers are equally ready to sacrifice the +welfare of the nation and the welfare of the workers for mere personal +advantage. It has a traditional experience to support these suspicions. + +In no department of morals have ideas changed so completely during the +last eight years as in relation to “profits”. Eighty years ago everyone +believed in the divine right of property to do what it pleased its +advantages, a doctrine more disastrous socially than the divine right +of kings. There was no such sense of the immorality of “holding up” as +pervades the public conscience to-day. The worker was expected not only +to work, but to be grateful for employment. The property owner held his +property and handed it out for use and development or not, just as he +thought fit. These ideas are not altogether extinct today. Only a few +days ago I met a magnificent old lady of seventy nine or eighty, who +discoursed upon the wickedness of her gardener in demanding another +shilling a week because of war prices. + +She was a valiant and handsome personage. A face that had still a +healthy natural pinkness looked out from under blond curls, and an +elegant and carefully tended hand tossed back some fine old lace to +gesticulate more freely. She had previously charmed her hearers by +sweeping aside certain rumours that were drifting about. + +“Germans invade _Us!_” she cried. “Who'd _let_ 'em, I'd like to know? +Who'd _let_ 'em?” + +And then she reverted to her grievance about the gardener. + +“I told him that after the war he'd be glad enough to get anything. +Grateful! They'll all be coming back after the war--all of 'em, glad +enough to get anything. Asking for another shilling indeed!” + +Everyone who heard her looked shocked. But that was the tone of everyone +of importance in the dark years that followed the Napoleonic wars. +That is just one survivor of the old tradition. Another is Blight +the solicitor, who goes about bewailing the fact that we writers are +“holding out false hopes of higher agricultural wages after the war.” + But these are both exceptions. They are held to be remarkable people +even by their own class. The mass of property owners and influential +people in Europe to-day no more believe in the sacred right of property +to hold up development and dictate terms than do the more intelligent +workers. The ideas of collective ends and of the fiduciary nature of +property, had been soaking through the European community for years +before the war. The necessity for sudden and even violent co-operations +and submersions of individuality in a common purpose, is rapidly +crystallising out these ideas into clear proposals. + +War is an evil thing, but most people who will not learn from reason +must have an ugly teacher. This war has brought home to everyone the +supremacy of the public need over every sort of individual claim. + +One of the most remarkable things in the British war press is the amount +of space given to the discussion of labour developments after the war. +This in its completeness peculiar to the British situation. Nothing on +the same scale is perceptible in the press of the Latin allies. A great +movement on the part of capitalists and business organisers is manifest +to assure the worker of a change of heart and a will to change method. +Labour is suspicious, not foolishly but wisely suspicious. But labour is +considering it. + +“National industrial syndication,” say the business organisers. + +“Guild socialism,” say the workers. + +There is also a considerable amount of talking and writing about +“profit-sharing” and about giving the workers a share in the business +direction. Neither of these ideas appeals to the shrewder heads among +the workers. So far as direction goes their disposition is to ask +the captain to command the ship. So far as profits go, they think the +captain has no more right than the cabin boy to speculative gains; he +should do his work for his pay whether it is profitable or unprofitable +work. There is little balm for labour discontent in these schemes for +making the worker also an infinitesimal profiteer. + +During my journey in Italy and France I met several men who were keenly +interested in business organisation. Just before I started my friend N, +who has been the chief partner in the building up of a very big and very +extensively advertised American business, came to see me on his way back +to America. He is as interested in his work as a scientific specialist, +and as ready to talk about it to any intelligent and interested +hearer. He was particularly keen upon the question of continuity in the +business, when it behoves the older generation to let in the younger +to responsible management and to efface themselves. He was a man of +five-and-forty. Incidentally he mentioned that he had never taken +anything for his private life out of the great business he had built up +but a salary, “a good salary,” and that now he was gong to grant himself +a pension. “I shan't interfere any more. I shall come right away and +live in Europe for a year so as not to be tempted to interfere. The boys +have got to run it some day, and they had better get their experience +while they're young and capable of learning by it. I did.” + +I like N's ideas. “Practically,” I said, “you've been a public official. +You've treated your business like a public service.” + +That was his idea. + +“Would you mind if it was a public service?” + +He reflected, and some disagreeable memory darkened his face. “Under the +politicians?” he said. + +I took the train of thought N had set going abroad with me next day. I +had the good luck to meet men who were interesting industrially. Captain +Pirelli, my guide in Italy, has a name familiar to every motorist; his +name goes wherever cars go, spelt with a big long capital P. Lieutenant +de Tessin's name will recall one of the most interesting experiments +in profit-sharing to the student of social science. I tried over N's +problem on both of them. I found in both their minds just the same +attitude as he takes up towards his business. They think any businesses +that are worthy of respect, the sorts of businesses that interest them, +are public functions. Money-lenders and speculators, merchants and +gambling gentlefolk may think in terms of profit; capable business +directors certainly do nothing of the sort. + +I met a British officer in France who is also a landowner. I got him to +talk about his administrative work upon his property. He was very keen +upon new methods. He said he tried to do his duty by his land. + +“How much land?” I asked. + +“Just over nine thousand acres,” he said. + +“But you could manage forty or fifty thousand with little more trouble.” + +“If I had it. In some ways it would be easier.” + +“What a waste!” I said. “Of course you ought not to _own_ these acres; +what you ought to be is the agricultural controller of just as big an +estate of the public lands as you could manage--with a suitable salary.” + +He reflected upon that idea. He said he did not get much of a salary +out of his land as it was, and made a regrettable allusion to Mr. Lloyd +George. “When a man tries to do his duty by his land,” he said... + +But here running through the thoughts of the Englishman and the Italian +and the Frenchman and the American alike one finds just the same idea +of a kind of officialdom in ownership. It is an idea that pervades our +thought and public discussion to-day everywhere, and it is an idea that +is scarcely traceable at all in the thought of the early half of the +nineteenth century. The idea of service and responsibility in property +has increased and is increasing, the conception of “hold-up,” the +usurer's conception of his right to be bought out of the way, fades. +And the process has been enormously enhanced by the various big-scale +experiments in temporary socialism that have been forced upon the +belligerent powers. Men of the most individualistic quality are being +educated up to the possibilities of concerted collective action. My +friend and fellow-student Y, inventor and business organiser, who used +to make the best steam omnibuses in the world, and who is now making all +sorts of things for the army, would go pink with suspicious anger at the +mere words “inspector” or “socialism” three or four years ago. He does +not do so now. + +A great proportion of this sort of man, this energetic directive sort +of man in England, is thinking socialism to-day. They may not be saying +socialism, but they are thinking it. When labour begins to realise what +is adrift it will be divided between two things: between appreciative +co-operation, for which guild socialism in particular has prepared its +mind, and traditional suspicion. I will not over to guess here which +will prevail. + + +3 + +The impression I have of the present mental process in the European +communities is that while the official class and the _rentier_ class +is thinking very poorly and inadequately and with a merely obstructive +disposition; while the churches are merely wasting their energies in +futile self-advertisement; while the labour mass is suspicious and +disposed to make terms for itself rather than come into any large +schemes of reconstruction that will abolish profit as a primary aim in +economic life, there is still a very considerable movement towards such +a reconstruction. Nothing is so misleading as a careless analogy. In the +dead years that followed the Napoleonic wars, which are often quoted as +a precedent for expectation now, the spirit of collective service +was near its minimum; it was never so strong and never so manifestly +spreading and increasing as it is to-day. + +But service to what? + +I have my own very strong preconceptions here, and since my temperament +is sanguine they necessarily colour my view. I believe that this impulse +to collective service can satisfy itself only under the formula that +mankind is one state of which God is the undying king, and that the +service of men's collective needs is the true worship of God. But +eagerly as I would grasp at any evidence that this idea is being +developed and taken up by the general consciousness, I am quite unable +to persuade myself that anything of the sort is going on. I do perceive +a search for large forms into which the prevalent impulse to devotion +can be thrown. But the organised religious bodies, with their creeds +and badges and their instinct for self-preservation at any cost, +stand between men and their spiritual growth in just the same way the +forestallers stand between men and food. Their activities at present are +an almost intolerable nuisance. One cannot say “God” but some tout is +instantly seeking to pluck one into his particular cave of flummery and +orthodoxy. What a rational man means by God is just God. The more you +define and argue about God the more he remains the same simple thing. +Judaism, Christianity, Islam, modern Hindu religious thought, all agree +in declaring that there is one God, master and leader of all mankind, in +unending conflict with cruelty, disorder, folly and waste. To my mind, +it follows immediately that there can be no king, no government of any +sort, which is not either a subordinate or a rebel government, a local +usurpation, in the kingdom of God. But no organised religious body has +ever had the courage and honesty to insist upon this. They all pander to +nationalism and to powers and princes. They exists so to pander. Every +organised religion in the world exists only to exploit and divert and +waste the religious impulse in man. + +This conviction that the world kingdom of God is the only true method +of human service, is so clear and final in my own mind, it seems +so inevitably the conviction to which all right-thinking men must +ultimately come, that I feel almost like a looker-on at a game of +blind-man's bluff as I watch the discussion of synthetic political +ideas. The blind man thrusts his seeking hands into the oddest corners, +he clutches at chairs and curtains, but at last he must surely find and +hold and feel over and guess the name of the plainly visible quarry. + +Some of the French and Italian people I talked to said they were +fighting for “Civilisation.” That is one name for the kingdom of God, +and I have heard English people use it too. But much of the contemporary +thought of England stills wanders with its back to the light. Most of it +is pawing over jerry-built, secondary things. I have before me a +little book, the joint work of Dr. Grey and Mr. Turner, of an ex-public +schoolmaster and a manufacturer, called _Eclipse or Empire?_ (The title +_World Might or Downfall?_ had already been secured in another quarter.) +It is a book that has been enormously advertised; it has been almost +impossible to escape its column-long advertisements; it is billed upon +the hoardings, and it is on the whole a very able and right-spirited +book. It calls for more and better education, for more scientific +methods, for less class suspicion and more social explicitness and +understanding, for a franker and fairer treatment of labour. But why +does it call for these things? Does it call for them because they are +right? Because in accomplishing them one serves God? + +Not at all. But because otherwise this strange sprawling empire of ours +will drop back into a secondary place in the world. These two writers +really seem to think that the slack workman, the slacker wealthy man, +the negligent official, the conservative schoolmaster, the greedy +usurer, the comfortable obstructive, confronted with this alternative, +terrified at this idea of something or other called the Empire being +“eclipsed,” eager for the continuance of this undefined glory over their +fellow-creatures called “Empire,” will perceive the error of their ways +and become energetic, devoted, capable. They think an ideal of that sort +is going to change the daily lives of men.... I sympathise with their +purpose, and I deplore their conception of motives. If men will not +give themselves for righteousness, they will not give themselves for +a geographical score. If they will not work well for the hatred of bad +work, they will not work well for the hatred of Germans. This “Empire” + idea has been cadging about the British empire, trying to collect +enthusiasm and devotion, since the days of Disraeli. It is, I submit, +too big for the mean-spirited, and too tawdry and limited for the fine +and generous. It leaves out the French and the Italians and the Belgians +and all our blood brotherhood of allies. It has no compelling force +in it. We British are not naturally Imperialist; we are something +greater--or something less. For two years and a half now we have been +fighting against Imperialism in its most extravagant form. It is a +poor incentive to right living to propose to parody the devil we fight +against. + +The blind man must lunge again. + +For when the right answer is seized it answers not only the question why +men should work for their fellow-men but also why nation should cease to +arm and plan and contrive against nation. The social problem is only the +international problem in retail, the international problem is only the +social one in gross. + +My bias rules me altogether here. I see men in social, in economic +and in international affairs alike, eager to put an end to conflict, +inexpressibly weary of conflict and the waste and pain and death it +involves. But to end conflict one must abandon aggressive or uncordial +pretensions. Labour is sick at the idea of more strikes and struggles +after the war, industrialism is sick of competition and anxious for +service, everybody is sick of war. But how can they end any of these +clashes except by the definition and recognition of a common end which +will establish a standard for the trial of every conceivable issue, to +which, that is, every other issue can be subordinated; and what common +end can there be in all the world except this idea of the world kingdom +of God? What is the good of orienting one's devotion to a firm, or to +class solidarity, or _La Republique Francais_, or Poland, or Albania, or +such love and loyalty as people profess for King George or King Albert +or the Duc d'Orleans--it puzzles me why--or any such intermediate object +of self-abandonment? We need a standard so universal that the platelayer +may say to the barrister or the duchess, or the Red Indian to the +Limehouse sailor, or the Anzac soldier to the Sinn Feiner or the +Chinaman, “What are we two doing for it?” And to fill the place of that +“it,” no other idea is great enough or commanding enough, but only the +world kingdom of God. + +However long he may have to hunt, the blind man who is seeking service +and an end to bickerings will come to that at last, because of all the +thousand other things he may clutch at, nothing else can satisfy his +manifest need. + + + + +VI. THE ENDING OF THE WAR + + +1 + +About the end of the war there are two chief ways of thinking, there is +a simpler sort of mind which desires merely a date, and a more complex +kind which wants particulars. To the former class belong most of the men +out at the front. They are so bored by this war that they would +welcome any peace that did not definitely admit defeat--and examine +the particulars later. The “tone” of the German army, to judge by its +captured letters, is even lower. It would welcome peace in any form. +Never in the whole history of the world has a war been so universally +unpopular as this war. + +The mind of the soldier is obsessed by a vision of home-coming for +good, so vivid and alluring that it blots out nearly every other +consideration. The visions of people at home are of plenty instead +of privation, lights up, and the cessation of a hundred tiresome +restrictions. And it is natural therefore that a writer rather given to +guesses and forecasts should be asked very frequently to guess how long +the war has still to run. + +All such forecasting is the very wildest of shooting. There are the +chances of war to put one out, and of a war that changes far faster than +the military intelligence. I have made various forecasts. At the outset +I thought that military Germany would fight at about the 1899 level, +would be lavish with cavalry and great attacks, that it would be +reluctant to entrench, and that the French and British had learnt +the lesson of the Boer war better than the Germans. I trusted to +the melodramatic instinct of the Kaiser. I trusted to the quickened +intelligence of the British military caste. The first rush seemed to +bear me out, and I opened my paper day by day expecting to read of the +British and French entrenched and the Germans beating themselves to +death against wire and trenches. In those days I wrote of the French +being over the Rhine before 1915. But it was the Germans who entrenched +first. + +Since then I have made some other attempts. I did not prophesy at all in +1915, so far as I can remember. If I had I should certainly have backed +the Gallipoli attempt to win. It was the right thing to do, and it was +done abominably. It should have given us Constantinople and brought +Bulgaria to our side; it gave us a tragic history of administrative +indolence and negligence, and wasted bravery and devotion. I was very +hopeful of the western offensive in 1915; and in 1916 I counted still on +our continuing push. I believe we were very near something like decision +this last September, but some archaic dream of doing it with cavalry +dashed these hopes. The “Tanks” arrived to late to do their proper work, +and their method of use is being worked out very slowly.... I still +believe in the western push, if only we push it for all we are worth. +If only we push it with our brains, with our available and still +unorganised brains; if only we realise that the art of modern war is to +invent and invent and invent. Hitherto I have always hoped and looked +for decision, a complete victory that would enable the Allies to dictate +peace. But such an expectation is largely conditioned by these delicate +questions of adaptability that my tour of the front has made very urgent +in my mind. A spiteful German American writer has said that the British +would rather kill twenty thousand of their men than break one general. +Even a grain of truth in such a remark is a very valid reasoning for +lengthening one's estimate of the duration of the war. + +There can be no doubt that the Western allies are playing a winning game +upon the western front, and that this is the front of decision now. It +is not in doubt that they are beating the Germans and shoving them back. +The uncertain factor is the rate at which they are shoving them back. +If they can presently get to so rapid an advance as to bring the average +rate since July 1st up to two or three miles a day, then we shall still +see the Allies dictating terms. But if the shove drags on at its present +pace of less than a mile and four thousand prisoners a week over the +limited Somme front only, if nothing is attempted elsewhere to increase +the area of pressure, [*This was written originally before the French +offensive at Verdun.] then the intolerable stress and boredom of the war +will bring about a peace long before the Germans are decisively crushed. +But the war, universally detested, may go on into 1918 or 1919. Food +riots, famine, and general disorganisation will come before 1920, if it +does. The Allies have a winning game before them, but they seem unable +to discover and promote the military genius needed to harvest an +unquestionable victory. In the long run this may not be an unmixed evil. +Victory, complete and dramatic, may be bought too dearly. We need not +triumphs out of this war but the peace of the world. + +This war is altogether unlike any previous war, and its ending, like its +development, will follow a course of its own. For a time people's minds +ran into the old grooves, the Germans were going _nach Paris_ and _nach +London_; Lord Curzon filled our minds with a pleasant image of the +Bombay Lancers riding down _Unter den Linden._ But the Versailles +precedent of a council of victors dictating terms to the vanquished is +not now so evidently in men's minds. The utmost the Allies talk upon +now is to say, “We must end the war on German soil.” The Germans talk +frankly of “holding out.” I have guessed that the western offensive will +be chiefly on German soil by next June; it is a mere guess, and I admit +it is quite conceivable that the “push” may still be grinding out its +daily tale of wounded and prisoners in 1918 far from that goal. + +None of the combatants expected such a war as this, and the consequence +is that the world at large has no idea how to get out of it. The war may +stay with us like a schoolboy caller, because it does not know how to +go. The Italians said as much to me. “Suppose we get to Innsbruck and +Laibach and Trieste,” they said, “it isn't an end!” Lord Northcliffe, +I am told, came away from Italy with the conviction that the war would +last six years. + +There is the clearest evidence that nearly everyone is anxious to get +out of the war now. Nobody at all, except perhaps a few people who may +be called to account, and a handful of greedy profit-seekers, wants to +keep it going. Quietly perhaps and unobtrusively, everyone I know is now +trying to find the way out of the war, and I am convinced that the +same is the case in Germany. That is what makes the Peace-at-any-price +campaign so exasperating. It is like being chased by clamorous geese +across a common in the direction in which you want to go. But how are +we to get out--with any credit--in such a way as to prevent a subsequent +collapse into another war as frightful? + +At present three programmes are before the world of the way in which the +war can be ended. The first of these assumes a complete predominance +of our Allies. It has been stated in general terms by Mr. Asquith. +Evacuation, reparation, due punishment of those responsible for the war, +and guarantees that nothing of the sort shall happen again. There is as +yet no mention of the nature of these guarantees. Just exactly what is +to happen to Poland, Austria, and the Turkish Empire does not appear in +this prospectus. The German Chancellor is equally elusive. The Kaiser +has stampeded the peace-at-any-price people of Great Britain by +proclaiming that Germany wants peace. We knew that. But what sort +of peace? It would seem that we are promised vaguely evacuation and +reparation on the western frontier, and in addition there are to be +guarantees--but it is quite evident that they are altogether different +guarantees from Mr. Asquith's--that nothing of the sort is ever to +happen again. The programme of the British and their Allies seems +to contemplate something like a forcible disarmament and military +occupation of Belgium, the desertion of Serbia and Russia, and the +surrender to Germany of every facility for a later and more successful +German offensive in the west. But it is clear that on these terms as +stated the war must go on to the definite defeat of one side or the +other, or a European chaos. They are irreconcilable sets of terms. + +Yet it is hard to say how they can be modified on either side, if the +war is to be decided only between the belligerents and by standards of +national interest only, without reference to any other considerations. +Our Allies would be insane to leave the Hohenzollern at the end of +the war with a knife in his hand, after the display he has made of +his quality. To surrender his knife means for the Hohenzollern the +abandonment of his dreams, the repudiation of the entire education and +training of Germany for half a century. When we realise the fatality of +this antagonism, we realise how it is that, in this present anticipation +of hell, the weary, wasted and tormented nations must still sustain +their monstrous dreary struggle. And that is why this thought that +possible there may be a side way out, a sort of turning over of the +present endlessly hopeless game into a new and different and manageable +game through the introduction of some external factor, creeps and +spreads as I find it creeping and spreading. + +That is what the finer intelligences of America are beginning to +realise, and why men in Europe continually turn their eyes to America, +with a surmise, with a doubt. + +A point of departure for very much thinking in this matter is the recent +speech of President Wilson that heralded the present discussion. All +Europe was impressed by the truth, and by President Wilson's recognition +of the truth, that from any other great war after this America will +be unable to abstain. Can America come into this dispute at the end to +insist upon something better than a new diplomatic patchwork, and so +obviate the later completer Armageddon? Is there, above the claims +and passions of Germany, France, Britain, and the rest of them, a +conceivable right thing to do for all mankind, that it might also be in +the interest of America to support? Is there a Third Party solution, so +to speak, which may possibly be the way out from this war? + +And further I would go on to ask, is not this present exchange of Notes, +appealing to the common sense of the world, really the beginning, and +the proper beginning, of the unprecedented Peace Negotiations to end +this unprecedented war? And, I submit, the longer this open discussion +goes on before the doors close upon the secret peace congress the better +for mankind. + + +2 + +Let me sketch out here what I conceive to be the essentials of a world +settlement. Some of the items are the mere commonplaces of everyone who +discusses this question; some are less frequently insisted upon. I have +been joining up one thing to another, suggestions I have heard from +this man and that, and I believe that it is really possible to state a +solution that will be acceptable to the bulk of reasonable men all about +the world. Directly we put the panic-massacres of Dinant and Louvain, +the crime of the _Lusitania_ and so on into the category of symptoms +rather than essentials, outrages that call for special punishments and +reparations, but that do not enter further into the ultimate settlement, +we can begin to conceive a possible world treaty. Let me state the broad +outlines of this pacification. The outlines depend one upon the other; +each is a condition of the other. It is upon these lines that the +thoughtful, as distinguished from the merely the combative people, seem +to be drifting everywhere. + +In the first place, it is agreed that there would have to be an +identical treaty between all the great powers of the world binding them +to certain things. It would have to provide:-- + +That the few great industrial states capable of producing modern war +equipment should take over and control completely the manufacture of all +munitions of war in the world. And that they should absolutely close the +supply of such material to all the other states in the world. This is a +far easier task than many people suppose. War has now been so developed +on its mechanical side that the question of its continuance or abolition +rests now entirely upon four or five great powers. + +Next comes the League of Peace idea; that there should be an +International Tribunal for the discussion and settlement of +international disputes. That the dominating powers should maintain land +and sea forces only up to a limit agreed upon and for internal police +use only or for the purpose of enforcing the decisions of the Tribunal. +That they should all be bound to attack and suppress any power amongst +them which increases its war equipment beyond its defined limits. + +That much has already been broached in several quarters. But so far is +not enough. It ignores the chief processes of that economic war that +aids and abets and is inseparably a part of modern international +conflicts. If we are to go as far as we have already stated in the +matter of international controls, then we must go further and provide +that the International Tribunal should have power to consider and set +aside all tariffs and localised privileges that seem grossly unfair or +seriously irritating between the various states of the world. It +should have power to pass or revise all new tariff, quarantine, alien +exclusion, or the like legislation affecting international relations. +Moreover, it should take over and extend the work of the International +Bureau of Agriculture at Rome with a view to the control of all staple +products. It should administer the sea law of the world, and control and +standardise freights in the common interests of mankind. Without these +provisions it would be merely preventing the use of certain weapons; it +would be doing nothing to prevent countries strangling or suffocating +each other by commercial warfare. It would not abolish war. + +Now upon this issue people do not seem to me to be yet thinking very +clearly. It is the exception to find anyone among the peace talkers who +really grasps how inseparably the necessity for free access for everyone +to natural products, to coal and tropical products, e.g. free shipping +at non-discriminating tariffs, and the recognition by a Tribunal of the +principle of common welfare in trade matters, is bound up with the ideal +of a permanent world peace. But any peace that does not provide for +these things will be merely laying down of the sword in order to take up +the cudgel. And a “peace” that did not rehabilitate industrial Belgium, +Poland, and the north of France would call imperatively for the +imposition upon the Allies of a system of tariffs in the interests of +these countries, and for a bitter economic “war after the war” against +Germany. That restoration is, of course, an implicit condition to any +attempt to set up an economic peace in the world. + +These things being arranged for the future, it would be further +necessary to set up an International Boundary Commission, subject to +certain defining conditions agreed upon by the belligerents, to re-draw +the map of Europe, Asia, and Africa. This war does afford an occasion +such as the world may never have again of tracing out the “natural map” + of mankind, the map that will secure the maximum of homogeneity and the +minimum of racial and economic freedom. All idealistic people hope for +a restored Poland. But it is a childish thing to dream of a contented +Poland with Posen still under the Prussian heel, with Cracow cut off, +and without a Baltic port. These claims of Poland to completeness have a +higher sanction than the mere give and take of belligerents in congress. + +Moreover this International Tribunal, if it was indeed to prevent war, +would need also to have power to intervene in the affairs of any country +or region in a state of open and manifest disorder, for the protection +of foreign travellers and of persons and interests localised in that +country but foreign to it. + +Such an agreement as I have here sketched out would at once lift +international politics out of the bloody and hopeless squalor of +the present conflict. It is, I venture to assert, the peace of the +reasonable man in any country whatever. But it needs the attention +of such a disengaged people as the American people to work it out and +supply it with--weight. It needs putting before the world with some sort +of authority greater than its mere entire reasonableness. Otherwise +it will not come before the minds of ordinary men with the effect of a +practicable proposition. I do not see any such plant springing from the +European battlefields. It is America's supreme opportunity. And yet it +is the common sense of the situation, and the solution that must satisfy +a rational German as completely as a rational Frenchman or Englishman. +It has nothing against it but the prejudice against new and entirely +novel things. + + +3 + +In throwing out the suggestion that America should ultimately undertake +the responsibility of proposing a world peace settlement, I admit that +I run counter to a great deal of European feeling. Nowhere in Europe now +do people seem to be in love with the United States. But feeling is +a colour that passes. And the question is above matters of feeling. +Whether the belligerents dislike Americans or the Americans dislike the +belligerents is an incidental matter. The main question is of the duty +of a great and fortunate nation towards the rest of the world and the +future of mankind. + +I do not know how far Americans are aware of the trend of feeling in +Europe at the present time. Both France and Great Britain have a sense +of righteousness in this war such as no nation, no people, has ever felt +in war before. We know we are fighting to save all the world from the +rule of force and the unquestioned supremacy of the military idea. Few +Frenchmen or Englishmen can imagine the war presenting itself to an +American intelligence under any other guise. At the invasion of Belgium +we were astonished that America did nothing. At the sinking of the +_Lusitania_ all Europe looked to America. The British mind contemplates +the spectacle of American destroyers acting as bottleholders to German +submarines with a dazzled astonishment. “Manila,” we gasp. In England we +find excuses for America in our own past. In '64 we betrayed Denmark; in +'70 we deserted France. The French have not these memories. They do +not understand the damning temptations of those who feel they are +“_au-dessus de la melee._” They believe they had some share in the +independence of America, that there is a sacred cause in republicanism, +that there are grounds for a peculiar sympathy between France and the +United States in republican institutions. They do not realise that +Germany and America have a common experience in recent industrial +development, and a common belief in the “degeneracy” of all nations with +a lower rate of trade expansion. They do not realise how a political +campaign with the slogan of “Peace and a Full Dinner-Pail” looks in the +middle west, what an honest, simple, rational appeal it makes there. +Atmospheres alter values. In Europe, strung up to tragic and majestic +issues, to Europe gripping a gigantic evil in a death struggle, that +would seem an inscription worthy of a pigsty. A child in Europe would +know now that the context is, “until the bacon-buyer calls,” and it is +difficult to realise that adult citizens in America may be incapable of +realising that obvious context. + +I set these things down plainly. There is a very strong disposition in +all the European countries to believe America fundamentally indifferent +to the rights and wrongs of the European struggle; sentimentally +interested perhaps, but fundamentally indifferent. President Wilson +is regarded as a mere academic sentimentalist by a great number of +Europeans. There is a very widespread disposition to treat America +lightly and contemptuously, to believe that America, as one man put it +to me recently, “hasn't the heart to do anything great or the guts to do +anything wicked.” There is a strong undercurrent of hostility therefore +to the idea of America having any voice whatever in the final settlement +after the war. It is not for a British writer to analyse the appearance +that have thus affected American world prestige. I am telling what I +have observed. + +Let me relate two trivial anecdotes. + +X came to my hotel in Paris one day to take me to see a certain +munitions organisation. He took from his pocket a picture postcard that +had been sent him by a well-meaning American acquaintance from America. +It bore a portrait of General Lafayette, and under it was printed the +words, “General Lafayette, _Colonel in the United States army._” + +“Oh! These Americans!” said X with a gesture. + +And as I returned to Paris from the French front, our train stopped at +some intermediate station alongside of another train of wounded +men. Exactly opposite our compartment was a car. It arrested our +conversation. It was, as it were, an ambulance _de grand luxe_; it was a +thing of very light, bright wood and very golden decorations; at one end +of it was painted very large and fair the Stars and Stripes, and at the +other fair-sized letters of gold proclaimed--I am sure the lady will +not resent this added gleam of publicity--“Presented by Mrs. William +Vanderbilt.” + +My companions were French writers and French military men, and they were +discussing with very keen interest that persistent question, “the ideal +battery.” But that ambulance sent a shaft of light into our carriage, +and we stared together. + +Then Colonel Z pointed with two fingers and remarked to us, without any +excess of admiration: + +“_America!_” + +Then he shrugged his shoulders and pulled down the corners of his mouth. + +We felt there was nothing more to add to that, and after a little pause +the previous question was resumed. + +I state these things in order to make it clear that America will start +at a disadvantage when she starts upon the mission of salvage and +reconciliation which is, I believe, her proper role in this world +conflict. One would have to be blind and deaf on this side to be +ignorant of European persuasion of America's triviality. I would not +like to be an American travelling in Europe now, and those I meet here +and there have some of the air of men who at any moment may be +dunned for a debt. They explode without provocation into excuses and +expostulations. + +And I will further confess that when Viscount Grey answered the +intimations of President Wilson and ex-President Taft of an American +initiative to found a World League for Peace, by asking if America +was prepared to back that idea with force, he spoke the doubts of all +thoughtful European men. No one but an American deeply versed in the +idiosyncrasies of the American population can answer that question, or +tell us how far the delusion of world isolation which has prevailed in +America for several generations has been dispelled. But if the answer +to Lord Grey is “Yes,” then I think history will emerge with a complete +justification of the obstinate maintenance of neutrality by America. It +is the end that reveals a motive. It is our ultimate act that sometimes +teaches us our original intention. No one can judge the United States +yet. Were you neutral because you are too mean and cowardly, or too +stupidly selfish, or because you had in view an end too great to be +sacrificed to a moment of indignant pride and a force in reserve too +precious to dispel? That is the still open question for America. + +Every country is a mixture of many strands. There is a Base America, +there is a Dull America, there is an Ideal and Heroic America. And I +am convinced that at present Europe underrates and misjudges the +possibilities of the latter. + +All about the world to-day goes a certain freemasonry of thought. It is +an impalpable and hardly conscious union of intention. It thinks not +in terms of national but human experience; it falls into directions and +channels of thinking that lead inevitably to the idea of a world-state +under the rule of one righteousness. In no part of the world is this +modern type of mind so abundantly developed, less impeded by antiquated +and perverse political and religious forms, and nearer the sources of +political and administrative power, than in America. It does not seem to +matter what thousand other things America may happen to be, seeing that +it is also that. And so, just as I cling to the belief, in spite of +hundreds of adverse phenomena, that the religious and social stir of +these times must ultimately go far to unify mankind under the kingship +of God, so do I cling also to the persuasion that there are intellectual +forces among the rational elements in the belligerent centres, among +the other neutrals and in America, that will co-operate in enabling the +United States to play that role of the Unimpassioned Third Party, which +becomes more and more necessary to a generally satisfactory ending of +the war. + + +4 + +The idea that the settlement of this war must be what one might call an +unimpassioned settlement or, if you will, a scientific settlement or a +judicial and not a treaty settlement, a settlement, that is, based upon +some conception of what is right and necessary rather than upon the +relative success or failure of either set of belligerents to make its +Will the standard of decision, is one that, in a great variety of forms +and partial developments, I find gaining ground in the most different +circles. The war was an adventure, it was the German adventure under the +Hohenzollern tradition, to dominate the world. It was to be the last of +the Conquests. It has failed. Without calling upon the reserve strength +of America the civilised world has defeated it, and the war continues +now partly upon the issue whether it shall be made for ever impossible, +and partly because Germany has no organ but its Hohenzollern +organisation through which it can admit its failure and develop its +latent readiness for a new understanding on lines of mutual toleration. +For that purpose nothing more reluctant could be devised than +Hohenzollern imperialism. But the attention of every new combatant--it +is not only Germany now--has been concentrated upon military +necessities; every nation is a clenched nation, with its powers of +action centred in its own administration, bound by many strategic +threats and declarations, and dominated by the idea of getting and +securing advantages. It is inevitable that a settlement made in a +conference of belligerents alone will be shortsighted, harsh, limited by +merely incidental necessities, and obsessed by the idea of hostilities +and rivalries continuing perennially; it will be a trading of advantages +for subsequent attacks. It will be a settlement altogether different in +effect as well as in spirit from a world settlement made primarily to +establish a new phase in the history of mankind. + +Let me take three instances of the impossibility of complete victory +_on either side_ giving a solution satisfactory to the conscience and +intelligence of reasonable men. + +The first--on which I will not expatiate, for everyone knows of its +peculiar difficulty--is Poland. + +The second is a little one, but one that has taken hold of my +imagination. In the settlement of boundaries preceding this war the +boundary between Serbia and north-eastern Albania was drawn with an +extraordinary disregard of the elementary needs of the Albanians of that +region. It ran along the foot of the mountains which form their summer +pastures and their refuge from attack, and it cut their mountains off +from their winter pastures and market towns. Their whole economic life +was cut to pieces and existence rendered intolerable for them. Now an +intelligent Third Party settling Europe would certainly restore these +market towns, Ipek, Jakova, and Prisrend, to Albania. But the Albanians +have no standing in this war; theirs is the happy lot that might have +fallen to Belgium had she not resisted; the war goes to and fro through +Albania; and when the settlement comes, it is highly improbable that +the slightest notice will be taken of Albania's plight in the region. In +which case these particular Albanians will either be driven into exile +to America or they will be goaded to revolt, which will be followed no +doubt by the punitive procedure usual in the Balkan peninsula. + +For my third instance I would step from a matter as small as three +market towns and the grazing of a few thousand head of sheep to a matter +as big as the world. What is going to happen to the shipping of the +world after this war? The Germans, with that combination of cunning +and stupidity which baffles the rest of mankind, have set themselves to +destroy the mercantile marine not merely of Britain and France but of +Norway and Sweden, Holland, and all the neutral countries. The German +papers openly boast that they are building up a big mercantile marine +that will start out to take up the world's overseas trade directly peace +is declared. Every such boast receives careful attention in the British +press. We have heard a very great deal about the German will-to-power +in this war, but there is something very much older and tougher and less +blatant and conspicuous, the British will. In the British papers there +has appeared and gained a permanent footing this phrase, “ton for ton.” + This means that Britain will go on fighting until she has exacted and +taken over from Germany the exact equivalent of all the British shipping +Germany has submarined. People do not realise that a time may come when +Germany will be glad and eager to give Russia, France and Italy all that +they require of her, when Great Britain may be quite content to let +her allies make an advantageous peace and herself still go on fighting +Germany. She does not intend to let that furtively created German +mercantile marine ship or coal or exist upon the high seas--so long as +it can be used as an economic weapon against her. Neither Britain nor +France nor Italy can tolerate anything of the sort. + +It has been the peculiar boast of Great Britain that her shipping has +been unpatriotic. She has been the impartial carrier of the whole world. +Her shippers may have served their own profit; they have never served +hers. The fluctuations of freight charges may have been a universal +nuisance, but they have certainly not been an aggressive national +conspiracy. It is Britain's case against any German ascendancy at sea, +an entirely convincing case, that such an ascendancy would be used +ruthlessly for the advancement of German world power. The long-standing +freedom of the seas vanishes at the German touch. So beyond the present +war there opens the agreeable prospect of a mercantile struggle, a +bitter freight war and a war of Navigation Acts for the ultimate control +in the interests of Germany or of the Anti-German allies, of the world's +trade. + +Now how in any of these three cases can the bargaining and trickery of +diplomatists and the advantage-hunting of the belligerents produce any +stable and generally beneficial solution? What all the neutrals want, +what every rational and far-sighted man in the belligerent countries +wants, what the common sense of the whole world demands, is neither the +“ascendancy” of Germany nor the “ascendancy” of Great Britain nor the +“ascendancy” of any state or people or interest in the shipping of the +world. The plain right thing is a world shipping control, as impartial +as the Postal Union. What right and reason and the welfare of coming +generations demand in Poland is a unified and autonomous Poland, +with Cracow, Danzig, and Posen brought into the same Polish-speaking +ring-fence with Warsaw. What everyone who has looked into the Albanian +question desires is that the Albanians shall pasture their flocks and +market their sheepskins in peace, free of Serbian control. In every +country at present at war, the desire of the majority of people is for +a non-contentious solution that will neither crystallise a triumph nor +propitiate an enemy, but which will embody the economic and ethnological +and geographical common sense of the matter. But while the formulae +of national belligerence are easy, familiar, blatant, and instantly +present, the gentler, greater formulae of that wider and newer world +pacifism has still to be generally understood. It is so much easier to +hate and suspect than negotiate generously and patiently; it is so +much harder to think than to let go in a shrill storm of hostility. The +rational pacifist is hampered not only by belligerency, but by a sort +of malignant extreme pacifism as impatient and silly as the extremest +patriotism. + + +5 + +I sketch out these ideas of a world pacification from a third-party +standpoint, because I find them crystallising out in men's minds. I note +how men discuss the suggestion that America may play a large part in +such a permanent world pacification. There I end my account rendered. +These things are as much a part of my impression of the war as a +shell-burst on the Carso or the yellow trenches at Martinpuich. But I +do not know how opinion is going in America, and I am quite unable to +estimate the power of these new ideas I set down, relative to the blind +forces of instinct and tradition that move the mass of mankind. On the +whole I believe more in the reason-guided will-power of men than I did +in the early half of 1914. If I am doubtful whether after all this war +will “end war,” I think on the other hand it has had such an effect of +demonstration that it may start a process of thought and conviction, +it may sow the world with organisations and educational movements +considerable enough to grapple with an either arrest or prevent the next +great war catastrophe. I am by no means sure even now that this is not +the last great war in the experience of men. I still believe it may be. + +The most dangerous thing in the business so far is concerned is the wide +disregard of the fact that national economic fighting is bound to cause +war, and the almost universal ignorance of the necessity of subjecting +shipping and overseas and international trade to some kind of +international control. These two things, restraint of trade and +advantage of shipping, are the chief material causes of anger between +modern states. But they would not be in themselves dangerous things if +it were not for the exaggerated delusions of kind and difference, and +the crack-brained “loyalties” arising out of these, that seem still to +rule men's minds. Years ago I came to the conviction that much of the +evil in human life was due to the inherent vicious disposition of the +human mind to intensify classification.[*See my “First and Last Things,” + Book I. and my “Modern Utopia,” Chapter X.] I do not know how it will +strike the reader, but to me this war, this slaughter of eight or nine +million people, is due almost entirely to this little, almost universal +lack of clear-headedness; I believe that the share of wickedness in +making war is quite secondary to the share of this universal shallow +silliness of outlook. These effigies of emperors and kings and statesmen +that lead men into war, these legends of nationality and glory, would +collapse before our universal derision, if they were not stuffed tight +and full with the unthinking folly of the common man. + +There is in all of us an indolent capacity for suffering evil and +dangerous things, that I contemplate each year of my life with a +deepening incredulity. I perceive we suffer them; I record the futile +protests of the intelligence. It seems to me incredible that men should +not rise up out of this muddy, bloody, wasteful mess of a world war, +with a resolution to end for ever the shams, the prejudices, the +pretences and habits that have impoverished their lives, slaughtered our +sons, and wasted the world, a resolution so powerful and sustained that +nothing could withstand it. + +But it is not apparent that any such will arises. Does it appear at all? +I find it hard to answer that question because my own answer varies with +my mood. There are moods when it seems to me that nothing of the sort +is happening. This war has written its warning in letters of blood and +flame and anguish in the skies of mankind for two years and a half. When +I look for the collective response to that warning, I see a multitude +of little chaps crawling about their private ends like mites in an old +cheese. The kings are still in their places, not a royal prince has been +killed in this otherwise universal slaughter; when the fatuous portraits +of the monarchs flash upon the screen the widows and orphans still break +into loyal song. The ten thousand religions of mankind are still ten +thousand religions, all busy at keeping men apart and hostile. I see +scarcely a measurable step made anywhere towards that world kingdom of +God, which is, I assert, the manifest solution, the only formula that +can bring peace to all mankind. Mankind as a whole seems to have learnt +nothing and forgotten nothing in thirty months of war. + +And then on the other hand I am aware of much quiet talking. This +book tells of how I set out to see the war, and it is largely +conversation.... Perhaps men have always expected miracles to happen; +if one had always lived in the night and only heard tell of the day, I +suppose one would have expected dawn to come as a vivid flash of light. +I suppose one would still think it was night long after the things about +one had crept out of the darkness into visibility. In comparison with +all previous wars there has been much more thinking and much more +discussion. If most of the talk seems to be futile, if it seems as if +everyone were talking and nobody doing, it does not follow that things +are not quietly slipping and sliding out of their old adjustments +amidst the babble and because of the babble. Multitudes of men must be +struggling with new ideas. It is reasonable to argue that there must +be reconsideration, there must be time, before these millions of mental +efforts can develop into a new collective purpose and really _show_--in +consequences. + +But that they will do so is my hope always and, on the whole, except in +moods of depression and impatience, my belief. When one has travelled +to a conviction so great as mine it is difficult to doubt that other men +faced by the same universal facts will not come to the same conclusion. +I believe that only through a complete simplification o religion to its +fundamental idea, to a world-wide realisation of God as the king of the +heart and of all mankind, setting aside monarchy and national egotism +altogether, can mankind come to any certain happiness and security. The +precedent of Islam helps my faith in the creative inspiration of such +a renascence of religion. The Sikh, the Moslem, the Puritan have shown +that men can fight better for a Divine Idea than for any flag or monarch +in the world. It seems to me that illusions fade and effigies lose +credit everywhere. It is a very wonderful thing to me that China is now +a republic.... I take myself to be very nearly an average man, abnormal +only by reason of a certain mental rapidity. I conceive myself to be +thinking as the world thinks, and if I find no great facts, I find a +hundred little indications to reassure me that God comes. Even those who +have neither the imagination nor the faith to apprehend God as a +reality will, I think, realise presently that the Kingdom of God over +a world-wide system of republican states, is the only possible formula +under which we may hope to unify and save mankind. + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of War and the Future, by H. G. 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Thus, we do not necessarily +keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. + + +Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: + + http://www.gutenberg.org + +This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, +including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to +subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. diff --git a/1804-0.zip b/1804-0.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..d277d25 --- /dev/null +++ b/1804-0.zip diff --git a/1804-h.zip b/1804-h.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..135266d --- /dev/null +++ b/1804-h.zip diff --git a/1804-h/1804-h.htm b/1804-h/1804-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..d17c12e --- /dev/null +++ b/1804-h/1804-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,6908 @@ +<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?> + +<!DOCTYPE html + PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" + "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd" > + +<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" lang="en"> + <head> + <title> + War and the Future, by H. G. Wells + </title> + <style type="text/css" xml:space="preserve"> + + body { margin:5%; background:#faebd0; text-align:justify} + P { text-indent: 1em; margin-top: .25em; margin-bottom: .25em; } + H1,H2,H3,H4,H5,H6 { text-align: center; margin-left: 15%; margin-right: 15%; } + hr { width: 50%; text-align: center;} + .foot { margin-left: 20%; margin-right: 20%; text-align: justify; text-indent: -3em; font-size: 90%; } + blockquote {font-size: 97%; font-style: italic; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%;} + .mynote {background-color: #DDE; color: #000; padding: .5em; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 95%;} + .toc { margin-left: 10%; margin-bottom: .75em;} + .toc2 { margin-left: 20%;} + div.fig { display:block; margin:0 auto; text-align:center; } + div.middle { margin-left: 20%; margin-right: 20%; text-align: justify; } + .figleft {float: left; margin-left: 0%; margin-right: 1%;} + .figright {float: right; margin-right: 0%; margin-left: 1%;} + .pagenum {display:inline; font-size: 70%; font-style:normal; + margin: 0; padding: 0; position: absolute; right: 1%; + text-align: right;} + pre { font-style: italic; font-size: 90%; margin-left: 10%;} + +</style> + </head> + <body> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + +The Project Gutenberg EBook of War and the Future, by H. G. Wells + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: War and the Future + +Author: H. G. Wells + +Release Date: March 21, 2006 [EBook #1804] +Last Updated: March 2, 2018 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: UTF-8 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK WAR AND THE FUTURE *** + + + + +Produced by Morgan L. Owens and David Widger + + + + + +</pre> + + <p> + <br /> <br /> + </p> + <h1> + WAR AND THE FUTURE + </h1> + <p> + <br /> + </p> + <h3> + Italy, France and Britain at War + </h3> + <p> + <br /> <br /> + </p> + <h2> + by H. G. Wells + </h2> + <p> + <br /> <br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /> <br /> + </p> + <blockquote> + <p class="toc"> + <big><b>CONTENTS</b></big> + </p> + <p> + <br /> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0001"> <b>THE PASSING OF THE EFFIGY</b> </a> + </p> + <p> + <br /> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0002"> <b>THE WAR IN ITALY (AUGUST, 1916)</b> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0003"> I. THE ISONZO FRONT </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0004"> II. THE MOUNTAIN WAR </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0005"> III. BEHIND THE FRONT </a> + </p> + <p> + <br /> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0006"> <b>THE WESTERN WAR (SEPTEMBER, 1916)</b> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0007"> I. RUINS </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0008"> II. THE GRADES OF WAR </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0009"> III. THE WAR LANDSCAPE </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0010"> IV. NEW ARMS FOR OLD ONES </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0011"> V. TANKS </a> + </p> + <p> + <br /> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0012"> <b>HOW PEOPLE THINK ABOUT THE WAR</b> </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0013"> I. DO THEY REALLY THINK AT ALL? </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0014"> II. THE YIELDING PACIFIST AND THE + CONSCIENTIOUS OBJECTOR </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0015"> III. THE RELIGIOUS REVIVAL </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0016"> IV. THE RIDDLE OF THE BRITISH </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0017"> V. THE SOCIAL CHANGES IN PROGRESS </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0018"> VI. THE ENDING OF THE WAR </a> + </p> + </blockquote> + <p> + <br /> <br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0001" id="link2H_4_0001"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> <br /> <br /> + </p> + <h2> + THE PASSING OF THE EFFIGY + </h2> + <p> + 1 + </p> + <p> + One of the minor peculiarities of this unprecedented war is the Tour of + the Front. After some months of suppressed information—in which even + the war correspondent was discouraged to the point of elimination—it + was discovered on both sides that this was a struggle in which Opinion was + playing a larger and more important part than it had ever done before. + This wild spreading weed was perhaps of decisive importance; the Germans + at any rate were attempting to make it a cultivated flower. There was + Opinion flowering away at home, feeding rankly on rumour; Opinion in + neutral countries; Opinion getting into great tangles of misunderstanding + and incorrect valuation between the Allies. The confidence and courage of + the enemy; the amiability and assistance of the neutral; the zeal, + sacrifice, and serenity of the home population; all were affected. The + German cultivation of opinion began long before the war; it is still the + most systematic and, because of the psychological ineptitude of the + Germans, it is probably the clumsiest. The French <i>Maison de la Presse</i> + is certainly the best organisation in existence for making things clear, + counteracting hostile suggestion, the British official organisations are + comparatively ineffective; but what is lacking officially is very largely + made up for by the good will and generous efforts of the English and + American press. An interesting monograph might be written upon these + various attempts of the belligerents to get themselves and their + proceedings explained. + </p> + <p> + Because there is perceptible in these developments, quite over and above + the desire to influence opinion, a very real effort to get things + explained. It is the most interesting and curious—one might almost + write touching—feature of these organisations that they do not + constitute a positive and defined propaganda such as the Germans maintain. + The German propaganda is simple, because its ends are simple; assertions + of the moral elevation and loveliness of Germany; of the insuperable + excellences of German Kultur, the Kaiser, and Crown Prince, and so forth; + abuse of the “treacherous” English who allied themselves with the + “degenerate” French and the “barbaric” Russians; nonsense about “the + freedom of the seas”—the emptiest phrase in history—childish + attempts to sow suspicion between the Allies, and still more childish + attempts to induce neutrals and simple-minded pacifists of allied + nationality to save the face of Germany by initiating peace negotiations. + But apart from their steady record and reminder of German brutalities and + German aggression, the press organisations of the Allies have none of this + definiteness in their task. The aim of the national intelligence in each + of the allied countries is not to exalt one's own nation and confuse and + divide the enemy, but to get a real understanding with the peoples and + spirits of a number of different nations, an understanding that will + increase and become a fruitful and permanent understanding between the + allied peoples. Neither the English, the Russians, the Italians, nor the + French, to name only the bigger European allies, are concerned in setting + up a legend, as the Germans are concerned in setting up a legend of + themselves to impose upon mankind. They are reality dealers in this war, + and the Germans are effigy mongers. Practically the Allies are saying each + to one another, “Pray come to me and see for yourself that I am very much + the human stuff that you are. Come and see that I am doing my best—and + I think that is not so very bad a best....” And with that is something + else still more subtle, something rather in the form of, “And please tell + me what you think of me—and all this.” + </p> + <p> + So we have this curious byplay of the war, and one day I find Mr. + Nabokoff, the editor of the <i>Retch</i>, and Count Alexy Tolstoy, that + writer of delicate short stories, and Mr. Chukovsky, the subtle critic, + calling in upon me after braving the wintry seas to see the British fleet; + M. Joseph Reinach follows them presently upon the same errand; and then + appear photographs of Mr. Arnold Bennett wading in the trenches of + Flanders, Mr. Noyes becomes discreetly indiscreet about what he has seen + among the submarines, and Mr. Hugh Walpole catches things from Mr. Stephen + Graham in the Dark Forest of Russia. All this is quite over and above such + writing of facts at first hand as Mr. Patrick McGill and a dozen other + real experiencing soldiers—not to mention the soldiers' letters Mr. + James Milne has collected, or the unforgettable and immortal <i>Prisoner + of War</i> of Mr. Arthur Green—or such admirable war correspondents' + work as Mr. Philip Gibbs or Mr. Washburne has done. Some of us writers—I + can answer for one—have made our Tour of the Fronts with a very + understandable diffidence. For my own part I did not want to go. I evaded + a suggestion that I should go in 1915. I travel badly, I speak French and + Italian with incredible atrocity, and am an extreme Pacifist. I hate + soldiering. And also I did not want to write anything “under instruction”. + It is largely owing to a certain stiffness in the composition of General + Delme-Radcliffe is resolved that Italy shall not feel neglected by the + refusal of the invitation from the Comando Supremo by anyone who from the + perspective of Italy may seem to be a representative of British opinion. + If Herbert Spencer had been alive General Radcliffe would have certainly + made him come, travelling-hammock, ear clips and all—and I am not + above confessing that I wish that Herbert Spencer was alive—for this + purpose. I found Udine warm and gay with memories of Mr. Belloc, Lord + Northcliffe, Mr. Sidney Low, Colonel Repington and Dr. Conan Doyle, and + anticipating the arrival of Mr. Harold Cox. So we pass, mostly in + automobiles that bump tremendously over war roads, a cloud of witnesses + each testifying after his manner. Whatever else has happened, we have all + been photographed with invincible patience and resolution under the + direction of Colonel Barberich in a sunny little court in Udine. + </p> + <p> + My own manner of testifying must be to tell what I have seen and what I + have thought during this extraordinary experience. It has been my natural + disposition to see this war as something purposeful and epic, as it is + great, as an epoch, as “the War that will end War”—but of that last, + more anon. I do not think I am alone in this inclination to a dramatic and + logical interpretation. The caricatures in the French shops show + civilisation (and particularly Marianne) in conflict with a huge and + hugely wicked Hindenburg Ogre. Well, I come back from this tour with + something not so simple as that. If I were to be tied down to one word for + my impression of this war, I should say that this war is <i>Queer.</i> It + is not like anything in a really waking world, but like something in a + dream. It hasn't exactly that clearness of light against darkness or of + good against ill. But it has the quality of wholesome instinct struggling + under a nightmare. The world is not really awake. This vague appeal for + explanations to all sorts of people, this desire to exhibit the business, + to get something in the way of elucidation at present missing, is + extraordinarily suggestive of the efforts of the mind to wake up that will + sometimes occur at a deep crisis. My memory of this tour I have just made + is full of puzzled-looking men. I have seen thousands of <i>poilus</i> + sitting about in cafes, by the roadside, in tents, in trenches, + thoughtful. I have seen Alpini sitting restfully and staring with + speculative eyes across the mountain gulfs towards unseen and + unaccountable enemies. I have seen trainloads of wounded staring out of + the ambulance train windows as we passed. I have seen these dim + intimations of questioning reflection in the strangest juxtapositions; in + Malagasy soldiers resting for a spell among the big shells they were + hoisting into trucks for the front, in a couple of khaki-clad Maoris + sitting upon the step of a horse-van in Amiens station. It is always the + same expression one catches, rather weary, rather sullen, inturned. The + shoulders droop. The very outline is a note of interrogation. They look up + as the privileged tourist of the front, in the big automobile or the + reserved compartment, with his officer or so in charge, passes—importantly. + One meets a pair of eyes that seems to say: “Perhaps <i>you</i> + understand.... + </p> + <p> + “In which case—-...?” + </p> + <p> + It is a part, I think, of this disposition to investigate what makes + everyone collect “specimens” of the war. Everywhere the souvenir forces + itself upon the attention. The homecoming permissionaire brings with him + invariably a considerable weight of broken objects, bits of shell, + cartridge clips, helmets; it is a peripatetic museum. It is as if he hoped + for a clue. It is almost impossible, I have found, to escape these pieces + in evidence. I am the least collecting of men, but I have brought home + Italian cartridges, Austrian cartridges, the fuse of an Austrian shell, a + broken Italian bayonet, and a note that is worth half a franc within the + confines of Amiens. But a large heavy piece of exploded shell that had + been thrust very urgently upon my attention upon the Carso I contrived to + lose during the temporary confusion of our party by the arrival and + explosion of another prospective souvenir in our close proximity. And two + really very large and almost complete specimens of some species of <i>Ammonites</i> + unknown to me, from the hills to the east of the Adige, partially wrapped + in a back number of the <i>Corriere della Sera</i>, that were pressed upon + me by a friendly officer, were unfortunately lost on the line between + Verona and Milan through the gross negligence of a railway porter. But I + doubt if they would have thrown any very conclusive light upon the war. + </p> + <p> + 2 + </p> + <p> + I avow myself an extreme Pacifist. I am against the man who first takes up + the weapon. I carry my pacifism far beyond the ambiguous little group of + British and foreign sentimentalists who pretend so amusingly to be + socialists in the <i>Labour Leader</i>, whose conception of foreign policy + is to give Germany now a peace that would be no more than a breathing time + for a fresh outrage upon civilisation, and who would even make heroes of + the crazy young assassins of the Dublin crime. I do not understand those + people. I do not merely want to stop this war. I want to nail down war in + its coffin. Modern war is an intolerable thing. It is not a thing to + trifle with in this Urban District Council way, it is a thing to end + forever. I have always hated it, so far that is as my imagination enabled + me to realise it; and now that I have been seeing it, sometimes quite + closely for a full month, I hate it more than ever. I never imagined a + quarter of its waste, its boredom, its futility, its desolation. It is + merely a destructive and dispersive instead of a constructive and + accumulative industrialism. It is a gigantic, dusty, muddy, weedy, + bloodstained silliness. It is the plain duty of every man to give his life + and all that he has if by so doing he may help to end it. I hate Germany, + which has thrust this experience upon mankind, as I hate some horrible + infectious disease. The new war, the war on the modern level, is her + invention and her crime. I perceive that on our side and in its broad + outlines, this war is nothing more than a gigantic and heroic effort in + sanitary engineering; an effort to remove German militarism from the life + and regions it has invaded, and to bank it in and discredit and enfeeble + it so that never more will it repeat its present preposterous and horrible + efforts. All human affairs and all great affairs have their reservations + and their complications, but that is the broad outline of the business as + it has impressed itself on my mind and as I find it conceived in the mind + of the average man of the reading class among the allied peoples, and as I + find it understood in the judgement of honest and intelligent neutral + observers. + </p> + <p> + It is my unshakeable belief that essentially the Allies fight for a + permanent world peace, that primarily they do not make war but resist war, + that has reconciled me to this not very congenial experience of touring as + a spectator all agog to see, through the war zones. At any rate there was + never any risk of my playing Balaam and blessing the enemy. This war is + tragedy and sacrifice for most of the world, for the Germans it is simply + the catastrophic outcome of fifty years of elaborate intellectual foolery. + Militarism, Welt Politik, and here we are! What else <i>could</i> have + happened, with Michael and his infernal War Machine in the very centre of + Europe, but this tremendous disaster? + </p> + <p> + It is a disaster. It may be a necessary disaster; it may teach a lesson + that could be learnt in no other way; but for all that, I insist, it + remains waste, disorder, disaster. + </p> + <p> + There is a disposition, I know, in myself as well as in others, to wriggle + away from this verity, to find so much good in the collapse that has come + to the mad direction of Europe for the past half-century as to make it on + the whole almost a beneficial thing. But at most I can find it in no + greater good than the good of a nightmare that awakens the sleeper in a + dangerous place to a realisation of the extreme danger of his sleep. + Better had he been awake—or never there. In Venetia Captain Pirelli, + whose task it was to keep me out of mischief in the war zone, was + insistent upon the way in which all Venetia was being opened up by the new + military roads; there has been scarcely a new road made in Venetia since + Napoleon drove his straight, poplar-bordered highways through the land. M. + Joseph Reinach, who was my companion upon the French front, was equally + impressed by the stirring up and exchange of ideas in the villages due to + the movement of the war. Charles Lamb's story of the discovery of roast + pork comes into one's head with an effect of repartee. More than ideas are + exchanged in the war zone, and it is doubtful how far the sanitary + precautions of the military authorities avails against a considerable + propaganda of disease. A more serious argument for the good of war is that + it evokes heroic qualities that it has brought out almost incredible + quantities of courage, devotion, and individual romance that did not show + in the suffocating peace time that preceded the war. The reckless and + beautiful zeal of the women in the British and French munition factories, + for example, the gaiety and fearlessness of the common soldiers + everywhere; these things have always been there—like champagne + sleeping in bottles in a cellar. But was there any need to throw a bomb + into the cellar? + </p> + <p> + I am reminded of a story, or rather of the idea for a story that I think I + must have read in that curious collection of fantasies and observations, + Hawthorne's <i>Note Book.</i> It was to be the story of a man who found + life dull and his circumstances altogether mediocre. He had loved his + wife, but now after all she seemed to be a very ordinary human being. He + had begun life with high hopes—and life was commonplace. He was to + grow fretful and restless. His discontent was to lead to some action, some + irrevocable action; but upon the nature of that action I do not think the + <i>Note Book</i> was very clear. It was to carry him in such a manner that + he was to forget his wife. Then, when it was too late, he was to see her + at an upper window, stripped and firelit, a glorious thing of light and + loveliness and tragic intensity.... + </p> + <p> + The elementary tales of the world are very few, and Hawthorne's story and + Lamb's story are, after all, only variations upon the same theme. But can + we poor human beings never realise our quality without destruction? + </p> + <p> + 3 + </p> + <p> + One of the larger singularities of the great war is its failure to produce + great and imposing personalities, mighty leaders, Napoleons, Caesars. I + would indeed make that the essential thing in my reckoning of the war. It + is a drama without a hero; without countless incidental heroes no doubt, + but no star part. Even the Germans, with a national predisposition for + hero-cults and living still in an atmosphere of Victorian humbug, can + produce nothing better than that timber image, Hindenburg. + </p> + <p> + It is not that the war has failed to produce heroes so much as that it has + produced heroism in a torrent. The great man of this war is the common + man. It becomes ridiculous to pick out particular names. There are too + many true stories of splendid acts in the past two years ever to be + properly set down. The V.C.'s and the palms do but indicate samples. One + would need an encyclopaedia, a row of volumes, of the gloriousness of + human impulses. The acts of the small men in this war dwarf all the + pretensions of the Great Man. Imperatively these multitudinous heroes + forbid the setting up of effigies. When I was a young man I imitated Swift + and posed for cynicism; I will confess that now at fifty and greatly + helped by this war, I have fallen in love with mankind. + </p> + <p> + But if I had to pick out a single figure to stand for the finest quality + of the Allies' war, I should I think choose the figure of General Joffre. + He is something new in history. He is leadership without vulgar ambition. + He is the extreme antithesis to the Imperial boomster of Berlin. He is as + it were the ordinary common sense of men, incarnate. He is the antithesis + of the effigy. + </p> + <p> + By great good luck I was able to see him. I was delayed in Paris on my way + to Italy, and my friend Captain Millet arranged for a visit to the French + front at Soissons and put me in charge of Lieutenant de Tessin, whom I had + met in England studying British social questions long before this war. + Afterwards Lieutenant de Tessin took me to the great hotel—it still + proclaims “<i>Restaurant</i>” in big black letters on the garden wall—which + shelters the General Headquarters of France, and here I was able to see + and talk to Generals Pelle and Castelnau as well as to General Joffre. + They are three very remarkable and very different men. They have at least + one thing in common; it is clear that not one of them has spent ten + minutes in all his life in thinking of himself as a Personage or Great + Man. They all have the effect of being active and able men doing an + extremely complicated and difficult but extremely interesting job to the + very best of their ability. With me they had all one quality in common. + They thought I was interested in what they were doing, and they were quite + prepared to treat me as an intelligent man of a different sort, and to + show me as much as I could understand.... + </p> + <p> + Let me confess that de Tessin had had to persuade me to go to + Headquarters. Partly that was because I didn't want to use up even ten + minutes of the time of the French commanders, but much more was it because + I have a dread of Personages. + </p> + <p> + There is something about these encounters with personages—as if one + was dealing with an effigy, with something tremendous put up to be seen. + As one approaches they become remoter; great unsuspected crevasses are + discovered. Across these gulfs one makes ineffective gestures. They do not + meet you, they pose at you enormously. Sometimes there is something more + terrible than dignity; there is condescension. They are affable. I had but + recently had an encounter with an imported Colonial statesman, who was + being advertised like a soap as the coming saviour of England. I was + curious to meet him. I wanted to talk to him about all sorts of things + that would have been profoundly interesting, as for example his + impressions of the Anglican bishops. But I met a hoarding. I met a thing + like a mask, something surrounded by touts, that was dully trying—as + we say in London—to “come it” over me. He said he had heard of me. + He had read <i>Kipps.</i> I intimated that though I had written <i>Kipps</i> + I had continued to exist—but he did not see the point of that. I + said certain things to him about the difference in complexity between + political life in Great Britain and the colonies, that he was manifestly + totally capable of understanding. But one could as soon have talked with + one of the statesmen at Madame Tussaud's. An antiquated figure. + </p> + <p> + The effect of these French commanders upon me was quite different from my + encounter with that last belated adventurer in the effigy line. I felt + indeed that I was a rather idle and flimsy person coming into the presence + of a tremendously compact and busy person, but I had none of that + unpleasant sensation of a conventional role, of being expected to play the + minute worshipper in the presence of the Great Image. I was so moved by + the common humanity of them all that in each case I broke away from the + discreet interpretations of de Tessin and talked to them directly in the + strange dialect which I have inadvertently made for myself out of French, + a disemvowelled speech of epicene substantives and verbs of incalculable + moods and temperaments, “<i>Entente Cordiale.</i>” The talked back as if + we had met in a club. General Pelle pulled my leg very gaily with some + quotations from an article I had written upon the conclusion of the war. I + think he found my accent and my idioms very refreshing. I had committed + myself to a statement that Bloch has been justified in his theory that + under modern conditions the defensive wins. There were excellent reasons, + and General Pelle pointed them out, for doubting the applicability of this + to the present war. + </p> + <p> + Both he and General Castelnau were anxious that I should see a French + offensive sector as well as Soissons. Then I should understand. And since + then I have returned from Italy and I have seen and I do understand. The + Allied offensive was winning; that is to say, it was inflicting far + greater losses than it experienced; it was steadily beating the spirit out + of the German army and shoving it back towards Germany. Only peace can, I + believe, prevent the western war ending in Germany. And it is the + Frenchmen mainly who have worked out how to do it. + </p> + <p> + But of that I will write later. My present concern is with General Joffre + as the antithesis of the Effigy. The effigy, + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + “Thou Prince of Peace, + Thou God of War,” + </pre> + <p> + as Mr. Sylvester Viereck called him, prances on a great horse, wears a + Wagnerian cloak, sits on thrones and talks of shining armour and “unser + Gott.” All Germany gloats over his Jovian domesticities; when I was last + in Berlin the postcard shops were full of photographs of a sort of + procession of himself and his sons, all with long straight noses and + sidelong eyes. It is all dreadfully old-fashioned. General Joffre sits in + a pleasant little sitting-room in a very ordinary little villa + conveniently close to Headquarters. He sits among furniture that has no + quality of pose at all, that is neither magnificent nor ostentatiously + simple and hardy. He has dark, rather sleepy eyes under light eyelashes, + eyes that glance shyly and a little askance at his interlocutor and then, + as he talks, away—as if he did not want to be preoccupied by your + attention. He has a broad, rather broadly modelled face, a soft voice, the + sort of persuasive reasoning voice that many Scotchmen have. I had a + feeling that if he were to talk English he would do so with a Scotch + accent. Perhaps somewhere I have met a Scotchman of his type. He sat + sideways to his table as a man might sit for a gossip in a cafe. + </p> + <p> + He is physically a big man, and in my memory he grows bigger and bigger. + He sits now in my memory in a room like the rooms that any decent people + might occupy, like that vague room that is the background of so many good + portraits, a great blue-coated figure with a soft voice and rather tired + eyes, explaining very simply and clearly the difficulties that this vulgar + imperialism of Germany, seizing upon modern science and modern appliances, + has created for France and the spirit of mankind. + </p> + <p> + He talked chiefly of the strangeness of this confounded war. It was + exactly like a sanitary engineer speaking of the unexpected difficulties + of some particularly nasty inundation. He made little stiff horizontal + gestures with his hands. First one had to build a dam and stop the rush of + it, so; then one had to organise the push that would send it back. He + explained the organisation of the push. They had got an organisation now + that was working out most satisfactorily. Had I seen a sector? I had seen + the sector of Soissons. Yes, but that was not now an offensive sector. I + must see an offensive sector; see the whole method. Lieutenant de Tessin + must see that that was arranged.... + </p> + <p> + Neither he nor his two colleagues spoke of the Germans with either + hostility or humanity. Germany for them is manifestly merely an + objectionable Thing. It is not a nation, not a people, but a nuisance. One + has to build up this great counter-thrust bigger and stronger until they + go back. The war must end in Germany. The French generals have no such + delusions about German science or foresight or capacity as dominates the + smart dinner chatter of England. One knows so well that detestable type of + English folly, and its voice of despair: “They <i>plan</i> everything. + They foresee everything.” This paralysing Germanophobia is not common + among the French. The war, the French generals said, might take—well, + it certainly looked like taking longer than the winter. Next summer + perhaps. Probably, if nothing unforeseen occurred, before a full year has + passed the job might be done. Were any surprises in store? They didn't + seem to think it was probable that the Germans had any surprises in + store.... The Germans are not an inventive people; they are merely a + thorough people. One never knew for certain. + </p> + <p> + Is any greater contrast possible than between so implacable, patient, + reasonable—and above all things <i>capable</i>—a being as + General Joffre and the rhetorician of Potsdam, with his talk of German + Might, of Hammer Blows and Hacking Through? Can there be any doubt of the + ultimate issue between them? + </p> + <p> + There are stories that sound pleasantly true to me about General Joffre's + ambitions after the war. He is tired; then he will be very tired. He will, + he declares, spend his first free summer in making a tour of the waterways + of France in a barge. So I hope it may be. One imagines him as sitting + quietly on the crumpled remains of the last and tawdriest of Imperial + traditions, with a fishing line in the placid water and a large buff + umbrella overhead, the good ordinary man who does whatever is given to him + to do—as well as he can. The power that has taken the great effigy + of German imperialism by the throat is something very composite and + complex, but if we personify it at all it is something more like General + Joffre than any other single human figure I can think of or imagine. + </p> + <p> + If I were to set a frontispiece to a book about this War I would make + General Joffre the frontispiece. + </p> + <p> + 4 + </p> + <p> + As we swung back along the dusty road to Paris at a pace of fifty miles an + hour and upwards, driven by a helmeted driver with an aquiline profile fit + to go upon a coin, whose merits were a little flawed by a childish and + dangerous ambition to run over every cat he saw upon the road, I talked to + de Tessin about this big blue-coated figure of Joffre, which is not so + much a figure as a great generalisation of certain hitherto rather + obscured French qualities, and of the impression he had made upon me. And + from that I went on to talk about the Super Man, for this encounter had + suddenly crystallised out a set of realisations that had been for some + time latent in my mind. + </p> + <p> + How much of what follows I said to de Tessin at the time I do not clearly + remember, but this is what I had in mind. + </p> + <p> + The idea of the superman is an idea that has been developed by various + people ignorant of biology and unaccustomed to biological ways of + thinking. It is an obvious idea that follows in the course of half an hour + or so upon one's realisation of the significance of Darwinism. If man has + evolved from something different, he must now be evolving onward into + something sur-human. The species in the future will be different from the + species of the past. So far at least our Nietzsches and Shaws and so on + went right. + </p> + <p> + But being ignorant of the elementary biological proposition that + modification of a species means really a secular change in its average, + they jumped to a conclusion—to which the late Lord Salisbury also + jumped years ago at a very memorable British Association meeting—that + a species is modified by the sudden appearance of eccentric individuals + here and there in the general mass who interbreed—preferentially. + Helped by a streak of antic egotism in themselves, they conceived of the + superman as a posturing personage, misunderstood by the vulgar, fantastic, + wonderful. But the antic Personage, the thing I have called the Effigy, is + not new but old, the oldest thing in history, the departing thing. It + depends not upon the advance of the species but upon the uncritical + hero-worship of the crowd. You may see the monster drawn twenty times the + size of common men upon the oldest monuments of Egypt and Assyria. The + true superman comes not as the tremendous personal entry of a star, but in + the less dramatic form of a general increase of goodwill and skill and + common sense. A species rises not by thrusting up peaks but by the + brimming up as a flood does. The coming of the superman means not an + epidemic of personages but the disappearance of the Personage in the + universal ascent. That is the point overlooked by the megalomaniac school + of Nietzsche and Shaw. + </p> + <p> + And it is the peculiarity of this war, it is the most reassuring evidence + that a great increase in general ability and critical ability has been + going on throughout the last century, that no isolated great personages + have emerged. Never has there been so much ability, invention, + inspiration, leadership; but the very abundance of good qualities has + prevented our focusing upon those of any one individual. We all play our + part in the realisation of God's sanity in the world, but, as the strange, + dramatic end of Lord Kitchener has served to remind us, there is no single + individual of all the allied nations whose death can materially affect the + great destinies of this war. + </p> + <p> + In the last few years I have developed a religious belief that has become + now to me as real as any commonplace fact. I think that mankind is still + as it were collectively dreaming and hardly more awakened to reality than + a very young child. It has these dreams that we express by the flags of + nationalities and by strange loyalties and by irrational creeds and + ceremonies, and its dreams at times become such nightmares as this war. + But the time draws near when mankind will awake and the dreams will fade + away, and then there will be no nationality in all the world but humanity, + and no kind, no emperor, nor leader but the one God of mankind. This is my + faith. I am as certain of this as I was in 1900 that men would presently + fly. To me it is as if it must be so. + </p> + <p> + So that to me this extraordinary refusal of the allied nations under + conditions that have always hitherto produced a Great Man to produce + anything of the sort, anything that can be used as an effigy and carried + about for the crowd to follow, is a fact of extreme significance and + encouragement. It seems to me that the twilight of the half gods must have + come, that we have reached the end of the age when men needed a Personal + Figure about which they could rally. The Kaiser is perhaps the last of + that long series of crowned and cloaked and semi-divine personages which + has included Caesar and Alexander and Napoleon the First—and Third. + In the light of the new time we see the emperor-god for the guy he is. In + the August of 1914 he set himself up to be the paramount Lord of the + World, and it will seem to the historian to come, who will know our dates + so well and our feelings, our fatigues and efforts so little, it will seem + a short period from that day to this, when the great figure already sways + and staggers towards the bonfire. + </p> + <p> + 5 + </p> + <p> + I had the experience of meeting a contemporary king upon this journey. He + was the first king I had ever met. The Potsdam figure—with perhaps + some local exceptions behind the Gold Coast—is, with its collection + of uniforms and its pomps and splendours, the purest survival of the old + tradition of divine monarchy now that the Emperor at Pekin has followed + the Shogun into the shadows. The modern type of king shows a disposition + to intimate at the outset that he cannot help it, and to justify or at any + rate utilise his exceptional position by sound hard work. It is an age of + working kings, with the manners of private gentlemen. The King of Italy + for example is far more accessible than was the late Pierpont Morgan or + the late Cecil Rhodes, and he seems to keep a smaller court. + </p> + <p> + I went to see him from Udine. He occupied a moderate-sized country villa + about half an hour by automobile from headquarters. I went over with + General Radcliffe; we drove through the gates of the villa past a single + sentinel in an ordinary infantry uniform, up to the door of the house, and + the number of guards, servants, attendants, officials, secretaries, + ministers and the like that I saw in that house were—I counted very + carefully—four. Downstairs were three people, a tall soldier of the + bodyguard in grey; an A.D.C., Captain Moreno, and Col. Matteoli, the + minister of the household. I went upstairs to a drawing-room of much the + same easy and generalised character as the one in which I had met General + Joffre a few days before. I gave my hat to a second bodyguard, and as I + did so a pleasantly smiling man appeared at the door of the study whom I + thought at first must be some minister in attendance. I did not recognise + him instantly because on the stamps and coins he is always in profile. He + began to talk in excellent English about my journey, and I replied, and so + talking we went into the study from which he had emerged. Then I realised + I was talking to the king. + </p> + <p> + Addicted as I am to the cinematograph, in which the standard of study + furniture is particularly rich and high, I found something very cooling + and simple and refreshing in the sight of the king's study furniture. He + sat down with me at a little useful writing table, and after asking me + what I had seen in Italy and hearing what I had seen and what I was to + see, he went on talking, very good talk indeed. + </p> + <p> + I suppose I did a little exceed the established tradition of courts by + asking several questions and trying to get him to talk upon certain points + as to which I was curious, but I perceived that he had had to carry on at + least so much of the regal tradition as to control the conversation. He + was, however, entirely un-posed. His talk reminded me somehow of Maurice + Baring's books; it had just the same quick, positive understanding. And he + had just the same detachment from the war as the French generals. He spoke + of it—as one might speak of an inundation. And of its difficulties + and perplexities. + </p> + <p> + Here on the Adriatic side there were political entanglements that by + comparison made our western after-the-war problems plain sailing. He + talked of the game of spellicans among the Balkan nationalities. How was + that difficulty to be met? In Macedonia there were Turkish villages that + were Christian and Bulgarians that were Moslem. There were families that + changed the termination of their names from <i>ski</i> to <i>off</i> as + Serbian or Bulgarian prevailed. I remarked that that showed a certain + passion for peace, and that much of the mischief might be due to the + propaganda of the great Powers. I have a prejudice against that blessed + Whig “principle of nationality,” but the King of Italy was not to be drawn + into any statement about that. He left the question with his admission of + its extreme complexity. + </p> + <p> + He went on to talk of the strange contrasts of war, of such things as the + indifference of the birds to gunfire and desolation. One day on the Carso + he had been near the newly captured Austrian trenches, and suddenly from + amidst a scattered mass of Austrian bodies a quail had risen that had + struck him as odd, and so too had the sight of a pack of cards and a wine + flask on some newly-made graves. The ordinary life was a very <i>obstinate</i> + thing.... + </p> + <p> + He talked of the courage of modern men. He was astonished at the quickness + with which they came to disregard shrapnel. And they were so quietly + enduring when they were wounded. He had seen a lot of the wounded, and he + had expected much groaning and crying out. But unless a man is hit in the + head and goes mad he does not groan or scream! They are just brave. If you + ask them how they feel it is always one of two things: either they say + quietly that they are very bad or else they say there is nothing the + matter.... + </p> + <p> + He spoke as if these were mere chance observations, but everyone tells me + that nearly every day the king is at the front and often under fire. He + has taken more risks in a week than the Potsdam War Lord has taken since + the war began. He keeps himself acutely informed upon every aspect of the + war. He was a little inclined to fatalism, he confessed. There were two + stories current of two families of four sons, in each three had been + killed and in each there was an attempt to put the fourth in a place of + comparative safety. In one case a general took the fourth son in as an + attendant and embarked upon a ship that was immediately torpedoed; in the + other the fourth son was killed by accident while he was helping to carry + dinner in a rest camp. From those stories we came to the question whether + the uneducated Italians were more superstitious than the uneducated + English; the king thought they were much less so. That struck me as a + novel idea. But then he thought that English rural people believe in + witches and fairies. + </p> + <p> + I have given enough of this talk to show the quality of this king of the + new dispensation. It was, you see, the sort of easy talk one might hear + from fine-minded people anywhere. When we had done talking he came to the + door of the study with me and shook hands and went back to his desk—with + that gesture of return to work which is very familiar and sympathetic to a + writer, and with no gesture of regality at all. + </p> + <p> + Just to complete this impression let me repeat a pleasant story about this + king and our Prince of Wales, who recently visited the Italian front. The + Prince is a source of anxiety on these visits; he has a very strong and + very creditable desire to share the ordinary risks of war. He is keenly + interested, and unobtrusively bent upon getting as near the fighting as + line as possible. But the King of Italy was firm upon keeping him out of + anything more than the most incidental danger. “We don't want any + historical incidents here,” he said. I think that might well become an + historical phrase. For the life of the Effigy is a series of historical + incidents. + </p> + <p> + 6 + </p> + <p> + Manifestly one might continue to multiply portraits of fine people working + upon this great task of breaking and ending the German aggression, the + German legend, the German effigy, and the effigy business generally; the + thesis being that the Allies have no effigy. One might fill a thick volume + with pictures of men up the scale and down working loyally and devotedly + upon the war, to make this point clear that the essential king and the + essential loyalty of our side is the commonsense of mankind. + </p> + <p> + There comes into my head as a picture at the other extreme of this series, + a memory of certain trenches I visited on my last day in France. They were + trenches on an offensive front; they were not those architectural + triumphs, those homes from home, that grow to perfection upon the less + active sections of the great line. They had been first made by men who had + run rapidly forward with spade and rifle, stooping as they ran, who had + dropped into the craters of big shells, who had organised these chiefly at + night and dug the steep ditches sideways to join up into continuous + trenches. Now they were pushing forward saps into No Man's Land, linking + them across, and so continually creeping nearer to the enemy and a + practicable jumping-off place for an attack. (It has been made since; the + village at which I peeped was in our hands a week later.) These trenches + were dug into a sort of yellowish sandy clay; the dug-outs were mere holes + in the earth that fell in upon the clumsy; hardly any timber had been got + up the line; a storm might flood them at any time a couple of feet deep + and begin to wash the sides. Overnight they had been “strafed” and there + had been a number of casualties; there were smashed rifles about and a + smashed-up machine gun emplacement, and the men were dog-tired and many of + them sleeping like logs, half buried in clay. Some slept on the firing + steps. As one went along one became aware ever and again of two or three + pairs of clay-yellow feet sticking out of a clay hole, and peering down + one saw the shapes of men like rudely modelled earthen images of soldiers, + motionless in the cave. + </p> + <p> + I came round the corner upon a youngster with an intelligent face and + steady eyes sitting up on the firing step, awake and thinking. We looked + at one another. There are moments when mind leaps to mind. It is natural + for the man in the trenches suddenly confronted by so rare a beast as a + middle-aged civilian with an enquiring expression, to feel oneself + something of a spectacle and something generalised. It is natural for the + civilian to look rather in the vein of saying, “Well, how do you take it?” + As I pushed past him we nodded slightly with an effect of mutual + understanding. And we said with our nods just exactly what General Joffre + had said with his horizontal gestures of the hand and what the King of + Italy conveyed by his friendly manner; we said to each other that here was + the trouble those Germans had brought upon us and here was the task that + had to be done. + </p> + <p> + Our guide to these trenches was a short, stocky young man, a cob; with a + rifle and a tight belt and projecting skirts and a helmet, a queer little + figure that, had you seen it in a picture a year or so before the war, you + would most certainly have pronounced Chinese. He belonged to a + Northumbrian battalion; it does not matter exactly which. As we returned + from this front line, trudging along the winding path through the barbed + wire tangles before the smashed and captured German trench that had been + taken a fortnight before, I fell behind my guardian captain and had a + brief conversation wit this individual. He was a lad in the early + twenties, weather-bit and with bloodshot eyes. He was, he told me, a + miner. I asked my stock question in such cases, whether he would go back + to the old work after the war. He said he would, and then added—with + the events of overnight on his mind: “If A'hm looky.” + </p> + <p> + Followed a little silence. Then I tried my second stock remark for such + cases. One does not talk to soldiers at the front in this war of Glory or + the “Empire on which the sun never sets” or “the meteor flag of England” + or of King and Country or any of those fine old headline things. On the + desolate path that winds about amidst the shell craters and the fragments + and the red-rusted wire, with the silken shiver of passing shells in the + air and the blue of the lower sky continually breaking out into eddying + white puffs, it is wonderful how tawdry such panoplies of the effigy + appear. We knew that we and our allies are upon a greater, graver, more + fundamental business than that sort of thing now. We are very near the + waking point. + </p> + <p> + “Well,” I said, “it's got to be done.” + </p> + <p> + “Aye,” he said, easing the strap of his rifle a little; “it's got to be + done.” + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0002" id="link2H_4_0002"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + THE WAR IN ITALY (AUGUST, 1916) + </h2> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0003" id="link2H_4_0003"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + I. THE ISONZO FRONT + </h2> + <p> + 1 + </p> + <p> + My first impressions of the Italian war centre upon Udine. So far I had + had only a visit to Soissons on an exceptionally quiet day and the sound + of a Zeppelin one night in Essex for all my experience of actual warfare. + But my bedroom at the British mission in Udine roused perhaps extravagant + expectations. There were holes in the plaster ceiling and wall, betraying + splintered laths, holes, that had been caused by a bomb that had burst and + killed several people in the little square outside. Such excitements seem + to be things of the past now in Udine. Udine keeps itself dark nowadays, + and the Austrian sea-planes, which come raiding the Italian coast country + at night very much in the same aimless, casually malignant way in which + the Zeppelins raid England, apparently because there is nothing else for + them to do, find it easier to locate Venice. + </p> + <p> + My earlier rides in Venetia began always with the level roads of the + plain, roads frequently edged by watercourses, with plentiful willows + beside the road, vines and fields of Indian corn and suchlike lush crops. + Always quite soon one came to some old Austrian boundary posts; almost + everywhere the Italians are fighting upon what is technically enemy + territory, but nowhere does it seem a whit less Italian than the plain of + Lombardy. When at last I motored away from Udine to the northern mountain + front I passed through Campo-Formio and saw the white-faced inn at which + Napoleon dismembered the ancient republic of Venice and bartered away this + essential part of Italy into foreign control. It just gravitates back now—as + though there had been no Napoleon. + </p> + <p> + And upon the roads and beside them was the enormous equipment of a modern + army advancing. Everywhere I saw new roads being made, railways pushed up, + vast store dumps, hospitals; everywhere the villages swarmed with grey + soldiers; everywhere our automobile was threading its way and taking + astonishing risks among interminable processions of motor lorries, strings + of ambulances or of mule carts, waggons with timber, waggons with wire, + waggons with men's gear, waggons with casks, waggons discreetly veiled, + columns of infantry, cavalry, batteries <i>en route.</i> Every waggon that + goes up full comes back empty, and many wounded were coming down and + prisoners and troops returning to rest. Goritzia had been taken a week or + so before my arrival; the Isonzo had been crossed and the Austrians driven + back across the Carso for several miles; all the resources of Italy seemed + to be crowding up to make good these gains and gather strength for the + next thrust. The roads under all this traffic remained wonderful; gangs of + men were everywhere repairing the first onset of wear, and Italy is the + most fortunate land in the world for road metal; her mountains are solid + road metal, and in this Venetian plain you need but to scrape through a + yard of soil to find gravel. + </p> + <p> + One travelled through a choking dust under the blue sky, and above the + steady incessant dusty succession of lorry, lorry, lorry, lorry that + passed one by, one saw, looking up, the tree tops, house roofs, or the + solid Venetian campanile of this or that wayside village. Once as we were + coming out of the great grey portals of that beautiful old relic of a + former school of fortification, Palmanova, the traffic became suddenly + bright yellow, and for a kilometre or so we were passing nothing but + Sicilian mule carts loaded with hay. These carts seem as strange among the + grey shapes of modern war transport as a Chinese mandarin in painted silk + would be. They are the most individual of things, all two-wheeled, all + bright yellow and the same size it is true, but upon each there are they + gayest of little paintings, such paintings as one sees in England at times + upon an ice-cream barrow. Sometimes the picture will present a scriptural + subject, sometimes a scene of opera, sometimes a dream landscape or a + trophy of fruits or flowers, and the harness—now much out of repair—is + studded with brass. Again and again I have passed strings of these gay + carts; all Sicily must be swept of them. + </p> + <p> + Through the dust I came to Aquileia, which is now an old cathedral, built + upon the remains of a very early basilica, standing in a space in a + scattered village. But across this dusty space there was carried the head + of the upstart Maximinus who murdered Alexander Severus, and later + Aquileia brought Attila near to despair. Our party alighted; we inspected + a very old mosaic floor which has been uncovered since the Austrian + retreat. The Austrian priests have gone too, and their Italian successors + are already tracing out a score of Roman traces that it was the Austrian + custom to minimise. Captain Pirelli refreshed my historical memories; it + was rather like leaving a card on Gibbon <i>en route</i> for contemporary + history. + </p> + <p> + By devious routes I went on to certain batteries of big guns which had + played their part in hammering the Austrian left above Monfalcone across + an arm of the Adriatic, and which were now under orders to shift and move + up closer. The battery was the most unobtrusive of batteries; its one + desire seemed to be to appear a simple piece of woodland in the eye of God + and the aeroplane. I went about the network of railways and paths under + the trees that a modern battery requires, and came presently upon a great + gun that even at the first glance seemed a little less carefully hidden + than its fellows. Then I saw that it was a most ingenious dummy made of a + tree and logs and so forth. It was in the emplacement of a real gun that + had been located; it had its painted sandbags about it just the same, and + it felt itself so entirely a part of the battery that whenever its + companions fired t burnt a flash and kicked up a dust. It was an excellent + example of the great art of camouflage which this war has developed. + </p> + <p> + I went on through the wood to a shady observation post high in a tree, + into which I clambered with my guide. I was able from this position to get + a very good idea of the lie of the Italian eastern front. I was in the + delta of the Isonzo. Directly in front of me were some marshes and the + extreme tip of the Adriatic Sea, at the head of which was Monfalcone, now + in Italian hands. Behind Monfalcone ran the red ridge of the Carso, of + which the Italians had just captured the eastern half. Behind this again + rose the mountains to the east of the Isonzo which the Austrians still + held. The Isonzo came towards me from out of the mountains, in a great + westward curve. Fifteen or sixteen miles away where it emerged from the + mountains lay the pleasant and prosperous town of Goritzia, and at the + westward point of the great curve was Sagrado with its broken bridge. The + battle of Goritzia was really not fought at Goritzia at all. What happened + was the brilliant and bloody storming of Mounts Podgora and Sabotino on + the western side of the river above Goritzia, and simultaneously a + crossing at Sagrado below Goritzia and a magnificent rush up the plateau + and across the plateau of the Carso. Goritzia itself was not organised for + defence, and the Austrians were so surprised by the rapid storm of the + mountains to the north-west of it and of the Carso to the south-east, that + they made no fight in the town itself. + </p> + <p> + As a consequence when I visited it I found it very little injured—compared, + that is, with such other towns as have been fought through. Here and there + the front of a house has been knocked in by an Austrian shell, or a + lamp-post prostrated. But the road bridge had suffered a good deal; its + iron parapet was twisted about by shell bursts and interwoven with young + trees and big boughs designed to screen the passer-by from the observation + of the Austrian gunners upon Monte Santo. Here and there were huge holes + through which one could look down upon the blue trickles of water in the + stony river bed far below. The driver of our automobile displayed what + seemed to me an extreme confidence in the margins of these gaps, but his + confidence was justified. At Sagrado the bridge had been much more + completely demolished; no effort had been made to restore the horizontal + roadway, but one crossed by a sort of timber switchback that followed the + ups and downs of the ruins. + </p> + <p> + It is not in these places that one must look for the real destruction of + modern war. The real fight on the left of Goritzia went through the + village of Lucinico up the hill of Podgora. Lucinico is nothing more than + a heap of grey stones; except for a bit of the church wall and the gable + end of a house one cannot even speak of it as ruins. But in one place + among the rubble I saw the splintered top and a leg of a grand piano. + Podgora hill, which was no doubt once neatly terraced and cultivated, is + like a scrap of landscape from some airless, treeless planet. Still more + desolate was the scene upon the Carso to the right (south) of Goritzia. + Both San Martino and Doberdo are destroyed beyond the limits of ruination. + The Carso itself is a waterless upland with but a few bushy trees; it must + always have been a desolate region, but now it is an indescribable + wilderness of shell craters, smashed-up Austrian trenches, splintered + timber, old iron, rags, and that rusty thorny vileness of man's invention, + worse than all the thorns and thickets of nature, barbed wire. There are + no dead visible; the wounded have been cleared away; but about the + trenches and particularly near some of the dug-outs there was a faint + repulsive smell.... + </p> + <p> + Yet into this wilderness the Italians are now thrusting a sort of order. + The German is a wonderful worker, they say on the Anglo-French front that + he makes his trenches by way of resting, but I doubt if he can touch the + Italian at certain forms of toil. All the way up to San Martino and + beyond, swarms of workmen were making one of those carefully graded roads + that the Italians make better than any other people. Other swarms were + laying water-pipes. For upon the Carso there are neither roads nor water, + and before the Italians can thrust farther both must be brought up to the + front. + </p> + <p> + As we approached San Martino an Austrian aeroplane made its presence felt + overhead by dropping a bomb among the tents of some workmen, in a little + scrubby wood on the hillside near at hand. One heard the report and turned + to see the fragments flying and the dust. Probably they got someone. And + then, after a little pause, the encampment began to spew out men; here, + there and everywhere they appeared among the tents, running like rabbits + at evening-time, down the hill. Soon after and probably in connection with + this signal, Austrian shells began to come over. They do not use shrapnel + because the rocky soil of Italy makes that unnecessary. They fire a sort + of shell that goes bang and releases a cloud of smoke overhead, and then + drops a parcel of high explosive that bursts on the ground. The ground + leaps into red dust and smoke. But these things are now to be seen on the + cinema. Forthwith the men working on the road about us begin to down tools + and make for the shelter trenches, a long procession going at a steady but + resolute walk. Then like a blow in the chest came the bang of a big + Italian gun somewhere close at hand.... + </p> + <p> + Along about four thousand miles of the various fronts this sort of thing + was going on that morning.... + </p> + <p> + 2 + </p> + <p> + This Carso front is the practicable offensive front of Italy. From the + left wing on the Isonzo along the Alpine boundary round to the Swiss + boundary there is mountain warfare like nothing else in the world; it is + warfare that pushes the boundary backward, but it is mountain warfare that + will not, for so long a period that the war will be over first, hold out + any hopeful prospects of offensive movements on a large scale against + Austria or Germany. It is a short distance as the crow flies from Rovereto + to Munich, but not as the big gun travels. The Italians, therefore, as + their contribution to the common effort, are thrusting rather eastwardly + towards the line of the Julian Alps through Carinthia and Carniola. From + my observation post in the tree near Monfalcone I saw Trieste away along + the coast to my right. It looked scarcely as distant as Folkestone from + Dungeness. The Italian advanced line is indeed scarcely ten miles from + Trieste. But the Italians are not, I think, going to Trieste just yet. + That is not the real game now. They are playing loyally with the Allies + for the complete defeat of the Central Powers, and that is to be achieved + striking home into Austria. Meanwhile there is no sense in knocking + Trieste to pieces, or using Italians instead of Austrian soldiers to + garrison it. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0004" id="link2H_4_0004"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + II. THE MOUNTAIN WAR + </h2> + <p> + 1 + </p> + <p> + The mountain warfare of Italy is extraordinarily unlike that upon any + other front. From the Isonzo to the Swiss frontier we are dealing with + high mountains, cut by deep valleys between which there is usually no + practicable lateral communication. Each advance must have the nature of an + unsupported shove along a narrow channel, until the whole mountain system, + that is, is won, and the attack can begin to deploy in front of the + passes. Geographically Austria has the advantage. She had the gentler + slope of the mountain chains while Italy has the steep side, and the + foresight of old treaties has given her deep bites into what is naturally + Italian territory; she is far nearer the Italian plain than Italy is near + any practicable fighting ground for large forces; particularly is this the + case in the region of the Adige valley and Lake Garda. + </p> + <p> + The legitimate war, so to speak, in this region is a mountaineering war. + The typical position is roughly as follows. The Austrians occupy valley A + which opens northward; the Italians occupy valley B which opens southward. + The fight is for the crest between A and B. The side that wins that crest + gains the power of looking down into, firing into and outflanking the + positions of the enemy valley. In most cases it is the Italians now who + are pressing, and if the reader will examine a map of the front and + compare it with the official reports he will soon realise that almost + everywhere the Italians are up to the head of the southward valleys and + working over the crests so as to press down upon the Austrian valleys. But + in the Trentino the Austrians are still well over the crest on the + southward slopes. When I was in Italy they still held Rovereto. + </p> + <p> + Now it cannot be said that under modern conditions mountains favour either + the offensive or the defensive. But they certainly make operations far + more deliberate than upon a level. An engineered road or railway in an + Alpine valley is the most vulnerable of things; its curves and viaducts + may be practically demolished by shell fire or swept by shrapnel, although + you hold the entire valley except for one vantage point. All the mountains + round about a valley must be won before that valley is safe for the + transport of an advance. But on the other hand a surprise capture of some + single mountain crest and the hoisting of one gun into position there may + block the retreat of guns and material from a great series of positions. + Mountain surfaces are extraordinarily various and subtle. You may + understand Picardy on a map, but mountain warfare is three-dimensional. A + struggle may go on for weeks or months consisting of apparently separate + and incidental skirmishes, and then suddenly a whole valley organisation + may crumble away in retreat or disaster. Italy is gnawing into the + Trentino day by day, and particularly around by her right wing. At no time + I shall be surprised to see a sudden lunge forward on that front, and hear + a tale of guns and prisoners. This will not mean that she has made a + sudden attack, but that some system of Austrian positions has collapsed + under her continual pressure. + </p> + <p> + Such briefly is the <i>idea</i> of mountain struggle. Its realities, I + should imagine, are among the strangest and most picturesque in all this + tremendous world conflict. I know nothing of the war in the east, of + course, but there are things here that must be hard to beat. Happily they + will soon get justice done to them by an abler pen than mine. I hear that + Kipling is to follow me upon this ground; nothing can be imagined more + congenial to his extraordinary power of vivid rendering than this struggle + against cliffs, avalanches, frost and the Austrian. + </p> + <p> + To go the Italian round needs, among other things, a good head. Everywhere + it has been necessary to make roads where hitherto there have been only + mule tracks or no tracks at all; the roads are often still in the making, + and the automobile of the war tourist skirts precipices and takes hairpin + bends upon tracks of loose metal not an inch too broad for the operation, + or it floats for a moment over the dizzy edge while a train of mule + transport blunders by. The unruly imagination of man's heart (which is + “only evil continually”) speculates upon what would be the consequences of + one good bump from the wheel of a mule cart. Down below, the trees that + one sees through a wisp of cloud look far too small and spiky and + scattered to hold out much hope for a fallen man of letters. And at the + high positions they are too used to the vertical life to understand the + secret feelings of the visitor from the horizontal. General Bompiani, + whose writings are well known to all English students of military matters, + showed me the Gibraltar he is making of a great mountain system east of + the Adige. + </p> + <p> + “Let me show you,” he said, and flung himself on to the edge of the + precipice into exactly the position of a lady riding side-saddle. “You + will find it more comfortable to sit down.” + </p> + <p> + But anxious as I am abroad not to discredit my country by unseemly + exhibitions I felt unequal to such gymnastics without a proper rehearsal + at a lower level. I seated myself carefully at a yard (perhaps it was a + couple of yards) from the edge, advanced on my trousers without dignity to + the verge, and so with an effort thrust my legs over to dangle in the + crystalline air. + </p> + <p> + “That,” proceeded General Bompiani, pointing with a giddy flourish of his + riding whip, “is Monte Tomba.” + </p> + <p> + I swayed and half-extended my hand towards him. But he was still there—sitting, + so to speak, on the half of himself.... I was astonished that he did not + disappear abruptly during his exposition.... + </p> + <p> + 2 + </p> + <p> + The fighting man in the Dolomites has been perhaps the most wonderful of + all these separate campaigns. I went up by automobile as far as the + clambering new road goes up the flanks of Tofana No. 2; thence for a time + by mule along the flank of Tofana No. 1, and thence on foot to the + vestiges of the famous Castelletto. + </p> + <p> + The aspect of these mountains is particularly grim and wicked; they are + worn old mountains, they tower overhead in enormous vertical cliffs of + sallow grey, with the square jointings and occasional clefts and gullies, + their summits are toothed and jagged; the path ascends and passes round + the side of the mountain upon loose screes, which descend steeply to a + lower wall of precipices. In the distance rise other harsh and + desolate-looking mountain masses, with shining occasional scars of old + snow. Far below is a bleak valley of stunted pine trees through which + passes the road of the Dolomites. + </p> + <p> + As I ascended the upper track two bandages men were coming down on led + mules. It was mid-August, and they were suffering from frostbite. Across + the great gap between the summits a minute traveller with some provisions + was going up by wire to some post upon the crest. For everywhere upon the + icy pinnacles are observation posts directing the fire of the big guns on + the slopes below, or machine-gun stations, or little garrisons that sit + and wait through the bleak days. Often they have no link with the world + below but a precipitous climb or a “teleferic” wire. Snow and frost may + cut them off absolutely for weeks from the rest of mankind. The sick and + wounded must begin their journey down to help and comfort in a giddy + basket that swings down to the head of the mule track below. + </p> + <p> + Originally all these crests were in Austrian hands; they were stormed by + the Alpini under almost incredible conditions. For fifteen days, for + example, they fought their way up these screes on the flanks of Tofana No. + 2 to the ultimate crags, making perhaps a hundred metres of ascent each + day, hiding under rocks and in holes in the daylight and receiving fresh + provisions and ammunition and advancing by night. They were subjected to + rifle fire, machine-gun fire and bombs of a peculiar sort, big iron balls + of the size of a football filled with explosive that were just flung down + the steep. They dodged flares and star shells. At one place they went up a + chimney that would be far beyond the climbing powers of any but a very + active man. It must have been like storming the skies. The dead and + wounded rolled away often into inaccessible ravines. Stray skeletons, rags + of uniform, fragments of weapons, will add to the climbing interest of + these gaunt masses for many years to come. In this manner it was that + Tofana No. 2 was taken. + </p> + <p> + Now the Italians are organising this prize, and I saw winding up far above + me on the steep grey slope a multitudinous string of little things that + looked like black ants, each carrying a small bright yellow egg. They were + mules bringing back balks of timber.... + </p> + <p> + But one position held out invincibly; this was the Castelletto, a great + natural fortress of rock standing out at an angle of the mountain in such + a position that it commanded the Italian communications (the Dolomite + road) in the valley below, and rendered all their positions uncomfortable + and insecure. This obnoxious post was practically inaccessible either from + above or below, and it barred the Italians even from looking into the Val + Travenanzes which it defended. It was, in fact, an impregnable position, + and against it was pitted the invincible 5th Group of the Alpini. It was + the old problem of the irresistible force in conflict with the immovable + object. And the outcome has been the biggest military mine in all history. + </p> + <p> + The business began in January, 1916, with surveys of the rock in question. + The work of surveying for excavations, never a very simple one, becomes + much more difficult when the site is occupied by hostile persons with + machine guns. In March, as the winter's snows abated, the boring machinery + began to arrive, by mule as far as possible and then by hand. Altogether + about half a kilometre of gallery had to be made to the mine chamber, and + meanwhile the explosive was coming up load by load and resting first here, + then there, in discreetly chosen positions. There were at the last + thirty-five tons of it in the inner chamber. And while the boring machines + bored and the work went on, Lieutenant Malvezzi was carefully working out + the problem of “il massimo effetto dirompimento” and deciding exactly how + to pack and explode his little hoard. On the eleventh of July, at 3.30, as + he rejoices to state in his official report, “the mine responded perfectly + both in respect of the calculations made and of the practical effects,” + that is to say, the Austrians were largely missing and the Italians were + in possession of the crater of the Castelletto and looking down the Val + Travenanzes from which they had been barred for so long. Within a month + things had been so tidied up, and secured by further excavations and + sandbags against hostile fire, that even a middle-aged English writer, + extremely fagged and hot and breathless, could enjoy the same privilege. + All this, you must understand, had gone on at a level to which the + ordinary tourist rarely climbs, in a rarefied, chest-tightening + atmosphere, with wisps of clouds floating in the clear air below and + club-huts close at hand.... + </p> + <p> + Among these mountains avalanches are frequent; and they come down + regardless of human strategy. In many cases the trenches cross avalanche + tracks; they and the men in them are periodically swept away and + periodically replaced. They are positions that must be held; if the + Italians will not face such sacrifices, the Austrians will. Avalanches and + frostbite have slain and disabled their thousands; they have accounted + perhaps for as many Italians in this austere and giddy campaign as the + Austrians.... + </p> + <p> + 3 + </p> + <p> + It seems to be part of the stern resolve of Fate that this, the greatest + of wars, shall be the least glorious; it is manifestly being decided not + by victories but by blunders. It is indeed a history of colossal + stupidities. Among the most decisive of these blunders, second only + perhaps of the blunder of the Verdun attack and far outshining the wild + raid of the British towards Bagdad, was the blunder of the Trentino + offensive. It does not need the equipment of a military expert, it demands + only quite ordinary knowledge and average intelligence, to realise the + folly of that Austrian adventure. There is some justification for a claim + that the decisive battle of the war was fought upon the soil of Italy. + There is still more justification for saying that it might have been. + </p> + <p> + There was only one good point about the Austrian thrust. No one could have + foretold it. And it did so completely surprise the Italians as to catch + them without any prepared line of positions in the rear. On the very eve + of the big Russian offensive, the Austrians thrust eighteen divisions hard + at the Trentino frontier. The Italian posts were then in Austrian + territory; they held on the left wing and the right, but they were driven + by the sheer weight of men and guns in the centre; they lost guns and + prisoners because of the difficulty of mountain retreats to which I have + alluded, and the Austrians pouring through reached not indeed the plain of + Venetia, but to the upland valleys immediately above it, to Asiago and + Arsiero. They probably saw the Venetian plain through gaps in the hills, + but they were still separated from it even at Arsiero by what are + mountains to an English eye, mountains as high as Snowdon. But the + Italians of such beautiful old places and Vicenza, Marostica, and Bassano + could watch the Austrian shells bursting on the last line of hills above + the plain, and I have no doubt they felt extremely uneasy. + </p> + <p> + As one motors through these ripe and beautiful towns and through the rich + valleys that link them—it is a smiling land abounding in old castles + and villas, Vicenza is a rich museum of Palladio's architecture and + Bassano is full of irreplaceable painted buildings—one feels that + the things was a narrow escape, but from the military point of view it was + merely an insane escapade. The Austrians had behind them—and some + way behind them—one little strangulated railway and no good pass + road; their right was held at Pasubio, their left was similarly bent back. + In front of them was between twice and three times their number of first + class troops, with an unlimited equipment. If they had surmounted that + last mountain crest they would have come down to almost certain + destruction in the plain. They could never have got back. For a time it + was said that General Cadorna considered that possibility. From the point + of view of purely military considerations, the Trentino offensive should + perhaps have ended in the capitulation of Vicenza. + </p> + <p> + I will confess I am glad it did not do so. This tour of the fronts has + made me very sad and weary with a succession of ruins. I can bear no more + ruins unless they are the ruins of Dusseldorf, Cologne, Berlin, or + suchlike modern German city. Anxious as I am to be a systematic + Philistine, to express my preference for Marinetti over the Florentine + British and generally to antagonise aesthetic prigs, I rejoiced over that + sunlit land as one might rejoice over a child saved from beasts. + </p> + <p> + On the hills beyond Schio I walked out through the embrasure of a big gun + in a rock gallery, and saw the highest points upon the hillside to which + the Austrian infantry clambered in their futile last attacks. Below me + were the ruins of Arsiero and Velo d'Astico recovered, and across the + broad valley rose Monte Cimone with the Italian trenches upon its crest + and the Austrians a little below to the north. A very considerable + bombardment was going on and it reverberated finely. (It is only among + mountains that one hears anything that one can call the thunder of guns. + The heaviest bombardments I heard in France sounded merely like Brock's + benefit on a much large scale, and disappointed me extremely.) As I sat + and listened to the uproar and watched the shells burst on Cimone and far + away up the valley over Castelletto above Pedescala, Captain Pirelli + pointed out the position of the Austrian frontier. I doubt if the English + people realise that the utmost depth to which this great Trentino + offensive, which exhausted Austria, wasted the flower of the Hungarian + army and led directly to the Galician disasters and the intervention of + Rumania, penetrated into Italian territory was about six miles. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0005" id="link2H_4_0005"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + III. BEHIND THE FRONT + </h2> + <p> + 1 + </p> + <p> + I have a peculiar affection for Verona and certain things in Verona. + Italians must forgive us English this little streak of impertinent + proprietorship in the beautiful things of their abundant land. It is quite + open to them to revenge themselves by professing a tenderness for + Liverpool or Leeds. It was, for instance, with a peculiar and personal + indignation that I saw where an Austrian air bomb had killed + five-and-thirty people in the Piazza Erbe. Somehow in that jolly old + place, a place that have very much of the quality of a very pretty and + cheerful old woman, it seemed exceptionally an outrage. And I made a + special pilgrimage to see how it was with that monument of Can Grande, the + equestrian Scaliger with the sidelong grin, for whom I confess a + ridiculous admiration. Can Grande, I rejoice to say, has retired into a + case of brickwork, surmounted by a steep roof of thick iron plates; no + aeroplane exists to carry bombs enough to smash that covering; there he + will smile securely in the darkness until peace comes again. + </p> + <p> + All over Venetia the Austrian seaplanes are making the same sort of idiot + raid on lighted places that the Zeppelins have been making over England. + These raids do no effective military work. What conceivable military + advantage can there be in dropping bombs into a marketing crowd? It is a + sort of anti-Teutonic propaganda by the Central Powers to which they seem + to have been incited by their own evil genius. It is as if they could + convince us that there is an essential malignity in Germans, that until + the German powers are stamped down into the mud they will continue to do + evil things. All of the Allies have borne the thrusting and boasting of + Germany with exemplary patience for half a century; England gave her + Heligoland and stood out of the way of her colonial expansion, Italy was a + happy hunting ground for her business enterprise, France had come near + resignation on the score of Alsace-Lorraine. And then over and above the + great outrage of the war come these incessant mean-spirited atrocities. A + great and simple wickedness it is possible to forgive; the war itself, had + it been fought greatly by Austria and Germany, would have made no such + deep and enduring breach as these silly, futile assassinations have down + between the Austro-Germans and the rest of the civilised world. One great + misdeed is a thing understandable and forgivable; what grows upon the + consciousness of the world is the persuasion that here we fight not a + national sin but a national insanity; that we dare not leave the German + the power to attack other nations any more for ever.... + </p> + <p> + Venice has suffered particularly from this ape-like impulse to hurt and + terrorise enemy non-combatants. Venice has indeed suffered from this war + far more than any other town in Italy. Her trade has largely ceased; she + has no visitors. I woke up on my way to Udine and found my train at Venice + with an hour to spare; after much examining and stamping of my passport I + was allowed outside the station wicket to get coffee in the refreshment + room and a glimpse of a very sad and silent Grand Canal. There was nothing + doing; a black despondent remnant of the old crowd of gondolas browsed + dreamily among against the quay to stare at me the better. The empty + palaces seemed to be sleeping in the morning sunshine because it was not + worth while to wake up.... + </p> + <p> + 2 + </p> + <p> + Except in the case of Venice, the war does not seem as yet to have made + nearly such a mark upon life in Italy as it has in England or provincial + France. People speak of Italy as a poor country, but that is from a + banker's point of view. In some respects she is the richest country on + earth, and in the matter of staying power I should think she is better off + than any other belligerent. She produces food in abundance everywhere; her + women are agricultural workers, so that the interruption of food + production by the war has been less serious in Italy than in any other + part of Europe. In peace time, she has constantly exported labour; the + Italian worker has been a seasonal emigrant to America, north and south, + to Switzerland, Germany and the south of France. The cessation of this + emigration has given her great reserves of man power, so that she has + carried on her admirable campaign with less interference with her normal + economic life than any other power. The first person I spoke to upon the + platform at Modane was a British officer engaged in forwarding Italian + potatoes to the British front in France. Afterwards, on my return, when a + little passport irregularity kept me for half a day in Modane, I went for + a walk with him along the winding pass road that goes down into France. + “You see hundreds and hundreds of new Fiat cars,” he remarked, “along here—going + up to the French front.” + </p> + <p> + But there is a return trade. Near Paris I saw scores of thousands of + shells piled high to go to Italy.... + </p> + <p> + I doubt if English people fully realise either the economic sturdiness or + the political courage of their Italian ally. Italy is not merely fighting + a first-class war in first-class fashion but she is doing a big, + dangerous, generous and far-sighted thing in fighting at all. France and + England were obliged to fight; the necessity was as plain as daylight. The + participation of Italy demanded a remoter wisdom. In the long run she + would have been swallowed up economically and politically by Germany if + she had not fought; but that was not a thing staring her plainly in the + face as the danger, insult and challenge stared France and England in the + face. What did stare her in the face was not merely a considerable + military and political risk, but the rupture of very close financial and + commercial ties. I found thoughtful men talking everywhere I have been in + Italy of two things, of the Jugo-Slav riddle and of the question of post + war finance. So far as the former matter goes, I think the Italians are + set upon the righteous solution of all such riddles, they are possessed by + an intelligent generosity. They are clearly set upon deserving Jugo-Slav + friendship; they understand the plain necessity of open and friendly + routes towards Roumania. It was an Italian who set out to explain to me + that Fiume must be at least a free port; it would be wrong and foolish to + cut the trade of Hungary off from the Mediterranean. But the banking + puzzle is a more intricate and puzzling matter altogether than the + possibility of trouble between Italian and Jugo-Slav. + </p> + <p> + I write of these things with the simplicity of an angel, but without an + angelic detachment. Here are questions into which one does not so much + rush as get reluctantly pushed. Currency and banking are dry distasteful + questions, but it is clear that they are too much in the hands of + mystery-mongers; it is as much the duty of anyone who talks and writes of + affairs, it is as much the duty of every sane adult, to bring his possibly + poor and unsuitable wits to bear upon these things, as it is for him to + vote or enlist or pay his taxes. Behind the simple ostensible spectacle of + Italy recovering the unredeemed Italy of the Trentino and East Venetia, + goes on another drama. Has Italy been sinking into something rather hard + to define called “economic slavery”? Is she or is she not escaping from + that magical servitude? Before this question has been under discussion for + a minute comes a name—for a time I was really quite unable to decide + whether it is the name of the villain in the piece or of the maligned + heroine, or a secret society or a gold mine, or a pestilence or a delusion—the + name of the <i>Banca Commerciale Italiana.</i> + </p> + <p> + Banking in a country undergoing so rapid and vigorous an economic + development as Italy is very different from the banking we simple English + know of at home. Banking in England, like land-owning, has hitherto been a + sort of hold up. There were always borrowers, there were always tenants, + and all that had to be done was to refuse, obstruct, delay and worry the + helpless borrower or would-be tenant until the maximum of security and + profit was obtained. I have never borrowed but I have built, and I know + something of the extreme hauteur of property of England towards a man who + wants to do anything with land, and with money I gather the case is just + the same. But in Italy, which already possessed a sunny prosperity of its + own upon mediaeval lines, the banker has had to be suggestive and + persuasive, sympathetic and helpful. These are unaccustomed attitudes for + British capital. The field has been far more attractive to the German + banker, who is less of a proudly impassive usurer and more of a partner, + who demands less than absolute security because he investigates more + industriously and intelligently. This great bank, the Banca Commerciale + Italiana, is a bank of the German type: to begin with, it was certainly + dominated by German directors; it was a bank of stimulation, and its + activities interweave now into the whole fabric of Italian commercial + life. But it has already liberated itself from German influence, and the + bulk of its capital is Italian. Nevertheless I found discussion ranging + about firstly what the Banca Commerciale essentially <i>was</i>, secondly + what it might <i>become</i>, thirdly what it might <i>do</i>, and fourthly + what, if anything, had to be done to it. + </p> + <p> + It is a novelty to an English mind to find banking thus mixed up with + politics, but it is not a novelty in Italy. All over Venetia there are + agricultural banks which are said to be “clerical.” I grappled with this + mystery. “How are they clerical?” I asked Captain Pirelli. “Do they lend + money on bad security to clerical voters, and on no terms whatever to + anti-clericals?” He was quite of my way of thinking. “<i>Pecunia non olet</i>,” + he said; “I have never yet smelt a clerical fifty lira note.”... But on + the other hand Italy is very close to Germany; she wants easy money for + development, cheap coal, a market for various products. The case against + the Germans—this case in which the Banca Commerciale Italiana + appears, I am convinced unjustly, as a suspect—is that they have + turned this natural and proper interchange with Italy into the acquisition + of German power. That they have not been merely easy traders, but + patriotic agents. It is alleged that they used their early “pull” in + Italian banking to favour German enterprises and German political + influence against the development of native Italian business; that their + merchants are not bona-fide individuals, but members of a nationalist + conspiracy to gain economic controls. The German is a patriotic + monomaniac. He is not a man but a limb, the worshipper of a national + effigy, the digit of an insanely proud and greedy Germania, and here are + the natural consequences. + </p> + <p> + The case of the individual Italian compactly is this: “We do not like the + Austrians and Germans. These Imperialisms look always over the Alps. + Whatever increases German influence here threatens Italian life. The + German is a German first and a human being afterwards.... But on the other + hand England seems commercially indifferent to us and France has been + economically hostile...” + </p> + <p> + “After all,” I said presently, after reflection, “in that matter of <i>Pecunia + non olet</i>; there used to be fusses about European loans in China. And + one of the favourite themes of British fiction and drama before the war + was the unfortunate position of the girl who accepted a loan from the + wicked man to pay her debts at bridge.” + </p> + <p> + “Italy,” said Captain Pirelli, “isn't a girl. And she hasn't been playing + bridge.” + </p> + <p> + I incline on the whole to his point of view. Money is facile cosmopolitan + stuff. I think that any bank that settles down in Italy is going to be + slowly and steadily naturalised Italian, it will become more and more + Italian until it is wholly Italian. I would trust Italy to make and keep + the Banca Commerciale Italiana Italian. I believe the Italian brain is a + better brain than the German article. But still I heard people talking of + the implicated organisation as if it were engaged in the most insidious + duplicities. “Wait for only a year or so after the war,” said one English + authority to me, “and the mask will be off and it will be frankly a + 'Deutsche Bank' once more.” They assure me that then German enterprises + will be favoured again, Italian and Allied enterprises blockaded and + embarrassed, the good understanding of Italians and English poisoned, + entirely through this organisation.... + </p> + <p> + The reasonable uncommercial man would like to reject all this last sort of + talk as “suspicion mania.” So far as the Banca Commerciale Italiana goes, + I at least find that easy enough; I quote that instance simply because it + is a case where suspicion has been dispelled, but in regard to a score of + other business veins it is not so easy to dispel suspicion. This war has + been a shock to reasonable men the whole world over. They have been forced + to realise that after all a great number of Germans have been engaged in a + crack-brained conspiracy against the non-German world; that in a great + number of cases when one does business with a German the business does not + end with the individual German. We hated to believe that a business could + be tainted by German partners or German associations. If now we err on the + side of over-suspicion, it is the German's little weakness for patriotic + disingenuousness that is most to blame.... + </p> + <p> + But anyhow I do not think there is much good in a kind of witch-smelling + among Italian enterprises to find the hidden German. Certain things are + necessary for Italian prosperity and Italy must get them. The Italians + want intelligent and helpful capital. They want a helpful France. They + want bituminous coal for metallurgical purposes. They want cheap shipping. + The French too want metallurgical coal. It is more important for + civilisation, for the general goodwill of the Allies and for Great Britain + that these needs should be supplied than that individual British + money-owners or ship-owners should remain sluggishly rich by insisting + upon high security or high freights. The control of British coal-mining + and shipping is in the national interests—for international + interests—rather than for the creation of that particularly passive, + obstructive, and wasteful type of wealth, the wealth of the mere + profiteer, is as urgent a necessity for the commercial welfare of France + and Italy and the endurance of the Great Alliance as it is for the + well-being of the common man in Britain. + </p> + <p> + 3 + </p> + <p> + I left my military guide at Verona on Saturday afternoon and reached Milan + in time to dine outside Salvini's in the Galleria Vittorio Emanuele, with + an Italian fellow story-writer. The place was as full as ever; we had to + wait for a table. It is notable that there were still great numbers of + young men not in uniform in Milan and Turin and Vicenza and Verona; there + was no effect anywhere of a depletion of men. The whole crowded place was + smouldering with excitement. The diners looked about them as they talked, + some talked loudly and seemed to be expressing sentiments. Newspaper + vendors appeared at the intersection of the arcades, uttering ambiguous + cries, and did a brisk business of flitting white sheets among the little + tables. + </p> + <p> + “To-night,” said my companion, “I think we shall declare war upon Germany. + The decision is being made.” + </p> + <p> + I asked intelligently why this had not been done before. I forget the + precise explanation he gave. A young soldier in uniform, who had been + dining at an adjacent table and whom I had not recognised before as a + writer I had met some years previously in London, suddenly joined in our + conversation, with a slightly different explanation. I had been carrying + on a conversation in slightly ungainly French, but now I relapsed into + English. + </p> + <p> + But indeed the matter of that declaration of war is as plain as daylight; + the Italian national consciousness has not at first that direct sense of + the German danger that exists in the minds of the three northern Allies. + To the Italian the traditional enemy is Austria, and this war is not + primarily a war for any other end than the emancipation of Italy. Moreover + we have to remember that for years there has been serious commercial + friction between France and Italy, and considerable mutual elbowing in + North Africa. Both Frenchmen and Italians are resolute to remedy this now, + but the restoration of really friendly and trustful relations is not to be + done in a day. It has been an extraordinary misfortune for Great Britain + that instead of boldly taking over her shipping from its private owners + and using it all, regardless of their profit, in the interests of herself + and her allies, her government has permitted so much of it as military and + naval needs have not requisitioned to continue to ply for gain, which the + government itself has shared by a tax on war profits. The Anglophobe + elements in Italian public life have made the utmost of this folly or + laxity in relation more particularly to the consequent dearness of coal in + Italy. They have carried on an amazingly effective campaign in which this + British slackness with the individual profiteer, is represented as if it + were the deliberate greed of the British state. This certainly contributed + very much to fortify Italy's disinclination to slam the door on the German + connection. + </p> + <p> + I did my best to make it clear to my two friends that so far from England + exploiting Italy, I myself suffered in exactly the same way as any + Italian, through the extraordinary liberties of our shipping interest. “I + pay as well as you do,” I said; “the shippers' blockade of Great Britain + is more effective than the submarines'. My food, my coal, my petrol are + all restricted in the sacred name of private property. You see, capital in + England has hitherto been not an exploitation but a hold-up. We are + learning differently now.... And anyhow, Mr. Runciman has been here and + given Italy assurances....” + </p> + <p> + In the train to Modane this old story recurred again. It is imperative + that English readers should understand clearly how thoroughly these little + matters have been <i>worked</i> by the enemy. + </p> + <p> + Some slight civilities led to a conversation that revealed the Italian + lady in the corner as an Irishwoman married to an Italian, and also + brought out the latent English of a very charming elderly lady opposite to + her. She had heard a speech, a wonderful speech from a railway train, by + “the Lord Runciman.” He had said the most beautiful things about Italy. + </p> + <p> + I did my best to echo these beautiful things. + </p> + <p> + Then the Irishwoman remarked that Mr. Runciman had not satisfied + everybody. She and her husband had met a minister—I found afterwards + he was one of the members of the late Giolotti government—who had + been talking very loudly and scornfully of the bargain Italy was making + with England. I assured her that the desire of England was simply to give + Italy all that she needed. + </p> + <p> + “But,” said the husband casually, “Mr. Runciman is a shipowner.” + </p> + <p> + I explained that he was nothing of the sort. It was true that he came of a + shipowning family—and perhaps inherited a slight tendency to see + things from a shipowning point of view—but in England we did not + suspect a man on such a score as that. + </p> + <p> + “In Italy I think we should,” said the husband of the Irish lady. + </p> + <p> + 4 + </p> + <p> + This incidental discussion is a necessary part of my impression of Italy + at war. The two western allies and Great Britain in particular have to + remember Italy's economic needs, and to prepare to rescue them from the + blind exploitation of private profit. They have to remember these needs + too, because, if they are left out of the picture, then it becomes + impossible to understand the full measure of the risk Italy has faced in + undertaking this war for an idea. With a Latin lucidity she has counted + every risk, and with a Latin idealism she has taken her place by the side + of those who fight for a liberal civilisation against a Byzantine + imperialism. + </p> + <p> + As I came out of the brightly lit Galleria Vittorio Emanuele into the + darkened Piazza del Duomo I stopped under the arcade and stood looking up + at the shadowy darkness of that great pinnacled barn, that marble + bride-cake, which is, I suppose, the last southward fortress of the + Franco-English Gothic. + </p> + <p> + “It was here,” said my host, “that we burnt the German stuff.” + </p> + <p> + “What German stuff?” + </p> + <p> + “Pianos and all sorts of things. From the shops. It is possible, you know, + to buy things too cheaply—and to give too much for the cheapness.” + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0006" id="link2H_4_0006"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + THE WESTERN WAR (SEPTEMBER, 1916) + </h2> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0007" id="link2H_4_0007"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + I. RUINS + </h2> + <p> + 1 + </p> + <p> + If I had to present some particular scene as typical of the peculiar + vileness and mischief wrought by this modern warfare that Germany has + elaborated and thrust upon the world, I do not think I should choose as my + instance any of those great architectural wrecks that seem most to impress + contemporary writers. I have seen the injuries and ruins of the cathedrals + at Arras and Soissons and the wreckage of the great church at Saint Eloi, + I have visited the Hotel de Ville at Arras and seen photographs of the + present state of the Cloth Hall at Ypres—a building I knew very well + indeed in its days of pride—and I have not been very deeply moved. I + suppose that one is a little accustomed to Gothic ruins, and that there is + always something monumental about old buildings; it is only a question of + degree whether they are more or less tumble-down. I was far more desolated + by the obliteration of such villages as Fricourt and Dompierre, and by the + horrible state of the fields and gardens round about them, and my visit to + Arras railway station gave me all the sensations of coming suddenly on a + newly murdered body. + </p> + <p> + Before I visited the recaptured villages in the zone of the actual + fighting, I had an idea that their evacuation was only temporary, that as + soon as the war line moved towards Germany the people of the devastated + villages would return to build their houses and till their fields again. + But I see now that not only are homes and villages destroyed almost beyond + recognition, but the very fields are destroyed. They are wildernesses of + shell craters; the old worked soil is buried and great slabs of crude + earth have been flung up over it. No ordinary plough will travel over this + frozen sea, let along that everywhere chunks of timber, horrible tangles + of rusting wire, jagged fragments of big shells, and a great number of + unexploded shells are entangled in the mess. Often this chaos is stained + bright yellow by high explosives, and across it run the twisting trenches + and communication trenches eight, ten, or twelve feet deep. These will + become water pits and mud pits into which beasts will fall. It is + incredible that there should be crops from any of this region of the push + for many years to come. There is no shade left; the roadside trees are + splintered stumps with scarcely the spirit to put forth a leaf; a few + stunted thistles and weeds are the sole proofs that life may still go on. + </p> + <p> + The villages of this wide battle region are not ruined; they are + obliterated. It is just possible to trace the roads in them, because the + roads have been cleared and repaired for the passing of the guns and + ammunition. Fricourt is a tangle of German dug-outs. One dug-out in + particular there promises to become a show place. It must be the + masterpiece of some genius for dug-outs; it is made as if its makers + enjoyed the job; it is like the work of some horrible badger among the + vestiges of what were pleasant human homes. You are taken down a timbered + staircase into its warren of rooms and passages; you are shown the places + under the craters of the great British shells, where the wood splintered + but did not come in. (But the arrival of those shells must have been a + stunning moment.) There are a series of ingenious bolting shafts set with + iron climbing bars. In this place German officers and soldiers have lived + continually for nearly two years. This war is, indeed, a troglodytic + propaganda. You come up at last at the far end into what was once a cellar + of a decent Frenchman's home. + </p> + <p> + But there are stranger subterranean refuges than that at Fricourt. At + Dompierre the German trenches skirted the cemetery, and they turned the + dead out of their vaults and made lurking places of the tombs. I walked + with M. Joseph Reinach about this place, picking our way carefully amidst + the mud holes and the wire, and watched the shells bursting away over the + receding battle line to the west. The wreckage of the graves was + Durereqsue. And here would be a fragment of marble angle and here a split + stone with an inscription. Splinters of coffins, rusty iron crosses and + the petals of tin flowers were trampled into the mud, amidst the universal + barbed wire. A little distance down the slope is a brand new cemetery, + with new metal wreaths and even a few flowers; it is a disciplined array + of uniform wooden crosses, each with its list of soldiers' names. Unless I + am wholly mistaken in France no Germans will ever get a chance for ever + more to desecrate that second cemetery as they have done its predecessor. + </p> + <p> + We walked over the mud heaps and litter that had once been houses towards + the centre of Dompierre village, and tried to picture to ourselves what + the place had been. Many things are recognisable in Dompierre that have + altogether vanished at Fricourt; for instance, there are quire large + triangular pieces of the church wall upstanding at Dompierre. And a mile + away perhaps down the hill on the road towards Amiens, the ruins of the + sugar refinery are very distinct. A sugar refinery is an affair of big + iron receptacles and great flues and pipes and so forth, and iron does not + go down under gun fire as stone or brick does. The whole fabric wars rust, + bent and twisted, gaping with shell holes, that raggedest display of old + iron, but it still kept its general shape, as a smashed, battered, and + sunken ironclad might do at the bottom of the sea. + </p> + <p> + There wasn't a dog left of the former life of Dompierre. There was not + even much war traffic that morning on the worn and muddy road. The guns + muttered some miles away to the west, and a lark sang. But a little way + farther on up the road was an intermediate dressing station, rigged up + with wood and tarpaulins, and orderlies were packing two wounded men into + an ambulance. The men on the stretchers were grey faced, as though they + had been trodden on by some gigantic dirty boot. + </p> + <p> + As we came back towards where our car waited by the cemetery I heard the + jingle of a horseman coming across the space behind us. I turned and + beheld one of the odd contrasts that seem always to be happening in this + incredible war. This man was, I suppose, a native officer of some cavalry + force from French north Africa. He was a handsome dark brown Arab, wearing + a long yellow-white robe and a tall cap about which ran a band of + sheepskin. He was riding one of those little fine lean horses with long + tails that I think are Barbary horses, his archaic saddle rose fore and + aft of him, and the turned-up toes of his soft leather boots were stuck + into great silver stirrups. He might have ridden straight out of the + Arabian nights. He passed thoughtfully, picking his way delicately among + the wire and the shell craters, and coming into the road, broke into a + canter and vanished in the direction of the smashed-up refinery. + </p> + <p> + 2 + </p> + <p> + About such towns as Rheims or Arras or Soissons there is an effect of + waiting stillness like nothing else I have ever experienced. At Arras the + situation is almost incredible to the civilian mind. The British hold the + town, the Germans hold a northern suburb; at one point near the river the + trenches are just four metres apart. This state of tension has lasted for + long months. + </p> + <p> + Unless a very big attack is contemplated, I suppose there is no advantage + in an assault; across that narrow interval we should only get into + trenches that might be costly or impossible to hold, and so it would be + for the Germans on our side. But there is a kind of etiquette observed; + loud vulgar talking on either side of the four-metre gap leads at once to + bomb throwing. And meanwhile on both sides guns of various calibre keep up + an intermittent fire, the German guns register—I think that is the + right term—on the cross of Arras cathedral, the British guns search + lovingly for the German batteries. As one walks about the silent streets + one hears, “<i>Bang</i>—-Pheeee—-woooo” and then far away “<i>dump.</i>” + One of ours. Then presently back comes “Pheeee—-woooo—-<i>Bang!</i>” + One of theirs. + </p> + <p> + Amidst these pleasantries, the life of the town goes on. <i>Le Lion + d'Arras</i>, an excellent illustrated paper, produces its valiant sheets, + and has done so since the siege began. + </p> + <p> + The current number of <i>Le Lion d'Arras</i> had to report a local German + success. Overnight they had killed a gendarme. There is to be a public + funeral and much ceremony. It is rare for anyone now to get killed; + everything is so systematised. + </p> + <p> + You may buy postcards with views of the destruction at various angles, and + send them off with the Arras postmark. The town is not without a certain + business activity. There is, I am told, a considerable influx of visitors + of a special sort; they wear khaki and lead the troglodytic life. They + play cards and gossip and sleep in the shadows, and may not walk the + streets. I had one glimpse of a dark crowded cellar. Now and then one sees + a British soldier on some special errand; he keeps to the pavement, + mindful of the spying German sausage balloon in the air. The streets are + strangely quite and grass grows between the stones. + </p> + <p> + The Hotel de Ville and the cathedral are now mostly heaps of litter, but + many streets of the town have suffered very little. Here and there a house + has been crushed and one or two have been bisected, the front reduced to a + heap of splinters and the back halves of the rooms left so that one sees + the bed, the hanging end of the carpet, the clothes cupboard yawning open, + the pictures still on the wall. In one place a lamp stands on a chest of + drawers, on a shelf of floor cut off completely from the world below.... + Pheeee—-woooo—-<i>Bang!</i> One would be irresistibly reminded + of a Sunday afternoon in the city of London, if it were not for those + unmeaning explosions. + </p> + <p> + I went to the station, a dead railway station. A notice-board requested us + to walk around the silent square on the outside pavement and not across + it. The German sausage balloon had not been up for days; it had probably + gone off to the Somme; the Somme was a terrible vortex just then which was + sucking away the resources of the whole German line; but still discipline + is discipline. The sausage might come peeping up at any moment over the + station roof, and so we skirted the square. Arras was fought for in the + early stages of the war; two lines of sand-bagged breastworks still run + obliquely through the station; one is where the porters used to put + luggage upon cabs and one runs the length of the platform. The station was + a fine one of the modern type, with a glass roof whose framework still + remains, though the glass powders the floor and is like a fine angular + gravel underfoot. The rails are rails of rust, and cornflowers and mustard + and tall grasses grow amidst the ballast. The waiting-rooms have suffered + from a shell or so, but there are still the sofas of green plush, askew, a + little advertisement hung from the wall, the glass smashed. The ticket + bureau is as if a giant had scattered a great number of tickets, mostly + still done up in bundles, to Douai, to Valenciennes, to Lens and so on. + These tickets are souvenirs too portable to resist. I gave way to that + common weakness. + </p> + <p> + I went out and looked up and down the line; two deserted goods trucks + stood as if they sheltered under a footbridge. The grass poked out through + their wheels. The railway signals seemed uncertain in their intimations; + some were up and some were down. And it was as still and empty as a summer + afternoon in Pompeii. No train has come into Arras for two long years now. + </p> + <p> + We lunched in a sunny garden with various men who love Arras but are weary + of it, and we disputed about Irish politics. We discussed the political + future of Sir F. E. Smith. We also disputed whether there was an + equivalent in English for <i>embusque.</i> Every now and then a shell came + over—an aimless shell. + </p> + <p> + A certain liveliness marked our departure from the town. Possibly the + Germans also listen for the rare infrequent automobile. At any rate, as we + were just starting our way back—it is improper to mention the exact + point from which we started—came “Pheeee—-woooo.” Quite close. + But there was no <i>Bang!</i> One's mind hung expectant and disappointed. + It was a dud shell. + </p> + <p> + And then suddenly I became acutely aware of the personality of our + chauffeur. It was not his business to talk to us, but he turned his head, + showed a sharp profile, wry lips and a bright excited eye, and remarked, “<i>That</i> + was a near one—anyhow.” He then cut a corner over the pavement and + very nearly cut it through a house. He bumped us over a shell hole and + began to toot his horn. At every gateway, alley, and cross road on this + silent and empty streets of Arras and frequently in between, he tooted + punctiliously. (It is not proper to sound motor horns in Arras.) I cannot + imagine what the listening Germans made of it. We passed the old gates of + that city of fear, still tooting vehemently, and then with shoulders + eloquent of his feelings, our chauffeur abandoned the horn altogether and + put his whole soul into the accelerator.... + </p> + <p> + 3 + </p> + <p> + Soissons was in very much the same case as Arras. There was the same + pregnant silence in her streets, the same effect of waiting for the moment + which draws nearer and nearer, when the brooding German lines away there + will be full of the covert activities of retreat, when the streets of the + old town will stir with the joyous excitement of the conclusive advance. + </p> + <p> + The organisation of Soissons for defence is perfect. I may not describe + it, but think of whatever would stop and destroy an attacking party or + foil the hostile shell. It is there. Men have had nothing else to do and + nothing else to think of for two years. I crossed the bridge the English + made in the pursuit after the Marne, and went into the first line trenches + and peeped towards the invisible enemy. To show me exactly where to look a + seventy-five obliged with a shell. In the crypt of the Abbey of St. Medard + near by it—it must provoke the Germans bitterly to think that all + the rest of the building vanished ages ago—the French boys sleep + beside the bones of King Childebert the Second. They shelter safely in the + prison of Louis the Pious. An ineffective shell from a German + seventy-seven burst in the walled garden close at hand as I came out from + those thousand-year-old memories again. + </p> + <p> + The cathedral at Soissons had not been nearly so completely smashed up as + the one at Arras; I doubt if it has been very greatly fired into. There is + a peculiar beauty in the one long vertical strip of blue sky between the + broken arches in the chief gap where the wall has tumbled in. And the + people are holding on in many cases exactly as they are doing in Arras; I + do not know whether it is habit or courage that is most apparent in this + persistence. About the chief place of the town there are ruined houses, + but some invisible hand still keeps the grass of the little garden within + bounds and has put out a bed of begonias. In Paris I met a charming + American writer, the wife of a French artist, the lady who wrote <i>My + House on the Field of Honour.</i> She gave me a queer little anecdote. On + account of some hospital work she had been allowed to visit Soissons—a + rare privilege for a woman—and she stayed the night in a lodging. + The room into which she was shown was like any other French provincial + bedroom, and after her Anglo-Saxon habit she walked straight to the + windows to open them. + </p> + <p> + They looked exactly like any other French bedroom windows, with neat, + clean white lace curtains across them. The curtains had been put there, + because they were the proper things to put there. + </p> + <p> + “Madame,” said the hostess, “need not trouble to open the glass. There is + no more glass in Soissons.” + </p> + <p> + But there were curtains nevertheless. There was all the precise delicacy + of the neatly curtained home life of France. + </p> + <p> + And she told me too of the people at dinner, and how as the little + serving-maid passed about a proud erection of cake and conserve and cream, + came the familiar “Pheeee—-woooo—-<i>Bang!</i>” + </p> + <p> + “That must have been the Seminaire,” said someone. + </p> + <p> + As one speaks of the weather or a passing cart. + </p> + <p> + “It was in the Rue de la Bueire, M'sieur,” the little maid asserted with + quiet conviction, poising the trophy of confectionery for Madame Huard + with an unshaking hand. + </p> + <p> + So stoutly do the roots of French life hold beneath the tramplings of war. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0008" id="link2H_4_0008"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + II. THE GRADES OF WAR + </h2> + <p> + 1 Soissons and Arras when I visited them were samples of the deadlock war; + they were like Bloch come true. The living fact about war so far is that + Bloch has not come true—<i>yet.</i> I think in the end he will come + true, but not so far as this war is concerned, and to make that clear it + is necessary to trouble the reader with a little disquisition upon war—omitting + as far as humanly possible all mention of Napoleon's campaigns. + </p> + <p> + The development of war has depended largely upon two factors. One of these + is invention. New weapons and new methods have become available, and have + modified tactics, strategy, the relative advantage of offensive and + defensive. The other chief factor in the evolution of the war has been + social organisation. As Machiavelli points out in his <i>Art of War</i>, + there was insufficient social stability in Europe to keep a properly + trained and disciplined infantry in the field from the passing of the + Roman legions to the appearance of the Swiss footmen. He makes it very + clear that he considers the fighting of the Middle Ages, though frequent + and bloody, to be a confused, mobbing sort of affair, and politically and + technically unsatisfactory. The knight was an egotist in armour. + Machiavelli does small justice to the English bowmen. It is interesting to + note that Switzerland, that present island of peace, was regarded by him + as the mother of modern war. Swiss aggression was the curse of the + Milanese. That is a remark by the way; our interest here is to note that + modern war emerges upon history as the sixteenth century unfolds, as an + affair in which the essential factor is the drilled and trained + infantryman. The artillery is developing as a means of breaking the + infantry; cavalry for charging them when broken, for pursuit and scouting. + To this day this triple division of forces dominates soldiers' minds. The + mechanical development of warfare has consisted largely in the development + of facilities for enabling or hindering the infantry to get to close + quarters. As that has been made easy or difficult the offensive or the + defensive has predominated. + </p> + <p> + A history of military method for the last few centuries would be a record + of successive alternate steps in which offensive and defensive + contrivances pull ahead, first one and then the other. Their relative + fluctuations are marked by the varying length of campaigns. From the very + outset we have the ditch and the wall; the fortified place upon a pass or + main road, as a check to the advance. Artillery improves, then + fortification improves. The defensive holds its own for a long period, + wars are mainly siege wars, and for a century before the advent of + Napoleon there are no big successful sweeping invasions, no marches upon + the enemy capital and so on. There were wars of reduction, wars of + annoyance. Napoleon developed the offensive by seizing upon the + enthusiastic infantry of the republic, improving transport and mobile + artillery, using road-making as an aggressive method. In spite of the + successful experiment of Torres Vedras and the warning of Plevna the + offensive remained dominant throughout the nineteenth century. + </p> + <p> + But three things were working quietly towards the rehabilitation of the + defensive; firstly the increased range, accuracy and rapidity of rifle + fire, with which we may include the development of the machine gun; + secondly the increasing use of the spade, and thirdly the invention of + barbed wire. By the end of the century these things had come so far into + military theory as to produce the great essay of Bloch, and to surprise + the British military people, who are not accustomed to read books or talk + shop, in the Boer war. In the thinly populated war region of South Africa + the difficulties of forcing entrenched positions were largely met by + outflanking, the Boers had only a limited amount of barbed wire and could + be held down in their trenches by shrapnel, and even at the beginning of + the present war there can be little doubt that we and our Allies were + still largely unprepared for the full possibilities of trench warfare, we + attempted a war of manoeuvres, war at about the grade to which war had + been brought in 1898, and it was the Germans who first brought the war up + to date by entrenching upon the Aisne. We had, of course, a few aeroplanes + at that time, but they were used chiefly as a sort of accessory cavalry + for scouting; our artillery was light and our shell almost wholly + shrapnel. + </p> + <p> + Now the grades of warfare that have been developed since the present war + began, may be regarded as a series of elaborations and counter + elaborations of the problem which begins as a line of trenches behind + wire, containing infantry with rifles and machine guns. Against this an + infantry attack with bayonet, after shrapnel fails. This we will call + Grade A. To this the offensive replies with improved artillery, and + particularly with high explosive shell instead of shrapnel. By this the + wire is blown away, the trench wrecked and the defender held down as the + attack charges up. This is Grade B. But now appear the dug-out elaborating + the trench and the defensive battery behind the trench. The defenders, + under the preliminary bombardment, get into the dug-outs with their rifles + and machine guns, and emerge as fresh as paint as the attack comes up. + Obviously there is much scope for invention and contrivance in the dug-out + as the reservoir of counter attacks. Its possibilities have been very ably + exploited by the Germans. Also the defensive batteries behind, which have + of course the exact range of the captured trench, concentrate on it and + destroy the attack at the moment of victory. The trench falls back to its + former holders under this fire and a counter attack. Check again for the + offensive. Even if it can take, it cannot hold a position under these + conditions. This we will call Grade A2; a revised and improved A. What is + the retort from the opposite side? Obviously to enhance and extend the + range of the preliminary bombardment behind the actual trench line, to + destroy or block, if it can, the dug-outs and destroy or silence the + counter offensive artillery. If it can do that, it can go on; otherwise + Bloch wins. + </p> + <p> + If fighting went on only at ground level Bloch would win at this stage, + but here it is that the aeroplane comes in. From the ground it would be + practically impossible to locate the enemies' dug-outs, secondary + defences, and batteries. But the aeroplane takes us immediately into a new + grade of warfare, in which the location of the defender's secondary + trenches, guns, and even machine-gun positions becomes a matter of extreme + precision—provided only that the offensive has secured command of + the air and can send his aeroplanes freely over the defender lines. Then + the preliminary bombardment becomes of a much more extensive character; + the defender's batteries are tackled by the overpowering fire of guns they + are unable to locate and answer; the secondary dug-outs and strong places + are plastered down, a barrage fire shuts off support from the doomed + trenches, the men in these trenches are held down by a concentrated + artillery fire and the attack goes up at last to hunt them out of the + dug-outs and collect the survivors. Until the attack is comfortably + established in the captured trench, the fire upon the old counter attack + position goes on. This is the grade, Grade B2, to which modern warfare has + attained upon the Somme front. The appearance of the Tank has only + increased the offensive advantage. There at present warfare rests. + </p> + <p> + There is, I believe, only one grade higher possible. The success of B2 + depends upon the completeness of the aerial observation. The invention of + an anti-aircraft gun which would be practically sure of hitting and + bringing down an aeroplane at any height whatever up to 20,000 feet, would + restore the defensive and establish what I should think must be the final + grade of war, A3. But at present nothing of the sort exists and nothing of + the sort is likely to exist for a very long time; at present hitting an + aeroplane by any sort of gun at all is a rare and uncertain achievement. + Such a gun is not impossible and therefore we must suppose such a gun will + some day be constructed, but it will be of a novel type and character, + unlike anything at present in existence. The grade of fighting that I was + privileged to witness on the Somme, the grade at which a steady successful + offensive is possible, is therefore, I conclude, the grade at which the + present war will end. + </p> + <p> + 2 + </p> + <p> + But now having thus spread out the broad theory of the business, let me go + on to tell some of the actualities of the Somme offensive. They key fact + upon both British and French fronts was the complete ascendancy of the + Allies aeroplanes. It is the necessary preliminary condition for the + method upon which the great generals of the French army rely in this + sanitary task of shoving the German Thing off the soil of Belgium and + France back into its own land. A man who is frequently throwing out + prophecies is bound to score a few successes, and one that I may + legitimately claim is my early insistence upon that fact that the equality + of the German aviator was likely to be inferior to that of his French or + British rival. The ordinary German has neither the flexible quality of + body, the quickness of nerve, the temperament, nor the mental habits that + make a successful aviator. This idea was first put into my head by + considering the way in which Germans walk and carry themselves, and by + nothing the difference in nimbleness between the cyclists in the streets + of German and French towns. It was confirmed by a conversation I had with + a German aviator who was also a dramatist, and who came to see me upon + some copyright matter in 1912. He broached the view that aviation would + destroy democracy, because he said only aristocrats make aviators. (He was + a man of good family.) With a duke or so in my mind I asked him why. + Because, he explained, a man without aristocratic quality in tradition, + cannot possibly endure the “high loneliness” of the air. That sounded + rather like nonsense at the time, and then I reflected that for a Prussian + that might be true. There may be something in the German composition that + does demand association and the support of pride and training before + dangers can be faced. The Germans are social and methodical, the French + and English are by comparison chaotic and instinctive; perhaps the very + readiness for a conscious orderliness that makes the German so formidable + upon the ground, so thorough and fore-seeking, makes him slow and unsure + in the air. At any rate the experiences of this war have seemed to carry + out this hypothesis. The German aviators will not as a class stand up to + those of the Allies. They are not nimble in the air. Such champions as + they have produced have been men of one trick; one of their great men, + Immelmann—he was put down by an English boy a month or so ago—had + a sort of hawk's swoop. He would go very high and then come down at his + utmost pace at his antagonist, firing his machine gun at him as he came. + If he missed in this hysterical lunge, he went on down.... This does not + strike the Allied aviator as very brilliant. A gentleman of that sort can + sooner or later be caught on the rise by going for him over the German + lines. + </p> + <p> + The first phase, then, of the highest grade offensive, the ultimate + development of war regardless of expense, is the clearance of the air. + Such German machines as are up are put down by fighting aviators. These + last fly high; in the clear blue of the early morning they look exactly + like gnats; some trail a little smoke in the sunshine; they take their + machine guns in pursuit over the German lines, and the German + anti-aircraft guns, the Archibalds, begin to pattern the sky about them + with little balls of black smoke. From below one does not see men nor feel + that men are there; it is as if it were an affair of midges. Close after + the fighting machines come the photographic aeroplanes, with cameras as + long as a man is high, flying low—at four or five thousand feet that + is—over the enemy trenches. The Archibald leaves these latter alone; + it cannot fire a shell to explode safely so soon after firing; but they + are shot at with rifles and machine guns. They do not mind being shot at; + only the petrol tank and the head and thorax of the pilot are to be + considered vital. They will come back with forty or fifty bullet holes in + the fabric. They will go under this fire along the length of the German + positions exposing plate after plate; one machine will get a continuous + panorama of many miles and then come back straight to the aerodrome to + develop its plates. + </p> + <p> + There is no waste of time about the business, the photographs are + developed as rapidly as possible. Within an hour and a half after the + photographs were taken the first prints are going back into the bureau for + the examination of the photographs. Both British and French air + photographs are thoroughly scrutinised and marked. + </p> + <p> + An air photograph to an inexperienced eye is not a very illuminating + thing; one makes our roads, blurs of wood, and rather vague buildings. But + the examiner has an eye that has been in training; he is a picked man; he + has at hand yesterday's photographs and last week's photographs, marked + maps and all sorts of aids and records. If he is a Frenchman he is only + too happy to explain his ideas and methods. Here, he will point out, is a + little difference between the German trench beyond the wood since + yesterday. For a number of reasons he thinks that will be a new machine + gun emplacement; here at the centre of the farm wall they have been making + another. This battery here—isn't it plain? Well, it's a dummy. The + grass in front of it hasn't been scorched, and there's been no serious + wear on the road here for a week. Presently the Germans will send one or + two waggons up and down that road and instruct them to make figures of + eight to imitate scorching on the grass in front of the gun. We know all + about that. The real wear on the road, compare this and this and this, + ends here at this spot. It turns off into the wood. There's a sort of + track in the trees. Now look where the trees are just a little displaced! + (This lens is rather better for that.) <i>That's</i> one gun. You see? + Here, I will show you another.... + </p> + <p> + That process goes on two or three miles behind the front line. Very clean + young men in white overalls do it as if it were a labour of love. And the + Germans in the trenches, the German gunners, <i>know it is going on.</i> + They know that in the quickest possible way these observations of the + aeroplane that was over them just now will go to the gunners. The careful + gunner, firing by the map and marking by aeroplane, kite balloon or direct + observation, will be getting onto the located guns and machine guns in + another couple of hours. The French claim that they have located new + batteries, got their <i>tir de demolition</i> upon them in and destroyed + them within five hours. The British I told of that found it incredible. + Every day the French print special maps showing the guns, sham guns, + trenches, everything of significance behind the German lines, showing + everything that has happened in the last four-and-twenty hours. It is + pitiless. It is indecent. The map-making and printing goes on in the room + next and most convenient to the examination of the photographs. And, as I + say, the German army knows of this, and knows that it cannot prevent it + because of its aerial weakness. That knowledge is not the last among the + forces that is crumpling up the German resistance upon the Somme. + </p> + <p> + I visited some French guns during the <i>tir de demolition</i> phase. I + counted nine aeroplanes and twenty-six kite balloons in the air at the + same time. There was nothing German visible in the air at all. + </p> + <p> + It is a case of eyes and no eyes. + </p> + <p> + The French attack resolves itself into a triple system of gunfire. First + for a day or so, or two or three days, there is demolition fire to smash + up all the exactly located batteries, organisation, supports, behind the + front line enemy trenches; then comes barrage fire to cut off supplies and + reinforcements; then, before the advance, the hammering down fire, “heads + down,” upon the trenches. When at last this stops and the infantry goes + forward to rout out the trenches and the dug-outs, they go forward with a + minimum of inconvenience. The first wave of attack fights, destroys, or + disarms the surviving Germans and sends them back across the open to the + French trenches. They run as fast as they can, hands up, and are + shepherded farther back. The French set to work to turn over the captured + trenches and organise themselves against any counter attack that may face + the barrage fire. + </p> + <p> + That is the formula of the present fighting, which the French have + developed. After an advance there is a pause, while the guns move up + nearer the Germans and fresh aeroplane reconnaissance goes on. Nowhere on + this present offensive has a German counter attack had more than the most + incidental success; and commonly they have had frightful losses. Then + after a few days of refreshment and accumulation, the Allied attack + resumes. + </p> + <p> + That is the perfected method of the French offensive. I had the pleasure + of learning its broad outlines in good company, in the company of M. + Joseph Reinach and Colonel Carence, the military writer. Their talk + together and with me in the various messes at which we lunched was for the + most part a keen discussion of every detail and every possibility of the + offensive machine; every French officer's mess seems a little council upon + the one supreme question in France, <i>how to do it best.</i> M. Reinach + has made certain suggestions about the co-operation of the French and + British that I will discuss elsewhere, but one great theme was the + constitution of “the ideal battery.” For years French military thought has + been acutely attentive to the best number of guns for effective common + action, and has tended rather to the small battery theory. My two + companies were playing with the idea that the ideal battery was a battery + of one big gun, with its own aeroplane and kite balloon marking for it. + </p> + <p> + The British seem to be associated with the adventurous self-reliance + needed in the air. The British aeroplanes do not simply fight the Germans + out of the sky; they also make themselves an abominable nuisance by + bombing the enemy trenches. For every German bomb that is dropped by + aeroplane on or behind the British lines, about twenty go down on the + heads of the Germans. British air bombs upon guns, stores and + communications do some of the work that the French effect by their + systematic demolition fire. + </p> + <p> + And the British aviator has discovered and is rapidly developing an + altogether fresh branch of air activity in the machine-gun attack at a + very low altitude. Originally I believe this was tried in western Egypt, + but now it is being increasingly used upon the British front in France. An + aeroplane which comes down suddenly, travelling very rapidly, to a few + hundred feet, is quite hard to hit, even if it is not squirting bullets + from a machine gun as it advances. Against infantry in the open this sort + of thing is extremely demoralising. It is a method of attack still in its + infancy, but there are great possibilities for it in the future, when the + bending and cracking German line gives, as ultimately it must give if this + offensive does not relax. If the Allies persist in their pressure upon the + western front, if there is no relaxation in the supply of munitions from + Britain and no lapse into tactical stupidity, a German retreat eastward is + inevitable. + </p> + <p> + Now a cavalry pursuit alone may easily come upon disaster, cavalry can be + so easily held up by wire and a few machine guns. I think the Germans have + reckoned on that and on automobiles, probably only the decay of their <i>morale</i> + prevents their opening their lines now on the chance of the British + attempting some such folly as a big cavalry advance, but I do not think + the Germans have reckoned on the use of machine guns in aeroplanes, + supported by and supporting cavalry or automobiles. At the present time I + should imagine there is no more perplexing consideration amidst the many + perplexities of the German military intelligence than the new complexion + put upon pursuit by these low level air developments. It may mean that in + all sorts of positions where they had counted confidently on getting away, + they may not be able to get away—from the face of a scientific + advance properly commanding and using modern material in a dexterous and + intelligent manner. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0009" id="link2H_4_0009"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + III. THE WAR LANDSCAPE + </h2> + <p> + 1 + </p> + <p> + I saw rather more of the British than of the French aviators because of + the vileness of the weather when I visited the latter. It is quite + impossible for me to institute comparisons between these two services. I + should think that the British organisation I saw would be hard to beat, + and that none but the French could hope to beat it. On the Western front + the aviation has been screwed up to a very much higher level than on the + Italian line. In Italy it has not become, as it has in France, the + decisive factor. The war on the Carso front in Italy—I say nothing + of the mountain warfare, which is a thing in itself—is in fact still + in the stage that I have called B. It is good warfare well waged, but not + such an intensity of warfare. It has not, as one says of pianos and + voices, the same compass. + </p> + <p> + This is true in spite of the fact that the Italians along of all the + western powers have adopted a type of aeroplane larger and much more + powerful than anything except the big Russian machines. They are not at + all suitable for any present purpose upon the Italian front, but at a + later stage, when the German is retiring and Archibald no longer searches + the air, they would be invaluable on the western front because of their + enormous bomb or machine gun carrying capacity. “But sufficient for the + day is the swat thereof,” as the British public schoolboy says, and no + doubt we shall get them when we have sufficiently felt the need for them. + The big Caproni machines which the Italians possess are of 300 h.p. and + will presently be of 500 h.p. One gets up a gangway into them was one gets + into a yacht; they wave a main deck, a forward machine gun deck and an aft + machine gun; one may walk about in them; in addition to guns and men they + carry a very considerable weight of bombs beneath. They cannot of course + beget up with the speed nor soar to the height of our smaller aeroplanes; + it is as carriers in raids behind a force of fighting machines that they + should find their use. + </p> + <p> + The British establishment I visited was a very refreshing and reassuring + piece of practical organisation. The air force of Great Britain has had + the good fortune to develop with considerable freedom from old army + tradition; many of its officers are ex-civil engineers and so forth; + Headquarters is a little shy of technical direction; and all this in a + service that is still necessarily experimental and plastic is to the good. + There is little doubt that, given a release from prejudice, bad + associations and the equestrian tradition, British technical intelligence + and energy can do just as well as the French. Our problem with our army is + not to create intelligence, there is an abundance of it, but to release it + from a dreary social and official pressure. The air service ransacks the + army for men with technical training and sees that it gets them, there is + a real keenness upon the work, and the men in these great mobile hangars + talk shop readily and clearly. + </p> + <p> + I have already mentioned and the newspapers have told abundantly of the + pluck, daring, and admirable work of our aviators; what is still + untellable in any detail is the energy and ability of the constructive and + repairing branch upon whose efficiency their feats depend. Perhaps the + most interesting thing I saw in connection with the air work was the + hospital for damaged machines and the dump to which those hopelessly + injured are taken, in order that they may be disarticulated and all that + is sound in them used for reconstruction. How excellently this work is + being done may be judged from the fact that our offensive in July started + with a certain number of aeroplanes, a number that would have seemed + fantastic in a story a year before the war began. These aeroplanes were in + constant action; they fought, they were shot down, they had their share of + accidents. Not only did the repair department make good every loss, but + after three weeks of the offensive the army was fighting with fifty more + machines than at the outset. One goes through a vast Rembrandtesque shed + opening upon a great sunny field, in whose cool shadows rest a number of + interesting patients; captured and slightly damaged German machines, + machines of our own with scars of battle upon them, one or two cases of + bad landing. The star case came over from Peronne. It had come in two days + ago. + </p> + <p> + I examined this machine and I will tell the state it was in, but I + perceive that what I have to tell will read not like a sober statement of + truth but like strained and silly lying. The machine had had a direct hit + from an Archibald shell. The propeller had been clean blown away; so had + the machine gun and all its fittings. The engines had been stripped naked + and a good deal bent about. The timber stay over the aviator had been + broken, so that it is marvellous the wings of the machine did not just up + at once like the wings of a butterfly. The solitary aviator had been + wounded in the face. He had then come down in a long glide into the + British lines, and made a tolerable landing.... + </p> + <p> + 2 + </p> + <p> + One consequence of the growing importance of the aeroplane in warfare is + the development of a new military art, the art of camouflage. Camouflage + is humbugging disguise, it is making things—and especially in this + connection, military things—seem not what they are, but something + peaceful and rural, something harmless and quite uninteresting to + aeroplane observers. It is the art of making big guns look like haystacks + and tents like level patches of field. + </p> + <p> + Also it includes the art of making attractive models of guns, camps, + trenches and the like that are not bona-fide guns, camps, or trenches at + all, so that the aeroplane bomb-dropper and the aeroplane observer may + waste his time and energies and the enemy gunfire be misdirected. In Italy + I saw dummy guns so made as to deceive the very elect at a distance of a + few thousand feet. The camouflage of concealment aims either at + invisibility or imitation; I have seen a supply train look like a row of + cottages, its smoke-stack a chimney, with the tops of sham palings running + along the back of the engine and creepers painted up its sides. But that + was a flight of the imagination; the commonest camouflage is merely to + conceal. Trees are brought up and planted near the object to be hidden, it + is painted in the same tones as its background, it is covered with an + awning painted to look like grass or earth. I suppose it is only a matter + of development before a dummy cow or so is put up to chew the cud on the + awning. + </p> + <p> + But camouflage or no camouflage, the bulk of both the French and British + forces in the new won ground of the great offensive lay necessarily in the + open. Only the big guns and the advanced Red Cross stations had got into + pits and subterranean hiding places. The advance has been too rapid and + continuous for the armies to make much of a toilette as they halted, and + the destruction and the desolation of the country won afforded few + facilities for easy concealment. Tents, transport, munitions, these all + indicated an army on the march—at the rate of half a mile in a week + or so, to Germany. If the wet and mud of November and December have for a + time delayed that advance, the force behind has but accumulated for the + resumption of the thrust. + </p> + <p> + 3 + </p> + <p> + A journey up from the base to the front trenches shows an interesting + series of phases. One leaves Amiens, in which the normal life threads its + way through crowds of resting men in khaki and horizon blue, in which + staff officers in automobiles whisk hither and thither, in which there are + nurses and even a few inexplicable ladies in worldly costume, in which + restaurants and cafes are congested and busy, through which there is a + perpetual coming and going of processions of heavy vans to the railway + sidings. One dodges past a monstrous blue-black gun going up to the + British front behind two resolute traction engines—the three + sun-blistered young men in the cart that trails behind lounge in attitudes + of haughty pride that would shame the ceiling gods of Hampton Court. One + passes through arcades of waiting motor vans, through arcades of waiting + motor vans, through suburbs still more intensely khaki or horizon blue, + and so out upon the great straight poplar-edged road—to the front. + Sometimes one laces through spates of heavy traffic, sometimes the dusty + road is clear ahead, now we pass a vast aviation camp, now a park of + waiting field guns, now an encampment of cavalry. One turns aside, and + abruptly one is in France—France as one knew it before the war, on a + shady secondary road, past a delightful chateau behind its iron gates, + past a beautiful church, and then suddenly we are in a village street full + of stately Indian soldiers. + </p> + <p> + It betrays no military secret to say that commonly the rare tourist to the + British offensive passes through Albert, with its great modern red + cathedral smashed to pieces and the great gilt Madonna and Child that once + surmounted the tower now, as everyone knows, hanging out horizontally in + an attitude that irresistibly suggests an imminent dive upon the passing + traveller. One looks right up under it. + </p> + <p> + Presently we begin to see German prisoners. The whole lot look entirely + contented, and are guarded by perhaps a couple of men in khaki. These + German prisoners do not attempt to escape, they have not the slightest + desire for any more fighting, they have done their bit, they say, honour + is satisfied; they give remarkably little trouble. A little way further on + perhaps we pass their cage, a double barbed-wire enclosure with a few + tents and huts within. + </p> + <p> + A string of covered waggons passes by. I turn and see a number of men + sitting inside and looking almost as cheerful as a beanfeast in Epping + Forest. They make facetious gestures. They have a subdued sing-song going + on. But one of them looks a little sick, and then I notice not very + obtrusive bandages. “Sitting-up cases,” my guide explains. + </p> + <p> + These are part of the casualties of last night's fight. + </p> + <p> + The fields on either side are now more evidently in the war zone. The + array of carts, the patches of tents, the coming and going of men + increases. But here are three women harvesting, and presently in a + cornfield are German prisoners working under one old Frenchman. Then the + fields become trampled again. Here is a village, not so very much knocked + about, and passing through it we go slowly beside a long column of men + going up to the front. We scan their collars for signs of some familiar + regiment. These are new men going up for the first time; there is a sort + of solemn elation in many of their faces. + </p> + <p> + The men coming down are usually smothered in mud or dust, and unless there + has been a fight they look pretty well done up. They stoop under their + equipment, and some of the youngsters drag. One pleasant thing about this + coming down is the welcome of the regimental band, which is usually at + work as soon as the men turn off from the high road. I hear several bands + on the British front; they do much to enhance the general cheerfulness. On + one of these days of my tour I had the pleasure of seeing the —-th + Blankshires coming down after a fight. As we drew near I saw that they + combined an extreme muddiness with an unusual elasticity. They all seemed + to be looking us in the face instead of being too fagged to bother. Then I + noticed a nice grey helmet dangling from one youngster's bayonet, in fact + his eye directed me to it. A man behind him had a black German helmet of + the type best known in English illustrations; then two more grey appeared. + The catch of helmets was indeed quite considerable. Then I perceived on + the road bank above and marching parallel with this column, a double file + of still muddier Germans. Either they wore caps or went bare-headed. There + were no helmets among them. We do not rob our prisoners but—a helmet + is a weapon. Anyhow, it is an irresistible souvenir. + </p> + <p> + Now and then one sees afar off an ammunition dump, many hundreds of stacks + of shells—without their detonators as yet—being unloaded from + railway trucks, transferred from the broad gauge to the narrow gauge line, + or loaded onto motor trolleys. Now and then one crosses a railway line. + The railway lines run everywhere behind the British front, the + construction follows the advance day by day. They go up as fast as the + guns. One's guide remarks as the car bumps over the level crossing, “That + is one of Haig's railways.” It is an aspect of the Commander-in-Chief that + has much impressed and pleased the men. And at last we begin to enter the + region of the former Allied trenches, we pass the old German front line, + we pass ruined houses, ruined fields, and thick patches of clustering + wooden crosses and boards where the dead of the opening assaults lie. + There are no more reapers now, there is no more green upon the fields, + there is no green anywhere, scarcely a tree survives by the roadside, but + only overthrown trunks and splintered stumps; the fields are wildernesses + of shell craters and coarse weeds, the very woods are collections of + blasted stems and stripped branches. This absolutely ravaged and ruined + battlefield country extends now along the front of the Somme offensive for + a depth of many miles; across it the French and British camps and + batteries creep forward, the stores, the dumps, the railways creep + forward, in their untiring, victorious thrust against the German lines. + Overhead hum and roar the aeroplanes, away towards the enemy the humped, + blue sausage-shaped kite balloons brood thoughtfully, and from this point + and that, guns, curiously invisible until they speak, flash suddenly and + strike their one short hammer-blow of sound. + </p> + <p> + Then one sees an enemy shell drop among the little patch of trees on the + crest to the right, and kick up a great red-black mass of smoke and dust. + We see it, and then we hear the whine of its arrival and at last the bang. + The Germans are blind now, they have lost the air, they are firing by + guesswork and their knowledge of the abandoned territory. + </p> + <p> + “They think they have got divisional headquarters there,” someone + remarks.... “They haven't. But they keep on.” + </p> + <p> + In this zone where shells burst the wise automobile stops and tucks itself + away as inconspicuously as possible close up to a heap of ruins. There is + very little traffic on the road now except for a van or so that hurries + up, unloads, and gets back as soon as possible. Mules and men are taking + the stuff the rest of the journey. We are in a flattened village, all + undermined by dug-outs that were in the original German second line. We + report ourselves to a young troglodyte in one of these, and are given a + guide, and so set out on the last part of the journey to the ultimate + point, across the land of shell craters and barbed wire litter and old and + new trenches. We have all put on British steel helmets, hard but heavy and + inelegant head coverings. I can write little that is printable about these + aesthetic crimes. The French and German helmets are noble and beautiful + things. These lumpish <i>pans.</i>.. + </p> + <p> + They ought to be called by the name of the man who designed them. + </p> + <p> + Presently we are advised to get into a communication trench. It is not a + very attractive communication trench, and we stick to our track across the + open. Three or four shells shiver overhead, but we decide they are British + shells, going out. We reach a supporting trench in which men are waiting + in a state of nearly insupportable boredom for the midday stew, the one + event of interest in a day-long vigil. Here we are told imperatively to + come right in at once, and we do. + </p> + <p> + All communication trenches are tortuous and practically endless. On an + offensive front they have vertical sides of unsupported earth and + occasional soakaways for rain, covered by wooden gratings, and they go on + and on and on. At rare intervals they branch, and a notice board says “To + Regent Street,” or “To Oxford Street,” or some such lie. It is all just + trench. For a time you talk, but talking in single file soon palls. You + cease to talk, and trudge. A great number of telephone wires come into the + trench and cross and recross it. You cannot keep clear of them. Your + helmet pings against them and they try to remove it. Sometimes you have to + stop and crawl under wires. Then you wonder what the trench is like in + really wet weather. You hear a shell burst at no great distance. You pass + two pages of <i>The Strand Magazine.</i> Perhaps thirty yards on you pass + a cigarette end. After these sensational incidents the trench quiets down + again and continues to wind endlessly—just a sandy, extremely narrow + vertical walled trench. A giant crack. + </p> + <p> + At last you reach the front line trench. On an offensive sector it has + none of the architectural interest of first line trenches at such places + as Soissons or Arras. It was made a week or so ago by joining up shell + craters, and if all goes well we move into the German trench along by the + line of scraggy trees, at which we peep discreetly, to-morrow night. We + can peep discreetly because just at present our guns are putting shrapnel + over the enemy at the rate of about three shells a minute, the puffs + follow each other up and down the line, and no Germans are staring out to + see us. + </p> + <p> + The Germans “strafed” this trench overnight, and the men are tired and + sleepy. Our guns away behind us are doing their best now to give them a + rest by strafing the Germans. One or two men are in each forward sap + keeping a look out; the rest sleep, a motionless sleep, in the earthy + shelter pits that have been scooped out. One officer sits by a telephone + under an earth-covered tarpaulin, and a weary man is doing the toilet of a + machine gun. We go on to a shallow trench in which we must stoop, and + which has been badly knocked about.... Here we have to stop. The road to + Berlin is not opened up beyond this point. + </p> + <p> + My companion on this excursion is a man I have admired for years and never + met until I came out to see the war, a fellow writer. He is a journalist + let loose. Two-thirds of the junior British officers I met on this journey + were really not “army men” at all. One finds that the apparent subaltern + is really a musician, or a musical critic, or an Egyptologist, or a + solicitor, or a cloth manufacturer, or a writer. At the outbreak of the + war my guide dyed his hair to conceal its tell-tale silver, and having + been laughed to scorn by the ordinary recruiting people, enlisted in the + sportsmen's battalion. He was wounded, and then the authorities discovered + that he was likely to be of more use with a commission and drew him, in + spite of considerable resistance, out of the firing line. To which he + always returns whenever he can get a visitor to take with him as an + excuse. He now stood up, fairly high and clear, explaining casually that + the Germans were no longer firing, and showed me the points of interest. + </p> + <p> + I had come right up to No Man's Land at last. It was under my chin. The + skyline, the last skyline before the British could look down on Bapaume, + showed a mangy wood and a ruined village, crouching under repeated + gobbings of British shrapnel. “They've got a battery just there, and we're + making it uncomfortable.” No Man's Land itself is a weedy space broken up + by shell craters, with very little barbed wire in front of us and very + little in front of the Germans. “They've got snipers in most of the + craters, and you see them at twilight hopping about from one to the + other.” We have very little wire because we don't mean to stay for very + long in this trench, but the Germans have very little wire because they + have not been able to get it up yet. They never will get it up now.... + </p> + <p> + I had been led to believe that No Man's Land was littered with the + unburied dead, but I saw nothing of the sort at this place. There had been + no German counter attack since our men came up here. But at one point as + we went along the trench there was a dull stench. “Germans, I think,” said + my guide, though I did not see how he could tell. + </p> + <p> + He looked at his watch and remarked reluctantly, “If you start at once, + you may just do it.” + </p> + <p> + I wanted to catch the Boulogne boat. It was then just past one in the + afternoon. We met the stew as we returned along the communication trench, + and it smelt very good indeed.... We hurried across the great spaces of + rusty desolation upon which every now and again a German shell was + bursting.... + </p> + <p> + That night I was in my flat in London. I had finished reading the + accumulated letters of some weeks, and I was just going comfortably to + bed. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0010" id="link2H_4_0010"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + IV. NEW ARMS FOR OLD ONES + </h2> + <p> + 1 + </p> + <p> + Such are the landscapes and method of modern war. It is more difficult in + its nature from war as it was waged in the nineteenth century than that + was from the nature of the phalanx or the legion. The nucleus fact—when + I talked to General Joffre he was very insistent upon this point—is + still as ever the ordinary fighting man, but all the accessories and + conditions of his personal encounter with the fighting man of the other + side have been revolutionised in a quarter of a century. The fighting + together in a close disciplined order, shoulder to shoulder, which has + held good for thousands of years as the best and most successful fighting, + has been destroyed; the idea of <i>breaking</i> infantry formation as the + chief offensive operation has disappeared, the cavalry charge and the + cavalry pursuit are as obsolete as the cross-bow. The modern fighting man + is as individualised as a half back or a centre forward in a football + team. Personal fighting has become “scrapping” again, an individual + adventure with knife, club, bomb, revolver or bayonet. In this war we are + working out things instead of thinking them out, and these enormous + changes are still but imperfectly apprehended. The trained and specialised + military man probably apprehends them as feebly as anyone. + </p> + <p> + This is a thing that I want to state as emphatically as possible. It is + the pith of the lesson I have learnt at the front. The whole method of war + has been so altered in the past five and twenty years as to make it a new + and different process altogether. Much the larger part of this alteration + has only become effective in the last two years. Everyone is a beginner at + this new game; everyone is experimenting and learning. + </p> + <p> + The idea has been put admirably by <i>Punch.</i> That excellent picture of + the old-fashioned sergeant who complains to his officer of the new + recruit; “'E's all right in the trenches, Sir; 'e's all right at a scrap; + but 'e won't never make a soldier,” is the quintessence of everything I am + saying here. And were there not the very gravest doubts about General + Smuts in British military circles because he had “had no military + training”? A Canadian expressed the new view very neatly on being asked, + in consequence of a deficient salute, whether he wanted to be a soldier, + by saying, “Not I! I want to be a fighter!” + </p> + <p> + The professional officer of the old dispensation was a man specialised in + relation to one of the established “arms.” He was an infantryman, a + cavalryman, a gunner or an engineer. It will be interesting to trace the + changes that have happened to all these arms. + </p> + <p> + Before this war began speculative writers had argued that infantry drill + in close formation had now no fighting value whatever, that it was no + doubt extremely necessary for the handling, packing, forwarding and + distribution of men, but that the ideal infantry fighter was now a highly + individualised and self-reliant man put into a pit with a machine gun, and + supported by a string of other men bringing him up supplies and ready to + assist him in any forward rush that might be necessary. + </p> + <p> + The opening phases of the war seemed to contradict this. It did not at + first suit the German game to fight on this most modern theory, and + isolated individual action is uncongenial to the ordinary German + temperament and opposed to the organised social tendencies of German life. + To this day the Germans attack only in close order; they are unable to + produce a real modern infantry for aggressive purposes, and it is a matter + of astonishment to military minds on the English side that our hastily + trained new armies should turn out to be just as good at the new fighting + as the most “seasoned troops.” But there is no reason whatever why they + should not be. “Leading,” in the sense of going ahead of the men and + making them move about mechanically at the word of command, has ceased. On + the British side our magnificent new subalterns and our equally + magnificent new non-commissioned officers play the part of captains of + football teams; they talk their men individually into an understanding of + the job before them; they criticise style and performance. On the French + side things have gone even farther. Every man in certain attacks has been + given a large scale map of the ground over which he has to go, and has had + his own individual job clearly marked and explained to him. All the Allied + infantrymen tend to become specialised, as bombers, as machine-gun men, + and so on. The unspecialised common soldier, the infantryman who has stood + and marched and moved in ranks and ranks, the “serried lines of men,” who + are the main substance of every battle story for the last three thousand + years, are as obsolete as the dodo. The rifle and bayonet very probably + are becoming obsolete too. Knives and clubs and revolvers serve better in + the trenches. The krees and the Roman sword would be as useful. The fine + flourish of the bayonet is only possible in the rare infrequent open. Even + the Zulu assegai would serve as well. + </p> + <p> + The two operations of the infantry attack now are the rush and the + “scrap.” These come after the artillery preparation. Against the rush, the + machine gun is pitted. The machine gun becomes lighter and more and more + controllable by one man; as it does so the days of the rifle draw to a + close. Against the machine gun we are now directing the “Tank,” which goes + ahead and puts out the machine gun as soon as it begins to sting the + infantry rush. We are also using the swooping aeroplane with a machine + gun. Both these devices are of British origin, and they promise very well. + </p> + <p> + After the rush and the scrap comes the organisation of the captured + trench. “Digging in” completes the cycle of modern infantry fighting. You + may consider this the first or the last phase of an infantry operation. It + is probably at present the least worked-out part of the entire cycle. Here + lies the sole German superiority; they bunch and crowd in the rush, they + are inferior at the scrap, but they do dig like moles. The weakness of the + British is their failure to settle down. They like the rush and the scrap; + they press on too far, they get outflanked and lost “in the blue”; they + are not naturally clever at the excavating part of the work, and they are + not as yet well trained in making dug-outs and shelter-pits rapidly and + intelligently. They display most of the faults that were supposed to be + most distinctively French before this war came to revolutionise all our + conceptions of French character. + </p> + <p> + 2 + </p> + <p> + Now the operations of this modern infantry, which unlike any preceding + infantry in the history of war does not fight in disciplined formations + but as highly individualised specialists, are determined almost completely + by the artillery preparation. Artillery is now the most essential + instrument of war. You may still get along with rather bad infantry; you + may still hold out even after the loss of the aerial ascendancy, but so + soon as your guns fail you approach defeat. The backbone process of the + whole art of war is the manufacture in overwhelming quantities, the + carriage and delivery of shell upon the vulnerable points of the enemy's + positions. That is, so to speak, the essential blow. Even the infantryman + is now hardly more than the residuary legatee after the guns have taken + their toll. + </p> + <p> + I have now followed nearly every phase in the life history of a shell from + the moment when it is a segment of steel bar just cut off, to the moment + when it is no more than a few dispersed and rusting rags and fragments of + steel—pressed upon the stray visitor to the battlefield as + souvenirs. All good factories are intensely interesting places to visit, + but a good munition factory is romantically satisfactory. It is as nearly + free from the antagonism of employer and employed as any factory can be. + The busy sheds I visited near Paris struck me as being the most living and + active things in the entire war machine. Everywhere else I saw fitful + activity, or men waiting. I have seen more men sitting about and standing + about, more bored inactivity, during my tour than I have ever seen before + in my life. Even the front line trenches seem to slumber; the Angel of + Death drowses over them, and moves in his sleep to crush out men's lives. + The gunfire has an indolent intermittence. But the munition factories + grind on night and day, grinding against the factories in Central Europe, + grinding out the slow and costly and necessary victory that should end + aggressive warfare in the world for ever. + </p> + <p> + It would be very interesting if one could arrange a meeting between any + typical Allied munition maker on the one hand, and the Kaiser and + Hindenburg, those two dominant effigies of the German nationalists' dream + of “world might.” Or failing that, Mr. Dyson might draw the encounter. You + imagine these two heroic figures got up for the interview, very + magnificent in shining helms and flowing cloaks, decorations, splendid + swords, spurs. “Here,” one would say, “is the power that has held you. You + were bolstered up very loyally by the Krupp firm and so forth, you piled + up shell, guns, war material, you hoped to snatch your victory before the + industrialisation and invention of the world could turn upon you. But you + failed. You were not rapid enough. The battle of the Marne was your + misfortune. And Ypres. You lost some chances at Ypres. Two can play at + destructive industrialism, and now we out-gun you. We are piling up + munitions now faster than you. The essentials of this Game of the War Lord + are idiotically simple, but it was not of our choosing. It is now merely a + question of months before you make your inevitable admission. This is no + war to any great commander's glory. This gentleman in the bowler hat is + the victor, Sire; not you. Assisted, Sire, by these disrespectful-looking + factory girls in overalls.” + </p> + <p> + For example, there is M. Citroen. Before the war I understand he made + automobiles; after the war he wants to turn to and make automobiles again. + For the duration of the war he makes shell. He has been temporarily + diverted from constructive to destructive industrialism. He did me the + honours of his factory. He is a compact, active man in dark clothes and a + bowler hat, with a pencil and notebook conveniently at hand. He talked to + me in carefully easy French, and watched my face with an intelligent eye + through his pince-nez for the signs of comprehension. Then he went on to + the next point. + </p> + <p> + He took me through every stage of his process. In his office he showed me + the general story. Here were photographs of certain vacant fields and old + sheds—“this place”—he indicated the altered prospect from the + window—“at the outbreak of the war.” He showed me a plan of the + first undertaking. “Now we have rather over nine thousand workpeople.” + </p> + <p> + He showed me a little row of specimens. “These we make for Italy. These go + to Russia. These are the Rumanian pattern.” + </p> + <p> + Thence to the first stage, the chopping up of the iron bars, the furnace, + the punching out of the first shape of the shell; all this is men's work. + I had seen this sort of thing before in peace ironworks, but I saw it + again with the same astonishment, the absolute precision of movement on + the part of the half-naked sweating men, the calculated efficiency of each + worker, the apparent heedlessness, the real certitude, with which the + blazing hot cylinder is put here, dropped there, rolls to its next + appointed spot, is chopped up and handed on, the swift passage to the + cooling crude, pinkish-purple shell shape. Down a long line one sees in + perspective a practical symmetry, of furnace and machine group and the + shells marching on from this first series of phases to undergo the long + succession of operations, machine after machine, across the great width of + the shed in which eighty per cent of the workers are women. There is a + thick dust of sounds in the air, a rumble of shafting, sudden thuddings, + clankings, and M. Citroen has to raise his voice. He points out where he + has made little changes in procedures, cut out some wasteful movement.... + He has an idea and makes a note in the ever-ready notebook. + </p> + <p> + There is a beauty about all these women, there is extraordinary grace in + their finely adjusted movements. I have come from an after-lunch coffee + upon the boulevards and from watching the ugly fashion of our time; it is + a relief to be reminded that most women can after all be beautiful—if + only they would not “dress.” these women wear simple overalls and caps. In + the cap is a rosette. Each shed has its own colour of rosette. + </p> + <p> + “There is much esprit de corps here,” says M. Citroen. + </p> + <p> + “And also,” he adds, showing obverse as well as reverse of the world's + problem of employment and discipline, “we can see at once if a woman is + not in her proper shed.” + </p> + <p> + Across the great sheds under the shafting—how fine it must look at + night!—the shells march, are shaped, cut, fitted with copper bands, + calibrated, polished, varnished.... + </p> + <p> + Then we go on to another system of machines in which lead is reduced to + plastic ribbons and cut into shrapnel bullets as the sweetstuff makers + pull out and cut up sweetstuff. And thence into a warren of hot + underground passages in which run the power cables. There is not a cable + in the place that is not immediately accessible to the electricians. We + visit the dynamos and a vast organisation of switchboards.... + </p> + <p> + These things are more familiar to M. Citroen than they are to me. He wants + me to understand, but he does not realise that I would like a little + leisure to wonder. What is interesting him just now, because it is the + newest thing, is his method of paying his workers. He lifts a hand + gravely: “I said, what we must do is abolish altogether the counting of + change.” + </p> + <p> + At a certain hour, he explained, came pay-time. The people had done; it + was to his interest and their that they should get out of the works as + quickly as possible and rest and amuse themselves. He watched them + standing in queues at the wickets while inside someone counted; so many + francs, so many centimes. It bored him to see this useless, tiresome + waiting. It is abolished. Now at the end of each week the worker goes to a + window under the initial of his name, and is handed a card on which these + items have been entered: + </p> + <p> + Balance from last week. So many hours at so much. Premiums. + </p> + <p> + The total is so many francs, so many centimes. This is divided into the + nearest round number, 100, 120, 80 francs as the case may be, and a + balance of the odd francs and centimes. The latter is carried forward to + the next week's account. At the bottom of the card is a tear-off coupon + with a stamp, coloured to indicate the round sum, green, let us say, for + 100, blue for 130 francs. This is taken to a wicket marked 100 or 130 as + the case may be, and there stands a cashier with his money in piles of 100 + or 130 francs counted ready to hand; he sweeps in the coupon, sweeps out + the cash. “<i>Next!</i>” + </p> + <p> + I became interested in the worker's side of this organisation. I insist on + seeing the entrances, the clothes-changing places, the lavatories, and so + forth of the organisation. As we go about we pass a string of electric + trolleys steered by important-looking girls, and loaded with shell, + finished as far as these works are concerned and on their way to the + railway siding. We visit the hospital, for these works demand a medical + staff. It is not only that men and women faint or fall ill, but there are + accidents, burns, crushings, and the like. The war casualties begin + already here, and they fall chiefly among the women. I saw a wounded woman + with a bandaged face sitting very quietly in the corner. + </p> + <p> + The women here face danger, perhaps not quite such obvious danger as the + women who, at the next stage in the shell's career, make and pack the + explosives in their silk casing, but quite considerable risk. And they + work with a real enthusiasm. They know they are fighting the Bloches as + well as any men. Certain of them wear Russian decorations. The women of + this particular factory have been thanked by the Tsar, and a number of + decorations were sent by him for distribution among them. + </p> + <p> + 3 + </p> + <p> + The shell factory and the explosives shed stand level with the drill yard + as the real first stage in one of the two essential <i>punches</i> in + modern war. When one meets the shell again it is being unloaded from the + railway truck into an ammunition dump. And here the work of control is + much more the work of a good traffic manager than of the old-fashioned + soldier. + </p> + <p> + The dump I best remember I visited on a wet and windy day. Over a great + space of ground the sidings of the rail-head spread, the normal gauge + rail-head spread out like a fan and interdigitated with the narrow gauge + lines that go up practically to the guns. And also at the sides camions + were loading, and an officer from the Midi in charge of one of these was + being dramatically indignant at five minutes' delay. Between these two + sets of lines, shells were piled of all sizes, I should think some + hundreds of thousands of shells altogether, wet and shining in the rain. + French reservists, soldiers from Madagascar, and some Senegalese were busy + at different points loading and unloading the precious freights. A little + way from me were despondent-looking German prisoners handling timber. All + this dump was no more than an eddy as it were in the path of the shell + from its birth from the steel bars near Paris to the accomplishment of its + destiny in the destruction or capture of more Germans. + </p> + <p> + And next the visitor meets the shell coming up upon a little trolley to + the gun. He sees the gunners, as drilled and precise as the men he saw at + the forges, swing out the breech block and run the shell, which has met + and combined with its detonators and various other industrial products + since it left the main dump, into the gun. The breech closes like a safe + door, and hides the shell from the visitor. It is “good-bye.” He receives + exaggerated warning of the danger to his ears, stuffs his fingers into + them, and opens his mouth as instructed, hears a loud but by no means + deafening report, and sees a spit of flame near the breech. Regulations of + a severe character prevent his watching from an aeroplane the delivery of + the goods upon the customers opposite. + </p> + <p> + I have already described the method of locating enemy guns and so forth by + photography. Many of the men at this work are like dentists rather than + soldiers; they are busy in carefully lit rooms, they wear white overalls, + they have clean hands and laboratory manners. The only really romantic + figure in the whole of this process, the only figure that has anything of + the old soldierly swagger about him still, is the aviator. And, as one + friend remarked to me when I visited the work of the British flying corps, + “The real essential strength of this arm is the organisation of its + repairs. Here is one of the repair vans through which our machine guns go. + It is a motor workshop on wheels. But at any time all this park, + everything, can pack up and move forward like Barnum and Bailey's Circus. + The machine guns come through this shop in rotation; they go out again, + cleaned, repaired, made new again. Since we got all that working we have + heard nothing of a machine gun jamming in any air fight at all.”... + </p> + <p> + The rest of the career of the shell after it has left the gun one must + imagine chiefly from the incoming shell from the enemy. You see suddenly a + flying up of earth and stones and anything else that is movable in the + neighbourhood of the shell-burst, the instantaneous unfolding of a dark + cloud of dust and reddish smoke, which comes very quickly to a certain + size and then begins slowly to fray out and blow away. Then, after seeing + the cloud of the burst you hear the hiss of the shell's approach, and + finally you are hit by the sound of the explosion. This is the climax and + end of the life history of any shell that is not a dud shell. Afterwards + the battered fuse may serve as some journalist's paper-weight. The rest is + scrap iron. + </p> + <p> + Such is, so to speak, the primary process of modern warfare. I will not + draw the obvious pacifist moral of the intense folly of human + concentration upon such a process. The Germans willed it. We Allies have + but obeyed the German will for warfare because we could not do otherwise, + we have taken up this simple game of shell delivery, and we are teaching + them that we can play it better, in the hope that so we and the world may + be freed from the German will-to-power and all its humiliating and + disgusting consequences henceforth for ever. Europe now is no more than a + household engaged in holding up and if possible overpowering a monomaniac + member. + </p> + <p> + 4 + </p> + <p> + Now the whole of this process of the making and delivery of a shell, which + is the main process of modern warfare, is one that can be far better + conducted by a man accustomed to industrial organisation or transit work + than by the old type of soldier. This is a thing that cannot be too + plainly stated or too often repeated. Germany nearly won this way because + of her tremendously modern industrial resources; but she blundered into it + and she is losing it because she has too many men in military uniform and + because their tradition and interests were to powerful with her. All the + state and glories of soldiering, the bright uniforms, the feathers and + spurs, the flags, the march-past, the disciplined massed advance, the + charge; all these are as needless and obsolete now in war as the masks and + shields of an old-time Chinese brave. Liberal-minded people talk of the + coming dangers of militarism in the face of events that prove conclusively + that professional militarism is already as dead as Julius Caesar. What is + coming is not so much the conversion of men into soldiers as the + socialisation of the economic organisation of the country with a view to + both national and international necessities. We do not want to turn a + chemist or a photographer into a little figure like a lead soldier, moving + mechanically at the word of command, but we do want to make his chemistry + or photography swiftly available if the national organisation is called + upon to fight. + </p> + <p> + We have discovered that the modern economic organisation is in itself a + fighting machine. It is so much so that it is capable of taking on and + defeating quite easily any merely warrior people that is so rash as to pit + itself against it. Within the last sixteen years methods of fighting have + been elaborated that have made war an absolutely hopeless adventure for + any barbaric or non-industrialised people. In the rush of larger events + few people have realised the significance of the rapid squashing of the + Senussi in western Egypt, and the collapse of De Wet's rebellion in South + Africa. Both these struggles would have been long, tedious and uncertain + even in A.D. 1900. This time they have been, so to speak, child's play. + </p> + <p> + Occasionally into the writer's study there come to hand drifting fragments + of the American literature upon the question of “preparedness,” and + American papers discussing the Mexican situation. In none of these is + there evident any clear realisation of the fundamental revolution that has + occurred in military methods during the last two years. It looks as if a + Mexican war, for example, was thought of as an affair of rather + imperfectly trained young men with rifles and horses and old-fashioned + things like that. A Mexican war on that level might be as tedious as the + South African war. But if the United States preferred to go into Mexican + affairs with what I may perhaps call a 1916 autumn outfit instead of the + small 1900 outfit she seems to possess at present, there is no reason why + America should not clear up any and every Mexican guerilla force she + wanted to in a few weeks. + </p> + <p> + To do that she would need a plant of a few hundred aeroplanes, for the + most part armed with machine guns, and the motor repair vans and so forth + needed to go with the aeroplanes; she would need a comparatively small + army of infantry armed with machine guns, with motor transport, and a few + small land ironclads. Such a force could locate, overtake, destroy and + disperse any possible force that a country in the present industrial + condition of Mexico could put into the field. No sort of entrenchment or + fortification possible in Mexico could stand against it. It could go from + one end of the country to the other without serious loss, and hunt down + and capture anyone it wished.... + </p> + <p> + The practical political consequence of the present development of warfare, + of the complete revolution in the conditions of warfare since this century + began, is to make war absolutely hopeless for any peoples not able either + to manufacture or procure the very complicated appliances and munitions + now needed for its prosecution. Countries like Mexico, Bulgaria, Serbia, + Afghanistan or Abyssinia are no more capable of going to war without the + connivance and help of manufacturing states than horses are capable of + flying. And this makes possible such a complete control of war by the few + great states which are at the necessary level of industrial development as + not the most Utopian of us have hitherto dared to imagine. + </p> + <p> + 5 + </p> + <p> + Infantrymen with automobile transport, plentiful machine guns, Tanks and + such-like accessories; that is the first Arm in modern war. The factory + hand and all the material of the shell route from the factory to the gun + constitute the second Arm. Thirdly comes the artillery, the guns and the + photographic aeroplanes working with the guns. Next I suppose we must + count sappers and miners as a fourth Arm of greatly increased importance. + The fifth and last combatant Arm is the modern substitute for cavalry; and + that also is essentially a force of aeroplanes supported by automobiles. + Several of the French leaders with whom I talked seemed to be convinced + that the horse is absolutely done with in modern warfare. There is + nothing, they declared, that cavalry ever did that cannot now be done + better by aeroplane. + </p> + <p> + This is something to break the hearts of the Prussian junkers and of + old-fashioned British army people. The hunt across the English + countryside, the preservation of the fox as a sacred animal, the race + meeting, the stimulation of betting in all classes of the public; all + these things depend ultimately upon the proposition that the “breed of + horses” is of vital importance to the military strength of Great Britain. + But if the arguments of these able French soldiers are sound, the cult of + the horse ceases to be of any more value to England than the elegant + activities of the Toxophilite Society. Moreover, there has been a colossal + buying of horses for the British army, a tremendous organisation for the + purchase and supply of fodder, then employment of tens of thousands of men + as grooms, minders and the like, who would otherwise have been in the + munition factories or the trenches. + </p> + <p> + To what possible use can cavalry be put? Can it be used in attack? Not + against trenches; that is better done by infantrymen following up gunfire. + Can it be used against broken infantry in the open? Not if the enemy has + one or two machine guns covering their retreat. Against expose infantry + the swooping aeroplane with a machine gun is far more deadly and more + difficult to hit. Behind it your infantry can follow to receive + surrenders; in most circumstances they can come up on cycles if it is a + case of getting up quickly across a wide space. Similarly for pursuit the + use of wire and use of the machine gun have abolished the possibility of a + pouring cavalry charge. The swooping aeroplane does everything that + cavalry can do in the way of disorganising the enemy, and far more than it + can do in the way of silencing machine guns. It can capture guns in + retreat much more easily by bombing traction engines and coming down low + and shooting horses and men. An ideal modern pursuit would be an advance + of guns, automobiles full of infantry, motor cyclists and cyclists, behind + a high screen of observation aeroplanes and a low screen of bombing and + fighting aeroplanes. Cavalry <i>might</i> advance across fields and so + forth, but only as a very accessory part of the general advance.... + </p> + <p> + And what else is there for the cavalry to do? + </p> + <p> + It may be argued that horses can go over country that is impossible for + automobiles. That is to ignore altogether what has been done in this war + by such devices as caterpillar wheels. So far from cavalry being able to + negotiate country where machines would stick and fail, mechanism can now + ride over places where any horse would flounder. + </p> + <p> + I submit these considerations to the horse-lover. They are not my original + observations; they have been put to me and they have convinced me. Except + perhaps as a parent of transport mules I see no further part henceforth + for the horse to play in war. + </p> + <p> + 6 + </p> + <p> + The form and texture of the coming warfare—if there is still warfare + to come—are not yet to be seen in their completeness upon the modern + battlefield. One swallow does not make a summer, nor a handful of + aeroplanes, a “Tank” or so, a few acres of shell craters, and a village + here and there, pounded out of recognition, do more than foreshadow the + spectacle of modernised war on land. War by these developments has become + the monopoly of the five great industrial powers; it is their alternative + to end or evolve it, and if they continue to disagree, then it must needs + become a spectacle of majestic horror such as no man can yet conceive. It + has been wise of Mr. Pennell therefore, who has recently been drawing his + impressions of the war upon stone, to make his pictures not upon the + battlefield, but among the huge industrial apparatus that is thrusting + behind and thrusting up through the war of the gentlemen in spurs. He + gives us the splendours and immensities of forge and gun pit, furnace and + mine shaft. He shows you how great they are and how terrible. Among them + go the little figures of men, robbed of all dominance, robbed of all + individual quality. He leaves it for you to draw the obvious conclusion + that presently, if we cannot contrive to put an end to war, blacknessess + like these, enormities and flares and towering threats, will follow in the + track of the Tanks and come trampling over the bickering confusion of + mankind. + </p> + <p> + There is something very striking in these insignificant and incidental men + that Mr. Pennell shows us. Nowhere does a man dominate in all these + wonderful pictures. You may argue perhaps that that is untrue to the + essential realities; all this array of machine and workshop, all this + marshalled power and purpose, has been the creation of inventor and + business organiser. But are we not a little too free with that word “<i>creation</i>”? + Falstaff was a “creation” perhaps, or the Sistine sibyls; there we have + indubitably an end conceived and sought and achieved; but did these + inventors and business organisers do more than heed certain unavoidable + imperatives? Seeking coal they were obliged to mine in a certain way; + seeking steel they had to do this and this and not that and that; seeking + profit they had to obey the imperative of the economy. So little did they + plan their ends that most of these manufacturers speak with a kind of + astonishment of the deadly use to which their works are put. They find + themselves making the new war as a man might wake out of some drugged + condition to find himself strangling his mother. + </p> + <p> + So that Mr. Pennell's sketchy and transient human figures seem altogether + right to me. He sees these forges, workshops, cranes and the like, as + inhuman and as wonderful as cliffs or great caves or icebergs or the + stars. They are a new aspect of the logic of physical necessity that made + all these older things, and he seizes upon the majesty and beauty of their + dimensions with an entire impartiality. And they are as impartial. Through + all these lithographs runs one present motif, the motif of the supreme + effort of western civilisation to save itself and the world from the + dominance of the reactionary German Imperialism of modern science. The + pictures are arranged to shape out the life of a shell, from the mine to + the great gun; nothing remains of their history to show except the + ammunition dump, the gun in action and the shell-burst. Upon this theme + all these great appearances are strung to-day. But to-morrow they may be + strung upon some other and nobler purpose. These gigantic beings of which + the engineer is the master and slave, are neither benevolent nor + malignant. To-day they produce destruction, they are the slaves of the + spur; to-morrow we hope they will bridge and carry and house and help + again. + </p> + <p> + For that peace we struggle against the dull inflexibility of the German + Will-to-Power. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0011" id="link2H_4_0011"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + V. TANKS + </h2> + <p> + 1 + </p> + <p> + It is the British who have produced the “land ironclad” since I returned + from France, and used it apparently with very good effect. I felt no + little chagrin at not seeing them there, because I have a peculiar + interest in these contrivances. It would be more than human not to claim a + little in this matter. I described one in a story in <i>The Strand + Magazine</i> in 1903, and my story could stand in parallel columns beside + the first account of these monsters in action given by Mr. Beach Thomas or + Mr. Philip Gibbs. My friend M. Joseph Reinach has successfully passed off + long extracts from my story as descriptions of the Tanks upon British + officers who had just seen them. The filiation was indeed quite traceable. + They were my grandchildren—I felt a little like King Lear when first + I read about them. Yet let me state at once that I was certainly not their + prime originator. I took up an idea, manipulated it slightly, and handed + it on. The idea was suggested to me by the contrivances of a certain Mr. + Diplock, whose “ped-rail” notion, the notion of a wheel that was something + more than a wheel, a wheel that would take locomotives up hill-sides and + over ploughed fields, was public property nearly twenty years ago. + Possibly there were others before Diplock. To the Ped-rail also Commander + Murray Sueter, one of the many experimentalists upon the early tanks, + admits his indebtedness, and it would seem that Mr. Diplock was actually + concerned in the earlier stage of the tanks. + </p> + <p> + Since my return I have been able to see the Tank at home, through the + courtesy of the Ministry of Munitions. They have progressed far beyond any + recognisable resemblance to the initiatives of Mr. Diplock; they have + approximated rather to the American caterpillar. As I suspected when first + I heard of these devices, the War Office and the old army people had + practically nothing to do with their development. They took to it very + reluctantly—as they have taken to every novelty in this war. One + brilliant general scrawled over an early proposal the entirely + characteristic comment that it was a pity the inventor could not use his + imagination to better purpose. (That foolish British trick of sneering at + “imagination” has cost us hundreds of thousands of useless casualties and + may yet lose us the war.) Tanks were first mooted at the front about a + year and a half ago; Mr. Winston Churchill was then asking questions about + their practicability; he filled many simple souls with terror; they + thought him a most dangerous lunatic. The actual making of the Tanks arose + as an irregular side development of the armoured-car branch of the Royal + Naval Air Service work. The names most closely associated with the work + are (I quote a reply of Dr. Macnamara's in the House of Commons) Mr. + d'Eyncourt, the Director of Naval Construction, Mr. W. O. Tritton, Lieut. + Wilson, R.N.A.S., Mr. Bussell, Lieut. Stern, R.N.A.S., who is now Colonel + Stern, Captain Symes, and Mr. F. Skeens. There are many other claims too + numerous to mention in detail. + </p> + <p> + But however much the Tanks may disconcert the gallant Colonel Newcomes who + throw an air of restraint over our victorious front, there can be no doubt + that they are an important as well as a novel development of the modern + offensive. Of course neither the Tanks nor their very obvious next + developments going to wrest the decisive pre-eminence from the aeroplane. + The aeroplane remains now more than ever the instrument of victory upon + the western front. Aerial ascendancy, properly utilised, is victory. But + the mobile armoured big gun and the Tank as a machine-gun silencer must + enormously facilitate an advance against the blinded enemy. Neither of + them can advance against properly aimed big gun fire. That has to be + disposed of before they make their entrance. It remains the function of + the aeroplane to locate the hostile big guns and to direct the <i>tir de + demolition</i> upon them before the advance begins—possibly even to + bomb them out. But hitherto, after the destruction of driving back of the + defender's big guns has been effected, the dug-out and the machine gun + have still inflicted heavy losses upon the advancing infantry until the + fight is won. So soon as the big guns are out, the tanks will advance, + destroying machine guns, completing the destruction of the wire, and + holding prisoners immobile. Then the infantry will follow to gather in the + sheaves. Multitudinously produced and—I write it with a defiant eye + on Colonel Newcome—<i>properly handled</i>, these land ironclads are + going to do very great things in shortening the war, in pursuit, in + breaking up the retreating enemy. Given the air ascendancy, and I am + utterly unable to imagine any way of conclusively stopping or even greatly + delaying an offensive thus equipped. + </p> + <p> + 2 + </p> + <p> + The young of even the most horrible beasts have something piquant and + engaging about them, and so I suppose it is in the way of things that the + land ironclad which opens a new and more dreadful and destructive phase in + the human folly of warfare, should appear first as if it were a joke. + Never has any such thing so completely masked its wickedness under an + appearance of genial silliness. The Tank is a creature to which one + naturally flings a pet name; the five or six I was shown wandering, + rooting and climbing over obstacles, round a large field near X, were as + amusing and disarming as a little of lively young pigs. + </p> + <p> + At first the War Office prevented the publication of any pictures or + descriptions of these contrivances except abroad; then abruptly the + embargo was relaxed, and the press was flooded with photographs. The + reader will be familiar now with their appearance. They resemble large + slugs with an underside a little like the flattened rockers of a + rocking-horse, slugs between 20 and 40 feet long. They are like flat-sided + slugs, slugs of spirit, who raise an enquiring snout, like the snout of a + dogfish, into the air. They crawl upon their bellies in a way that would + be tedious to describe to the general reader and unnecessary to describe + to the enquiring specialists. They go over the ground with the sliding + speed of active snails. Behind them trail two wheels, supporting a flimsy + tail, wheels that strike one as incongruous as if a monster began kangaroo + and ended doll's perambulator. (These wheels annoy me.) They are not + steely monsters; they are painted with drab and unassuming colours that + are fashionable in modern warfare, so that the armour seems rather like + the integument of a rhinoceros. At the sides of the head project armoured + checks, and from above these stick out guns that look like stalked eyes. + That is the general appearance of the contemporary tank. + </p> + <p> + It slides on the ground; the silly little wheels that so detract from the + genial bestiality of its appearance dandle and bump behind it. It swings + about its axis. It comes to an obstacle, a low wall let us say, or a heap + of bricks, and sets to work to climb it with its snout. It rears over the + obstacle, it raises its straining belly, it overhangs more and more, and + at last topples forward; it sways upon the heap and then goes plunging + downwards, sticking out the weak counterpoise of its wheeled tail. If it + comes to a house or a tree or a wall or such-like obstruction it rams + against it so as to bring all its weight to bear upon it—it weighs + <i>some</i> tons—and then climbs over the debris. I saw it, and + incredulous soldiers of experience watched it at the same time, cross + trenches and wallow amazingly through muddy exaggerations of small holes. + Then I repeated the tour inside. + </p> + <p> + Again the Tank is like a slug. The slug, as every biological student + knows, is unexpectedly complicated inside. The Tank is as crowded with + inward parts as a battleship. It is filled with engines, guns and + ammunition, and in the interstices men. + </p> + <p> + “You will smash your hat,” said Colonel Stern. “No; keep it on, or else + you will smash your head.” + </p> + <p> + Only Mr. C. R. W. Nevinson could do justice to the interior of a Tank. You + see a hand gripping something; you see the eyes and forehead of an + engineer's face; you perceive that an overall bluishness beyond the engine + is the back of another man. “Don't hold that,” says someone; “it is too + hot. Hold on to that.” The engines roar, so loudly that I doubt whether + one could hear guns without; the floor begins to slope and slopes until + one seems to be at forty-five degrees or thereabouts; then the whole + concern swings up and sways and slants the other way. You have crossed a + bank. You heel sideways. Through the door which has been left open you see + the little group of engineers, staff officers and naval men receding and + falling away behind you. You straighten up and go up hill. You halt and + begin to rotate. Through the open door, the green field, with its red + walls, rows of worksheds and forests of chimneys in the background, begins + a steady processional movement. The group of engineers and officers and + naval men appears at the other side of the door and farther off. Then + comes a sprint down hill. You descend and stretch your legs. + </p> + <p> + About the field other Tanks are doing their stunts. One is struggling in + an apoplectic way in the mud pit with a cheek half buried. It noses its + way out and on with an air of animal relief. + </p> + <p> + They are like jokes by Heath Robinson. One forgets that these things have + already saved the lives of many hundreds of our soldiers and smashed and + defeated thousands of Germans. + </p> + <p> + Said one soldier to me: “In the old attacks you used to see the British + dead lying outside the machine-gun emplacements like birds outside a butt + with a good shot inside. <i>Now</i>, these things walk through.” + </p> + <p> + 3 + </p> + <p> + I saw other things that day at X. The Tank is only a beginning in a new + phase of warfare. Of these other things I may only write in the most + general terms. + </p> + <p> + But though Tanks and their collaterals are being made upon a very + considerable scale in X, already I realised as I walked through gigantic + forges as high and marvellous as cathedrals, and from workshed to workshed + where gun carriages, ammunition carts and a hundred such things were + flowing into existence with the swelling abundance of a river that flows + out of a gorge, that as the demand for the new developments grows clear + and strong, the resources of Britain are capable still of a tremendous + response. <i>If only we do not rob these great factories and works of + their men.</i> + </p> + <p> + Upon this question certain things need to be said very plainly. The + decisive factor in the sort of war we are now waging is production and + right use of mechanical material; victory in this war depends now upon + three things: the aeroplane, the gun, and the Tank developments. These—and + not crowds of men—are the prime necessity for a successful + offensive. Every man we draw from munition making to the ranks brings our + western condition nearer to the military condition of Russia. In these + things we may be easily misled by military “experts” We have to remember + that the military “expert” is a man who learnt his business before 1914, + and that the business of war has been absolutely revolutionised since + 1914; the military expert is a man trained to think of war as essentially + an affair of cavalry, infantry in formation, and field guns, whereas + cavalry is entirely obsolete, infantry no longer fights in formation, and + the methods of gunnery have been entirely changed. The military man I + observe still runs about the world in spurs, he travels in trains in + spurs, he walks in spurs, he thinks in terms of spurs. He has still to + discover that it is about as ridiculous as if he were to carry a crossbow. + I take it these spurs are only the outward and visible sign of an inward + obsolescence. The disposition of the military “expert” is still to think + too little of machinery and to demand too much of the men. Behind our + front at the time of my visit there were, for example, many thousands of + cavalry, men tending horses, men engaged in transporting bulky fodder for + horses and the like. These men were doing about as much in this war as if + they had been at Timbuctoo. Every man who is taken from munition making at + X to spur-worshipping in khaki, is a dead loss to the military efficiency + of the country. Every man that is needed or is likely to be needed for the + actual operations of modern warfare can be got by combing out the cavalry, + the brewing and distilling industries, the theatres and music halls, and + the like unproductive occupations. The under-staffing of munition works, + the diminution of their efficiency by the use of aged and female labour, + is the straight course to failure in this war. + </p> + <p> + In X, in the forges and machine shops, I saw already too large a + proportion of boys and grey heads. + </p> + <p> + War is a thing that changes very rapidly, and we have in the Tanks only + the first of a great series of offensive developments. They are bound to + be improved, at a great pace. The method of using them will change very + rapidly. Any added invention will necessitate the scrapping of old types + and the production of the new patterns in quantity. It is of supreme + necessity to the Allies if they are to win this war outright that the lead + in inventions and enterprise which the British have won over the Germans + in this matter should be retained. It is our game now to press the + advantage for all it is worth. We have to keep ahead to win. We cannot do + so unless we have unstinted men and unstinted material to produce each new + development as its use is realised. + </p> + <p> + Given that much, the Tank will enormously enhance the advantage of the new + offensive method on the French front; the method that is of gun demolition + after aerial photography, followed by an advance; it is a huge addition to + our prospect of decisive victory. What does it do? It solves two problems. + The existing Tank affords a means of advancing against machine-gun fire + and of destroying wire and machine guns without much risk of loss, so soon + as the big guns have done their duty by the enemy guns. And also behind + the Tank itself, it is useless to conceal, lies the possibility of + bringing up big guns and big gun ammunition, across nearly any sort of + country, as fast as the advance can press forward. Hitherto every advance + has paid a heavy toll to the machine gun, and every advance has had to + halt after a couple of miles or so while the big guns (taking five or six + days for the job) toiled up to the new positions. + </p> + <p> + 4 + </p> + <p> + It is impossible to restrain a note of sharp urgency from what one has to + say about these developments. The Tanks remove the last technical + difficulties in our way to decisive victory and a permanent peace; they + also afford a reason for straining every nerve to bring about a decision + and peace soon. At the risk of seeming an imaginative alarmist I would + like to point out the reasons these things disclose for hurrying this war + to a decision and doing our utmost to arrange the world's affairs so as to + make another war improbable. Already these serio-comic Tanks, weighing + something over twenty tons or so, have gone slithering around and sliding + over dead and wounded men. That is not an incident for sensitive minds to + dwell upon, but it is a mere little child's play anticipation of what the + big land ironclads <i>that are bound to come if there is no world + pacification</i>, are going to do. + </p> + <p> + What lies behind the Tank depends upon this fact; there is no definable + upward limit of mass. Upon that I would lay all the stress possible, + because everything turns upon that. + </p> + <p> + You cannot make a land ironclad so big and heavy but that you cannot make + a caterpillar track wide enough and strong enough to carry it forward. + Tanks are quite possible that will carry twenty-inch or twenty-five inch + guns, besides minor armament. Such Tanks may be undesirable; the + production may exceed the industrial resources of any empire to produce; + but there is no inherent impossibility in such things. There are not even + the same limitations as to draught and docking accommodation that sets + bounds to the size of battleships. It follows, therefore, as a necessary + deduction that if the world's affairs are so left at the end of the war + that the race of armaments continues, that Tank will develop steadily into + a tremendous instrument of warfare, driven by engines of scores of + thousands of horse-power, tracking on a track scores of hundreds of yards + wide and weighing hundreds or thousands of tons. Nothing but a world + agreement not to do so can prevent this logical development of the land + ironclad. Such a structure will make wheel-ruts scores of feet deep; it + will plough up, devastate and destroy the country it passes over + altogether. + </p> + <p> + For my own part I never imagined the land ironclad idea would get loose + into war. I thought that the military intelligence was essentially + unimaginative and that such an aggressive military power as Germany, + dominated by military people, would never produce anything of the sort. I + thought that this war would be fought out without Tanks and that then war + would come to an end. For of course it is mere stupidity that makes people + doubt the ultimate ending of war. I have been so far justified in these + expectations of mine, that it is not from military sources that these + things have come. They have been thrust upon the soldiers from without. + But now that they are loose, now that they are in war, we have to face + their full possibilities, to use our advantage in them and press on to the + end of the war. In support of a photo-aero directed artillery, even our + present Tanks can be used to complete an invisible offensive. We shall not + so much push as ram. It is doubtful if the Germans can get anything of the + sort into action before six months are out. We ought to get the war on to + German soil before the Tanks have grown to more than three or four times + their present size. Then it will not matter so much how much bigger they + grow. It will be the German landscape that will suffer. + </p> + <p> + After one has seen the actual Tanks it is not very difficult to close + one's eyes and figure the sort of Tank that may be arguing with Germany in + a few months' time about the restoration of Belgium and Serbia and France, + the restoration of the sunken tonnage, the penalties of the various + Zeppelin and submarine murders, the freedom of seas and land alike from + piracy, the evacuation of all Poland including Posen and Cracow, and the + guarantees for the future peace of Europe. The machine will be perhaps as + big as a destroyer and more heavily armed and equipped. It will swim over + and through the soil at a pace of ten or twelve miles an hour. In front of + it will be corn, land, neat woods, orchards, pasture, gardens, villages + and towns. It will advance upon its belly with a swaying motion, devouring + the ground beneath it. Behind it masses of soil and rock, lumps of turf, + splintered wood, bits of houses, occasional streaks of red, will drop from + its track, and it will leave a wake, six or seven times as wide as a high + road, from which all soil, all cultivation, all semblance to cultivated or + cultivatable land will have disappeared. It will not even be a track of + soil. It will be a track of subsoil laid bare. It will be a flayed strip + of nature. In the course of its fighting the monster may have to + turnabout. It will then halt and spin slowly round, grinding out an arena + of desolation with a diameter equal to its length. If it has to retreat + and advance again these streaks and holes of destruction will increase and + multiply. Behind the fighting line these monsters will manoeuvre to and + fro, destroying the land for all ordinary agricultural purposes for ages + to come. The first imaginative account of the land ironclad that was ever + written concluded with the words, “They are the <i>reductio ad absurdum</i> + of war.” They are, and it is to the engineers, the ironmasters, the + workers and the inventive talent of Great Britain and France that we must + look to ensure that it is in Germany, the great teacher of war, that this + demonstration of war's ultimate absurdity is completed. + </p> + <p> + For forty years Frankenstein Germany invoked war, turned every development + of material and social science to aggressive ends, and at last when she + felt the time was ripe she let loose the new monster that she had made of + war to cow the spirit of mankind. She set the thing trampling through + Belgium. She cannot grumble if at last it comes home, stranger and more + dreadful even than she made it, trampling the German towns and fields with + German blood upon it and its eyes towards Berlin. + </p> + <p> + This logical development of the Tank idea may seem a gloomy prospect for + mankind. But it is open to question whether the tremendous development of + warfare that has gone on in the last two years does after all open a + prospect of unmitigated gloom. There has been a good deal of cheap and + despondent sneering recently at the phrase, “The war that will end war.” + It is still possible to maintain that that may be a correct description of + this war. It has to be remembered that war, as the aeroplane and the Tank + have made it, has already become an impossible luxury for any barbaric or + uncivilised people. War on the grade that has been achieved on the Somme + predicates an immense industrialism behind it. Of all the States in the + world only four can certainly be said to be fully capable of sustaining + war at the level to which it has now been brought upon the western front. + These are Britain, France, Germany, and the United States of America. Less + certainly equal to the effort are Italy, Japan, Russia, and Austria. These + eight powers are the only powers <i>capable of warfare under modern + conditions.</i> Five are already Allies and one is incurably pacific. + There is no other power or people in the world that can go to war now + without the consent and connivance of these great powers. If we consider + their alliances, we may count it that the matter rests now between two + groups of Allies and one neutral power. So that while on the one hand the + development of modern warfare of which the Tank is the present symbol + opens a prospect of limitless senseless destruction, it opens on the other + hand a prospect of organised world control. This Tank development must + ultimately bring the need of a real permanent settlement within the + compass of the meanest of diplomatic intelligences. A peace that will + restore competitive armaments has now become a less desirable prospect for + everyone than a continuation of the war. Things were bad enough before, + when the land forces were still in a primitive phase of infantry, cavalry + and artillery, and when the only real race to develop monsters and + destructors was for sea power. But the race for sea power before 1914 was + mere child's play to the breeding of engineering monstrosities for land + warfare that must now follow any indeterminate peace settlement. I am no + blind believer in the wisdom of mankind, but I cannot believe that men are + so insensate and headstrong as to miss the plain omens of the present + situation. + </p> + <p> + So that after all the cheerful amusement the sight of a Tank causes may + not be so very unreasonable. These things may be no more than one of those + penetrating flashes of wit that will sometimes light up and dispel the + contentions of an angry man. If they are not that, then they are the + grimmest jest that ever set men grinning. Wait and see, if you do not + believe me. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0012" id="link2H_4_0012"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + HOW PEOPLE THINK ABOUT THE WAR + </h2> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0013" id="link2H_4_0013"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + I. DO THEY REALLY THINK AT ALL? + </h2> + <p> + All human affairs are mental affairs; the bright ideas of to-day are the + realities of to-morrow. The real history of mankind is the history of how + ideas have arisen, how they have taken possession of men's minds, how they + have struggled, altered, proliferated, decayed. There is nothing in this + war at all but a conflict of ideas, traditions, and mental habits. The + German Will clothed in conceptions of aggression and fortified by cynical + falsehood, struggles against the fundamental sanity of the German mind and + the confused protest of mankind. So that the most permanently important + thing in the tragic process of this war is the change of opinion that is + going on. What are people making of it? Is it producing any great common + understandings, any fruitful unanimities? + </p> + <p> + No doubt it is producing enormous quantities of cerebration, but is it + anything more than chaotic and futile cerebration? We are told all sorts + of things in answer to that, things without a scrap of evidence or + probability to support them. It is, we are assured, turning people to + religion, making them moral and thoughtful. It is also, we are assured + with equal confidence, turning them to despair and moral disaster. It will + be followed by (1) a period of moral renascence, and (2) a debauch. It is + going to make the workers (1) more and (2) less obedient and industrious. + It is (1) inuring men to war and (2) filling them with a passionate + resolve never to suffer war again. And so on. I propose now to ask what is + really happening in this matter? How is human opinion changing? I have + opinions of my own and they are bound to colour my discussion. The reader + must allow for that, and as far as possible I will remind him where + necessary to make his allowance. + </p> + <p> + Now first I would ask, is any really continuous and thorough mental + process going on at all about this war? I mean, is there any considerable + number of people who are seeing it as a whole, taking it in as a whole, + trying to get a general idea of it from which they can form directing + conclusions for the future? Is there any considerable number of people + even trying to do that? At any rate let me point out first that there is + quite an enormous mass of people who—in spite of the fact that their + minds are concentrated on aspects of this war, who are at present hearing, + talking, experiencing little else than the war—are nevertheless + neither doing nor trying to do anything that deserves to be called + thinking about it at all. They may even be suffering quite terribly by it. + But they are no more mastering its causes, reasons, conditions, and the + possibility of its future prevention than a monkey that has been rescued + in a scorching condition from the burning of a house will have mastered + the problem of a fire. It is just happening to and about them. It may, for + anything they have learnt about it, happen to them again. + </p> + <p> + A vast majority of people are being swamped by the spectacular side of the + business. It was very largely my fear of being so swamped myself that made + me reluctant to go as a spectator to the front. I knew that my chances of + being hit by a bullet were infinitesimal, but I was extremely afraid of + being hit by some too vivid impression. I was afraid that I might see some + horribly wounded man or some decayed dead body that would so scar my + memory and stamp such horror into me as to reduce me to a mere useless, + gibbering, stop-the-war-at-any-price pacifist. Years ago my mind was once + darkened very badly for some weeks with a kind of fear and distrust of + life through a sudden unexpected encounter one tranquil evening with a + drowned body. But in this journey in Italy and France, although I have had + glimpses of much death and seen many wounded men, I have had no really + horrible impressions at all. That side of the business has, I think, been + overwritten. The thing that haunts me most is the impression of a + prevalent relapse into extreme untidiness, of a universal discomfort, of + fields, and of ruined houses treated disregardfully.... But that is not + what concerns us now in this discussion. What concerns us now is the fact + that this war is producing spectacular effects so tremendous and incidents + so strange, so remarkable, so vivid, that the mind forgets both causes and + consequences and simply sits down to stare. + </p> + <p> + For example, there is this business of the Zeppelin raids in England. It + is a supremely silly business; it is the most conclusive demonstration of + the intellectual inferiority of the German to the Western European that is + should ever have happened. There was the clearest <i>a priori</i> case + against the gas-bag. I remember the discussions ten or twelve years ago in + which it was established to the satisfaction of every reasonable man that + ultimately the “heavier than air” machine (as we called it then) must fly + better than the gas-bag, and still more conclusively that no gas-bag was + conceivable that could hope to fight and defeat aeroplanes. Nevertheless + the German, with that dull faith of his in mere “Will,” persisted along + his line. He knew instinctively that he could not produce aviators to meet + the Western European; all his social instincts made him cling to the idea + of a great motherly, almost sow-like bag of wind above him. At an enormous + waste of resources Germany has produced these futile monsters, that drift + in the darkness over England promiscuously dropping bombs on fields and + houses. They are now meeting the fate that was demonstrably certain ten + years ago. If they found us unready for them it is merely that we were + unable to imagine so idiotic an enterprise would ever be seriously + sustained and persisted in. We did not believe in the probability of + Zeppelin raids any more than we believed that Germany would force the + world into war. It was a thing too silly to be believed. But they came—to + their certain fate. In the month after I returned from France and Italy, + no less than four of these fatuities were exploded and destroyed within + thirty miles of my Essex home.... There in chosen phrases you have the + truth about these things. But now mark the perversion of thought due to + spectacular effect. + </p> + <p> + I find over the Essex countryside, which has been for more than a year and + a half a highway for Zeppelins, a new and curious admiration for them that + has arisen out of these very disasters. Previously they were regarded with + dislike and a sort of distrust, as one might regard a sneaking neighbour + who left his footsteps in one's garden at night. But the Zeppelins of + Billericay and Potter's Bar are—heroic things. (The Cuffley one came + down too quickly, and the fourth one which came down for its crew to + surrender is despised.) I have heard people describe the two former with + eyes shining with enthusiasm. + </p> + <p> + “First,” they say, “you saw a little round red glow that spread. Then you + saw the whole Zeppelin glowing. Oh, it was <i>beautiful!</i> Then it began + to turn over and come down, and it flames and pieces began to break away. + And then down it came, leaving flaming pieces all up the sky. At last it + was a pillar of fire eight thousand feet high.... Everyone said, 'Ooooo!' + And then someone pointed out the little aeroplane lit up by the flare—such + a leetle thing up there in the night! It is the greatest thing I have ever + seen. Oh! the most wonderful—most wonderful!” + </p> + <p> + There is a feeling that the Germans really must after all be a splendid + people to provide such magnificent pyrotechnics. + </p> + <p> + Some people in London the other day were pretending to be shocked by an + American who boasted that he had been in “two <i>bully</i> bombardments,” + but he was only saying what everyone feels more or less. We are at a + spectacle that—as a spectacle—our grandchildren will envy. I + understand now better the story of the man who stared at the sparks + raining up from his own house as it burnt in the night and whispered “<i>Lovely! + Lovely!</i>” + </p> + <p> + The spectacular side of the war is really an enormous distraction from + thought. And against thought there also fights the native indolence of the + human mind. The human mind, it seems, was originally developed to think + about the individual; it thinks reluctantly about the species. It takes + refuge from that sort of thing if it possibly can. And so the second great + preventive of clear thinking is the tranquillising platitude. + </p> + <p> + The human mind is an instrument very easily fatigued. Only a few + exceptions go on thinking restlessly—to the extreme exasperation of + their neighbours. The normal mind craves for decisions, even wrong or + false decisions rather than none. It clutches at comforting falsehoods. It + loves to be told, “<i>There</i>, don't you worry. That'll be all right. + That's <i>settled.</i>” This war has come as an almost overwhelming + challenge to mankind. To some of us it seems as it if were the Sphynx + proffering the alternative of its riddle or death. Yet the very urgency of + this challenge to think seems to paralyse the critical intelligence of + very many people altogether. They will say, “This war is going to produce + enormous changes in everything.” They will then subside mentally with a + feeling of having covered the whole ground in a thoroughly safe manner. Or + they will adopt an air of critical aloofness. They will say, “How is it + possible to foretell what may happen in this tremendous sea of change?” + And then, with an air of superior modesty, they will go on doing—whatever + they feel inclined to do. Many others, a degree less simple in their + methods, will take some entirely partial aspect, arrive at some guesswork + decision upon that, and then behave as though that met every question we + have to face. Or they will make a sort of admonitory forecast that is + conditional upon the good behaviour of other people. “Unless the Trade + Unions are more reasonable,” they will say. Or, “Unless the shipping + interest is grappled with and controlled.” Or, “Unless England wakes up.” + And with that they seem to wash their hands of further responsibility for + the future. + </p> + <p> + One delightful form of put-off is the sage remark, “Let us finish the war + first, and then let us ask what is going to happen after it.” One likes to + think of the beautiful blank day after the signing of the peace when these + wise minds swing round to pick up their deferred problems.... + </p> + <p> + I submit that a man has not done his duty by himself as a rational + creature unless he has formed an idea of what is going on, as one + complicated process, until he has formed an idea sufficiently definite for + him to make it the basis of a further idea, which is his own relationship + to that process. He must have some notion of what the process is going to + do to him, and some notion of what he means to do, if he can, to the + process. That is to say, he must not only have an idea how the process is + going, but also an idea of how he wants it to go. It seems so natural and + necessary for a human brain to do this that it is hard to suppose that + everyone has not more or less attempted it. But few people, in Great + Britain at any rate, have the habit of frank expression, and when people + do not seem to have made out any of these things for themselves there is a + considerable element of secretiveness and inexpressiveness to be allowed + for before we decide that they have not in some sort of fashion done so. + Still, after all allowances have been made, there remains a vast amount of + jerry-built and ready-made borrowed stuff in most of people's philosophies + of the war. The systems of authentic opinion in this world of thought + about the war are like comparatively rare thin veins of living mentality + in a vast world of dead repetitions and echoed suggestions. And that being + the case, it is quite possible that history after the war, like history + before the war, will not be so much a display of human will and purpose as + a resultant of human vacillations, obstructions, and inadvertences. We + shall still be in a drama of blind forces following the line of least + resistance. + </p> + <p> + One of the people who is often spoken of as if he were doing an enormous + amount of concentrated thinking is “the man in the trenches.” We are told—by + gentlemen writing for the most part at home—of the most + extraordinary things that are going on in those devoted brains, how they + are getting new views about the duties of labour, religion, morality, + monarchy, and any other notions that the gentleman at home happens to + fancy and wished to push. Now that is not at all the impression of the + khaki mentality I have reluctantly accepted as correct. For the most part + the man in khaki is up against a round of tedious immediate duties that + forbid consecutive thought; he is usually rather crowded and not very + comfortable. He is bored. + </p> + <p> + The real horror of modern war, when all is said and done, is the boredom. + To get killed our wounded may be unpleasant, but it is at any rate + interesting; the real tragedy is in the desolated fields, the desolated + houses, the desolated hours and days, the bored and desolated minds that + hang behind the melee and just outside the melee. The peculiar beastliness + of the German crime is the way the German war cant and its consequences + have seized upon and paralysed the mental movement of Western Europe. + Before 1914 war was theoretically unpopular in every European country; we + thought of it as something tragic and dreadful. Now everyone knows by + experience that it is something utterly dirty and detestable. We thought + it was the Nemean lion, and we have found it is the Augean stable. But + being bored by war and hating war is quite unproductive <i>unless you are + thinking about its nature and causes so thoroughly that you will presently + be able to take hold of it and control it and end it.</i> It is no good + for everyone to say unanimously, “We will have no more war,” unless you + have thought out how to avoid it, and mean to bring that end about. It is + as if everyone said, “We will have no more catarrh,” or “no more flies,” + or “no more east wind.” And my point is that the immense sorrows at home + in every European country and the vast boredom of the combatants are + probably not really producing any effective remedial mental action at all, + and will not do so unless we get much more thoroughly to work upon the + thinking-out process. + </p> + <p> + In such talks as I could get with men close up to the front I found beyond + this great boredom and attempts at distraction only very specialised talk + about changes in the future. Men were keen upon questions of army + promotion, of the future of conscription, of the future of the temporary + officer, upon the education of boys in relation to army needs. But the war + itself was bearing them all upon its way, as unquestioned and uncontrolled + as if it were the planet on which they lived. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0014" id="link2H_4_0014"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + II. THE YIELDING PACIFIST AND THE CONSCIENTIOUS OBJECTOR + </h2> + <p> + 1 Among the minor topics that people are talking about behind the western + fronts is the psychology of the Yielding Pacifist and the Conscientious + Objector. Of course, we are all pacifists nowadays; I know of no one who + does not want not only to end this war but to put an end to war + altogether, except those blood-red terrors Count Reventlow, Mr. Leo Maxse—how + he does it on a vegetarian dietary I cannot imagine!—and our + wild-eyed desperados of <i>The Morning Post.</i> But most of the people I + meet, and most of the people I met on my journey, are pacifists like + myself who want to <i>make</i> peace by beating the armed man until he + gives in and admits the error of his ways, disarming him and reorganising + the world for the forcible suppression of military adventures in the + future. They want belligerency put into the same category as burglary, as + a matter of forcible suppression. The Yielding Pacifist who will accept + any sort of peace, and the Conscientious Objector who will not fight at + all, are not of that opinion. + </p> + <p> + Both Italy and France produce parallel types to those latter, but it would + seem that in each case England displays the finer developments. The Latin + mind is directer than the English, and its standards—shall I say?—more + primitive; it gets more directly to the fact that here are men who will + not fight. And it is less charitable. I was asked quite a number of times + for the English equivalent of an <i>embusque.</i> “We don't generalise,” I + said, “we treat each case on its merits!” + </p> + <p> + One interlocutor near Udine was exercised by our Italian Red Cross work. + </p> + <p> + “Here,” he said, “are sixty or seventy young Englishmen, all fit for + military service.... Of course they go under fire, but it is not like + being junior officers in the trenches. Not one of them has been killed or + wounded.” + </p> + <p> + He reflected. “One, I think, has been decorated,” he said.... + </p> + <p> + My French and Italian are only for very rough common jobs; when it came to + explaining the Conscientious Objector sympathetically they broke down + badly. I had to construct long parenthetical explanations of our + antiquated legislative methods to show how it was that the “conscientious + objector” had been so badly defined. The foreigner does not understand the + importance of vague definition in British life. “Practically, of course, + we offered to exempt anyone who conscientiously objected to fight or + serve. Then the Pacifist and German people started a campaign to enrol + objectors. Of course every shirker, every coward and slacker in the + country decided at once to be a conscientious objector. Anyone but a + British legislator could have foreseen that. Then we started Tribunals to + wrangle with the objectors about their <i>bona fides.</i> Then the + Pacifists and the Pro-Germans issued little leaflets and started + correspondence courses to teach people exactly how to lie to the + Tribunals. Trouble about freedom of the pamphleteer followed. I had to + admit—it has been rather a sloppy business. The people who made the + law knew their own minds, but we English are not an expressive people.” + </p> + <p> + These are not easy things to say in Elementary (and slightly Decayed) + French or in Elementary and Corrupt Italian. + </p> + <p> + “But why do people support the sham conscientious objector and issue + leaflets to help him—when there is so much big work clamouring to be + done?” + </p> + <p> + “That,” I said, “is the Whig tradition.” + </p> + <p> + When they pressed me further, I said: “I am really the questioner. I am + visiting <i>your</i> country, and you have to tell <i>me</i> things. It is + not right that I should do all the telling. Tell me all about Romain + Rolland.” + </p> + <p> + And so I pressed them about the official socialists in Italy and the + Socialist minority in France until I got the question out of the net of + national comparisons and upon a broader footing. In several conversations + we began to work out in general terms the psychology of those people who + were against the war. But usually we could not get to that; my + interlocutors would insist upon telling me just what they would like to do + or just what they would like to see done to stop-the-war pacifists and + conscientious objectors; pleasant rather than fruitful imaginative + exercises from which I could effect no more than platitudinous uplifts. + </p> + <p> + But the general drift of such talks as did seem to penetrate the question + was this, that among these stop-the-war people there are really three + types. First there is a type of person who hates violence and the + infliction of pain under any circumstances, and who have a mystical belief + in the rightness (and usually the efficacy) of non-resistance. These are + generally Christians, and then their cardinal text is the instruction to + “turn the other cheek.” Often they are Quakers. If they are consistent + they are vegetarians and wear <i>Lederlos</i> boots. They do not desire + police protection for their goods. They stand aloof from all the force and + conflict of life. They have always done so. This is an understandable and + respectable type. It has numerous Hindu equivalents. It is a type that + finds little difficulty about exemptions—provided the individual has + not been too recently converted to his present habits. But it is not the + prevalent type in stop-the-war circles. Such genuine ascetics do not + number more than a thousand or so, all three of our western allied + countries. The mass of the stop-the-war people is made up quite other + elements. + </p> + <p> + 2 + </p> + <p> + In the complex structure of the modern community there are two groups or + strata or pockets in which the impulse of social obligation, the + gregarious sense of a common welfare, is at its lowest; one of these is + the class of the Resentful Employee, the class of people who, without + explanation, adequate preparation or any chance, have been shoved at an + early age into uncongenial work and never given a chance to escape, and + the other is the class of people with small fixed incomes or with small + salaries earnt by routine work, or half independent people practising some + minor artistic or literary craft, who have led uneventful, irresponsible + lives from their youth up, and never came at any point into relations of + service to the state. This latter class was more difficult to define than + the former—because it is more various within itself. My French + friends wanted to talk of the “Psychology of the Rentier.” I was for such + untranslatable phrases as the “Genteel Whig,” or the “Donnish Liberal.” + But I lit up an Italian—he is a Milanese manufacturer—with + “these Florentine English who would keep Italy in a glass case.” “I know,” + he said. Before I go on to expand this congenial theme, let me deal first + with the Resentful Employee, who is a much more considerable, and to me a + much more sympathetic, figure in European affairs. I began life myself as + a Resentful Employee. By the extremest good luck I have got my mind and + spirit out of the distortions of that cramping beginning, but I can still + recall even the anger of those old days. + </p> + <p> + He becomes an employee between thirteen and fifteen; he is made to do work + he does not like for no other purpose that he can see except the profit + and glory of a fortunate person called his employer, behind whom stand + church and state blessing and upholding the relationship. He is not + allowed to feel that he has any share whatever in the employer's business, + or that any end is served but the employer's profit. He cannot see that + the employer acknowledges any duty to the state. Neither church nor state + seems to insist that the employer has any public function. At no point + does the employee come into a clear relationship of mutual obligation with + the state. There does not seem to be any way out for the employee from a + life spent in this subordinate, toilsome relationship. He feels put upon + and cheated out of life. He is without honour. If he is a person of + ability or stubborn temper he struggles out of his position; if he is a + kindly and generous person he blames his “luck” and does his work and + lives his life as cheerfully as possible—and so live the bulk of our + amazing European workers; if he is a being of great magnanimity he is + content to serve for the ultimate good of the race; if he has imagination, + he says, “Things will not always be like this,” and becomes a socialist or + a guild socialist, and tries to educate the employer to a sense of + reciprocal duty; but if he is too human for any of these things, then he + begins to despise and hate the employer and the system that made him. He + wants to hurt them. Upon that hate it is easy to trade. + </p> + <p> + A certain section of what is called the Socialist press and the Socialist + literature in Europe is no doubt great-minded; it seeks to carve a better + world out of the present. But much of it is socialist only in name. Its + spirit is Anarchistic. Its real burthen is not construction but grievance; + it tells the bitter tale of the employee, it feeds and organises his + malice, it schemes annoyance and injury for the hated employer. The state + and the order of the world is confounded with the capitalist. Before the + war the popular so-called socialist press reeked with the cant of + rebellion, the cant of any sort of rebellion. “I'm a rebel,” was the silly + boast of the young disciple. “Spoil something, set fire to something,” was + held to be the proper text for any girl or lad of spirit. And this blind + discontent carried on into the war. While on the one hand a great rush of + men poured into the army saying, “Thank God! we can serve our country at + last instead of some beastly profiteer,” a sourer remnant, blind to the + greater issues of the war, clung to the reasonless proposition, “the state + is only for the Capitalist. This war is got up by Capitalists. Whatever + has to be done—<i>we are rebels.</i>” + </p> + <p> + Such a typical paper as the British <i>Labour Leader</i>, for example, may + be read in vain, number after number, for any sound and sincere + constructive proposal. It is a prolonged scream of extreme individualism, + a monotonous repetition of incoherent discontent with authority, with + direction, with union, with the European effort. It wants to do nothing. + It just wants effort to stop—even at the price of German victory. If + the whole fabric of society in western Europe were to be handed over to + those pseudo-socialists to-morrow, to be administered for the common good, + they would fly the task in terror. They would make excuses and refuse the + undertaking. They do not want the world to go right. The very idea of the + world going right does not exist in their minds. They are embodied + discontent and hatred, making trouble, and that is all they are. They want + to be “rebels”—to be admired as “rebels”. + </p> + <p> + That is the true psychology of the Resentful Employee. He is a + de-socialised man. His sense of the State has been destroyed. + </p> + <p> + The Resentful Employees are the outcome of our social injustices. They are + the failures of our social ad educational systems. We may regret their + pitiful degradation, we may exonerate them from blame; none the less they + are a pitiful crew. I have seen the hardship of the trenches, the gay and + gallant wounded. I do a little understand what our soldiers, officers and + men alike, have endured and done. And though I know I ought to allow for + all that I have stated, I cannot regard these conscientious objectors with + anything but contempt. Into my house there pours a dismal literature + rehearsing the hardships of these men who set themselves up to be martyrs + for liberty; So and So, brave hero, has been sworn at—positively + sworn at by a corporal; a nasty rough man came into the cell of So and So + and dropped several h's; So and So, refusing to undress and wash, has been + undressed and washed, and soap was rubbed into his eyes—perhaps + purposely; the food and accommodation are not of the best class; the + doctors in attendance seem hasty; So and So was put into a damp bed and + has got a nasty cold. Then I recall a jolly vanload of wounded men I saw + out there.... + </p> + <p> + But after all, we must be just. A church and state that permitted these + people to be thrust into dreary employment in their early 'teens, without + hope or pride, deserves such citizens as these. The marvel is that there + are so few. There are a poor thousand or so of these hopeless, + resentment-poisoned creatures in Great Britain. Against five willing + millions. The Allied countries, I submit, have not got nearly all the + conscientious objectors they deserve. + </p> + <p> + 3 + </p> + <p> + If the Resentful Employee provides the emotional impulse of the resisting + pacifist, whose horizon is bounded by his one passionate desire that the + particular social system that has treated him so ill should collapse and + give in, and its leaders and rulers be humiliated and destroyed, the + intellectual direction of a mischievous pacifism comes from an entirely + different class. + </p> + <p> + The Genteel Whig, though he differs very widely in almost every other + respect from the Resentful Employee, has this much in common, that he has + never been drawn into the whirl of collective life in any real and + assimilative fashion. This is what is the matter with both of them. He is + a little loose, shy, independent person. Except for eating and drinking—in + moderation, he has never done anything real from the day he was born. He + has frequently not even faced the common challenge of matrimony. Still + more frequently is he childless, or the daring parent of one particular + child. He has never traded nor manufactured. He has drawn his dividends or + his salary with an entire unconsciousness of any obligations to policemen + or navy for these punctual payments. Probably he has never ventured even + to reinvest his little legacy. He is acutely aware of possessing an + exceptionally fine intelligence, but he is entirely unconscious of a + fundamental unreality. Nothing has ever occurred to him to make him ask + why the mass of men were either not possessed of his security or + discontented with it. The impulses that took his school friends out upon + all sorts of odd feats and adventures struck him as needless. As he grew + up he turned with an equal distrust from passion or ambition. His friends + went out after love, after adventure, after power, after knowledge, after + this or that desire, and became men. But he noted merely that they became + fleshly, that effort strained them, that they were sometimes angry or + violent or heated. He could not but feel that theirs were vulgar + experiences, and he sought some finer exercise for his exceptional + quality. He pursued art or philosophy or literature upon their more + esoteric levels, and realised more and more the general vulgarity and + coarseness of the world about him, and his own detachment. The vulgarity + and crudity of the things nearest him impressed him most; the dreadful + insincerity of the Press, the meretriciousness of success, the loudness of + the rich, the baseness of common people in his own land. The world + overseas had by comparison a certain glamour. Except that when you said + “United States” to him he would draw the air sharply between his teeth and + beg you not to... + </p> + <p> + Nobody took him by the collar and shook him. + </p> + <p> + If our world had considered the advice of William James and insisted upon + national service from everyone, national service in the drains or the + nationalised mines or the nationalised deep-sea fisheries if not in the + army or navy, we should not have had any such men. If it had insisted that + wealth and property are no more than a trust for the public benefit, we + should have had no genteel indispensables. These discords in our national + unanimity are the direct consequence of our bad social organisation. We + permit the profiteer and the usurer; they evoke the response of the + Reluctant Employee, and the inheritor of their wealth becomes the Genteel + Whig. + </p> + <p> + But that is by the way. It was of course natural and inevitable that the + German onslaught upon Belgium and civilisation generally should strike + these recluse minds not as a monstrous ugly wickedness to be resisted and + overcome at any cost, but merely as a nerve-racking experience. Guns were + going off on both sides. The Genteel Whig was chiefly conscious of a + repulsive vast excitement all about him, in which many people did + inelegant and irrational things. They waved flags—nasty little + flags. This child of the ages, this last fruit of the gigantic and tragic + tree of life, could no more than stick its fingers in its ears as say, + “Oh, please, do <i>all</i> stop!” and then as the strain grew intenser and + intenser set itself with feeble pawings now to clamber “Au-dessus de la + Melee,” and now to—in some weak way—stop the conflict. + (“Au-dessus de la Melee”—as the man said when they asked him where + he was when the bull gored his sister.) The efforts to stop the conflict + at any price, even at the price of entire submission to the German Will, + grew more urgent as the necessity that everyone should help against the + German Thing grew more manifest. + </p> + <p> + Of all the strange freaks of distressed thinking that this war has + produced, the freaks of the Genteel Whig have been among the most + remarkable. With an air of profound wisdom he returns perpetually to his + proposition that there are faults on both sides. To say that is his + conception of impartiality. I suppose that if a bull gored his sister he + would say that there were faults on both sides; his sister ought not to + have strayed into the field, she was wearing a red hat of a highly + provocative type; she ought to have been a cow and then everything would + have been different. In the face of the history of the last forty years, + the Genteel Whig struggles persistently to minimise the German outrage + upon civilisation and to find excuses for Germany. He does this, not + because he has any real passion for falsehood, but because by training, + circumstance, and disposition he is passionately averse from action with + the vulgar majority and from self-sacrifice in a common cause, and because + he finds in the justification of Germany and, failing that, in the + blackening of the Allies to an equal blackness, one line of defence + against the wave of impulse that threatens to submerge his private self. + But when at last that line is forced he is driven back upon others equally + extraordinary. You can often find simultaneously in the same Pacifist + paper, and sometimes even in the utterances of the same writer, two + entirely incompatible statements. The first is that Germany is so + invincible that it is useless to prolong the war since no effort of the + Allies is likely to produce any material improvement in their position, + and the second is that Germany is so thoroughly beaten that she is now + ready to abandon militarism and make terms and compensations entirely + acceptable to the countries she has forced into war. And when finally + facts are produced to establish the truth that Germany, though still + largely wicked and impenitent, is being slowly and conclusively beaten by + the sanity, courage and persistence of the Allied common men, then the + Genteel Whig retorts with his last defensive absurdity. He invents a + national psychology for Germany. Germany, he invents, loves us and wants + to be our dearest friend. Germany has always loved us. The Germans are a + loving, unenvious people. They have been a little mislead—but nice + people do not insist upon that fact. But beware of beating Germany, beware + of humiliating Germany; then indeed trouble will come. Germany will begin + to dislike us. She will plan a revenge. Turning aside from her erstwhile + innocent career, she may even think of hate. What are our obligations to + France, Italy, Serbia and Russia, what is the happiness of a few thousands + of the Herero, a few millions of the Belgians—whose numbers moreover + are constantly diminishing—when we might weigh them against the + danger, the most terrible danger, of incurring <i>permanent German + hostility?...</i> + </p> + <p> + A Frenchman I talked to knew better than that. “What will happen to + Germany,” I asked, “if we are able to do so to her and so; would she take + to dreams of a <i>Revanche?</i>” + </p> + <p> + “She will take to Anglomania,” he said, and added after a flash of + reflection, “In the long run it will be the worse for you.” + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0015" id="link2H_4_0015"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + III. THE RELIGIOUS REVIVAL + </h2> + <p> + 1 + </p> + <p> + One of the indisputable things about the war, so far as Britain and France + go—and I have reason to believe that on a lesser scale things are + similar in Italy—is that it has produced a very great volume of + religious thought and feeling. About Russia in these matters we hear but + little at the present time, but one guesses at parallelism. People + habitually religious have been stirred to new depths of reality and + sincerity, and people are thinking of religion who never thought of + religion before. But as I have already pointed out, thinking and feeling + about a matter is of no permanent value unless something is <i>thought out</i>, + unless there is a change of boundary or relationship, and it an altogether + different question to ask whether any definite change is resulting from + this universal ferment. If it is not doing so, then the sleeper merely + dreams a dream that he will forget again.... + </p> + <p> + Now in no sort of general popular mental activity is there so much froth + and waste as in religious excitements. This has been the case in all + periods of religious revival. The number who are rather impressed, who for + a few days or weeks take to reading their Bibles or going to a new place + of worship or praying or fasting or being kind and unselfish, is always + enormous in relation to the people whose lives are permanently changed. + The effort needed if a contemporary is to blow off the froth, is always + very considerable. + </p> + <p> + Among the froth that I would blow off is I think most of the tremendous + efforts being made in England by the Anglican church to attract favourable + attention to itself <i>apropos</i> of the war. I came back from my visit + to the Somme battlefields to find the sylvan peace of Essex invaded by a + number of ladies in blue dresses adorned with large white crosses, who, + regardless of the present shortage of nurses, were visiting every home in + the place on some mission of invitation whose details remained obscure. So + far as I was able to elucidate this project, it was in the nature of a + magic incantation; a satisfactory end of the war was to be brought about + by convergent prayer and religious assiduities. The mission was shy of + dealing with me personally, although as a lapsed communicant I should have + thought myself a particularly hopeful field for Anglican effort, and it + came to my wife and myself merely for our permission and countenance in an + appeal to our domestic servants. My wife consulted the household; it + seemed very anxious to escape from that appeal, and as I respect + Christianity sufficiently to detest the identification of its services + with magic processes, the mission retired—civilly repulsed. But the + incident aroused an uneasy curiosity in my mind with regard to the general + trend of Anglican teaching and Anglican activities at the present time. + The trend of my enquiries is to discover the church much more incoherent + and much less religious—in any decent sense of the word—than I + had supposed it to be. + </p> + <p> + Organisation is the life of material and the death of mental and spiritual + processes. There could be no more melancholy exemplification of this than + the spectacle of the Anglican and Catholic churches at the present time, + one using the tragic stresses of war mainly for pew-rent touting, and the + other paralysed by its Austrian and South German political connections + from any clear utterance upon the moral issues of the war. Through the + opening phases of the war the Established Church of England was + inconspicuous; this is no longer the case, but it may be doubted whether + the change is altogether to its advantage. To me this is a very great + disappointment. I have always had a very high opinion of the intellectual + values of the leading divines of both the Anglican and Catholic + communions. The self-styled Intelligentsia of Great Britain is all too + prone to sneer at their equipment; but I do not see how any impartial + person can deny that Father Bernard Vaughn is in mental energy, vigour of + expression, richness of thought and variety of information fully the equal + of such an influential lay publicist as Mr. Horatio Bottomley. One might + search for a long time among prominent laymen to find the equal of the + Bishop of London. Nevertheless it is impossible to conceal the impression + of tawdriness that this latter gentleman's work as head of the National + Mission has left upon my mind. Attired in khaki he has recently been + preaching in the open air to the people of London upon Tower Hill, + Piccadilly, and other conspicuous places. Obsessed as I am by the + humanities, and impressed as I have always been by the inferiority of + material to moral facts, I would willingly have exchanged the sight of two + burning Zeppelins for this spectacle of ecclesiastical fervour. But as it + is, I am obliged to trust to newspaper reports and the descriptions of + hearers and eye-witnesses. They leave to me but little doubt of the + regrettable superficiality of the bishop's utterances. + </p> + <p> + We have a multitude of people chastened by losses, ennobled by a common + effort, needing support in that effort, perplexed by the reality of evil + and cruelty, questioning and seeking after God. What does the National + Mission offer? On Tower Hill the bishop seems to have been chiefly busy + with a wrangling demonstration that ten thousand a year is none too big a + salary for a man subject to such demands and expenses as his see involves. + So far from making anything out of his see he was, he declared, two + thousand a year to the bad. Some day, when the church has studied + efficiency, I suppose that bishops will have the leisure to learn + something about the general state of opinion and education in their + dioceses. The Bishop of London was evidently unaware of the almost + automatic response of the sharp socialists among his hearers. Their first + enquiry would be to learn how he came by that mysterious extra two + thousand a year with which he supplemented his stipend. How did he earn <i>that?</i> + And if he didn't earn it—-! And secondly, they would probably have + pointed out to him that his standard of housing, clothing, diet and + entertaining was probably a little higher than theirs. It is really no + proof of virtuous purity that a man's expenditure exceeds his income. And + finally some other of his hearers were left unsatisfied by his silence + with regard to the current proposal to pool all clerical stipends for the + common purposes of the church. It is a reasonable proposal, and if bishops + must dispute about stipends instead of preaching the kingdom of God, then + they are bound to face it. The sooner they do so, the more graceful will + the act be. From these personal apologetics the bishop took up the + question of the exemption, at the request of the bishops, of the clergy + from military service. It is one of our contrasts with French conditions—and + it is all to the disadvantage of the British churches. + </p> + <p> + In his Piccadilly contribution to the National Mission of Repentance and + Hope the bishop did not talk politics but sex. He gave his hearers the + sort of stuff that is handed out so freely by the Cinema Theatres, White + Slave Traffic talk, denunciations of “Night Hawks”—whatever “Night + Hawks” may be—and so on. One this or another occasion the bishop—he + boasts that he himself is a healthy bachelor—lavished his eloquence + upon the Fall in the Birth Rate, and the duty of all married people, from + paupers upward, to have children persistently. Now sex, like diet, is a + department of conduct and a very important department, but <i>it isn't + religion!</i> The world is distressed by international disorder, by the + monstrous tragedy of war; these little hot talks about indulgence and + begetting have about as much to do with the vast issues that concern us + as, let us say, a discussion of the wickedness of eating very new and + indigestible bread. It is talking round and about the essential issue. It + is fogging the essential issue, which is the forgotten and neglected + kingship of God. The sin that is stirring the souls of men is the sin of + this war. It is the sin of national egotism and the devotion of men to + loyalties, ambitions, sects, churches, feuds, aggressions, and divisions + that are an outrage upon God's universal kingdom. + </p> + <p> + 2 + </p> + <p> + The common clergy of France, sharing the military obligations and the food + and privations of their fellow parishioners, contrast very vividly with + the home-staying types of the ministries of the various British churches. + I met and talked to several. Near Frise there were some barge gunboats—they + have since taken their place in the fighting, but then they were a + surprise—and the men had been very anxious to have their craft + visited and seen. The priest who came after our party to see if he could + still arrange that, had been decorated for gallantry. Of course the + English too have their gallant chaplains, but they are men of the officer + caste, they are just young officers with peculiar collars; not men among + men, as are the French priests. + </p> + <p> + There can be no doubt that the behaviour of the French priests in this war + has enormously diminished anti-clerical bitterness in France. There can be + no doubt that France is far more a religious country than it was before + the war. But if you ask whether that means any return to the church, any + reinstatement of the church, the answer is a doubtful one. Religion and + the simple priest are stronger in France to-day; the church, I think, is + weaker. + </p> + <p> + I trench on no theological discussion when I record the unfavourable + impression made upon all western Europe by the failure of the Holy Father + to pronounce definitely upon the rights and wrongs of the war. The church + has abrogated its right of moral judgement. Such at least seemed to be the + opinion of the Frenchmen with whom I discussed a remarkable interview with + Cardinal Gasparri that I found one morning in <i>Le Journal.</i> + </p> + <p> + It was not the sort of interview to win the hearts of men who were ready + to give their lives to set right what they believe to be the greatest + outrage that has ever been inflicted upon Christendom, that is to say the + forty-three years of military preparation and of diplomacy by threats that + culminated in the ultimatum to Serbia, the invasion of Belgium and the + murder of the Vise villagers. It was adorned with a large portrait of + “Benoit XV.,” looking grave and discouraging over his spectacles, and the + headlines insisted it was “<i>La Pensee du Pape.</i>” Cross-heads + sufficiently indicated the general tone. One read: + </p> + <p> + <i>“Le Saint Siege impartial... Au-dessus de la bataille....”</i> The good + Cardinal would have made a good lawyer. He had as little to say about God + and the general righteousness of things as the Bishop of London. But he + got in some smug reminders of the severance of diplomatic relations with + the Vatican. Perhaps now France will be wiser. He pointed out that the + Holy See in its Consistorial Allocution of January 22nd, 1915, invited the + belligerents to observe the rules of war. Could anything more be done than + that? Oh!—in the general issue of the war, if you want a judgement + on the war as a whole, how is it possible that the Vatican to decide? + Surely the French know that excellent principle of justice, <i>Audiatur et + altera pars</i>, and how under existing circumstances can the Vatican do + that...? The Vatican is cut off from communication with Austria and + Germany. The Vatican has been deprived of its temporal power and local + independence (another neat point).... + </p> + <p> + So France is bowed out. When peace is restored, the Vatican will perhaps + be able to enquire if there was a big German army in 1914, if German + diplomacy was aggressive from 1875 onward, if Belgium was invaded + unrighteously, if (Catholic) Austria forced the pace upon (non-Catholic) + Russia. But now—now the Holy See must remain as impartial as an + unbought mascot in a shop window.... + </p> + <p> + The next column of <i>Le Journal</i> contained an account of the Armenian + massacres; the blood of the Armenian cries out past the Holy Father to + heaven; but then Armenians are after all heretics, and here again the + principle of <i>Audiatur et altera pars</i> comes in. Communications are + not open with the Turks. Moreover, Armenians, like Serbs, are worse than + infidels; they are heretics. Perhaps God is punishing them.... + </p> + <p> + <i>Audiatur et altera pars</i>, and the Vatican has not forgotten the + infidelity and disrespect of both France and Italy in the past. These are + the things, it seems, that really matter to the Vatican. Cardinal + Gasparri's portrait, in the same issue of <i>Le Journal</i>, displays a + countenance of serene contentment, a sort of incarnate “Told-you-so.” + </p> + <p> + So the Vatican lifts its pontifical skirts and shakes the dust of western + Europe off its feet. + </p> + <p> + It is the most astounding renunciation in history. + </p> + <p> + Indubitably the Christian church took a wide stride from the kingship of + God when it placed a golden throne for the unbaptised Constantine in the + midst of its most sacred deliberations at Nicaea. But it seems to me that + this abandonment of moral judgements in the present case by the Holy See + is an almost wider step from the church's allegiance to God.... + </p> + <p> + 3 + </p> + <p> + Thought about the great questions of life, thought and reasoned direction, + this is what the multitude demands mutely and weakly, and what the + organised churches are failing to give. They have not the courage of their + creeds. Either their creeds are intellectual flummery or they are the + solution to the riddles with which the world is struggling. But the + churches make no mention of their creeds. They chatter about sex and the + magic effect of church attendance and simple faith. If simple faith is + enough, the churches and their differences are an imposture. Men are + stirred to the deepest questions about life and God, and the Anglican + church, for example, obliges—as I have described. + </p> + <p> + It is necessary to struggle against the unfavourable impression made by + these things. They must not blind us to the deeper movement that is in + progress in a quite considerable number of minds in England and France + alike towards the realisation of the kingdom of God. + </p> + <p> + What I conceive to be the reality of the religious revival is to be found + in quarters remote from the religious professionals. Let me give but one + instance of several that occur to me. I met soon after my return from + France a man who has stirred my curiosity for years, Mr. David Lubin, the + prime mover in the organisation of the International Institute of + Agriculture in Rome. It is a movement that has always appealed to my + imagination. The idea is to establish and keep up to date a record of the + food supplies in the world with a view to the ultimate world control of + food supply and distribution. When its machinery has developed + sufficiently to a control in the interests of civilisation of many other + staples besides foodstuffs. It is in fact the suggestion and beginning of + the economic world peace and the economic world state, just as the Hague + Tribunal is the first faint sketch of a legal world state. The King of + Italy has met Mr. Lubin's idea with open hands. (It was because of this + profoundly interesting experiment that in a not very widely known book of + mine, <i>The World Set Free</i> (May, 1914), in which I represented a + world state as arising out of Armageddon, I made the first world + conference meet at Brissago in Italian Switzerland under the presidency of + the King of Italy.) So that when I found I could meet Mr. Lubin I did so + very gladly. We lunched together in a pretty little room high over + Knightsbridge, and talked through an afternoon. + </p> + <p> + He is a man rather after the type of Gladstone; he could be made to look + like Gladstone in a caricature, and he has that compelling quality of + intense intellectual excitement which was one of the great factors in the + personal effectiveness of Gladstone. He is a Jew, but until I had talked + to him for some time that fact did not occur to me. He is in very ill + health, he has some weakness of the heart that grips him and holds him at + times white and silent. + </p> + <p> + At first we talked of his Institute and its work. Then we came to shipping + and transport. Whenever one talks now of human affairs one comes presently + to shipping and transport generally. In Paris, in Italy, when I returned + to England, everywhere I found “cost of carriage” was being discovered to + be a question of fundamental importance. Yet transport, railroads and + shipping, these vitally important services in the world's affairs, are + nearly everywhere in private hands and run for profit. In the case of + shipping they are run for profit on such antiquated lines that freights + vary from day to day and from hour to hour. It makes the business of food + supply a gamble. And it need not be a gamble. + </p> + <p> + But that is by the way in the present discussion. As we talked, the + prospect broadened out from a prospect of the growing and distribution of + food to a general view of the world becoming one economic community. + </p> + <p> + I talked of various people I had been meeting in the previous few weeks. + “So many of us,” I said, “seem to be drifting away from the ideas of + nationalism and faction and policy, towards something else which is + larger. It is an idea of a right way of doing things for human purposes, + independently of these limited and localised references. Take such things + as international hygiene for example, take <i>this</i> movement. We are + feeling our way towards a bigger rule.” + </p> + <p> + “The rule of Righteousness,” said Mr. Lubin. + </p> + <p> + I told him that I had been coming more and more to the idea—not as a + sentimentality or a metaphor, but as the ruling and directing idea, the + structural idea, of all one's political and social activities—of the + whole world as one state and community and of God as the King of that + state. + </p> + <p> + “But <i>I</i> say that,” cried Mr. Lubin, “I have put my name to that. And—it + is <i>here!</i>” + </p> + <p> + He struggled up, seized an Old Testament that lay upon a side table. He + stood over it and rapped its cover. “It is <i>here</i>,” he said, looking + more like Gladstone than ever, “in the Prophets.” + </p> + <p> + 4 + </p> + <p> + That is all I mean to tell at present of that conversation. + </p> + <p> + We talked of religion for two hours. Mr. Lubin sees things in terms of + Israel and I do not. For all that we see things very much after the same + fashion. That talk was only one of a number of talks about religion that I + have had with hard and practical men who want to get the world straighter + than it is, and who perceive that they must have a leadership and + reference outside themselves. That is why I assert so confidently that + there is a real deep religious movement afoot in the world. But not one of + those conversations could have gone on, it would have ceased instantly, if + anyone bearing the uniform and brand of any organised religious body, any + clergyman, priest, mollah, of suchlike advocate of the ten thousand + patented religions in the world, had come in. He would have brought in his + sectarian spites, his propaganda of church-going, his persecution of the + heretic and the illegitimate, his ecclesiastical politics, his taboos, and + his doctrinal touchiness.... That is why, though I perceive there is a + great wave of religious revival in the world to-day, I doubt whether it + bodes well for the professional religions.... + </p> + <p> + The other day I was talking to an eminent Anglican among various other + people and someone with an eye to him propounded this remarkable view. + </p> + <p> + “There are four stages between belief and utter unbelief. There are those + who believe in God, those who doubt like Huxley the Agnostic, those who + deny him like the Atheists but who do at least keep his place vacant, and + lastly those who have set up a Church in his place. That is the last + outrage of unbelief.” + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0016" id="link2H_4_0016"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + IV. THE RIDDLE OF THE BRITISH + </h2> + <p> + All the French people I met in France seemed to be thinking and talking + about the English. The English bring their own atmosphere with them; to + begin with they are not so talkative, and I did not find among them + anything like the same vigour of examination, the same resolve to + understand the Anglo-French reaction, that I found among the French. In + intellectual processes I will confess that my sympathies are undisguisedly + with the French; the English will never think nor talk clearly until the + get clerical “Greek” and sham “humanities” out of their public schools and + sincere study and genuine humanities in; our disingenuous Anglican + compromise is like a cold in the English head, and the higher education in + England is a training in evasion. This is an always lamentable state of + affairs, but just now it is particularly lamentable because quite + tremendous opportunities for the good of mankind turn on the possibility + of a thorough and entirely frank mutual understanding between French, + Italians, and English. For years there has been a considerable amount of + systematic study in France of English thought and English developments. + Upon almost any question of current English opinion and upon most current + English social questions, the best studies are in French. But there has + been little or no reciprocal activity. The English in France seem to + confine their French studies to <i>La Vie Parisienne.</i> It is what they + have been led to expect of French literature. + </p> + <p> + There can be no doubt in any reasonable mind that this war is binding + France and England very closely together. They dare not quarrel for the + next fifty years. They are bound to play a central part in the World + League for the Preservation of Peace that must follow this struggle. There + is no question of their practical union. It is a thing that must be. But + it is remarkable that while the French mind is agog to apprehend every + fact and detail it can about the British, to make the wisest and fullest + use of our binding necessities, that strange English “incuria”—to + use the new slang—attains to its most monumental in this matter. + </p> + <p> + So there is not much to say about how the British think about the French. + They do not think. They feel. At the outbreak of the war, when the + performance of France seemed doubtful, there was an enormous feeling for + France in Great Britain; it was like the formless feeling one has for a + brother. It was as if Britain had discovered a new instinct. If France had + crumpled up like paper, the English would have fought on passionately to + restore her. That is ancient history now. Now the English still feel + fraternal and fraternally proud; but in a mute way they are dazzled. Since + the German attack on Verdun began, the French have achieved a crescendo. + None of us could have imagined it. It did not seem possible to very many + of us at the end of 1915 that either France or Germany could hold on for + another year. There was much secret anxiety for France. It has given place + now to unstinted confidence and admiration. In their astonishment the + British are apt to forget the impressive magnitude of their own effort, + the millions of soldiers, the innumerable guns, the endless torrent of + supplies that pour into France to avenge the little army of Mons. It seems + natural to us that we should so exert ourselves under the circumstances. I + suppose it is wonderful, but, as a sample Englishman, I do not feel that + it is at all wonderful. I did not feel it wonderful even when I saw the + British aeroplanes lording it in the air over Martinpuich, and not a + German to be seen. Since Michael would have it so, there, at last, they + were. + </p> + <p> + There was a good deal of doubt in France about the vigour of the British + effort, until the Somme offensive. All that had been dispelled in August + when I reached Paris. There was not the shadow of a doubt remaining + anywhere of the power and loyalty of the British. These preliminary + assurances have to be made, because it is in the nature of the French mind + to criticise, and it must not be supposed that criticisms of detail and + method affect the fraternity and complete mutual confidence which is the + stuff of the Anglo-French relationship. + </p> + <p> + 2 + </p> + <p> + Now first the French have been enormously astonished by the quality of the + ordinary British soldiers in our new armies. One Colonial colonel said + something almost incredible to me—almost incredible as coming as + from a Frenchman; it was a matter to solemn for any compliments or polite + exaggerations; he said in tones of wonder and conviction, “<i>They are as + good as ours.</i>” It was his acme of all possible praise. + </p> + <p> + That means any sort of British soldier. Unless he is assisted by a kilt + the ordinary Frenchman is unable to distinguish between one sort of + British soldier and another. He cannot tell—let the ardent + nationalist mark the fact!—a Cockney from an Irishman or the Cardiff + from the Essex note. He finds them all extravagantly and unquenchably + cheerful and with a generosity—“like good children.” There his + praise is a little tinged by doubt. The British are reckless—recklessness + in battle a Frenchman can understand, but they are also reckless about + to-morrow's bread and whether the tent is safe against a hurricane in the + night. He is struck too by the fact that they are much more vocal than the + French troops, and that they seem to have a passion for bad lugubrious + songs. There he smiles and shrugs his shoulders, and indeed what else can + any of us do in the presence of that mystery? At any rate the legend of + the “phlegmatic” Englishman has been scattered to the four winds of heaven + by the guns of the western front. The men are cool in action, it is true; + but for the rest they are, by the French standards, quicksilver. + </p> + <p> + But I will not expand further upon the general impression made by the + English in France. Philippe Millet's <i>En Liaison avec les Anglais</i> + gives in a series of delightful pictures portraits of British types from + the French angle. There can be little doubt that the British quality, + genial naive, plucky and generous, has won for itself a real affection in + France wherever it has had a chance to display itself.... + </p> + <p> + But when it comes to British methods then the polite Frenchman's + difficulties begin. Translating hints into statements and guessing at + reservations, I would say that the French fall very short of admiration of + the way in which our higher officers set about their work, they are + disagreeably impressed by a general want of sedulousness and close method + in our leading. They think we economise brains and waste blood. They are + shocked at the way in which obviously incompetent or inefficient men of + the old army class are retained in their positions even after serious + failures, and they were profoundly moved by the bad staff work and + needlessly heavy losses of our opening attacks in July. They were ready to + condone the blunderings and flounderings of the 1915 offensive as the + necessary penalties of an “amateur” army, they had had to learn their own + lesson in Champagne, but they were surprised to find how much the British + had still to learn in July, 1916. The British officers excuse themselves + because, they plead, they are still amateurs. “That is no reason,” says + the Frenchman, “why they should be amateurish.” + </p> + <p> + No Frenchman said as much as this to me, but their meaning was as plain as + daylight. I tackled one of my guides on this matter; I said that it was + the plain duty of the French military people to criticise British military + methods sharply if they thought they were wrong. “It is not easy,” he + said. “Many British officers do not think they have anything to learn. And + English people do not like being told things. What could we do? We could + hardly send a French officer or so to your headquarters in a tutorial + capacity. You have to do things in your own way.” When I tried to draw + General Castelnau into this dangerous question by suggesting that we might + borrow a French general or so, he would say only, “There is only one way + to learn war, and that is to make war.” When it was too late, in the lift, + I thought of the answer to that. There is only one way to make war, and + that is by the sacrifice of incapables and the rapid promotion of able + men. If old and tried types fail now, new types must be sought. But to do + that we want a standard of efficiency. We want a conception of + intellectual quality in performance that is still lacking.... + </p> + <p> + M. Joseph Reinach, in whose company I visited the French part of the Somme + front, was full of a scheme, which he has since published, for the + breaking up and recomposition of the French and British armies into a + series of composite armies which would blend the magnificent British + manhood and material with French science and military experience. He + pointed out the endless advantages of such an arrangement; the stimulus of + emulation, the promotion of intimate fraternal feeling between the peoples + of the two countries. “At present,” he said, “no Frenchman ever sees an + Englishman except at Amiens or on the Somme. Many of them still have no + idea of what the English are doing....” + </p> + <p> + “Have I ever told you the story of compulsory Greek at Oxford and + Cambridge?” I asked abruptly. + </p> + <p> + “What has that to do with it?” + </p> + <p> + “Or how two undistinguished civil service commissioners can hold up the + scientific education of our entire administrative class?” + </p> + <p> + M. Reinach protested further. + </p> + <p> + “Because you are proposing to loosen the grip of a certain narrow and + limited class upon British affairs, and you propose it as though it were a + job as easy as rearranging railway fares or sending a van to Calais. That + is the problem that every decent Englishman is trying to solve to-day, + every man of that Greater Britain which has supplied these five million + volunteers, these magnificent temporary officers and all this wealth of + munitions. And the oligarchy is so invincibly fortified! Do you think it + will let in Frenchmen to share its controls? It will not even let in + Englishmen. It holds the class schools; the class universities; the + examinations for our public services are its class shibboleths; it is the + church, the squirearchy, the permanent army class, permanent officialdom; + it makes every appointment, it is the fountain of honour; what it does not + know is not knowledge, what it cannot do must not be done. It rules India + ignorantly and obstructively; it will wreck the empire rather than + relinquish its ascendancy in Ireland. It is densely self-satisfied and + instinctively monopolistic. It is on our backs, and with it on our backs + we common English must bleed and blunder to victory.... And you make this + proposal!” + </p> + <p> + 3 + </p> + <p> + The antagonistic relations of the Anglican oligarchy with the greater and + greater-spirited Britain that thrust behind it in this war are probably + paralleled very closely in Germany, probably they are exaggerated in + Germany with a bigger military oligarchy and a relatively lesser civil + body under it. This antagonism is the oddest outcome of the tremendous <i>de-militarisation</i> + of war that has been going on. In France it is probably not so marked + because of the greater flexibility and adaptability of the French culture. + </p> + <p> + All military people—people, that is, professionally and primarily + military—are inclined to be conservative. For thousands of years the + military tradition has been a tradition of discipline. The conception of + the common soldier has been a mechanically obedient, almost dehumanised + man, of the of officer a highly trained autocrat. In two years all this + has been absolutely reversed. Individual quality, inventive organisation + and industrialism will win this war. And no class is so innocent of these + things as the military caste. Long accustomed as they are to the + importance of moral effect they put a brave face upon the business; they + save their faces astonishingly, but they are no longer guiding and + directing this war, they are being pushed from behind by forces they never + foresaw and cannot control. The aeroplanes and great guns have bolted with + them, the tanks begotten of naval and civilian wits, shove them to victory + in spite of themselves. + </p> + <p> + Wherever I went behind the British lines the officers were going about in + spurs. These spurs at last got on my nerves. They became symbolical. They + became as grave an insult to the tragedy of the war as if they were false + noses. The British officers go for long automobile rides in spurs. They + walk about the trenches in spurs. Occasionally I would see a horse; I do + not wish to be unfair in this matter, there were riding horses sometimes + within two or three miles of the ultimate front, but they were rarely + used. + </p> + <p> + I do not say that the horse is entirely obsolescent in this war. In was + nothing is obsolete. In the trenches men fight with sticks. In the Pasubio + battle the other day one of the Alpini silenced a machine gun by throwing + stones. In the West African campaign we have employed troops armed with + bows and arrows, and they have done very valuable work. But these are + exceptional cases. The military use of the horse henceforth will be such + an exceptional case. It is ridiculous for these spurs still to clink about + the modern battlefield. What the gross cost of the spurs and horses and + trappings of the British army amount to, and how many men are grooming and + tending horses who might just as well be ploughing and milking at home, I + cannot guess; it must be a total so enormous as seriously to affect the + balance of the war. + </p> + <p> + And these spurs and their retention are only the outward and visible + symbol of the obstinate resistance of the Anglican intelligence to the + clear logic of the present situation. It is not only the external + equipment of our leaders that falls behind the times; our political and + administrative services are in the hands of the same desolatingly + inadaptable class. The British are still wearing spurs in Ireland; they + are wearing them in India; and the age of the spur has passed. At the + outset of this war there was an absolute cessation of criticism of the + military and administrative castes; it is becoming a question whether we + may not pay too heavily in blundering and waste, in military and economic + lassitude, in international irritation and the accumulation of future + dangers in Ireland, Egypt, India, and elsewhere, for an apparent absence + of internal friction. These people have no gratitude for tacit help, no + spirit of intelligent service, and no sense of fair play to the outsider. + The latter deficiency indeed they call <i>esprit de corps</i> and prize it + as if it were a noble quality. + </p> + <p> + It becomes more and more imperative that the foreign observer should + distinguish between this narrower, older official Britain and the greater + newer Britain that struggles to free itself from the entanglement of a + system outgrown. There are many Englishmen who would like to say to the + French and Irish and the Italians and India, who indeed feel every week + now a more urgent need of saying, “Have patience with us.” The Riddle of + the British is very largely solved if you will think of a great modern + liberal nation seeking to slough an exceedingly tough and tight skin.... + </p> + <p> + Nothing is more illuminating and self-educational than to explain one's + home politics to an intelligent foreigner enquirer; it strips off all the + secondary considerations, the allusiveness, the merely tactical + considerations, the allusiveness, the merely tactical considerations. One + sees the forest not as a confusion of trees but as something with a + definite shape and place. I was asked in Italy and in France, “Where does + Lord Northcliffe come into the British system—or Lloyd George? Who + is Mr. Redmond? Why is Lloyd George a Minister, and why does not Mr. + Redmond take office? Isn't there something called an ordnance department, + and why is there a separate ministry of munitions? Can Mr. Lloyd George + remove an incapable general?...” + </p> + <p> + I found it M. Joseph Reinach particularly penetrating and persistent. It + is an amusing but rather difficult exercise to recall what I tried to + convey to him by way of a theory of Britain. He is by no means an + uncritical listener. I explained that there is an “inner Britain,” + official Britain, which is Anglican or official Presbyterian, which at the + outside in the whole world cannot claim to speak for twenty million + Anglican or Presbyterian communicants, which monopolises official + positions, administration and honours in the entire British empire, + dominates the court, and, typically, is spurred and red-tabbed. (It was + just at this time that the spurs were most on my nerves.) + </p> + <p> + This inner Britain, I went on to explain, holds tenaciously to its + positions of advantage, from which it is difficult to dislodge it without + upsetting the whole empire, and it insists upon treating the rest of the + four hundred millions who constitute that empire as outsiders, foreigners, + subject races and suspected persons. + </p> + <p> + “To you,” I said, “it bears itself with an appearance of faintly hostile, + faintly contemptuous apathy. It is still so entirely insular that it + shudders at the thought of the Channel Tunnel. This is the Britain which + irritates and puzzles you so intensely—that you are quite unable to + conceal these feelings from me. Unhappily it is the Britain you see most + of. Well, outside this official Britain is 'Greater Britain'—the + real Britain with which you have to reckon in the future.” (From this + point a faint flavour of mysticism crept into my dissertation. I found + myself talking with something in my voice curiously reminiscent of those + liberal Russians who set themselves to explain the contrasts and + contradictions of “official” Russia and “true” Russia.) “This Greater + Britain,” I asserted, “is in a perpetual conflict with official Britain, + struggling to keep it up to its work, shoving it towards its ends, + endeavouring in spite of its tenacious mischievousness of the privileged + to keep the peace and a common aim with the French and Irish and Italians + and Russians and Indians. It is to that outer Britain that those + Englishmen you found so interesting and sympathetic, Lloyd George and Lord + Northcliffe, for example, belong. It is the Britain of the great effort, + the Britain of the smoking factories and the torrent of munitions, the + Britain of the men and subalterns of the new armies, the Britain which + invents and thinks and achieves, and stands now between German imperialism + and the empire of the world. I do not want to exaggerate the quality of + greater Britain. If the inner set are narrowly educated, the outer set if + often crudely educated. If the inner set is so close knit as to seem like + a conspiracy, the outer set is so loosely knit as to seem like a noisy + confusion. Greater Britain is only beginning to realise itself and find + itself. For all its crudity there is a giant spirit in it feeling its way + towards the light. It has quite other ambitions for the ending of the war + than some haggled treaty of alliance with France and Italy; some advantage + that will invalidate German competition; it begins to realise newer and + wider sympathies, possibilities of an amalgamation of interests and + community of aim that is utterly beyond the habits of the old oligarchy to + conceive, beyond the scope of that tawdry word 'Empire' to express....” + </p> + <p> + I descended from my rhetoric to find M. Reinach asking how and when this + greater Britain was likely to become politically effective. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0017" id="link2H_4_0017"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + V. THE SOCIAL CHANGES IN PROGRESS + </h2> + <p> + 1 + </p> + <p> + “Nothing will be the same after the war.” This is one of the consoling + platitudes with which people cover over voids of thought. They utter it + with an air of round-eyed profundity. But to ask in reply, “Then how will + things be different?” is in many cases to rouse great resentment. It is + almost as rude as saying, “Was that thought of yours really a thought?” + </p> + <p> + Let us in this chapter confine ourselves to the social-economic processes + that are going on. So far as I am able to distinguish among the things + that are being said in these matters, they may be classified out into + groups that centre upon several typical questions. There is the question + of “How to pay for the war?” There is the question of the behaviour of + labour after the war. “Will there be a Labour Truce or a violent labour + struggle?” There is the question of the reconstruction of European + industry after the war in the face of an America in a state of monetary + and economic repletion through non-intervention. My present purpose in + this chapter is a critical one; it is not to solve problems but to set out + various currents of thought that are flowing through the general mind. + Which current is likely to seize upon and carry human affairs with it, is + not for our present speculation. + </p> + <p> + There seem to be two distinct ways of answering the first of the questions + I have noted. They do not necessarily contradict each other. Of course the + war is being largely paid for immediately out of the accumulated private + wealth of the past. We are buying off the “hold-up” of the private owner + upon the material and resources we need, and paying in paper money and war + loans. This is not in itself an impoverishment of the community. The + wealth of individuals is not the wealth of nations; the two things may + easily be contradictory when the rich man's wealth consists of land or + natural resources or franchises or privileges the use of which he + reluctantly yields for high prices. The conversion of held-up land and + material into workable and actively used material in exchange for national + debt may be indeed a positive increase in the wealth of the community. And + what is happening in all the belligerent countries is the taking over of + more and more of the realities of wealth from private hands and, in + exchange, the contracting of great masses of debt to private people. The + nett tendency is towards the disappearance of a reality holding class and + the destruction of realities in warfare, and the appearance of a vast <i>rentier</i> + class in its place. At the end of the war much material will be destroyed + for evermore, transit, food production and industry will be everywhere + enormously socialised, and the country will be liable to pay every year in + interest, a sum of money exceeding the entire national expenditure before + the war. From the point of view of the state, and disregarding material + and moral damages, that annual interest is the annual instalment of the + price to be paid for the war. + </p> + <p> + Now the interesting question arises whether these great belligerent states + may go bankrupt, and if so to what extent. States may go bankrupt to the + private creditor without repudiating their debts or seeming to pay less to + him. They can go bankrupt either by a depreciation of their currency or—without + touching the gold standard—through a rise in prices. In the end both + these things work out to the same end; the creditor gets so many loaves or + pairs of boots or workman's hours of labour for his pound <i>less</i> than + he would have got under the previous conditions. One may imagine this + process of price (and of course wages) increase going on to a limitless + extent. Many people are inclined to look to such an increase in prices as + a certain outcome of the war, and just so far as it goes, just so far will + the burthen of the <i>rentier</i> class, their call, tat is, for goods and + services, be lightened. This expectation is very generally entertained, + and I can see little reason against it. The intensely stupid or dishonest + “labour” press, however, which in the interests of the common enemy + misrepresents socialism and seeks to misguide labour in Great Britain, + ignores these considerations, and positively holds out this prospect of + rising prices as an alarming one to the more credulous and ignorant of its + readers. + </p> + <p> + But now comes the second way of meeting the after-the-war obligations. + This second way is by increasing the wealth of the state and by increasing + the national production to such an extent that the payment of the <i>rentier</i> + class will not be an overwhelming burthen. Rising prices bilk the + creditor. Increased production will check the rise in prices and get him a + real payment. The outlook for the national creditor seems to be that he + will be partly bilked and partly paid; how far he will be bilked and how + far depends almost entirely upon this possible increase in production; and + there is consequently a very keen and quite unprecedented desire very + widely diffused among intelligent and active people, holding War Loan + scrip and the like, in all the belligerent countries, to see bold and + hopeful schemes for state enrichment pushed forward. The movement towards + socialism is receiving an impulse from a new and unexpected quarter, there + is now a <i>rentier</i> socialism, and it is interesting to note that + while the London <i>Times</i> is full of schemes of great state + enterprises, for the exploitation of Colonial state lands, for the state + purchase and wholesaling of food and many natural products, and for the + syndication of shipping and the great staple industries into vast trusts + into which not only the British but the French and Italian governments may + enter as partners, the so-called socialist press of Great Britain is + chiefly busy about the draughts in the cell of Mr. Fenner Brockway and the + refusal of Private Scott Duckers to put on his khaki trousers. <i>The New + Statesman</i> and the Fabian Society, however, display a wider + intelligence. + </p> + <p> + There is a great variety of suggestions for this increase of public wealth + and production. Many of them have an extreme reasonableness. The extent to + which they will be adopted depends, no doubt, very largely upon the + politician and permanent official, and both these classes are prone to + panic in the presence of reality. In spite of its own interests in + restraining a rise in prices, the old official “salariat” is likely to be + obstructive to any such innovations. It is the resistance of spurs and red + tabs to military innovations over again. This is the resistance of quills + and red tape. On the other hand the organisation of Britain for war has + “officialised” a number of industrial leaders, and created a large body of + temporary and adventurous officials. They may want to carry on into peace + production the great new factories the war has created. At the end of the + war, for example, every belligerent country will be in urgent need of + cheap automobiles for farmers, tradesmen, and industrial purposes + generally, America is now producing such automobiles at a price of eighty + pounds. But Europe will be heavily in debt to America, her industries will + be disorganised, and there will therefore be no sort of return payment + possible for these hundreds of thousands of automobiles. A country that is + neither creditor nor producer cannot be an importer. Consequently though + those cheap tin cars may be stacked as high as the Washington Monument in + America, they will never come to Europe. On the other hand the great shell + factories of Europe will be standing idle and ready, their staffs + disciplined and available, for conversion to the new task. The imperative + common sense of the position seems to be that the European governments + should set themselves straight away to out-Ford Ford, and provide their + own people with cheap road transport. + </p> + <p> + But here comes in the question whether this common-sense course is + inevitable. Suppose the mental energy left in Europe after the war is + insufficient for such a constructive feat as this. There will certainly be + the obstruction of official pedantry, the hold-up of this vested interest + and that, the greedy desire of “private enterprise” to exploit the + occasion upon rather more costly and less productive lines, the general + distrust felt by ignorant and unimaginative people of a new way of doing + things. The process after all may not get done in the obviously wise way. + This will not mean that Europe will buy American cars. It will be quite + unable to buy American cars. It will be unable to make anything that + America will not be able to make more cheaply for itself. But it will mean + that Europe will go on without cheap cars, that is to say it will go on a + more sluggishly and clumsily and wastefully at a lower economic level. + Hampered transport means hampered production of other things, and in + increasing inability to buy abroad. And so we go down and down. + </p> + <p> + It does not follow that because a course is the manifestly right and + advantageous course for the community that it will be taken. I am reminded + of this by a special basket in my study here, into which I pitch letters, + circulars, pamphlets and so forth as they come to hand from a gentleman + named Gattie, and his friends Mr. Adrian Ross, Mr. Roy Horniman, Mr. Henry + Murray and others. His particular project is the construction of a Railway + Clearing House for London. It is an absolutely admirable scheme. It would + cut down the heavy traffic in the streets of London to about one-third; it + would enable us to run the goods traffic of England with less than half + the number of railway trucks we now employ; it would turn over enormous + areas of valuable land from their present use as railway goods yards and + sidings; it would save time in the transit of goods and labour in their + handling. It is a quite beautifully worked out scheme. For the last eight + or ten years this group of devoted fanatics has been pressing this + undertaking upon an indifferent country with increasing vehemence and + astonishment at that indifference. The point is that its adoption, though + it would be of general benefit, would be of no particular benefit to any + leading man or highly placed official. On the other hand it would upset + all sorts of individuals who are in a position to obstruct it quietly—and + they do so. Meaning no evil. I dip my hand in the accumulation and extract + a leaflet by the all too zealous Mr. Murray. In it he denounces various + public officials by name as he cheats and scoundrels, and invites a + prosecution for libel. + </p> + <p> + In that fashion nothing will ever get done. There is no prosecution, but + for all that I do not agree with Mr. Murray about the men he names. These + gentlemen are just comfortable gentlemen, own brothers to these old + generals of ours who will not take off their spurs. They are probably + quite charming people except that they know nothing of that Fear of God + which searches by heart. Why should they bother? + </p> + <p> + So many of these after-the-war problems bring one back to the question of + how far the war has put the Fear of God into the hearts of responsible + men. There is really no other reason in existence that I can imagine why + they should ask themselves the question, “Have I done my best?” and that + still more important question, “Am I doing my best now?” And so while I + hear plenty of talk about the great reorganisations that are to come after + the war, while there is the stir of doubt among the <i>rentiers</i> + whether, after all, they will get paid, while the unavoidable stresses and + sacrifices of the war are making many people question the rightfulness of + much that they did as a matter of course, and of much that they took for + granted, I perceive there is also something dull and not very articulate + in this European world, something resistant and inert, that is like the + obstinate rolling over of a heavy sleeper after he has been called upon to + get up. “Just a little longer.... Just for <i>my</i> time.” + </p> + <p> + One thought alone seems to make these more intractable people anxious. I + thrust it in as my last stimulant when everything else has failed. “There + will be <i>frightful</i> trouble with labour after the war,” I say. + </p> + <p> + They try to persuade themselves that military discipline is breaking in + labour.... + </p> + <p> + 2 + </p> + <p> + What does British labour think of the outlook after the war? + </p> + <p> + As a distinctive thing British labour does not think. “Class-conscious + labour,” as the Marxists put it, scarcely exists in Britain. The only + convincing case I ever met was a bath-chairman of literary habits + Eastbourne. The only people who are, as a class, class-conscious in the + British community are the Anglican gentry and their fringe of the genteel. + Everybody else is “respectable.” The mass of British workers find their + thinking in the ordinary halfpenny papers or in <i>John Bull.</i> The + so-called labour papers are perhaps less representative of British Labour + than any other section of the press; the <i>Labour Leader</i>, for + example, is the organ of such people as Bertrand Russell, Vernon Lee, + Morel, academic <i>rentiers</i> who know about as much as of the labour + side of industrialism as they do of cock-fighting. All the British peoples + are racially willing and good-tempered people, quite ready to be led by + those they imagine to be abler than themselves. They make the most + cheerful and generous soldiers in the whole world, without insisting upon + that democratic respect which the Frenchman exacts. They do not criticise + and they do not trouble themselves much about the general plan of + operations, so long as they have confidence in the quality and good will + of their leading. But British soldiers will of their loading. But British + soldiers will hiss a general when they think he is selfish, unfeeling, or + a muff. And the socialist propaganda has imported ideas of public service + into private employment. Labour in Britain has been growing increasingly + impatient of bad or selfish industrial leadership. Labour trouble in Great + Britain turns wholly upon the idea crystallised in the one word + “profiteer.” Legislation and regulation of hours of labour, high wages, + nothing will keep labour quiet in Great Britain if labour thinks it is + being exploited for private gain. + </p> + <p> + Labour feels very suspicious of private gain. For that suspicion a certain + rather common type of employer is mainly to blame. Labour believes that + employers is mainly to blame. Labour believes that employers as a class + cheat workmen as a class, plan to cheat them of their full share in the + common output, and drive hard bargains. It believes that private employers + are equally ready to sacrifice the welfare of the nation and the welfare + of the workers for mere personal advantage. It has a traditional + experience to support these suspicions. + </p> + <p> + In no department of morals have ideas changed so completely during the + last eight years as in relation to “profits”. Eighty years ago everyone + believed in the divine right of property to do what it pleased its + advantages, a doctrine more disastrous socially than the divine right of + kings. There was no such sense of the immorality of “holding up” as + pervades the public conscience to-day. The worker was expected not only to + work, but to be grateful for employment. The property owner held his + property and handed it out for use and development or not, just as he + thought fit. These ideas are not altogether extinct today. Only a few days + ago I met a magnificent old lady of seventy nine or eighty, who discoursed + upon the wickedness of her gardener in demanding another shilling a week + because of war prices. + </p> + <p> + She was a valiant and handsome personage. A face that had still a healthy + natural pinkness looked out from under blond curls, and an elegant and + carefully tended hand tossed back some fine old lace to gesticulate more + freely. She had previously charmed her hearers by sweeping aside certain + rumours that were drifting about. + </p> + <p> + “Germans invade <i>Us!</i>” she cried. “Who'd <i>let</i> 'em, I'd like to + know? Who'd <i>let</i> 'em?” + </p> + <p> + And then she reverted to her grievance about the gardener. + </p> + <p> + “I told him that after the war he'd be glad enough to get anything. + Grateful! They'll all be coming back after the war—all of 'em, glad + enough to get anything. Asking for another shilling indeed!” + </p> + <p> + Everyone who heard her looked shocked. But that was the tone of everyone + of importance in the dark years that followed the Napoleonic wars. That is + just one survivor of the old tradition. Another is Blight the solicitor, + who goes about bewailing the fact that we writers are “holding out false + hopes of higher agricultural wages after the war.” But these are both + exceptions. They are held to be remarkable people even by their own class. + The mass of property owners and influential people in Europe to-day no + more believe in the sacred right of property to hold up development and + dictate terms than do the more intelligent workers. The ideas of + collective ends and of the fiduciary nature of property, had been soaking + through the European community for years before the war. The necessity for + sudden and even violent co-operations and submersions of individuality in + a common purpose, is rapidly crystallising out these ideas into clear + proposals. + </p> + <p> + War is an evil thing, but most people who will not learn from reason must + have an ugly teacher. This war has brought home to everyone the supremacy + of the public need over every sort of individual claim. + </p> + <p> + One of the most remarkable things in the British war press is the amount + of space given to the discussion of labour developments after the war. + This in its completeness peculiar to the British situation. Nothing on the + same scale is perceptible in the press of the Latin allies. A great + movement on the part of capitalists and business organisers is manifest to + assure the worker of a change of heart and a will to change method. Labour + is suspicious, not foolishly but wisely suspicious. But labour is + considering it. + </p> + <p> + “National industrial syndication,” say the business organisers. + </p> + <p> + “Guild socialism,” say the workers. + </p> + <p> + There is also a considerable amount of talking and writing about + “profit-sharing” and about giving the workers a share in the business + direction. Neither of these ideas appeals to the shrewder heads among the + workers. So far as direction goes their disposition is to ask the captain + to command the ship. So far as profits go, they think the captain has no + more right than the cabin boy to speculative gains; he should do his work + for his pay whether it is profitable or unprofitable work. There is little + balm for labour discontent in these schemes for making the worker also an + infinitesimal profiteer. + </p> + <p> + During my journey in Italy and France I met several men who were keenly + interested in business organisation. Just before I started my friend N, + who has been the chief partner in the building up of a very big and very + extensively advertised American business, came to see me on his way back + to America. He is as interested in his work as a scientific specialist, + and as ready to talk about it to any intelligent and interested hearer. He + was particularly keen upon the question of continuity in the business, + when it behoves the older generation to let in the younger to responsible + management and to efface themselves. He was a man of five-and-forty. + Incidentally he mentioned that he had never taken anything for his private + life out of the great business he had built up but a salary, “a good + salary,” and that now he was gong to grant himself a pension. “I shan't + interfere any more. I shall come right away and live in Europe for a year + so as not to be tempted to interfere. The boys have got to run it some + day, and they had better get their experience while they're young and + capable of learning by it. I did.” + </p> + <p> + I like N's ideas. “Practically,” I said, “you've been a public official. + You've treated your business like a public service.” + </p> + <p> + That was his idea. + </p> + <p> + “Would you mind if it was a public service?” + </p> + <p> + He reflected, and some disagreeable memory darkened his face. “Under the + politicians?” he said. + </p> + <p> + I took the train of thought N had set going abroad with me next day. I had + the good luck to meet men who were interesting industrially. Captain + Pirelli, my guide in Italy, has a name familiar to every motorist; his + name goes wherever cars go, spelt with a big long capital P. Lieutenant de + Tessin's name will recall one of the most interesting experiments in + profit-sharing to the student of social science. I tried over N's problem + on both of them. I found in both their minds just the same attitude as he + takes up towards his business. They think any businesses that are worthy + of respect, the sorts of businesses that interest them, are public + functions. Money-lenders and speculators, merchants and gambling + gentlefolk may think in terms of profit; capable business directors + certainly do nothing of the sort. + </p> + <p> + I met a British officer in France who is also a landowner. I got him to + talk about his administrative work upon his property. He was very keen + upon new methods. He said he tried to do his duty by his land. + </p> + <p> + “How much land?” I asked. + </p> + <p> + “Just over nine thousand acres,” he said. + </p> + <p> + “But you could manage forty or fifty thousand with little more trouble.” + </p> + <p> + “If I had it. In some ways it would be easier.” + </p> + <p> + “What a waste!” I said. “Of course you ought not to <i>own</i> these + acres; what you ought to be is the agricultural controller of just as big + an estate of the public lands as you could manage—with a suitable + salary.” + </p> + <p> + He reflected upon that idea. He said he did not get much of a salary out + of his land as it was, and made a regrettable allusion to Mr. Lloyd + George. “When a man tries to do his duty by his land,” he said... + </p> + <p> + But here running through the thoughts of the Englishman and the Italian + and the Frenchman and the American alike one finds just the same idea of a + kind of officialdom in ownership. It is an idea that pervades our thought + and public discussion to-day everywhere, and it is an idea that is + scarcely traceable at all in the thought of the early half of the + nineteenth century. The idea of service and responsibility in property has + increased and is increasing, the conception of “hold-up,” the usurer's + conception of his right to be bought out of the way, fades. And the + process has been enormously enhanced by the various big-scale experiments + in temporary socialism that have been forced upon the belligerent powers. + Men of the most individualistic quality are being educated up to the + possibilities of concerted collective action. My friend and fellow-student + Y, inventor and business organiser, who used to make the best steam + omnibuses in the world, and who is now making all sorts of things for the + army, would go pink with suspicious anger at the mere words “inspector” or + “socialism” three or four years ago. He does not do so now. + </p> + <p> + A great proportion of this sort of man, this energetic directive sort of + man in England, is thinking socialism to-day. They may not be saying + socialism, but they are thinking it. When labour begins to realise what is + adrift it will be divided between two things: between appreciative + co-operation, for which guild socialism in particular has prepared its + mind, and traditional suspicion. I will not over to guess here which will + prevail. + </p> + <p> + 3 + </p> + <p> + The impression I have of the present mental process in the European + communities is that while the official class and the <i>rentier</i> class + is thinking very poorly and inadequately and with a merely obstructive + disposition; while the churches are merely wasting their energies in + futile self-advertisement; while the labour mass is suspicious and + disposed to make terms for itself rather than come into any large schemes + of reconstruction that will abolish profit as a primary aim in economic + life, there is still a very considerable movement towards such a + reconstruction. Nothing is so misleading as a careless analogy. In the + dead years that followed the Napoleonic wars, which are often quoted as a + precedent for expectation now, the spirit of collective service was near + its minimum; it was never so strong and never so manifestly spreading and + increasing as it is to-day. + </p> + <p> + But service to what? + </p> + <p> + I have my own very strong preconceptions here, and since my temperament is + sanguine they necessarily colour my view. I believe that this impulse to + collective service can satisfy itself only under the formula that mankind + is one state of which God is the undying king, and that the service of + men's collective needs is the true worship of God. But eagerly as I would + grasp at any evidence that this idea is being developed and taken up by + the general consciousness, I am quite unable to persuade myself that + anything of the sort is going on. I do perceive a search for large forms + into which the prevalent impulse to devotion can be thrown. But the + organised religious bodies, with their creeds and badges and their + instinct for self-preservation at any cost, stand between men and their + spiritual growth in just the same way the forestallers stand between men + and food. Their activities at present are an almost intolerable nuisance. + One cannot say “God” but some tout is instantly seeking to pluck one into + his particular cave of flummery and orthodoxy. What a rational man means + by God is just God. The more you define and argue about God the more he + remains the same simple thing. Judaism, Christianity, Islam, modern Hindu + religious thought, all agree in declaring that there is one God, master + and leader of all mankind, in unending conflict with cruelty, disorder, + folly and waste. To my mind, it follows immediately that there can be no + king, no government of any sort, which is not either a subordinate or a + rebel government, a local usurpation, in the kingdom of God. But no + organised religious body has ever had the courage and honesty to insist + upon this. They all pander to nationalism and to powers and princes. They + exists so to pander. Every organised religion in the world exists only to + exploit and divert and waste the religious impulse in man. + </p> + <p> + This conviction that the world kingdom of God is the only true method of + human service, is so clear and final in my own mind, it seems so + inevitably the conviction to which all right-thinking men must ultimately + come, that I feel almost like a looker-on at a game of blind-man's bluff + as I watch the discussion of synthetic political ideas. The blind man + thrusts his seeking hands into the oddest corners, he clutches at chairs + and curtains, but at last he must surely find and hold and feel over and + guess the name of the plainly visible quarry. + </p> + <p> + Some of the French and Italian people I talked to said they were fighting + for “Civilisation.” That is one name for the kingdom of God, and I have + heard English people use it too. But much of the contemporary thought of + England stills wanders with its back to the light. Most of it is pawing + over jerry-built, secondary things. I have before me a little book, the + joint work of Dr. Grey and Mr. Turner, of an ex-public schoolmaster and a + manufacturer, called <i>Eclipse or Empire?</i> (The title <i>World Might + or Downfall?</i> had already been secured in another quarter.) It is a + book that has been enormously advertised; it has been almost impossible to + escape its column-long advertisements; it is billed upon the hoardings, + and it is on the whole a very able and right-spirited book. It calls for + more and better education, for more scientific methods, for less class + suspicion and more social explicitness and understanding, for a franker + and fairer treatment of labour. But why does it call for these things? + Does it call for them because they are right? Because in accomplishing + them one serves God? + </p> + <p> + Not at all. But because otherwise this strange sprawling empire of ours + will drop back into a secondary place in the world. These two writers + really seem to think that the slack workman, the slacker wealthy man, the + negligent official, the conservative schoolmaster, the greedy usurer, the + comfortable obstructive, confronted with this alternative, terrified at + this idea of something or other called the Empire being “eclipsed,” eager + for the continuance of this undefined glory over their fellow-creatures + called “Empire,” will perceive the error of their ways and become + energetic, devoted, capable. They think an ideal of that sort is going to + change the daily lives of men.... I sympathise with their purpose, and I + deplore their conception of motives. If men will not give themselves for + righteousness, they will not give themselves for a geographical score. If + they will not work well for the hatred of bad work, they will not work + well for the hatred of Germans. This “Empire" idea has been cadging about + the British empire, trying to collect enthusiasm and devotion, since the + days of Disraeli. It is, I submit, too big for the mean-spirited, and too + tawdry and limited for the fine and generous. It leaves out the French and + the Italians and the Belgians and all our blood brotherhood of allies. It + has no compelling force in it. We British are not naturally Imperialist; + we are something greater—or something less. For two years and a half + now we have been fighting against Imperialism in its most extravagant + form. It is a poor incentive to right living to propose to parody the + devil we fight against. + </p> + <p> + The blind man must lunge again. + </p> + <p> + For when the right answer is seized it answers not only the question why + men should work for their fellow-men but also why nation should cease to + arm and plan and contrive against nation. The social problem is only the + international problem in retail, the international problem is only the + social one in gross. + </p> + <p> + My bias rules me altogether here. I see men in social, in economic and in + international affairs alike, eager to put an end to conflict, + inexpressibly weary of conflict and the waste and pain and death it + involves. But to end conflict one must abandon aggressive or uncordial + pretensions. Labour is sick at the idea of more strikes and struggles + after the war, industrialism is sick of competition and anxious for + service, everybody is sick of war. But how can they end any of these + clashes except by the definition and recognition of a common end which + will establish a standard for the trial of every conceivable issue, to + which, that is, every other issue can be subordinated; and what common end + can there be in all the world except this idea of the world kingdom of + God? What is the good of orienting one's devotion to a firm, or to class + solidarity, or <i>La Republique Francais</i>, or Poland, or Albania, or + such love and loyalty as people profess for King George or King Albert or + the Duc d'Orleans—it puzzles me why—or any such intermediate + object of self-abandonment? We need a standard so universal that the + platelayer may say to the barrister or the duchess, or the Red Indian to + the Limehouse sailor, or the Anzac soldier to the Sinn Feiner or the + Chinaman, “What are we two doing for it?” And to fill the place of that + “it,” no other idea is great enough or commanding enough, but only the + world kingdom of God. + </p> + <p> + However long he may have to hunt, the blind man who is seeking service and + an end to bickerings will come to that at last, because of all the + thousand other things he may clutch at, nothing else can satisfy his + manifest need. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0018" id="link2H_4_0018"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + VI. THE ENDING OF THE WAR + </h2> + <p> + 1 + </p> + <p> + About the end of the war there are two chief ways of thinking, there is a + simpler sort of mind which desires merely a date, and a more complex kind + which wants particulars. To the former class belong most of the men out at + the front. They are so bored by this war that they would welcome any peace + that did not definitely admit defeat—and examine the particulars + later. The “tone” of the German army, to judge by its captured letters, is + even lower. It would welcome peace in any form. Never in the whole history + of the world has a war been so universally unpopular as this war. + </p> + <p> + The mind of the soldier is obsessed by a vision of home-coming for good, + so vivid and alluring that it blots out nearly every other consideration. + The visions of people at home are of plenty instead of privation, lights + up, and the cessation of a hundred tiresome restrictions. And it is + natural therefore that a writer rather given to guesses and forecasts + should be asked very frequently to guess how long the war has still to + run. + </p> + <p> + All such forecasting is the very wildest of shooting. There are the + chances of war to put one out, and of a war that changes far faster than + the military intelligence. I have made various forecasts. At the outset I + thought that military Germany would fight at about the 1899 level, would + be lavish with cavalry and great attacks, that it would be reluctant to + entrench, and that the French and British had learnt the lesson of the + Boer war better than the Germans. I trusted to the melodramatic instinct + of the Kaiser. I trusted to the quickened intelligence of the British + military caste. The first rush seemed to bear me out, and I opened my + paper day by day expecting to read of the British and French entrenched + and the Germans beating themselves to death against wire and trenches. In + those days I wrote of the French being over the Rhine before 1915. But it + was the Germans who entrenched first. + </p> + <p> + Since then I have made some other attempts. I did not prophesy at all in + 1915, so far as I can remember. If I had I should certainly have backed + the Gallipoli attempt to win. It was the right thing to do, and it was + done abominably. It should have given us Constantinople and brought + Bulgaria to our side; it gave us a tragic history of administrative + indolence and negligence, and wasted bravery and devotion. I was very + hopeful of the western offensive in 1915; and in 1916 I counted still on + our continuing push. I believe we were very near something like decision + this last September, but some archaic dream of doing it with cavalry + dashed these hopes. The “Tanks” arrived to late to do their proper work, + and their method of use is being worked out very slowly.... I still + believe in the western push, if only we push it for all we are worth. If + only we push it with our brains, with our available and still unorganised + brains; if only we realise that the art of modern war is to invent and + invent and invent. Hitherto I have always hoped and looked for decision, a + complete victory that would enable the Allies to dictate peace. But such + an expectation is largely conditioned by these delicate questions of + adaptability that my tour of the front has made very urgent in my mind. A + spiteful German American writer has said that the British would rather + kill twenty thousand of their men than break one general. Even a grain of + truth in such a remark is a very valid reasoning for lengthening one's + estimate of the duration of the war. + </p> + <p> + There can be no doubt that the Western allies are playing a winning game + upon the western front, and that this is the front of decision now. It is + not in doubt that they are beating the Germans and shoving them back. The + uncertain factor is the rate at which they are shoving them back. If they + can presently get to so rapid an advance as to bring the average rate + since July 1st up to two or three miles a day, then we shall still see the + Allies dictating terms. But if the shove drags on at its present pace of + less than a mile and four thousand prisoners a week over the limited Somme + front only, if nothing is attempted elsewhere to increase the area of + pressure, [*This was written originally before the French offensive at + Verdun.] then the intolerable stress and boredom of the war will bring + about a peace long before the Germans are decisively crushed. But the war, + universally detested, may go on into 1918 or 1919. Food riots, famine, and + general disorganisation will come before 1920, if it does. The Allies have + a winning game before them, but they seem unable to discover and promote + the military genius needed to harvest an unquestionable victory. In the + long run this may not be an unmixed evil. Victory, complete and dramatic, + may be bought too dearly. We need not triumphs out of this war but the + peace of the world. + </p> + <p> + This war is altogether unlike any previous war, and its ending, like its + development, will follow a course of its own. For a time people's minds + ran into the old grooves, the Germans were going <i>nach Paris</i> and <i>nach + London</i>; Lord Curzon filled our minds with a pleasant image of the + Bombay Lancers riding down <i>Unter den Linden.</i> But the Versailles + precedent of a council of victors dictating terms to the vanquished is not + now so evidently in men's minds. The utmost the Allies talk upon now is to + say, “We must end the war on German soil.” The Germans talk frankly of + “holding out.” I have guessed that the western offensive will be chiefly + on German soil by next June; it is a mere guess, and I admit it is quite + conceivable that the “push” may still be grinding out its daily tale of + wounded and prisoners in 1918 far from that goal. + </p> + <p> + None of the combatants expected such a war as this, and the consequence is + that the world at large has no idea how to get out of it. The war may stay + with us like a schoolboy caller, because it does not know how to go. The + Italians said as much to me. “Suppose we get to Innsbruck and Laibach and + Trieste,” they said, “it isn't an end!” Lord Northcliffe, I am told, came + away from Italy with the conviction that the war would last six years. + </p> + <p> + There is the clearest evidence that nearly everyone is anxious to get out + of the war now. Nobody at all, except perhaps a few people who may be + called to account, and a handful of greedy profit-seekers, wants to keep + it going. Quietly perhaps and unobtrusively, everyone I know is now trying + to find the way out of the war, and I am convinced that the same is the + case in Germany. That is what makes the Peace-at-any-price campaign so + exasperating. It is like being chased by clamorous geese across a common + in the direction in which you want to go. But how are we to get out—with + any credit—in such a way as to prevent a subsequent collapse into + another war as frightful? + </p> + <p> + At present three programmes are before the world of the way in which the + war can be ended. The first of these assumes a complete predominance of + our Allies. It has been stated in general terms by Mr. Asquith. + Evacuation, reparation, due punishment of those responsible for the war, + and guarantees that nothing of the sort shall happen again. There is as + yet no mention of the nature of these guarantees. Just exactly what is to + happen to Poland, Austria, and the Turkish Empire does not appear in this + prospectus. The German Chancellor is equally elusive. The Kaiser has + stampeded the peace-at-any-price people of Great Britain by proclaiming + that Germany wants peace. We knew that. But what sort of peace? It would + seem that we are promised vaguely evacuation and reparation on the western + frontier, and in addition there are to be guarantees—but it is quite + evident that they are altogether different guarantees from Mr. Asquith's—that + nothing of the sort is ever to happen again. The programme of the British + and their Allies seems to contemplate something like a forcible + disarmament and military occupation of Belgium, the desertion of Serbia + and Russia, and the surrender to Germany of every facility for a later and + more successful German offensive in the west. But it is clear that on + these terms as stated the war must go on to the definite defeat of one + side or the other, or a European chaos. They are irreconcilable sets of + terms. + </p> + <p> + Yet it is hard to say how they can be modified on either side, if the war + is to be decided only between the belligerents and by standards of + national interest only, without reference to any other considerations. Our + Allies would be insane to leave the Hohenzollern at the end of the war + with a knife in his hand, after the display he has made of his quality. To + surrender his knife means for the Hohenzollern the abandonment of his + dreams, the repudiation of the entire education and training of Germany + for half a century. When we realise the fatality of this antagonism, we + realise how it is that, in this present anticipation of hell, the weary, + wasted and tormented nations must still sustain their monstrous dreary + struggle. And that is why this thought that possible there may be a side + way out, a sort of turning over of the present endlessly hopeless game + into a new and different and manageable game through the introduction of + some external factor, creeps and spreads as I find it creeping and + spreading. + </p> + <p> + That is what the finer intelligences of America are beginning to realise, + and why men in Europe continually turn their eyes to America, with a + surmise, with a doubt. + </p> + <p> + A point of departure for very much thinking in this matter is the recent + speech of President Wilson that heralded the present discussion. All + Europe was impressed by the truth, and by President Wilson's recognition + of the truth, that from any other great war after this America will be + unable to abstain. Can America come into this dispute at the end to insist + upon something better than a new diplomatic patchwork, and so obviate the + later completer Armageddon? Is there, above the claims and passions of + Germany, France, Britain, and the rest of them, a conceivable right thing + to do for all mankind, that it might also be in the interest of America to + support? Is there a Third Party solution, so to speak, which may possibly + be the way out from this war? + </p> + <p> + And further I would go on to ask, is not this present exchange of Notes, + appealing to the common sense of the world, really the beginning, and the + proper beginning, of the unprecedented Peace Negotiations to end this + unprecedented war? And, I submit, the longer this open discussion goes on + before the doors close upon the secret peace congress the better for + mankind. + </p> + <p> + 2 + </p> + <p> + Let me sketch out here what I conceive to be the essentials of a world + settlement. Some of the items are the mere commonplaces of everyone who + discusses this question; some are less frequently insisted upon. I have + been joining up one thing to another, suggestions I have heard from this + man and that, and I believe that it is really possible to state a solution + that will be acceptable to the bulk of reasonable men all about the world. + Directly we put the panic-massacres of Dinant and Louvain, the crime of + the <i>Lusitania</i> and so on into the category of symptoms rather than + essentials, outrages that call for special punishments and reparations, + but that do not enter further into the ultimate settlement, we can begin + to conceive a possible world treaty. Let me state the broad outlines of + this pacification. The outlines depend one upon the other; each is a + condition of the other. It is upon these lines that the thoughtful, as + distinguished from the merely the combative people, seem to be drifting + everywhere. + </p> + <p> + In the first place, it is agreed that there would have to be an identical + treaty between all the great powers of the world binding them to certain + things. It would have to provide:— + </p> + <p> + That the few great industrial states capable of producing modern war + equipment should take over and control completely the manufacture of all + munitions of war in the world. And that they should absolutely close the + supply of such material to all the other states in the world. This is a + far easier task than many people suppose. War has now been so developed on + its mechanical side that the question of its continuance or abolition + rests now entirely upon four or five great powers. + </p> + <p> + Next comes the League of Peace idea; that there should be an International + Tribunal for the discussion and settlement of international disputes. That + the dominating powers should maintain land and sea forces only up to a + limit agreed upon and for internal police use only or for the purpose of + enforcing the decisions of the Tribunal. That they should all be bound to + attack and suppress any power amongst them which increases its war + equipment beyond its defined limits. + </p> + <p> + That much has already been broached in several quarters. But so far is not + enough. It ignores the chief processes of that economic war that aids and + abets and is inseparably a part of modern international conflicts. If we + are to go as far as we have already stated in the matter of international + controls, then we must go further and provide that the International + Tribunal should have power to consider and set aside all tariffs and + localised privileges that seem grossly unfair or seriously irritating + between the various states of the world. It should have power to pass or + revise all new tariff, quarantine, alien exclusion, or the like + legislation affecting international relations. Moreover, it should take + over and extend the work of the International Bureau of Agriculture at + Rome with a view to the control of all staple products. It should + administer the sea law of the world, and control and standardise freights + in the common interests of mankind. Without these provisions it would be + merely preventing the use of certain weapons; it would be doing nothing to + prevent countries strangling or suffocating each other by commercial + warfare. It would not abolish war. + </p> + <p> + Now upon this issue people do not seem to me to be yet thinking very + clearly. It is the exception to find anyone among the peace talkers who + really grasps how inseparably the necessity for free access for everyone + to natural products, to coal and tropical products, e.g. free shipping at + non-discriminating tariffs, and the recognition by a Tribunal of the + principle of common welfare in trade matters, is bound up with the ideal + of a permanent world peace. But any peace that does not provide for these + things will be merely laying down of the sword in order to take up the + cudgel. And a “peace” that did not rehabilitate industrial Belgium, + Poland, and the north of France would call imperatively for the imposition + upon the Allies of a system of tariffs in the interests of these + countries, and for a bitter economic “war after the war” against Germany. + That restoration is, of course, an implicit condition to any attempt to + set up an economic peace in the world. + </p> + <p> + These things being arranged for the future, it would be further necessary + to set up an International Boundary Commission, subject to certain + defining conditions agreed upon by the belligerents, to re-draw the map of + Europe, Asia, and Africa. This war does afford an occasion such as the + world may never have again of tracing out the “natural map” of mankind, + the map that will secure the maximum of homogeneity and the minimum of + racial and economic freedom. All idealistic people hope for a restored + Poland. But it is a childish thing to dream of a contented Poland with + Posen still under the Prussian heel, with Cracow cut off, and without a + Baltic port. These claims of Poland to completeness have a higher sanction + than the mere give and take of belligerents in congress. + </p> + <p> + Moreover this International Tribunal, if it was indeed to prevent war, + would need also to have power to intervene in the affairs of any country + or region in a state of open and manifest disorder, for the protection of + foreign travellers and of persons and interests localised in that country + but foreign to it. + </p> + <p> + Such an agreement as I have here sketched out would at once lift + international politics out of the bloody and hopeless squalor of the + present conflict. It is, I venture to assert, the peace of the reasonable + man in any country whatever. But it needs the attention of such a + disengaged people as the American people to work it out and supply it with—weight. + It needs putting before the world with some sort of authority greater than + its mere entire reasonableness. Otherwise it will not come before the + minds of ordinary men with the effect of a practicable proposition. I do + not see any such plant springing from the European battlefields. It is + America's supreme opportunity. And yet it is the common sense of the + situation, and the solution that must satisfy a rational German as + completely as a rational Frenchman or Englishman. It has nothing against + it but the prejudice against new and entirely novel things. + </p> + <p> + 3 + </p> + <p> + In throwing out the suggestion that America should ultimately undertake + the responsibility of proposing a world peace settlement, I admit that I + run counter to a great deal of European feeling. Nowhere in Europe now do + people seem to be in love with the United States. But feeling is a colour + that passes. And the question is above matters of feeling. Whether the + belligerents dislike Americans or the Americans dislike the belligerents + is an incidental matter. The main question is of the duty of a great and + fortunate nation towards the rest of the world and the future of mankind. + </p> + <p> + I do not know how far Americans are aware of the trend of feeling in + Europe at the present time. Both France and Great Britain have a sense of + righteousness in this war such as no nation, no people, has ever felt in + war before. We know we are fighting to save all the world from the rule of + force and the unquestioned supremacy of the military idea. Few Frenchmen + or Englishmen can imagine the war presenting itself to an American + intelligence under any other guise. At the invasion of Belgium we were + astonished that America did nothing. At the sinking of the <i>Lusitania</i> + all Europe looked to America. The British mind contemplates the spectacle + of American destroyers acting as bottleholders to German submarines with a + dazzled astonishment. “Manila,” we gasp. In England we find excuses for + America in our own past. In '64 we betrayed Denmark; in '70 we deserted + France. The French have not these memories. They do not understand the + damning temptations of those who feel they are “<i>au-dessus de la melee.</i>” + They believe they had some share in the independence of America, that + there is a sacred cause in republicanism, that there are grounds for a + peculiar sympathy between France and the United States in republican + institutions. They do not realise that Germany and America have a common + experience in recent industrial development, and a common belief in the + “degeneracy” of all nations with a lower rate of trade expansion. They do + not realise how a political campaign with the slogan of “Peace and a Full + Dinner-Pail” looks in the middle west, what an honest, simple, rational + appeal it makes there. Atmospheres alter values. In Europe, strung up to + tragic and majestic issues, to Europe gripping a gigantic evil in a death + struggle, that would seem an inscription worthy of a pigsty. A child in + Europe would know now that the context is, “until the bacon-buyer calls,” + and it is difficult to realise that adult citizens in America may be + incapable of realising that obvious context. + </p> + <p> + I set these things down plainly. There is a very strong disposition in all + the European countries to believe America fundamentally indifferent to the + rights and wrongs of the European struggle; sentimentally interested + perhaps, but fundamentally indifferent. President Wilson is regarded as a + mere academic sentimentalist by a great number of Europeans. There is a + very widespread disposition to treat America lightly and contemptuously, + to believe that America, as one man put it to me recently, “hasn't the + heart to do anything great or the guts to do anything wicked.” There is a + strong undercurrent of hostility therefore to the idea of America having + any voice whatever in the final settlement after the war. It is not for a + British writer to analyse the appearance that have thus affected American + world prestige. I am telling what I have observed. + </p> + <p> + Let me relate two trivial anecdotes. + </p> + <p> + X came to my hotel in Paris one day to take me to see a certain munitions + organisation. He took from his pocket a picture postcard that had been + sent him by a well-meaning American acquaintance from America. It bore a + portrait of General Lafayette, and under it was printed the words, + “General Lafayette, <i>Colonel in the United States army.</i>” + </p> + <p> + “Oh! These Americans!” said X with a gesture. + </p> + <p> + And as I returned to Paris from the French front, our train stopped at + some intermediate station alongside of another train of wounded men. + Exactly opposite our compartment was a car. It arrested our conversation. + It was, as it were, an ambulance <i>de grand luxe</i>; it was a thing of + very light, bright wood and very golden decorations; at one end of it was + painted very large and fair the Stars and Stripes, and at the other + fair-sized letters of gold proclaimed—I am sure the lady will not + resent this added gleam of publicity—“Presented by Mrs. William + Vanderbilt.” + </p> + <p> + My companions were French writers and French military men, and they were + discussing with very keen interest that persistent question, “the ideal + battery.” But that ambulance sent a shaft of light into our carriage, and + we stared together. + </p> + <p> + Then Colonel Z pointed with two fingers and remarked to us, without any + excess of admiration: + </p> + <p> + “<i>America!</i>” + </p> + <p> + Then he shrugged his shoulders and pulled down the corners of his mouth. + </p> + <p> + We felt there was nothing more to add to that, and after a little pause + the previous question was resumed. + </p> + <p> + I state these things in order to make it clear that America will start at + a disadvantage when she starts upon the mission of salvage and + reconciliation which is, I believe, her proper role in this world + conflict. One would have to be blind and deaf on this side to be ignorant + of European persuasion of America's triviality. I would not like to be an + American travelling in Europe now, and those I meet here and there have + some of the air of men who at any moment may be dunned for a debt. They + explode without provocation into excuses and expostulations. + </p> + <p> + And I will further confess that when Viscount Grey answered the + intimations of President Wilson and ex-President Taft of an American + initiative to found a World League for Peace, by asking if America was + prepared to back that idea with force, he spoke the doubts of all + thoughtful European men. No one but an American deeply versed in the + idiosyncrasies of the American population can answer that question, or + tell us how far the delusion of world isolation which has prevailed in + America for several generations has been dispelled. But if the answer to + Lord Grey is “Yes,” then I think history will emerge with a complete + justification of the obstinate maintenance of neutrality by America. It is + the end that reveals a motive. It is our ultimate act that sometimes + teaches us our original intention. No one can judge the United States yet. + Were you neutral because you are too mean and cowardly, or too stupidly + selfish, or because you had in view an end too great to be sacrificed to a + moment of indignant pride and a force in reserve too precious to dispel? + That is the still open question for America. + </p> + <p> + Every country is a mixture of many strands. There is a Base America, there + is a Dull America, there is an Ideal and Heroic America. And I am + convinced that at present Europe underrates and misjudges the + possibilities of the latter. + </p> + <p> + All about the world to-day goes a certain freemasonry of thought. It is an + impalpable and hardly conscious union of intention. It thinks not in terms + of national but human experience; it falls into directions and channels of + thinking that lead inevitably to the idea of a world-state under the rule + of one righteousness. In no part of the world is this modern type of mind + so abundantly developed, less impeded by antiquated and perverse political + and religious forms, and nearer the sources of political and + administrative power, than in America. It does not seem to matter what + thousand other things America may happen to be, seeing that it is also + that. And so, just as I cling to the belief, in spite of hundreds of + adverse phenomena, that the religious and social stir of these times must + ultimately go far to unify mankind under the kingship of God, so do I + cling also to the persuasion that there are intellectual forces among the + rational elements in the belligerent centres, among the other neutrals and + in America, that will co-operate in enabling the United States to play + that role of the Unimpassioned Third Party, which becomes more and more + necessary to a generally satisfactory ending of the war. + </p> + <p> + 4 + </p> + <p> + The idea that the settlement of this war must be what one might call an + unimpassioned settlement or, if you will, a scientific settlement or a + judicial and not a treaty settlement, a settlement, that is, based upon + some conception of what is right and necessary rather than upon the + relative success or failure of either set of belligerents to make its Will + the standard of decision, is one that, in a great variety of forms and + partial developments, I find gaining ground in the most different circles. + The war was an adventure, it was the German adventure under the + Hohenzollern tradition, to dominate the world. It was to be the last of + the Conquests. It has failed. Without calling upon the reserve strength of + America the civilised world has defeated it, and the war continues now + partly upon the issue whether it shall be made for ever impossible, and + partly because Germany has no organ but its Hohenzollern organisation + through which it can admit its failure and develop its latent readiness + for a new understanding on lines of mutual toleration. For that purpose + nothing more reluctant could be devised than Hohenzollern imperialism. But + the attention of every new combatant—it is not only Germany now—has + been concentrated upon military necessities; every nation is a clenched + nation, with its powers of action centred in its own administration, bound + by many strategic threats and declarations, and dominated by the idea of + getting and securing advantages. It is inevitable that a settlement made + in a conference of belligerents alone will be shortsighted, harsh, limited + by merely incidental necessities, and obsessed by the idea of hostilities + and rivalries continuing perennially; it will be a trading of advantages + for subsequent attacks. It will be a settlement altogether different in + effect as well as in spirit from a world settlement made primarily to + establish a new phase in the history of mankind. + </p> + <p> + Let me take three instances of the impossibility of complete victory <i>on + either side</i> giving a solution satisfactory to the conscience and + intelligence of reasonable men. + </p> + <p> + The first—on which I will not expatiate, for everyone knows of its + peculiar difficulty—is Poland. + </p> + <p> + The second is a little one, but one that has taken hold of my imagination. + In the settlement of boundaries preceding this war the boundary between + Serbia and north-eastern Albania was drawn with an extraordinary disregard + of the elementary needs of the Albanians of that region. It ran along the + foot of the mountains which form their summer pastures and their refuge + from attack, and it cut their mountains off from their winter pastures and + market towns. Their whole economic life was cut to pieces and existence + rendered intolerable for them. Now an intelligent Third Party settling + Europe would certainly restore these market towns, Ipek, Jakova, and + Prisrend, to Albania. But the Albanians have no standing in this war; + theirs is the happy lot that might have fallen to Belgium had she not + resisted; the war goes to and fro through Albania; and when the settlement + comes, it is highly improbable that the slightest notice will be taken of + Albania's plight in the region. In which case these particular Albanians + will either be driven into exile to America or they will be goaded to + revolt, which will be followed no doubt by the punitive procedure usual in + the Balkan peninsula. + </p> + <p> + For my third instance I would step from a matter as small as three market + towns and the grazing of a few thousand head of sheep to a matter as big + as the world. What is going to happen to the shipping of the world after + this war? The Germans, with that combination of cunning and stupidity + which baffles the rest of mankind, have set themselves to destroy the + mercantile marine not merely of Britain and France but of Norway and + Sweden, Holland, and all the neutral countries. The German papers openly + boast that they are building up a big mercantile marine that will start + out to take up the world's overseas trade directly peace is declared. + Every such boast receives careful attention in the British press. We have + heard a very great deal about the German will-to-power in this war, but + there is something very much older and tougher and less blatant and + conspicuous, the British will. In the British papers there has appeared + and gained a permanent footing this phrase, “ton for ton.” This means that + Britain will go on fighting until she has exacted and taken over from + Germany the exact equivalent of all the British shipping Germany has + submarined. People do not realise that a time may come when Germany will + be glad and eager to give Russia, France and Italy all that they require + of her, when Great Britain may be quite content to let her allies make an + advantageous peace and herself still go on fighting Germany. She does not + intend to let that furtively created German mercantile marine ship or coal + or exist upon the high seas—so long as it can be used as an economic + weapon against her. Neither Britain nor France nor Italy can tolerate + anything of the sort. + </p> + <p> + It has been the peculiar boast of Great Britain that her shipping has been + unpatriotic. She has been the impartial carrier of the whole world. Her + shippers may have served their own profit; they have never served hers. + The fluctuations of freight charges may have been a universal nuisance, + but they have certainly not been an aggressive national conspiracy. It is + Britain's case against any German ascendancy at sea, an entirely + convincing case, that such an ascendancy would be used ruthlessly for the + advancement of German world power. The long-standing freedom of the seas + vanishes at the German touch. So beyond the present war there opens the + agreeable prospect of a mercantile struggle, a bitter freight war and a + war of Navigation Acts for the ultimate control in the interests of + Germany or of the Anti-German allies, of the world's trade. + </p> + <p> + Now how in any of these three cases can the bargaining and trickery of + diplomatists and the advantage-hunting of the belligerents produce any + stable and generally beneficial solution? What all the neutrals want, what + every rational and far-sighted man in the belligerent countries wants, + what the common sense of the whole world demands, is neither the + “ascendancy” of Germany nor the “ascendancy” of Great Britain nor the + “ascendancy” of any state or people or interest in the shipping of the + world. The plain right thing is a world shipping control, as impartial as + the Postal Union. What right and reason and the welfare of coming + generations demand in Poland is a unified and autonomous Poland, with + Cracow, Danzig, and Posen brought into the same Polish-speaking ring-fence + with Warsaw. What everyone who has looked into the Albanian question + desires is that the Albanians shall pasture their flocks and market their + sheepskins in peace, free of Serbian control. In every country at present + at war, the desire of the majority of people is for a non-contentious + solution that will neither crystallise a triumph nor propitiate an enemy, + but which will embody the economic and ethnological and geographical + common sense of the matter. But while the formulae of national + belligerence are easy, familiar, blatant, and instantly present, the + gentler, greater formulae of that wider and newer world pacifism has still + to be generally understood. It is so much easier to hate and suspect than + negotiate generously and patiently; it is so much harder to think than to + let go in a shrill storm of hostility. The rational pacifist is hampered + not only by belligerency, but by a sort of malignant extreme pacifism as + impatient and silly as the extremest patriotism. + </p> + <p> + 5 + </p> + <p> + I sketch out these ideas of a world pacification from a third-party + standpoint, because I find them crystallising out in men's minds. I note + how men discuss the suggestion that America may play a large part in such + a permanent world pacification. There I end my account rendered. These + things are as much a part of my impression of the war as a shell-burst on + the Carso or the yellow trenches at Martinpuich. But I do not know how + opinion is going in America, and I am quite unable to estimate the power + of these new ideas I set down, relative to the blind forces of instinct + and tradition that move the mass of mankind. On the whole I believe more + in the reason-guided will-power of men than I did in the early half of + 1914. If I am doubtful whether after all this war will “end war,” I think + on the other hand it has had such an effect of demonstration that it may + start a process of thought and conviction, it may sow the world with + organisations and educational movements considerable enough to grapple + with an either arrest or prevent the next great war catastrophe. I am by + no means sure even now that this is not the last great war in the + experience of men. I still believe it may be. + </p> + <p> + The most dangerous thing in the business so far is concerned is the wide + disregard of the fact that national economic fighting is bound to cause + war, and the almost universal ignorance of the necessity of subjecting + shipping and overseas and international trade to some kind of + international control. These two things, restraint of trade and advantage + of shipping, are the chief material causes of anger between modern states. + But they would not be in themselves dangerous things if it were not for + the exaggerated delusions of kind and difference, and the crack-brained + “loyalties” arising out of these, that seem still to rule men's minds. + Years ago I came to the conviction that much of the evil in human life was + due to the inherent vicious disposition of the human mind to intensify + classification.[*See my “First and Last Things,” Book I. and my “Modern + Utopia,” Chapter X.] I do not know how it will strike the reader, but to + me this war, this slaughter of eight or nine million people, is due almost + entirely to this little, almost universal lack of clear-headedness; I + believe that the share of wickedness in making war is quite secondary to + the share of this universal shallow silliness of outlook. These effigies + of emperors and kings and statesmen that lead men into war, these legends + of nationality and glory, would collapse before our universal derision, if + they were not stuffed tight and full with the unthinking folly of the + common man. + </p> + <p> + There is in all of us an indolent capacity for suffering evil and + dangerous things, that I contemplate each year of my life with a deepening + incredulity. I perceive we suffer them; I record the futile protests of + the intelligence. It seems to me incredible that men should not rise up + out of this muddy, bloody, wasteful mess of a world war, with a resolution + to end for ever the shams, the prejudices, the pretences and habits that + have impoverished their lives, slaughtered our sons, and wasted the world, + a resolution so powerful and sustained that nothing could withstand it. + </p> + <p> + But it is not apparent that any such will arises. Does it appear at all? I + find it hard to answer that question because my own answer varies with my + mood. There are moods when it seems to me that nothing of the sort is + happening. This war has written its warning in letters of blood and flame + and anguish in the skies of mankind for two years and a half. When I look + for the collective response to that warning, I see a multitude of little + chaps crawling about their private ends like mites in an old cheese. The + kings are still in their places, not a royal prince has been killed in + this otherwise universal slaughter; when the fatuous portraits of the + monarchs flash upon the screen the widows and orphans still break into + loyal song. The ten thousand religions of mankind are still ten thousand + religions, all busy at keeping men apart and hostile. I see scarcely a + measurable step made anywhere towards that world kingdom of God, which is, + I assert, the manifest solution, the only formula that can bring peace to + all mankind. Mankind as a whole seems to have learnt nothing and forgotten + nothing in thirty months of war. + </p> + <p> + And then on the other hand I am aware of much quiet talking. This book + tells of how I set out to see the war, and it is largely conversation.... + Perhaps men have always expected miracles to happen; if one had always + lived in the night and only heard tell of the day, I suppose one would + have expected dawn to come as a vivid flash of light. I suppose one would + still think it was night long after the things about one had crept out of + the darkness into visibility. In comparison with all previous wars there + has been much more thinking and much more discussion. If most of the talk + seems to be futile, if it seems as if everyone were talking and nobody + doing, it does not follow that things are not quietly slipping and sliding + out of their old adjustments amidst the babble and because of the babble. + Multitudes of men must be struggling with new ideas. It is reasonable to + argue that there must be reconsideration, there must be time, before these + millions of mental efforts can develop into a new collective purpose and + really <i>show</i>—in consequences. + </p> + <p> + But that they will do so is my hope always and, on the whole, except in + moods of depression and impatience, my belief. When one has travelled to a + conviction so great as mine it is difficult to doubt that other men faced + by the same universal facts will not come to the same conclusion. I + believe that only through a complete simplification o religion to its + fundamental idea, to a world-wide realisation of God as the king of the + heart and of all mankind, setting aside monarchy and national egotism + altogether, can mankind come to any certain happiness and security. The + precedent of Islam helps my faith in the creative inspiration of such a + renascence of religion. The Sikh, the Moslem, the Puritan have shown that + men can fight better for a Divine Idea than for any flag or monarch in the + world. It seems to me that illusions fade and effigies lose credit + everywhere. It is a very wonderful thing to me that China is now a + republic.... I take myself to be very nearly an average man, abnormal only + by reason of a certain mental rapidity. I conceive myself to be thinking + as the world thinks, and if I find no great facts, I find a hundred little + indications to reassure me that God comes. Even those who have neither the + imagination nor the faith to apprehend God as a reality will, I think, + realise presently that the Kingdom of God over a world-wide system of + republican states, is the only possible formula under which we may hope to + unify and save mankind. + </p> + <p> + <br /> <br /> + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of War and the Future, by H. G. 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Wells + +Release Date: March 21, 2006 [EBook #1804] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK WAR AND THE FUTURE *** + + + + +Produced by Morgan L. Owens and David Widger + + + + + +WAR AND THE FUTURE + +Italy, France and Britain at War + + +by H. G. Wells + + + + +Contents + + The Passing of the Effigy + + The War in Italy (August, 1916) + I. The Isonzo Front + II. The Mountain War + III. Behind the Front + + The Western War (September, 1916) + I. Ruins + II. The Grades of War + III. The War Landscape + IV. New Arms for Old Ones + V. Tanks + + How People Think About the War + I. Do they Really Think at all? + II. The Yielding Pacifist and the Conscientious Objector + III. The Religious Revival + IV. The Riddle of the British + V. The Social Changes in Progress + VI. The Ending of the War + + + + +THE PASSING OF THE EFFIGY + + +1 + +One of the minor peculiarities of this unprecedented war is the Tour of +the Front. After some months of suppressed information--in which even +the war correspondent was discouraged to the point of elimination--it +was discovered on both sides that this was a struggle in which Opinion +was playing a larger and more important part than it had ever done +before. This wild spreading weed was perhaps of decisive importance; +the Germans at any rate were attempting to make it a cultivated flower. +There was Opinion flowering away at home, feeding rankly on rumour; +Opinion in neutral countries; Opinion getting into great tangles +of misunderstanding and incorrect valuation between the Allies. The +confidence and courage of the enemy; the amiability and assistance of +the neutral; the zeal, sacrifice, and serenity of the home population; +all were affected. The German cultivation of opinion began long +before the war; it is still the most systematic and, because of the +psychological ineptitude of the Germans, it is probably the clumsiest. +The French _Maison de la Presse_ is certainly the best organisation in +existence for making things clear, counteracting hostile suggestion, the +British official organisations are comparatively ineffective; but what +is lacking officially is very largely made up for by the good will +and generous efforts of the English and American press. An interesting +monograph might be written upon these various attempts of the +belligerents to get themselves and their proceedings explained. + +Because there is perceptible in these developments, quite over and +above the desire to influence opinion, a very real effort to get things +explained. It is the most interesting and curious--one might almost +write touching--feature of these organisations that they do not +constitute a positive and defined propaganda such as the Germans +maintain. The German propaganda is simple, because its ends are simple; +assertions of the moral elevation and loveliness of Germany; of the +insuperable excellences of German Kultur, the Kaiser, and Crown Prince, +and so forth; abuse of the "treacherous" English who allied themselves +with the "degenerate" French and the "barbaric" Russians; nonsense about +"the freedom of the seas"--the emptiest phrase in history--childish +attempts to sow suspicion between the Allies, and still more childish +attempts to induce neutrals and simple-minded pacifists of allied +nationality to save the face of Germany by initiating peace +negotiations. But apart from their steady record and reminder of German +brutalities and German aggression, the press organisations of the Allies +have none of this definiteness in their task. The aim of the national +intelligence in each of the allied countries is not to exalt one's own +nation and confuse and divide the enemy, but to get a real understanding +with the peoples and spirits of a number of different nations, an +understanding that will increase and become a fruitful and permanent +understanding between the allied peoples. Neither the English, the +Russians, the Italians, nor the French, to name only the bigger European +allies, are concerned in setting up a legend, as the Germans are +concerned in setting up a legend of themselves to impose upon mankind. +They are reality dealers in this war, and the Germans are effigy +mongers. Practically the Allies are saying each to one another, "Pray +come to me and see for yourself that I am very much the human stuff that +you are. Come and see that I am doing my best--and I think that is +not so very bad a best...." And with that is something else still more +subtle, something rather in the form of, "And please tell me what you +think of me--and all this." + +So we have this curious byplay of the war, and one day I find Mr. +Nabokoff, the editor of the _Retch_, and Count Alexy Tolstoy, that +writer of delicate short stories, and Mr. Chukovsky, the subtle critic, +calling in upon me after braving the wintry seas to see the British +fleet; M. Joseph Reinach follows them presently upon the same errand; +and then appear photographs of Mr. Arnold Bennett wading in the trenches +of Flanders, Mr. Noyes becomes discreetly indiscreet about what he has +seen among the submarines, and Mr. Hugh Walpole catches things from Mr. +Stephen Graham in the Dark Forest of Russia. All this is quite over and +above such writing of facts at first hand as Mr. Patrick McGill and a +dozen other real experiencing soldiers--not to mention the soldiers' +letters Mr. James Milne has collected, or the unforgettable and +immortal _Prisoner of War_ of Mr. Arthur Green--or such admirable war +correspondents' work as Mr. Philip Gibbs or Mr. Washburne has done. Some +of us writers--I can answer for one--have made our Tour of the Fronts +with a very understandable diffidence. For my own part I did not want +to go. I evaded a suggestion that I should go in 1915. I travel badly, +I speak French and Italian with incredible atrocity, and am an extreme +Pacifist. I hate soldiering. And also I did not want to write anything +"under instruction". It is largely owing to a certain stiffness in the +composition of General Delme-Radcliffe is resolved that Italy shall not +feel neglected by the refusal of the invitation from the Comando +Supremo by anyone who from the perspective of Italy may seem to be a +representative of British opinion. If Herbert Spencer had been +alive General Radcliffe would have certainly made him come, +travelling-hammock, ear clips and all--and I am not above confessing +that I wish that Herbert Spencer was alive--for this purpose. I found +Udine warm and gay with memories of Mr. Belloc, Lord Northcliffe, Mr. +Sidney Low, Colonel Repington and Dr. Conan Doyle, and anticipating the +arrival of Mr. Harold Cox. So we pass, mostly in automobiles that bump +tremendously over war roads, a cloud of witnesses each testifying after +his manner. Whatever else has happened, we have all been photographed +with invincible patience and resolution under the direction of Colonel +Barberich in a sunny little court in Udine. + +My own manner of testifying must be to tell what I have seen and what +I have thought during this extraordinary experience. It has been my +natural disposition to see this war as something purposeful and epic, +as it is great, as an epoch, as "the War that will end War"--but of +that last, more anon. I do not think I am alone in this inclination to a +dramatic and logical interpretation. The caricatures in the French shops +show civilisation (and particularly Marianne) in conflict with a huge +and hugely wicked Hindenburg Ogre. Well, I come back from this tour with +something not so simple as that. If I were to be tied down to one word +for my impression of this war, I should say that this war is _Queer._ It +is not like anything in a really waking world, but like something in a +dream. It hasn't exactly that clearness of light against darkness or +of good against ill. But it has the quality of wholesome instinct +struggling under a nightmare. The world is not really awake. This vague +appeal for explanations to all sorts of people, this desire to exhibit +the business, to get something in the way of elucidation at present +missing, is extraordinarily suggestive of the efforts of the mind to +wake up that will sometimes occur at a deep crisis. My memory of this +tour I have just made is full of puzzled-looking men. I have seen +thousands of _poilus_ sitting about in cafes, by the roadside, in +tents, in trenches, thoughtful. I have seen Alpini sitting restfully and +staring with speculative eyes across the mountain gulfs towards unseen +and unaccountable enemies. I have seen trainloads of wounded staring +out of the ambulance train windows as we passed. I have seen these dim +intimations of questioning reflection in the strangest juxtapositions; +in Malagasy soldiers resting for a spell among the big shells they were +hoisting into trucks for the front, in a couple of khaki-clad Maoris +sitting upon the step of a horse-van in Amiens station. It is always the +same expression one catches, rather weary, rather sullen, inturned. The +shoulders droop. The very outline is a note of interrogation. They look +up as the privileged tourist of the front, in the big automobile or +the reserved compartment, with his officer or so in charge, +passes--importantly. One meets a pair of eyes that seems to say: +"Perhaps _you_ understand.... + +"In which case---...?" + +It is a part, I think, of this disposition to investigate what makes +everyone collect "specimens" of the war. Everywhere the souvenir forces +itself upon the attention. The homecoming permissionaire brings with +him invariably a considerable weight of broken objects, bits of shell, +cartridge clips, helmets; it is a peripatetic museum. It is as if he +hoped for a clue. It is almost impossible, I have found, to escape these +pieces in evidence. I am the least collecting of men, but I have brought +home Italian cartridges, Austrian cartridges, the fuse of an Austrian +shell, a broken Italian bayonet, and a note that is worth half a franc +within the confines of Amiens. But a large heavy piece of exploded shell +that had been thrust very urgently upon my attention upon the Carso I +contrived to lose during the temporary confusion of our party by the +arrival and explosion of another prospective souvenir in our close +proximity. And two really very large and almost complete specimens of +some species of _Ammonites_ unknown to me, from the hills to the east +of the Adige, partially wrapped in a back number of the _Corriere +della Sera_, that were pressed upon me by a friendly officer, were +unfortunately lost on the line between Verona and Milan through the +gross negligence of a railway porter. But I doubt if they would have +thrown any very conclusive light upon the war. + + +2 + +I avow myself an extreme Pacifist. I am against the man who first takes +up the weapon. I carry my pacifism far beyond the ambiguous little group +of British and foreign sentimentalists who pretend so amusingly to be +socialists in the _Labour Leader_, whose conception of foreign policy is +to give Germany now a peace that would be no more than a breathing time +for a fresh outrage upon civilisation, and who would even make heroes of +the crazy young assassins of the Dublin crime. I do not understand those +people. I do not merely want to stop this war. I want to nail down war +in its coffin. Modern war is an intolerable thing. It is not a thing +to trifle with in this Urban District Council way, it is a thing to +end forever. I have always hated it, so far that is as my imagination +enabled me to realise it; and now that I have been seeing it, sometimes +quite closely for a full month, I hate it more than ever. I never +imagined a quarter of its waste, its boredom, its futility, its +desolation. It is merely a destructive and dispersive instead of a +constructive and accumulative industrialism. It is a gigantic, dusty, +muddy, weedy, bloodstained silliness. It is the plain duty of every man +to give his life and all that he has if by so doing he may help to end +it. I hate Germany, which has thrust this experience upon mankind, as +I hate some horrible infectious disease. The new war, the war on the +modern level, is her invention and her crime. I perceive that on our +side and in its broad outlines, this war is nothing more than a gigantic +and heroic effort in sanitary engineering; an effort to remove German +militarism from the life and regions it has invaded, and to bank it +in and discredit and enfeeble it so that never more will it repeat its +present preposterous and horrible efforts. All human affairs and all +great affairs have their reservations and their complications, but that +is the broad outline of the business as it has impressed itself on my +mind and as I find it conceived in the mind of the average man of the +reading class among the allied peoples, and as I find it understood in +the judgement of honest and intelligent neutral observers. + +It is my unshakeable belief that essentially the Allies fight for a +permanent world peace, that primarily they do not make war but resist +war, that has reconciled me to this not very congenial experience of +touring as a spectator all agog to see, through the war zones. At any +rate there was never any risk of my playing Balaam and blessing the +enemy. This war is tragedy and sacrifice for most of the world, for +the Germans it is simply the catastrophic outcome of fifty years of +elaborate intellectual foolery. Militarism, Welt Politik, and here we +are! What else _could_ have happened, with Michael and his infernal War +Machine in the very centre of Europe, but this tremendous disaster? + +It is a disaster. It may be a necessary disaster; it may teach a lesson +that could be learnt in no other way; but for all that, I insist, it +remains waste, disorder, disaster. + +There is a disposition, I know, in myself as well as in others, to +wriggle away from this verity, to find so much good in the collapse that +has come to the mad direction of Europe for the past half-century as to +make it on the whole almost a beneficial thing. But at most I can find +it in no greater good than the good of a nightmare that awakens the +sleeper in a dangerous place to a realisation of the extreme danger of +his sleep. Better had he been awake--or never there. In Venetia Captain +Pirelli, whose task it was to keep me out of mischief in the war zone, +was insistent upon the way in which all Venetia was being opened up +by the new military roads; there has been scarcely a new road made in +Venetia since Napoleon drove his straight, poplar-bordered highways +through the land. M. Joseph Reinach, who was my companion upon the +French front, was equally impressed by the stirring up and exchange of +ideas in the villages due to the movement of the war. Charles Lamb's +story of the discovery of roast pork comes into one's head with an +effect of repartee. More than ideas are exchanged in the war zone, +and it is doubtful how far the sanitary precautions of the military +authorities avails against a considerable propaganda of disease. A more +serious argument for the good of war is that it evokes heroic qualities +that it has brought out almost incredible quantities of courage, +devotion, and individual romance that did not show in the suffocating +peace time that preceded the war. The reckless and beautiful zeal of +the women in the British and French munition factories, for example, the +gaiety and fearlessness of the common soldiers everywhere; these things +have always been there--like champagne sleeping in bottles in a cellar. +But was there any need to throw a bomb into the cellar? + +I am reminded of a story, or rather of the idea for a story that I +think I must have read in that curious collection of fantasies and +observations, Hawthorne's _Note Book._ It was to be the story of a man +who found life dull and his circumstances altogether mediocre. He had +loved his wife, but now after all she seemed to be a very ordinary human +being. He had begun life with high hopes--and life was commonplace. He +was to grow fretful and restless. His discontent was to lead to some +action, some irrevocable action; but upon the nature of that action I do +not think the _Note Book_ was very clear. It was to carry him in such +a manner that he was to forget his wife. Then, when it was too late, +he was to see her at an upper window, stripped and firelit, a glorious +thing of light and loveliness and tragic intensity.... + +The elementary tales of the world are very few, and Hawthorne's story +and Lamb's story are, after all, only variations upon the same +theme. But can we poor human beings never realise our quality without +destruction? + + +3 + +One of the larger singularities of the great war is its failure to +produce great and imposing personalities, mighty leaders, Napoleons, +Caesars. I would indeed make that the essential thing in my reckoning +of the war. It is a drama without a hero; without countless incidental +heroes no doubt, but no star part. Even the Germans, with a national +predisposition for hero-cults and living still in an atmosphere of +Victorian humbug, can produce nothing better than that timber image, +Hindenburg. + +It is not that the war has failed to produce heroes so much as that +it has produced heroism in a torrent. The great man of this war is the +common man. It becomes ridiculous to pick out particular names. There +are too many true stories of splendid acts in the past two years ever to +be properly set down. The V.C.'s and the palms do but indicate samples. +One would need an encyclopaedia, a row of volumes, of the gloriousness +of human impulses. The acts of the small men in this war dwarf all the +pretensions of the Great Man. Imperatively these multitudinous heroes +forbid the setting up of effigies. When I was a young man I imitated +Swift and posed for cynicism; I will confess that now at fifty and +greatly helped by this war, I have fallen in love with mankind. + +But if I had to pick out a single figure to stand for the finest quality +of the Allies' war, I should I think choose the figure of General +Joffre. He is something new in history. He is leadership without vulgar +ambition. He is the extreme antithesis to the Imperial boomster of +Berlin. He is as it were the ordinary common sense of men, incarnate. He +is the antithesis of the effigy. + +By great good luck I was able to see him. I was delayed in Paris on my +way to Italy, and my friend Captain Millet arranged for a visit to the +French front at Soissons and put me in charge of Lieutenant de Tessin, +whom I had met in England studying British social questions long before +this war. Afterwards Lieutenant de Tessin took me to the great hotel--it +still proclaims "_Restaurant_" in big black letters on the garden +wall--which shelters the General Headquarters of France, and here I +was able to see and talk to Generals Pelle and Castelnau as well as to +General Joffre. They are three very remarkable and very different men. +They have at least one thing in common; it is clear that not one of +them has spent ten minutes in all his life in thinking of himself as +a Personage or Great Man. They all have the effect of being active and +able men doing an extremely complicated and difficult but extremely +interesting job to the very best of their ability. With me they had all +one quality in common. They thought I was interested in what they were +doing, and they were quite prepared to treat me as an intelligent man of +a different sort, and to show me as much as I could understand.... + +Let me confess that de Tessin had had to persuade me to go to +Headquarters. Partly that was because I didn't want to use up even +ten minutes of the time of the French commanders, but much more was it +because I have a dread of Personages. + +There is something about these encounters with personages--as if one was +dealing with an effigy, with something tremendous put up to be seen. +As one approaches they become remoter; great unsuspected crevasses are +discovered. Across these gulfs one makes ineffective gestures. They do +not meet you, they pose at you enormously. Sometimes there is something +more terrible than dignity; there is condescension. They are affable. I +had but recently had an encounter with an imported Colonial statesman, +who was being advertised like a soap as the coming saviour of England. +I was curious to meet him. I wanted to talk to him about all sorts of +things that would have been profoundly interesting, as for example his +impressions of the Anglican bishops. But I met a hoarding. I met a thing +like a mask, something surrounded by touts, that was dully trying--as we +say in London--to "come it" over me. He said he had heard of me. He +had read _Kipps._ I intimated that though I had written _Kipps_ I had +continued to exist--but he did not see the point of that. I said certain +things to him about the difference in complexity between political +life in Great Britain and the colonies, that he was manifestly totally +capable of understanding. But one could as soon have talked with one of +the statesmen at Madame Tussaud's. An antiquated figure. + +The effect of these French commanders upon me was quite different from +my encounter with that last belated adventurer in the effigy line. I +felt indeed that I was a rather idle and flimsy person coming into the +presence of a tremendously compact and busy person, but I had none of +that unpleasant sensation of a conventional role, of being expected to +play the minute worshipper in the presence of the Great Image. I was so +moved by the common humanity of them all that in each case I broke +away from the discreet interpretations of de Tessin and talked to them +directly in the strange dialect which I have inadvertently made for +myself out of French, a disemvowelled speech of epicene substantives and +verbs of incalculable moods and temperaments, "_Entente Cordiale._" The +talked back as if we had met in a club. General Pelle pulled my leg +very gaily with some quotations from an article I had written upon the +conclusion of the war. I think he found my accent and my idioms very +refreshing. I had committed myself to a statement that Bloch has been +justified in his theory that under modern conditions the defensive wins. +There were excellent reasons, and General Pelle pointed them out, for +doubting the applicability of this to the present war. + +Both he and General Castelnau were anxious that I should see a French +offensive sector as well as Soissons. Then I should understand. +And since then I have returned from Italy and I have seen and I do +understand. The Allied offensive was winning; that is to say, it was +inflicting far greater losses than it experienced; it was steadily +beating the spirit out of the German army and shoving it back towards +Germany. Only peace can, I believe, prevent the western war ending in +Germany. And it is the Frenchmen mainly who have worked out how to do +it. + +But of that I will write later. My present concern is with General +Joffre as the antithesis of the Effigy. The effigy, + + "Thou Prince of Peace, + Thou God of War," + +as Mr. Sylvester Viereck called him, prances on a great horse, wears a +Wagnerian cloak, sits on thrones and talks of shining armour and "unser +Gott." All Germany gloats over his Jovian domesticities; when I was +last in Berlin the postcard shops were full of photographs of a sort +of procession of himself and his sons, all with long straight noses and +sidelong eyes. It is all dreadfully old-fashioned. General Joffre +sits in a pleasant little sitting-room in a very ordinary little villa +conveniently close to Headquarters. He sits among furniture that has no +quality of pose at all, that is neither magnificent nor ostentatiously +simple and hardy. He has dark, rather sleepy eyes under light eyelashes, +eyes that glance shyly and a little askance at his interlocutor and +then, as he talks, away--as if he did not want to be preoccupied by your +attention. He has a broad, rather broadly modelled face, a soft voice, +the sort of persuasive reasoning voice that many Scotchmen have. I had +a feeling that if he were to talk English he would do so with a Scotch +accent. Perhaps somewhere I have met a Scotchman of his type. He sat +sideways to his table as a man might sit for a gossip in a cafe. + +He is physically a big man, and in my memory he grows bigger and bigger. +He sits now in my memory in a room like the rooms that any decent people +might occupy, like that vague room that is the background of so many +good portraits, a great blue-coated figure with a soft voice and rather +tired eyes, explaining very simply and clearly the difficulties that +this vulgar imperialism of Germany, seizing upon modern science and +modern appliances, has created for France and the spirit of mankind. + +He talked chiefly of the strangeness of this confounded war. It was +exactly like a sanitary engineer speaking of the unexpected difficulties +of some particularly nasty inundation. He made little stiff horizontal +gestures with his hands. First one had to build a dam and stop the rush +of it, so; then one had to organise the push that would send it back. He +explained the organisation of the push. They had got an organisation +now that was working out most satisfactorily. Had I seen a sector? I +had seen the sector of Soissons. Yes, but that was not now an offensive +sector. I must see an offensive sector; see the whole method. Lieutenant +de Tessin must see that that was arranged.... + +Neither he nor his two colleagues spoke of the Germans with either +hostility or humanity. Germany for them is manifestly merely an +objectionable Thing. It is not a nation, not a people, but a nuisance. +One has to build up this great counter-thrust bigger and stronger until +they go back. The war must end in Germany. The French generals have +no such delusions about German science or foresight or capacity as +dominates the smart dinner chatter of England. One knows so well that +detestable type of English folly, and its voice of despair: "They _plan_ +everything. They foresee everything." This paralysing Germanophobia is +not common among the French. The war, the French generals said, might +take--well, it certainly looked like taking longer than the winter. Next +summer perhaps. Probably, if nothing unforeseen occurred, before a full +year has passed the job might be done. Were any surprises in store? They +didn't seem to think it was probable that the Germans had any surprises +in store.... The Germans are not an inventive people; they are merely a +thorough people. One never knew for certain. + +Is any greater contrast possible than between so implacable, patient, +reasonable--and above all things _capable_--a being as General Joffre +and the rhetorician of Potsdam, with his talk of German Might, of Hammer +Blows and Hacking Through? Can there be any doubt of the ultimate issue +between them? + +There are stories that sound pleasantly true to me about General +Joffre's ambitions after the war. He is tired; then he will be very +tired. He will, he declares, spend his first free summer in making a +tour of the waterways of France in a barge. So I hope it may be. One +imagines him as sitting quietly on the crumpled remains of the last +and tawdriest of Imperial traditions, with a fishing line in the placid +water and a large buff umbrella overhead, the good ordinary man who does +whatever is given to him to do--as well as he can. The power that has +taken the great effigy of German imperialism by the throat is something +very composite and complex, but if we personify it at all it is +something more like General Joffre than any other single human figure I +can think of or imagine. + +If I were to set a frontispiece to a book about this War I would make +General Joffre the frontispiece. + + +4 + +As we swung back along the dusty road to Paris at a pace of fifty +miles an hour and upwards, driven by a helmeted driver with an aquiline +profile fit to go upon a coin, whose merits were a little flawed by a +childish and dangerous ambition to run over every cat he saw upon the +road, I talked to de Tessin about this big blue-coated figure of Joffre, +which is not so much a figure as a great generalisation of certain +hitherto rather obscured French qualities, and of the impression he had +made upon me. And from that I went on to talk about the Super Man, for +this encounter had suddenly crystallised out a set of realisations that +had been for some time latent in my mind. + +How much of what follows I said to de Tessin at the time I do not +clearly remember, but this is what I had in mind. + +The idea of the superman is an idea that has been developed by various +people ignorant of biology and unaccustomed to biological ways of +thinking. It is an obvious idea that follows in the course of half an +hour or so upon one's realisation of the significance of Darwinism. If +man has evolved from something different, he must now be evolving onward +into something sur-human. The species in the future will be different +from the species of the past. So far at least our Nietzsches and Shaws +and so on went right. + +But being ignorant of the elementary biological proposition that +modification of a species means really a secular change in its average, +they jumped to a conclusion--to which the late Lord Salisbury also +jumped years ago at a very memorable British Association meeting--that +a species is modified by the sudden appearance of eccentric individuals +here and there in the general mass who interbreed--preferentially. +Helped by a streak of antic egotism in themselves, they conceived of +the superman as a posturing personage, misunderstood by the vulgar, +fantastic, wonderful. But the antic Personage, the thing I have called +the Effigy, is not new but old, the oldest thing in history, the +departing thing. It depends not upon the advance of the species but upon +the uncritical hero-worship of the crowd. You may see the monster drawn +twenty times the size of common men upon the oldest monuments of Egypt +and Assyria. The true superman comes not as the tremendous personal +entry of a star, but in the less dramatic form of a general increase of +goodwill and skill and common sense. A species rises not by thrusting up +peaks but by the brimming up as a flood does. The coming of the superman +means not an epidemic of personages but the disappearance of the +Personage in the universal ascent. That is the point overlooked by the +megalomaniac school of Nietzsche and Shaw. + +And it is the peculiarity of this war, it is the most reassuring +evidence that a great increase in general ability and critical ability +has been going on throughout the last century, that no isolated +great personages have emerged. Never has there been so much ability, +invention, inspiration, leadership; but the very abundance of good +qualities has prevented our focusing upon those of any one individual. +We all play our part in the realisation of God's sanity in the world, +but, as the strange, dramatic end of Lord Kitchener has served to remind +us, there is no single individual of all the allied nations whose death +can materially affect the great destinies of this war. + +In the last few years I have developed a religious belief that has +become now to me as real as any commonplace fact. I think that mankind +is still as it were collectively dreaming and hardly more awakened to +reality than a very young child. It has these dreams that we express by +the flags of nationalities and by strange loyalties and by irrational +creeds and ceremonies, and its dreams at times become such nightmares as +this war. But the time draws near when mankind will awake and the dreams +will fade away, and then there will be no nationality in all the world +but humanity, and no kind, no emperor, nor leader but the one God of +mankind. This is my faith. I am as certain of this as I was in 1900 that +men would presently fly. To me it is as if it must be so. + +So that to me this extraordinary refusal of the allied nations under +conditions that have always hitherto produced a Great Man to produce +anything of the sort, anything that can be used as an effigy and carried +about for the crowd to follow, is a fact of extreme significance and +encouragement. It seems to me that the twilight of the half gods must +have come, that we have reached the end of the age when men needed a +Personal Figure about which they could rally. The Kaiser is perhaps +the last of that long series of crowned and cloaked and semi-divine +personages which has included Caesar and Alexander and Napoleon the +First--and Third. In the light of the new time we see the emperor-god +for the guy he is. In the August of 1914 he set himself up to be the +paramount Lord of the World, and it will seem to the historian to come, +who will know our dates so well and our feelings, our fatigues and +efforts so little, it will seem a short period from that day to this, +when the great figure already sways and staggers towards the bonfire. + + +5 + +I had the experience of meeting a contemporary king upon this journey. +He was the first king I had ever met. The Potsdam figure--with perhaps +some local exceptions behind the Gold Coast--is, with its collection of +uniforms and its pomps and splendours, the purest survival of the old +tradition of divine monarchy now that the Emperor at Pekin has followed +the Shogun into the shadows. The modern type of king shows a disposition +to intimate at the outset that he cannot help it, and to justify or at +any rate utilise his exceptional position by sound hard work. It is an +age of working kings, with the manners of private gentlemen. The King +of Italy for example is far more accessible than was the late Pierpont +Morgan or the late Cecil Rhodes, and he seems to keep a smaller court. + +I went to see him from Udine. He occupied a moderate-sized country villa +about half an hour by automobile from headquarters. I went over with +General Radcliffe; we drove through the gates of the villa past a single +sentinel in an ordinary infantry uniform, up to the door of the house, +and the number of guards, servants, attendants, officials, secretaries, +ministers and the like that I saw in that house were--I counted very +carefully--four. Downstairs were three people, a tall soldier of the +bodyguard in grey; an A.D.C., Captain Moreno, and Col. Matteoli, the +minister of the household. I went upstairs to a drawing-room of much +the same easy and generalised character as the one in which I had met +General Joffre a few days before. I gave my hat to a second bodyguard, +and as I did so a pleasantly smiling man appeared at the door of the +study whom I thought at first must be some minister in attendance. I did +not recognise him instantly because on the stamps and coins he is always +in profile. He began to talk in excellent English about my journey, +and I replied, and so talking we went into the study from which he had +emerged. Then I realised I was talking to the king. + +Addicted as I am to the cinematograph, in which the standard of study +furniture is particularly rich and high, I found something very cooling +and simple and refreshing in the sight of the king's study furniture. He +sat down with me at a little useful writing table, and after asking me +what I had seen in Italy and hearing what I had seen and what I was to +see, he went on talking, very good talk indeed. + +I suppose I did a little exceed the established tradition of courts +by asking several questions and trying to get him to talk upon certain +points as to which I was curious, but I perceived that he had had to +carry on at least so much of the regal tradition as to control the +conversation. He was, however, entirely un-posed. His talk reminded me +somehow of Maurice Baring's books; it had just the same quick, positive +understanding. And he had just the same detachment from the war as the +French generals. He spoke of it--as one might speak of an inundation. +And of its difficulties and perplexities. + +Here on the Adriatic side there were political entanglements that by +comparison made our western after-the-war problems plain sailing. He +talked of the game of spellicans among the Balkan nationalities. How was +that difficulty to be met? In Macedonia there were Turkish villages that +were Christian and Bulgarians that were Moslem. There were families that +changed the termination of their names from _ski_ to _off_ as Serbian or +Bulgarian prevailed. I remarked that that showed a certain passion for +peace, and that much of the mischief might be due to the propaganda +of the great Powers. I have a prejudice against that blessed Whig +"principle of nationality," but the King of Italy was not to be drawn +into any statement about that. He left the question with his admission +of its extreme complexity. + +He went on to talk of the strange contrasts of war, of such things as +the indifference of the birds to gunfire and desolation. One day on +the Carso he had been near the newly captured Austrian trenches, and +suddenly from amidst a scattered mass of Austrian bodies a quail had +risen that had struck him as odd, and so too had the sight of a pack of +cards and a wine flask on some newly-made graves. The ordinary life was +a very _obstinate_ thing.... + +He talked of the courage of modern men. He was astonished at the +quickness with which they came to disregard shrapnel. And they were +so quietly enduring when they were wounded. He had seen a lot of the +wounded, and he had expected much groaning and crying out. But unless +a man is hit in the head and goes mad he does not groan or scream! They +are just brave. If you ask them how they feel it is always one of two +things: either they say quietly that they are very bad or else they say +there is nothing the matter.... + +He spoke as if these were mere chance observations, but everyone tells +me that nearly every day the king is at the front and often under fire. +He has taken more risks in a week than the Potsdam War Lord has taken +since the war began. He keeps himself acutely informed upon every aspect +of the war. He was a little inclined to fatalism, he confessed. There +were two stories current of two families of four sons, in each three +had been killed and in each there was an attempt to put the fourth in a +place of comparative safety. In one case a general took the fourth +son in as an attendant and embarked upon a ship that was immediately +torpedoed; in the other the fourth son was killed by accident while he +was helping to carry dinner in a rest camp. From those stories we came +to the question whether the uneducated Italians were more superstitious +than the uneducated English; the king thought they were much less so. +That struck me as a novel idea. But then he thought that English rural +people believe in witches and fairies. + +I have given enough of this talk to show the quality of this king of the +new dispensation. It was, you see, the sort of easy talk one might hear +from fine-minded people anywhere. When we had done talking he came +to the door of the study with me and shook hands and went back to his +desk--with that gesture of return to work which is very familiar and +sympathetic to a writer, and with no gesture of regality at all. + +Just to complete this impression let me repeat a pleasant story about +this king and our Prince of Wales, who recently visited the Italian +front. The Prince is a source of anxiety on these visits; he has a very +strong and very creditable desire to share the ordinary risks of war. +He is keenly interested, and unobtrusively bent upon getting as near +the fighting as line as possible. But the King of Italy was firm upon +keeping him out of anything more than the most incidental danger. "We +don't want any historical incidents here," he said. I think that might +well become an historical phrase. For the life of the Effigy is a series +of historical incidents. + + +6 + +Manifestly one might continue to multiply portraits of fine people +working upon this great task of breaking and ending the German +aggression, the German legend, the German effigy, and the effigy +business generally; the thesis being that the Allies have no effigy. +One might fill a thick volume with pictures of men up the scale and down +working loyally and devotedly upon the war, to make this point clear +that the essential king and the essential loyalty of our side is the +commonsense of mankind. + +There comes into my head as a picture at the other extreme of this +series, a memory of certain trenches I visited on my last day in +France. They were trenches on an offensive front; they were not those +architectural triumphs, those homes from home, that grow to perfection +upon the less active sections of the great line. They had been first +made by men who had run rapidly forward with spade and rifle, stooping +as they ran, who had dropped into the craters of big shells, who had +organised these chiefly at night and dug the steep ditches sideways to +join up into continuous trenches. Now they were pushing forward saps +into No Man's Land, linking them across, and so continually creeping +nearer to the enemy and a practicable jumping-off place for an attack. +(It has been made since; the village at which I peeped was in our hands +a week later.) These trenches were dug into a sort of yellowish sandy +clay; the dug-outs were mere holes in the earth that fell in upon the +clumsy; hardly any timber had been got up the line; a storm might flood +them at any time a couple of feet deep and begin to wash the sides. +Overnight they had been "strafed" and there had been a number of +casualties; there were smashed rifles about and a smashed-up machine gun +emplacement, and the men were dog-tired and many of them sleeping like +logs, half buried in clay. Some slept on the firing steps. As one +went along one became aware ever and again of two or three pairs of +clay-yellow feet sticking out of a clay hole, and peering down one +saw the shapes of men like rudely modelled earthen images of soldiers, +motionless in the cave. + +I came round the corner upon a youngster with an intelligent face and +steady eyes sitting up on the firing step, awake and thinking. We looked +at one another. There are moments when mind leaps to mind. It is natural +for the man in the trenches suddenly confronted by so rare a beast as +a middle-aged civilian with an enquiring expression, to feel oneself +something of a spectacle and something generalised. It is natural for +the civilian to look rather in the vein of saying, "Well, how do you +take it?" As I pushed past him we nodded slightly with an effect of +mutual understanding. And we said with our nods just exactly what +General Joffre had said with his horizontal gestures of the hand and +what the King of Italy conveyed by his friendly manner; we said to each +other that here was the trouble those Germans had brought upon us and +here was the task that had to be done. + +Our guide to these trenches was a short, stocky young man, a cob; with +a rifle and a tight belt and projecting skirts and a helmet, a queer +little figure that, had you seen it in a picture a year or so before the +war, you would most certainly have pronounced Chinese. He belonged to a +Northumbrian battalion; it does not matter exactly which. As we returned +from this front line, trudging along the winding path through the barbed +wire tangles before the smashed and captured German trench that had been +taken a fortnight before, I fell behind my guardian captain and had +a brief conversation wit this individual. He was a lad in the early +twenties, weather-bit and with bloodshot eyes. He was, he told me, a +miner. I asked my stock question in such cases, whether he would go back +to the old work after the war. He said he would, and then added--with +the events of overnight on his mind: "If A'hm looky." + +Followed a little silence. Then I tried my second stock remark for such +cases. One does not talk to soldiers at the front in this war of Glory +or the "Empire on which the sun never sets" or "the meteor flag of +England" or of King and Country or any of those fine old headline +things. On the desolate path that winds about amidst the shell craters +and the fragments and the red-rusted wire, with the silken shiver of +passing shells in the air and the blue of the lower sky continually +breaking out into eddying white puffs, it is wonderful how tawdry such +panoplies of the effigy appear. We knew that we and our allies are upon +a greater, graver, more fundamental business than that sort of thing +now. We are very near the waking point. + +"Well," I said, "it's got to be done." + +"Aye," he said, easing the strap of his rifle a little; "it's got to be +done." + + + + +THE WAR IN ITALY (AUGUST, 1916) + + + + +I. THE ISONZO FRONT + + +1 + +My first impressions of the Italian war centre upon Udine. So far I had +had only a visit to Soissons on an exceptionally quiet day and the +sound of a Zeppelin one night in Essex for all my experience of actual +warfare. But my bedroom at the British mission in Udine roused perhaps +extravagant expectations. There were holes in the plaster ceiling and +wall, betraying splintered laths, holes, that had been caused by a bomb +that had burst and killed several people in the little square outside. +Such excitements seem to be things of the past now in Udine. Udine keeps +itself dark nowadays, and the Austrian sea-planes, which come raiding +the Italian coast country at night very much in the same aimless, +casually malignant way in which the Zeppelins raid England, apparently +because there is nothing else for them to do, find it easier to locate +Venice. + +My earlier rides in Venetia began always with the level roads of the +plain, roads frequently edged by watercourses, with plentiful willows +beside the road, vines and fields of Indian corn and suchlike lush +crops. Always quite soon one came to some old Austrian boundary posts; +almost everywhere the Italians are fighting upon what is technically +enemy territory, but nowhere does it seem a whit less Italian than +the plain of Lombardy. When at last I motored away from Udine to the +northern mountain front I passed through Campo-Formio and saw the +white-faced inn at which Napoleon dismembered the ancient republic +of Venice and bartered away this essential part of Italy into foreign +control. It just gravitates back now--as though there had been no +Napoleon. + +And upon the roads and beside them was the enormous equipment of a +modern army advancing. Everywhere I saw new roads being made, railways +pushed up, vast store dumps, hospitals; everywhere the villages swarmed +with grey soldiers; everywhere our automobile was threading its way +and taking astonishing risks among interminable processions of motor +lorries, strings of ambulances or of mule carts, waggons with timber, +waggons with wire, waggons with men's gear, waggons with casks, waggons +discreetly veiled, columns of infantry, cavalry, batteries _en route._ +Every waggon that goes up full comes back empty, and many wounded were +coming down and prisoners and troops returning to rest. Goritzia had +been taken a week or so before my arrival; the Isonzo had been crossed +and the Austrians driven back across the Carso for several miles; all +the resources of Italy seemed to be crowding up to make good these +gains and gather strength for the next thrust. The roads under all this +traffic remained wonderful; gangs of men were everywhere repairing the +first onset of wear, and Italy is the most fortunate land in the world +for road metal; her mountains are solid road metal, and in this Venetian +plain you need but to scrape through a yard of soil to find gravel. + +One travelled through a choking dust under the blue sky, and above the +steady incessant dusty succession of lorry, lorry, lorry, lorry that +passed one by, one saw, looking up, the tree tops, house roofs, or the +solid Venetian campanile of this or that wayside village. Once as we +were coming out of the great grey portals of that beautiful old relic of +a former school of fortification, Palmanova, the traffic became suddenly +bright yellow, and for a kilometre or so we were passing nothing but +Sicilian mule carts loaded with hay. These carts seem as strange among +the grey shapes of modern war transport as a Chinese mandarin in painted +silk would be. They are the most individual of things, all two-wheeled, +all bright yellow and the same size it is true, but upon each there are +they gayest of little paintings, such paintings as one sees in England +at times upon an ice-cream barrow. Sometimes the picture will present +a scriptural subject, sometimes a scene of opera, sometimes a dream +landscape or a trophy of fruits or flowers, and the harness--now much +out of repair--is studded with brass. Again and again I have passed +strings of these gay carts; all Sicily must be swept of them. + +Through the dust I came to Aquileia, which is now an old cathedral, +built upon the remains of a very early basilica, standing in a space in +a scattered village. But across this dusty space there was carried the +head of the upstart Maximinus who murdered Alexander Severus, and +later Aquileia brought Attila near to despair. Our party alighted; we +inspected a very old mosaic floor which has been uncovered since the +Austrian retreat. The Austrian priests have gone too, and their Italian +successors are already tracing out a score of Roman traces that it was +the Austrian custom to minimise. Captain Pirelli refreshed my historical +memories; it was rather like leaving a card on Gibbon _en route_ for +contemporary history. + +By devious routes I went on to certain batteries of big guns which had +played their part in hammering the Austrian left above Monfalcone across +an arm of the Adriatic, and which were now under orders to shift and +move up closer. The battery was the most unobtrusive of batteries; its +one desire seemed to be to appear a simple piece of woodland in the eye +of God and the aeroplane. I went about the network of railways and paths +under the trees that a modern battery requires, and came presently upon +a great gun that even at the first glance seemed a little less carefully +hidden than its fellows. Then I saw that it was a most ingenious dummy +made of a tree and logs and so forth. It was in the emplacement of a +real gun that had been located; it had its painted sandbags about it +just the same, and it felt itself so entirely a part of the battery that +whenever its companions fired t burnt a flash and kicked up a dust. It +was an excellent example of the great art of camouflage which this war +has developed. + +I went on through the wood to a shady observation post high in a tree, +into which I clambered with my guide. I was able from this position to +get a very good idea of the lie of the Italian eastern front. I was in +the delta of the Isonzo. Directly in front of me were some marshes +and the extreme tip of the Adriatic Sea, at the head of which was +Monfalcone, now in Italian hands. Behind Monfalcone ran the red ridge +of the Carso, of which the Italians had just captured the eastern half. +Behind this again rose the mountains to the east of the Isonzo which +the Austrians still held. The Isonzo came towards me from out of the +mountains, in a great westward curve. Fifteen or sixteen miles away +where it emerged from the mountains lay the pleasant and prosperous town +of Goritzia, and at the westward point of the great curve was Sagrado +with its broken bridge. The battle of Goritzia was really not fought at +Goritzia at all. What happened was the brilliant and bloody storming +of Mounts Podgora and Sabotino on the western side of the river above +Goritzia, and simultaneously a crossing at Sagrado below Goritzia and +a magnificent rush up the plateau and across the plateau of the Carso. +Goritzia itself was not organised for defence, and the Austrians were +so surprised by the rapid storm of the mountains to the north-west of it +and of the Carso to the south-east, that they made no fight in the town +itself. + +As a consequence when I visited it I found it very little +injured--compared, that is, with such other towns as have been fought +through. Here and there the front of a house has been knocked in by +an Austrian shell, or a lamp-post prostrated. But the road bridge had +suffered a good deal; its iron parapet was twisted about by shell bursts +and interwoven with young trees and big boughs designed to screen the +passer-by from the observation of the Austrian gunners upon Monte Santo. +Here and there were huge holes through which one could look down upon +the blue trickles of water in the stony river bed far below. The driver +of our automobile displayed what seemed to me an extreme confidence in +the margins of these gaps, but his confidence was justified. At Sagrado +the bridge had been much more completely demolished; no effort had been +made to restore the horizontal roadway, but one crossed by a sort of +timber switchback that followed the ups and downs of the ruins. + +It is not in these places that one must look for the real destruction +of modern war. The real fight on the left of Goritzia went through the +village of Lucinico up the hill of Podgora. Lucinico is nothing more +than a heap of grey stones; except for a bit of the church wall and the +gable end of a house one cannot even speak of it as ruins. But in one +place among the rubble I saw the splintered top and a leg of a grand +piano. Podgora hill, which was no doubt once neatly terraced and +cultivated, is like a scrap of landscape from some airless, treeless +planet. Still more desolate was the scene upon the Carso to the right +(south) of Goritzia. Both San Martino and Doberdo are destroyed beyond +the limits of ruination. The Carso itself is a waterless upland with but +a few bushy trees; it must always have been a desolate region, but now +it is an indescribable wilderness of shell craters, smashed-up Austrian +trenches, splintered timber, old iron, rags, and that rusty thorny +vileness of man's invention, worse than all the thorns and thickets of +nature, barbed wire. There are no dead visible; the wounded have been +cleared away; but about the trenches and particularly near some of the +dug-outs there was a faint repulsive smell.... + +Yet into this wilderness the Italians are now thrusting a sort of order. +The German is a wonderful worker, they say on the Anglo-French front +that he makes his trenches by way of resting, but I doubt if he can +touch the Italian at certain forms of toil. All the way up to San +Martino and beyond, swarms of workmen were making one of those carefully +graded roads that the Italians make better than any other people. Other +swarms were laying water-pipes. For upon the Carso there are neither +roads nor water, and before the Italians can thrust farther both must be +brought up to the front. + +As we approached San Martino an Austrian aeroplane made its presence +felt overhead by dropping a bomb among the tents of some workmen, in a +little scrubby wood on the hillside near at hand. One heard the report +and turned to see the fragments flying and the dust. Probably they got +someone. And then, after a little pause, the encampment began to spew +out men; here, there and everywhere they appeared among the tents, +running like rabbits at evening-time, down the hill. Soon after and +probably in connection with this signal, Austrian shells began to come +over. They do not use shrapnel because the rocky soil of Italy makes +that unnecessary. They fire a sort of shell that goes bang and releases +a cloud of smoke overhead, and then drops a parcel of high explosive +that bursts on the ground. The ground leaps into red dust and smoke. But +these things are now to be seen on the cinema. Forthwith the men working +on the road about us begin to down tools and make for the shelter +trenches, a long procession going at a steady but resolute walk. Then +like a blow in the chest came the bang of a big Italian gun somewhere +close at hand.... + +Along about four thousand miles of the various fronts this sort of thing +was going on that morning.... + + +2 + +This Carso front is the practicable offensive front of Italy. From the +left wing on the Isonzo along the Alpine boundary round to the Swiss +boundary there is mountain warfare like nothing else in the world; it +is warfare that pushes the boundary backward, but it is mountain warfare +that will not, for so long a period that the war will be over first, +hold out any hopeful prospects of offensive movements on a large scale +against Austria or Germany. It is a short distance as the crow flies +from Rovereto to Munich, but not as the big gun travels. The Italians, +therefore, as their contribution to the common effort, are thrusting +rather eastwardly towards the line of the Julian Alps through Carinthia +and Carniola. From my observation post in the tree near Monfalcone I saw +Trieste away along the coast to my right. It looked scarcely as distant +as Folkestone from Dungeness. The Italian advanced line is indeed +scarcely ten miles from Trieste. But the Italians are not, I think, +going to Trieste just yet. That is not the real game now. They are +playing loyally with the Allies for the complete defeat of the Central +Powers, and that is to be achieved striking home into Austria. Meanwhile +there is no sense in knocking Trieste to pieces, or using Italians +instead of Austrian soldiers to garrison it. + + + + +II. THE MOUNTAIN WAR + + +1 + +The mountain warfare of Italy is extraordinarily unlike that upon any +other front. From the Isonzo to the Swiss frontier we are dealing with +high mountains, cut by deep valleys between which there is usually no +practicable lateral communication. Each advance must have the nature of +an unsupported shove along a narrow channel, until the whole mountain +system, that is, is won, and the attack can begin to deploy in front +of the passes. Geographically Austria has the advantage. She had the +gentler slope of the mountain chains while Italy has the steep side, +and the foresight of old treaties has given her deep bites into what is +naturally Italian territory; she is far nearer the Italian plain +than Italy is near any practicable fighting ground for large forces; +particularly is this the case in the region of the Adige valley and Lake +Garda. + +The legitimate war, so to speak, in this region is a mountaineering war. +The typical position is roughly as follows. The Austrians occupy valley +A which opens northward; the Italians occupy valley B which opens +southward. The fight is for the crest between A and B. The side that +wins that crest gains the power of looking down into, firing into and +outflanking the positions of the enemy valley. In most cases it is the +Italians now who are pressing, and if the reader will examine a map of +the front and compare it with the official reports he will soon realise +that almost everywhere the Italians are up to the head of the southward +valleys and working over the crests so as to press down upon the +Austrian valleys. But in the Trentino the Austrians are still well over +the crest on the southward slopes. When I was in Italy they still held +Rovereto. + +Now it cannot be said that under modern conditions mountains favour +either the offensive or the defensive. But they certainly make +operations far more deliberate than upon a level. An engineered road or +railway in an Alpine valley is the most vulnerable of things; its curves +and viaducts may be practically demolished by shell fire or swept by +shrapnel, although you hold the entire valley except for one vantage +point. All the mountains round about a valley must be won before that +valley is safe for the transport of an advance. But on the other hand a +surprise capture of some single mountain crest and the hoisting of one +gun into position there may block the retreat of guns and material +from a great series of positions. Mountain surfaces are extraordinarily +various and subtle. You may understand Picardy on a map, but mountain +warfare is three-dimensional. A struggle may go on for weeks or months +consisting of apparently separate and incidental skirmishes, and then +suddenly a whole valley organisation may crumble away in retreat +or disaster. Italy is gnawing into the Trentino day by day, and +particularly around by her right wing. At no time I shall be surprised +to see a sudden lunge forward on that front, and hear a tale of guns +and prisoners. This will not mean that she has made a sudden attack, but +that some system of Austrian positions has collapsed under her continual +pressure. + +Such briefly is the _idea_ of mountain struggle. Its realities, I +should imagine, are among the strangest and most picturesque in all this +tremendous world conflict. I know nothing of the war in the east, of +course, but there are things here that must be hard to beat. Happily +they will soon get justice done to them by an abler pen than mine. +I hear that Kipling is to follow me upon this ground; nothing can be +imagined more congenial to his extraordinary power of vivid rendering +than this struggle against cliffs, avalanches, frost and the Austrian. + +To go the Italian round needs, among other things, a good head. +Everywhere it has been necessary to make roads where hitherto there have +been only mule tracks or no tracks at all; the roads are often still in +the making, and the automobile of the war tourist skirts precipices and +takes hairpin bends upon tracks of loose metal not an inch too broad +for the operation, or it floats for a moment over the dizzy edge while +a train of mule transport blunders by. The unruly imagination of man's +heart (which is "only evil continually") speculates upon what would be +the consequences of one good bump from the wheel of a mule cart. Down +below, the trees that one sees through a wisp of cloud look far too +small and spiky and scattered to hold out much hope for a fallen man +of letters. And at the high positions they are too used to the +vertical life to understand the secret feelings of the visitor from +the horizontal. General Bompiani, whose writings are well known to all +English students of military matters, showed me the Gibraltar he is +making of a great mountain system east of the Adige. + +"Let me show you," he said, and flung himself on to the edge of the +precipice into exactly the position of a lady riding side-saddle. "You +will find it more comfortable to sit down." + +But anxious as I am abroad not to discredit my country by unseemly +exhibitions I felt unequal to such gymnastics without a proper rehearsal +at a lower level. I seated myself carefully at a yard (perhaps it was a +couple of yards) from the edge, advanced on my trousers without dignity +to the verge, and so with an effort thrust my legs over to dangle in the +crystalline air. + +"That," proceeded General Bompiani, pointing with a giddy flourish of +his riding whip, "is Monte Tomba." + +I swayed and half-extended my hand towards him. But he was still +there--sitting, so to speak, on the half of himself.... I was astonished +that he did not disappear abruptly during his exposition.... + + +2 + +The fighting man in the Dolomites has been perhaps the most wonderful +of all these separate campaigns. I went up by automobile as far as the +clambering new road goes up the flanks of Tofana No. 2; thence for a +time by mule along the flank of Tofana No. 1, and thence on foot to the +vestiges of the famous Castelletto. + +The aspect of these mountains is particularly grim and wicked; they are +worn old mountains, they tower overhead in enormous vertical cliffs +of sallow grey, with the square jointings and occasional clefts and +gullies, their summits are toothed and jagged; the path ascends and +passes round the side of the mountain upon loose screes, which descend +steeply to a lower wall of precipices. In the distance rise other harsh +and desolate-looking mountain masses, with shining occasional scars +of old snow. Far below is a bleak valley of stunted pine trees through +which passes the road of the Dolomites. + +As I ascended the upper track two bandages men were coming down on led +mules. It was mid-August, and they were suffering from frostbite. +Across the great gap between the summits a minute traveller with +some provisions was going up by wire to some post upon the crest. For +everywhere upon the icy pinnacles are observation posts directing the +fire of the big guns on the slopes below, or machine-gun stations, or +little garrisons that sit and wait through the bleak days. Often +they have no link with the world below but a precipitous climb or a +"teleferic" wire. Snow and frost may cut them off absolutely for weeks +from the rest of mankind. The sick and wounded must begin their journey +down to help and comfort in a giddy basket that swings down to the head +of the mule track below. + +Originally all these crests were in Austrian hands; they were stormed +by the Alpini under almost incredible conditions. For fifteen days, for +example, they fought their way up these screes on the flanks of Tofana +No. 2 to the ultimate crags, making perhaps a hundred metres of ascent +each day, hiding under rocks and in holes in the daylight and receiving +fresh provisions and ammunition and advancing by night. They were +subjected to rifle fire, machine-gun fire and bombs of a peculiar sort, +big iron balls of the size of a football filled with explosive that were +just flung down the steep. They dodged flares and star shells. At one +place they went up a chimney that would be far beyond the climbing +powers of any but a very active man. It must have been like storming the +skies. The dead and wounded rolled away often into inaccessible ravines. +Stray skeletons, rags of uniform, fragments of weapons, will add to the +climbing interest of these gaunt masses for many years to come. In this +manner it was that Tofana No. 2 was taken. + +Now the Italians are organising this prize, and I saw winding up far +above me on the steep grey slope a multitudinous string of little things +that looked like black ants, each carrying a small bright yellow egg. +They were mules bringing back balks of timber.... + +But one position held out invincibly; this was the Castelletto, a great +natural fortress of rock standing out at an angle of the mountain +in such a position that it commanded the Italian communications (the +Dolomite road) in the valley below, and rendered all their positions +uncomfortable and insecure. This obnoxious post was practically +inaccessible either from above or below, and it barred the Italians +even from looking into the Val Travenanzes which it defended. It was, in +fact, an impregnable position, and against it was pitted the invincible +5th Group of the Alpini. It was the old problem of the irresistible +force in conflict with the immovable object. And the outcome has been +the biggest military mine in all history. + +The business began in January, 1916, with surveys of the rock in +question. The work of surveying for excavations, never a very simple +one, becomes much more difficult when the site is occupied by hostile +persons with machine guns. In March, as the winter's snows abated, the +boring machinery began to arrive, by mule as far as possible and then by +hand. Altogether about half a kilometre of gallery had to be made to the +mine chamber, and meanwhile the explosive was coming up load by load and +resting first here, then there, in discreetly chosen positions. There +were at the last thirty-five tons of it in the inner chamber. And while +the boring machines bored and the work went on, Lieutenant Malvezzi was +carefully working out the problem of "il massimo effetto dirompimento" +and deciding exactly how to pack and explode his little hoard. On the +eleventh of July, at 3.30, as he rejoices to state in his official +report, "the mine responded perfectly both in respect of the +calculations made and of the practical effects," that is to say, the +Austrians were largely missing and the Italians were in possession of +the crater of the Castelletto and looking down the Val Travenanzes from +which they had been barred for so long. Within a month things had been +so tidied up, and secured by further excavations and sandbags against +hostile fire, that even a middle-aged English writer, extremely fagged +and hot and breathless, could enjoy the same privilege. All this, you +must understand, had gone on at a level to which the ordinary tourist +rarely climbs, in a rarefied, chest-tightening atmosphere, with wisps of +clouds floating in the clear air below and club-huts close at hand.... + +Among these mountains avalanches are frequent; and they come down +regardless of human strategy. In many cases the trenches cross avalanche +tracks; they and the men in them are periodically swept away and +periodically replaced. They are positions that must be held; if the +Italians will not face such sacrifices, the Austrians will. Avalanches +and frostbite have slain and disabled their thousands; they have +accounted perhaps for as many Italians in this austere and giddy +campaign as the Austrians.... + + +3 + +It seems to be part of the stern resolve of Fate that this, the greatest +of wars, shall be the least glorious; it is manifestly being decided +not by victories but by blunders. It is indeed a history of colossal +stupidities. Among the most decisive of these blunders, second only +perhaps of the blunder of the Verdun attack and far outshining the wild +raid of the British towards Bagdad, was the blunder of the Trentino +offensive. It does not need the equipment of a military expert, it +demands only quite ordinary knowledge and average intelligence, +to realise the folly of that Austrian adventure. There is some +justification for a claim that the decisive battle of the war was fought +upon the soil of Italy. There is still more justification for saying +that it might have been. + +There was only one good point about the Austrian thrust. No one could +have foretold it. And it did so completely surprise the Italians as to +catch them without any prepared line of positions in the rear. On the +very eve of the big Russian offensive, the Austrians thrust eighteen +divisions hard at the Trentino frontier. The Italian posts were then in +Austrian territory; they held on the left wing and the right, but they +were driven by the sheer weight of men and guns in the centre; they lost +guns and prisoners because of the difficulty of mountain retreats to +which I have alluded, and the Austrians pouring through reached not +indeed the plain of Venetia, but to the upland valleys immediately above +it, to Asiago and Arsiero. They probably saw the Venetian plain through +gaps in the hills, but they were still separated from it even at Arsiero +by what are mountains to an English eye, mountains as high as Snowdon. +But the Italians of such beautiful old places and Vicenza, Marostica, +and Bassano could watch the Austrian shells bursting on the last line of +hills above the plain, and I have no doubt they felt extremely uneasy. + +As one motors through these ripe and beautiful towns and through the +rich valleys that link them--it is a smiling land abounding in old +castles and villas, Vicenza is a rich museum of Palladio's architecture +and Bassano is full of irreplaceable painted buildings--one feels that +the things was a narrow escape, but from the military point of view it +was merely an insane escapade. The Austrians had behind them--and some +way behind them--one little strangulated railway and no good pass road; +their right was held at Pasubio, their left was similarly bent back. In +front of them was between twice and three times their number of first +class troops, with an unlimited equipment. If they had surmounted +that last mountain crest they would have come down to almost certain +destruction in the plain. They could never have got back. For a time +it was said that General Cadorna considered that possibility. From the +point of view of purely military considerations, the Trentino offensive +should perhaps have ended in the capitulation of Vicenza. + +I will confess I am glad it did not do so. This tour of the fronts has +made me very sad and weary with a succession of ruins. I can bear no +more ruins unless they are the ruins of Dusseldorf, Cologne, Berlin, +or suchlike modern German city. Anxious as I am to be a systematic +Philistine, to express my preference for Marinetti over the Florentine +British and generally to antagonise aesthetic prigs, I rejoiced over +that sunlit land as one might rejoice over a child saved from beasts. + +On the hills beyond Schio I walked out through the embrasure of a big +gun in a rock gallery, and saw the highest points upon the hillside +to which the Austrian infantry clambered in their futile last attacks. +Below me were the ruins of Arsiero and Velo d'Astico recovered, and +across the broad valley rose Monte Cimone with the Italian trenches +upon its crest and the Austrians a little below to the north. A very +considerable bombardment was going on and it reverberated finely. (It +is only among mountains that one hears anything that one can call the +thunder of guns. The heaviest bombardments I heard in France sounded +merely like Brock's benefit on a much large scale, and disappointed me +extremely.) As I sat and listened to the uproar and watched the shells +burst on Cimone and far away up the valley over Castelletto above +Pedescala, Captain Pirelli pointed out the position of the Austrian +frontier. I doubt if the English people realise that the utmost depth to +which this great Trentino offensive, which exhausted Austria, wasted the +flower of the Hungarian army and led directly to the Galician disasters +and the intervention of Rumania, penetrated into Italian territory was +about six miles. + + + + +III. BEHIND THE FRONT + + +1 + +I have a peculiar affection for Verona and certain things in Verona. +Italians must forgive us English this little streak of impertinent +proprietorship in the beautiful things of their abundant land. It is +quite open to them to revenge themselves by professing a tenderness for +Liverpool or Leeds. It was, for instance, with a peculiar and +personal indignation that I saw where an Austrian air bomb had killed +five-and-thirty people in the Piazza Erbe. Somehow in that jolly old +place, a place that have very much of the quality of a very pretty and +cheerful old woman, it seemed exceptionally an outrage. And I made a +special pilgrimage to see how it was with that monument of Can Grande, +the equestrian Scaliger with the sidelong grin, for whom I confess a +ridiculous admiration. Can Grande, I rejoice to say, has retired into a +case of brickwork, surmounted by a steep roof of thick iron plates; no +aeroplane exists to carry bombs enough to smash that covering; there he +will smile securely in the darkness until peace comes again. + +All over Venetia the Austrian seaplanes are making the same sort of +idiot raid on lighted places that the Zeppelins have been making over +England. These raids do no effective military work. What conceivable +military advantage can there be in dropping bombs into a marketing +crowd? It is a sort of anti-Teutonic propaganda by the Central Powers to +which they seem to have been incited by their own evil genius. It is +as if they could convince us that there is an essential malignity in +Germans, that until the German powers are stamped down into the mud +they will continue to do evil things. All of the Allies have borne the +thrusting and boasting of Germany with exemplary patience for half a +century; England gave her Heligoland and stood out of the way of her +colonial expansion, Italy was a happy hunting ground for her +business enterprise, France had come near resignation on the score of +Alsace-Lorraine. And then over and above the great outrage of the +war come these incessant mean-spirited atrocities. A great and simple +wickedness it is possible to forgive; the war itself, had it been +fought greatly by Austria and Germany, would have made no such deep and +enduring breach as these silly, futile assassinations have down between +the Austro-Germans and the rest of the civilised world. One great +misdeed is a thing understandable and forgivable; what grows upon the +consciousness of the world is the persuasion that here we fight not a +national sin but a national insanity; that we dare not leave the German +the power to attack other nations any more for ever.... + +Venice has suffered particularly from this ape-like impulse to hurt and +terrorise enemy non-combatants. Venice has indeed suffered from this war +far more than any other town in Italy. Her trade has largely ceased; +she has no visitors. I woke up on my way to Udine and found my train at +Venice with an hour to spare; after much examining and stamping of my +passport I was allowed outside the station wicket to get coffee in the +refreshment room and a glimpse of a very sad and silent Grand Canal. +There was nothing doing; a black despondent remnant of the old crowd +of gondolas browsed dreamily among against the quay to stare at me the +better. The empty palaces seemed to be sleeping in the morning sunshine +because it was not worth while to wake up.... + + +2 + +Except in the case of Venice, the war does not seem as yet to have made +nearly such a mark upon life in Italy as it has in England or provincial +France. People speak of Italy as a poor country, but that is from a +banker's point of view. In some respects she is the richest country on +earth, and in the matter of staying power I should think she is +better off than any other belligerent. She produces food in abundance +everywhere; her women are agricultural workers, so that the interruption +of food production by the war has been less serious in Italy than in any +other part of Europe. In peace time, she has constantly exported labour; +the Italian worker has been a seasonal emigrant to America, north and +south, to Switzerland, Germany and the south of France. The cessation of +this emigration has given her great reserves of man power, so that she +has carried on her admirable campaign with less interference with her +normal economic life than any other power. The first person I spoke to +upon the platform at Modane was a British officer engaged in forwarding +Italian potatoes to the British front in France. Afterwards, on my +return, when a little passport irregularity kept me for half a day in +Modane, I went for a walk with him along the winding pass road that goes +down into France. "You see hundreds and hundreds of new Fiat cars," he +remarked, "along here--going up to the French front." + +But there is a return trade. Near Paris I saw scores of thousands of +shells piled high to go to Italy.... + +I doubt if English people fully realise either the economic sturdiness +or the political courage of their Italian ally. Italy is not merely +fighting a first-class war in first-class fashion but she is doing +a big, dangerous, generous and far-sighted thing in fighting at all. +France and England were obliged to fight; the necessity was as plain as +daylight. The participation of Italy demanded a remoter wisdom. In the +long run she would have been swallowed up economically and politically +by Germany if she had not fought; but that was not a thing staring her +plainly in the face as the danger, insult and challenge stared France +and England in the face. What did stare her in the face was not merely a +considerable military and political risk, but the rupture of very close +financial and commercial ties. I found thoughtful men talking everywhere +I have been in Italy of two things, of the Jugo-Slav riddle and of the +question of post war finance. So far as the former matter goes, I think +the Italians are set upon the righteous solution of all such riddles, +they are possessed by an intelligent generosity. They are clearly set +upon deserving Jugo-Slav friendship; they understand the plain necessity +of open and friendly routes towards Roumania. It was an Italian who set +out to explain to me that Fiume must be at least a free port; it +would be wrong and foolish to cut the trade of Hungary off from the +Mediterranean. But the banking puzzle is a more intricate and puzzling +matter altogether than the possibility of trouble between Italian and +Jugo-Slav. + +I write of these things with the simplicity of an angel, but without an +angelic detachment. Here are questions into which one does not so much +rush as get reluctantly pushed. Currency and banking are dry distasteful +questions, but it is clear that they are too much in the hands of +mystery-mongers; it is as much the duty of anyone who talks and writes +of affairs, it is as much the duty of every sane adult, to bring his +possibly poor and unsuitable wits to bear upon these things, as it is +for him to vote or enlist or pay his taxes. Behind the simple ostensible +spectacle of Italy recovering the unredeemed Italy of the Trentino +and East Venetia, goes on another drama. Has Italy been sinking into +something rather hard to define called "economic slavery"? Is she or is +she not escaping from that magical servitude? Before this question has +been under discussion for a minute comes a name--for a time I was really +quite unable to decide whether it is the name of the villain in the +piece or of the maligned heroine, or a secret society or a gold mine, +or a pestilence or a delusion--the name of the _Banca Commerciale +Italiana._ + +Banking in a country undergoing so rapid and vigorous an economic +development as Italy is very different from the banking we simple +English know of at home. Banking in England, like land-owning, has +hitherto been a sort of hold up. There were always borrowers, there were +always tenants, and all that had to be done was to refuse, obstruct, +delay and worry the helpless borrower or would-be tenant until the +maximum of security and profit was obtained. I have never borrowed but +I have built, and I know something of the extreme hauteur of property of +England towards a man who wants to do anything with land, and with +money I gather the case is just the same. But in Italy, which already +possessed a sunny prosperity of its own upon mediaeval lines, the banker +has had to be suggestive and persuasive, sympathetic and helpful. These +are unaccustomed attitudes for British capital. The field has been far +more attractive to the German banker, who is less of a proudly impassive +usurer and more of a partner, who demands less than absolute security +because he investigates more industriously and intelligently. This great +bank, the Banca Commerciale Italiana, is a bank of the German type: to +begin with, it was certainly dominated by German directors; it was a +bank of stimulation, and its activities interweave now into the whole +fabric of Italian commercial life. But it has already liberated +itself from German influence, and the bulk of its capital is Italian. +Nevertheless I found discussion ranging about firstly what the Banca +Commerciale essentially _was_, secondly what it might _become_, thirdly +what it might _do_, and fourthly what, if anything, had to be done to +it. + +It is a novelty to an English mind to find banking thus mixed up with +politics, but it is not a novelty in Italy. All over Venetia there are +agricultural banks which are said to be "clerical." I grappled with this +mystery. "How are they clerical?" I asked Captain Pirelli. "Do they lend +money on bad security to clerical voters, and on no terms whatever +to anti-clericals?" He was quite of my way of thinking. "_Pecunia non +olet_," he said; "I have never yet smelt a clerical fifty lira note."... +But on the other hand Italy is very close to Germany; she wants easy +money for development, cheap coal, a market for various products. The +case against the Germans--this case in which the Banca Commerciale +Italiana appears, I am convinced unjustly, as a suspect--is that they +have turned this natural and proper interchange with Italy into the +acquisition of German power. That they have not been merely easy +traders, but patriotic agents. It is alleged that they used their +early "pull" in Italian banking to favour German enterprises and German +political influence against the development of native Italian business; +that their merchants are not bona-fide individuals, but members of +a nationalist conspiracy to gain economic controls. The German is a +patriotic monomaniac. He is not a man but a limb, the worshipper of a +national effigy, the digit of an insanely proud and greedy Germania, and +here are the natural consequences. + +The case of the individual Italian compactly is this: "We do not like +the Austrians and Germans. These Imperialisms look always over the Alps. +Whatever increases German influence here threatens Italian life. The +German is a German first and a human being afterwards.... But on the +other hand England seems commercially indifferent to us and France has +been economically hostile..." + +"After all," I said presently, after reflection, "in that matter of +_Pecunia non olet_; there used to be fusses about European loans in +China. And one of the favourite themes of British fiction and drama +before the war was the unfortunate position of the girl who accepted a +loan from the wicked man to pay her debts at bridge." + +"Italy," said Captain Pirelli, "isn't a girl. And she hasn't been +playing bridge." + +I incline on the whole to his point of view. Money is facile +cosmopolitan stuff. I think that any bank that settles down in Italy is +going to be slowly and steadily naturalised Italian, it will become more +and more Italian until it is wholly Italian. I would trust Italy to make +and keep the Banca Commerciale Italiana Italian. I believe the Italian +brain is a better brain than the German article. But still I heard +people talking of the implicated organisation as if it were engaged in +the most insidious duplicities. "Wait for only a year or so after the +war," said one English authority to me, "and the mask will be off and it +will be frankly a 'Deutsche Bank' once more." They assure me that +then German enterprises will be favoured again, Italian and Allied +enterprises blockaded and embarrassed, the good understanding of +Italians and English poisoned, entirely through this organisation.... + +The reasonable uncommercial man would like to reject all this last sort +of talk as "suspicion mania." So far as the Banca Commerciale Italiana +goes, I at least find that easy enough; I quote that instance simply +because it is a case where suspicion has been dispelled, but in +regard to a score of other business veins it is not so easy to dispel +suspicion. This war has been a shock to reasonable men the whole world +over. They have been forced to realise that after all a great number +of Germans have been engaged in a crack-brained conspiracy against the +non-German world; that in a great number of cases when one does business +with a German the business does not end with the individual German. We +hated to believe that a business could be tainted by German partners or +German associations. If now we err on the side of over-suspicion, it is +the German's little weakness for patriotic disingenuousness that is most +to blame.... + +But anyhow I do not think there is much good in a kind of witch-smelling +among Italian enterprises to find the hidden German. Certain things are +necessary for Italian prosperity and Italy must get them. The Italians +want intelligent and helpful capital. They want a helpful France. +They want bituminous coal for metallurgical purposes. They want cheap +shipping. The French too want metallurgical coal. It is more important +for civilisation, for the general goodwill of the Allies and for Great +Britain that these needs should be supplied than that individual British +money-owners or ship-owners should remain sluggishly rich by insisting +upon high security or high freights. The control of British coal-mining +and shipping is in the national interests--for international +interests--rather than for the creation of that particularly passive, +obstructive, and wasteful type of wealth, the wealth of the mere +profiteer, is as urgent a necessity for the commercial welfare of France +and Italy and the endurance of the Great Alliance as it is for the +well-being of the common man in Britain. + + +3 + +I left my military guide at Verona on Saturday afternoon and reached +Milan in time to dine outside Salvini's in the Galleria Vittorio +Emanuele, with an Italian fellow story-writer. The place was as full as +ever; we had to wait for a table. It is notable that there were still +great numbers of young men not in uniform in Milan and Turin and Vicenza +and Verona; there was no effect anywhere of a depletion of men. The +whole crowded place was smouldering with excitement. The diners +looked about them as they talked, some talked loudly and seemed to be +expressing sentiments. Newspaper vendors appeared at the intersection +of the arcades, uttering ambiguous cries, and did a brisk business of +flitting white sheets among the little tables. + +"To-night," said my companion, "I think we shall declare war upon +Germany. The decision is being made." + +I asked intelligently why this had not been done before. I forget the +precise explanation he gave. A young soldier in uniform, who had been +dining at an adjacent table and whom I had not recognised before as a +writer I had met some years previously in London, suddenly joined in our +conversation, with a slightly different explanation. I had been carrying +on a conversation in slightly ungainly French, but now I relapsed into +English. + +But indeed the matter of that declaration of war is as plain as +daylight; the Italian national consciousness has not at first that +direct sense of the German danger that exists in the minds of the three +northern Allies. To the Italian the traditional enemy is Austria, and +this war is not primarily a war for any other end than the emancipation +of Italy. Moreover we have to remember that for years there has been +serious commercial friction between France and Italy, and considerable +mutual elbowing in North Africa. Both Frenchmen and Italians are +resolute to remedy this now, but the restoration of really friendly +and trustful relations is not to be done in a day. It has been an +extraordinary misfortune for Great Britain that instead of boldly taking +over her shipping from its private owners and using it all, regardless +of their profit, in the interests of herself and her allies, her +government has permitted so much of it as military and naval needs have +not requisitioned to continue to ply for gain, which the government +itself has shared by a tax on war profits. The Anglophobe elements in +Italian public life have made the utmost of this folly or laxity in +relation more particularly to the consequent dearness of coal in Italy. +They have carried on an amazingly effective campaign in which this +British slackness with the individual profiteer, is represented as if +it were the deliberate greed of the British state. This certainly +contributed very much to fortify Italy's disinclination to slam the door +on the German connection. + +I did my best to make it clear to my two friends that so far from +England exploiting Italy, I myself suffered in exactly the same way +as any Italian, through the extraordinary liberties of our shipping +interest. "I pay as well as you do," I said; "the shippers' blockade of +Great Britain is more effective than the submarines'. My food, my coal, +my petrol are all restricted in the sacred name of private property. +You see, capital in England has hitherto been not an exploitation but +a hold-up. We are learning differently now.... And anyhow, Mr. Runciman +has been here and given Italy assurances...." + +In the train to Modane this old story recurred again. It is imperative +that English readers should understand clearly how thoroughly these +little matters have been _worked_ by the enemy. + +Some slight civilities led to a conversation that revealed the Italian +lady in the corner as an Irishwoman married to an Italian, and also +brought out the latent English of a very charming elderly lady opposite +to her. She had heard a speech, a wonderful speech from a railway train, +by "the Lord Runciman." He had said the most beautiful things about +Italy. + +I did my best to echo these beautiful things. + +Then the Irishwoman remarked that Mr. Runciman had not satisfied +everybody. She and her husband had met a minister--I found afterwards +he was one of the members of the late Giolotti government--who had been +talking very loudly and scornfully of the bargain Italy was making with +England. I assured her that the desire of England was simply to give +Italy all that she needed. + +"But," said the husband casually, "Mr. Runciman is a shipowner." + +I explained that he was nothing of the sort. It was true that he came +of a shipowning family--and perhaps inherited a slight tendency to +see things from a shipowning point of view--but in England we did not +suspect a man on such a score as that. + +"In Italy I think we should," said the husband of the Irish lady. + + +4 + +This incidental discussion is a necessary part of my impression of Italy +at war. The two western allies and Great Britain in particular have to +remember Italy's economic needs, and to prepare to rescue them from the +blind exploitation of private profit. They have to remember these needs +too, because, if they are left out of the picture, then it becomes +impossible to understand the full measure of the risk Italy has faced in +undertaking this war for an idea. With a Latin lucidity she has counted +every risk, and with a Latin idealism she has taken her place by the +side of those who fight for a liberal civilisation against a Byzantine +imperialism. + +As I came out of the brightly lit Galleria Vittorio Emanuele into the +darkened Piazza del Duomo I stopped under the arcade and stood looking +up at the shadowy darkness of that great pinnacled barn, that marble +bride-cake, which is, I suppose, the last southward fortress of the +Franco-English Gothic. + +"It was here," said my host, "that we burnt the German stuff." + +"What German stuff?" + +"Pianos and all sorts of things. From the shops. It is possible, +you know, to buy things too cheaply--and to give too much for the +cheapness." + + + + +THE WESTERN WAR (SEPTEMBER, 1916) + + + + +I. RUINS + + +1 + +If I had to present some particular scene as typical of the peculiar +vileness and mischief wrought by this modern warfare that Germany has +elaborated and thrust upon the world, I do not think I should choose as +my instance any of those great architectural wrecks that seem most to +impress contemporary writers. I have seen the injuries and ruins of the +cathedrals at Arras and Soissons and the wreckage of the great church +at Saint Eloi, I have visited the Hotel de Ville at Arras and seen +photographs of the present state of the Cloth Hall at Ypres--a building +I knew very well indeed in its days of pride--and I have not been very +deeply moved. I suppose that one is a little accustomed to Gothic ruins, +and that there is always something monumental about old buildings; it is +only a question of degree whether they are more or less tumble-down. I +was far more desolated by the obliteration of such villages as Fricourt +and Dompierre, and by the horrible state of the fields and gardens +round about them, and my visit to Arras railway station gave me all the +sensations of coming suddenly on a newly murdered body. + +Before I visited the recaptured villages in the zone of the actual +fighting, I had an idea that their evacuation was only temporary, +that as soon as the war line moved towards Germany the people of the +devastated villages would return to build their houses and till their +fields again. But I see now that not only are homes and villages +destroyed almost beyond recognition, but the very fields are destroyed. +They are wildernesses of shell craters; the old worked soil is buried +and great slabs of crude earth have been flung up over it. No ordinary +plough will travel over this frozen sea, let along that everywhere +chunks of timber, horrible tangles of rusting wire, jagged fragments of +big shells, and a great number of unexploded shells are entangled in the +mess. Often this chaos is stained bright yellow by high explosives, and +across it run the twisting trenches and communication trenches eight, +ten, or twelve feet deep. These will become water pits and mud pits into +which beasts will fall. It is incredible that there should be crops from +any of this region of the push for many years to come. There is no shade +left; the roadside trees are splintered stumps with scarcely the spirit +to put forth a leaf; a few stunted thistles and weeds are the sole +proofs that life may still go on. + +The villages of this wide battle region are not ruined; they are +obliterated. It is just possible to trace the roads in them, because +the roads have been cleared and repaired for the passing of the guns +and ammunition. Fricourt is a tangle of German dug-outs. One dug-out +in particular there promises to become a show place. It must be the +masterpiece of some genius for dug-outs; it is made as if its makers +enjoyed the job; it is like the work of some horrible badger among +the vestiges of what were pleasant human homes. You are taken down a +timbered staircase into its warren of rooms and passages; you are shown +the places under the craters of the great British shells, where the wood +splintered but did not come in. (But the arrival of those shells must +have been a stunning moment.) There are a series of ingenious bolting +shafts set with iron climbing bars. In this place German officers and +soldiers have lived continually for nearly two years. This war is, +indeed, a troglodytic propaganda. You come up at last at the far end +into what was once a cellar of a decent Frenchman's home. + +But there are stranger subterranean refuges than that at Fricourt. At +Dompierre the German trenches skirted the cemetery, and they turned the +dead out of their vaults and made lurking places of the tombs. I walked +with M. Joseph Reinach about this place, picking our way carefully +amidst the mud holes and the wire, and watched the shells bursting away +over the receding battle line to the west. The wreckage of the graves +was Durereqsue. And here would be a fragment of marble angle and here +a split stone with an inscription. Splinters of coffins, rusty iron +crosses and the petals of tin flowers were trampled into the mud, amidst +the universal barbed wire. A little distance down the slope is a brand +new cemetery, with new metal wreaths and even a few flowers; it is +a disciplined array of uniform wooden crosses, each with its list of +soldiers' names. Unless I am wholly mistaken in France no Germans will +ever get a chance for ever more to desecrate that second cemetery as +they have done its predecessor. + +We walked over the mud heaps and litter that had once been houses +towards the centre of Dompierre village, and tried to picture to +ourselves what the place had been. Many things are recognisable in +Dompierre that have altogether vanished at Fricourt; for instance, +there are quire large triangular pieces of the church wall upstanding +at Dompierre. And a mile away perhaps down the hill on the road towards +Amiens, the ruins of the sugar refinery are very distinct. A sugar +refinery is an affair of big iron receptacles and great flues and pipes +and so forth, and iron does not go down under gun fire as stone or brick +does. The whole fabric wars rust, bent and twisted, gaping with shell +holes, that raggedest display of old iron, but it still kept its general +shape, as a smashed, battered, and sunken ironclad might do at the +bottom of the sea. + +There wasn't a dog left of the former life of Dompierre. There was not +even much war traffic that morning on the worn and muddy road. The guns +muttered some miles away to the west, and a lark sang. But a little way +farther on up the road was an intermediate dressing station, rigged up +with wood and tarpaulins, and orderlies were packing two wounded men +into an ambulance. The men on the stretchers were grey faced, as though +they had been trodden on by some gigantic dirty boot. + +As we came back towards where our car waited by the cemetery I heard +the jingle of a horseman coming across the space behind us. I turned and +beheld one of the odd contrasts that seem always to be happening in +this incredible war. This man was, I suppose, a native officer of some +cavalry force from French north Africa. He was a handsome dark brown +Arab, wearing a long yellow-white robe and a tall cap about which ran +a band of sheepskin. He was riding one of those little fine lean horses +with long tails that I think are Barbary horses, his archaic saddle rose +fore and aft of him, and the turned-up toes of his soft leather boots +were stuck into great silver stirrups. He might have ridden straight +out of the Arabian nights. He passed thoughtfully, picking his way +delicately among the wire and the shell craters, and coming into +the road, broke into a canter and vanished in the direction of the +smashed-up refinery. + + +2 + +About such towns as Rheims or Arras or Soissons there is an effect of +waiting stillness like nothing else I have ever experienced. At Arras +the situation is almost incredible to the civilian mind. The British +hold the town, the Germans hold a northern suburb; at one point near the +river the trenches are just four metres apart. This state of tension has +lasted for long months. + +Unless a very big attack is contemplated, I suppose there is no +advantage in an assault; across that narrow interval we should only +get into trenches that might be costly or impossible to hold, and so it +would be for the Germans on our side. But there is a kind of etiquette +observed; loud vulgar talking on either side of the four-metre gap leads +at once to bomb throwing. And meanwhile on both sides guns of various +calibre keep up an intermittent fire, the German guns register--I think +that is the right term--on the cross of Arras cathedral, the British +guns search lovingly for the German batteries. As one walks about the +silent streets one hears, "_Bang_---Pheeee---woooo" and then +far away "_dump._" One of ours. Then presently back comes +"Pheeee---woooo---_Bang!_" One of theirs. + +Amidst these pleasantries, the life of the town goes on. _Le Lion +d'Arras_, an excellent illustrated paper, produces its valiant sheets, +and has done so since the siege began. + +The current number of _Le Lion d'Arras_ had to report a local German +success. Overnight they had killed a gendarme. There is to be a public +funeral and much ceremony. It is rare for anyone now to get killed; +everything is so systematised. + +You may buy postcards with views of the destruction at various angles, +and send them off with the Arras postmark. The town is not without a +certain business activity. There is, I am told, a considerable influx +of visitors of a special sort; they wear khaki and lead the troglodytic +life. They play cards and gossip and sleep in the shadows, and may not +walk the streets. I had one glimpse of a dark crowded cellar. Now and +then one sees a British soldier on some special errand; he keeps to the +pavement, mindful of the spying German sausage balloon in the air. The +streets are strangely quite and grass grows between the stones. + +The Hotel de Ville and the cathedral are now mostly heaps of litter, +but many streets of the town have suffered very little. Here and there +a house has been crushed and one or two have been bisected, the front +reduced to a heap of splinters and the back halves of the rooms left +so that one sees the bed, the hanging end of the carpet, the clothes +cupboard yawning open, the pictures still on the wall. In one place +a lamp stands on a chest of drawers, on a shelf of floor cut off +completely from the world below.... Pheeee---woooo---_Bang!_ One would +be irresistibly reminded of a Sunday afternoon in the city of London, if +it were not for those unmeaning explosions. + +I went to the station, a dead railway station. A notice-board requested +us to walk around the silent square on the outside pavement and not +across it. The German sausage balloon had not been up for days; it had +probably gone off to the Somme; the Somme was a terrible vortex just +then which was sucking away the resources of the whole German line; but +still discipline is discipline. The sausage might come peeping up at any +moment over the station roof, and so we skirted the square. Arras was +fought for in the early stages of the war; two lines of sand-bagged +breastworks still run obliquely through the station; one is where the +porters used to put luggage upon cabs and one runs the length of the +platform. The station was a fine one of the modern type, with a glass +roof whose framework still remains, though the glass powders the floor +and is like a fine angular gravel underfoot. The rails are rails of +rust, and cornflowers and mustard and tall grasses grow amidst the +ballast. The waiting-rooms have suffered from a shell or so, but there +are still the sofas of green plush, askew, a little advertisement hung +from the wall, the glass smashed. The ticket bureau is as if a giant had +scattered a great number of tickets, mostly still done up in bundles, to +Douai, to Valenciennes, to Lens and so on. These tickets are souvenirs +too portable to resist. I gave way to that common weakness. + +I went out and looked up and down the line; two deserted goods trucks +stood as if they sheltered under a footbridge. The grass poked out +through their wheels. The railway signals seemed uncertain in their +intimations; some were up and some were down. And it was as still and +empty as a summer afternoon in Pompeii. No train has come into Arras for +two long years now. + +We lunched in a sunny garden with various men who love Arras but are +weary of it, and we disputed about Irish politics. We discussed the +political future of Sir F. E. Smith. We also disputed whether there was +an equivalent in English for _embusque._ Every now and then a shell came +over--an aimless shell. + +A certain liveliness marked our departure from the town. Possibly the +Germans also listen for the rare infrequent automobile. At any rate, as +we were just starting our way back--it is improper to mention the exact +point from which we started--came "Pheeee---woooo." Quite close. But +there was no _Bang!_ One's mind hung expectant and disappointed. It was +a dud shell. + +And then suddenly I became acutely aware of the personality of our +chauffeur. It was not his business to talk to us, but he turned his +head, showed a sharp profile, wry lips and a bright excited eye, and +remarked, "_That_ was a near one--anyhow." He then cut a corner over +the pavement and very nearly cut it through a house. He bumped us over +a shell hole and began to toot his horn. At every gateway, alley, and +cross road on this silent and empty streets of Arras and frequently in +between, he tooted punctiliously. (It is not proper to sound motor horns +in Arras.) I cannot imagine what the listening Germans made of it. We +passed the old gates of that city of fear, still tooting vehemently, and +then with shoulders eloquent of his feelings, our chauffeur abandoned +the horn altogether and put his whole soul into the accelerator.... + + +3 + +Soissons was in very much the same case as Arras. There was the same +pregnant silence in her streets, the same effect of waiting for the +moment which draws nearer and nearer, when the brooding German lines +away there will be full of the covert activities of retreat, when the +streets of the old town will stir with the joyous excitement of the +conclusive advance. + +The organisation of Soissons for defence is perfect. I may not describe +it, but think of whatever would stop and destroy an attacking party or +foil the hostile shell. It is there. Men have had nothing else to do and +nothing else to think of for two years. I crossed the bridge the English +made in the pursuit after the Marne, and went into the first line +trenches and peeped towards the invisible enemy. To show me exactly +where to look a seventy-five obliged with a shell. In the crypt of the +Abbey of St. Medard near by it--it must provoke the Germans bitterly to +think that all the rest of the building vanished ages ago--the French +boys sleep beside the bones of King Childebert the Second. They shelter +safely in the prison of Louis the Pious. An ineffective shell from a +German seventy-seven burst in the walled garden close at hand as I came +out from those thousand-year-old memories again. + +The cathedral at Soissons had not been nearly so completely smashed up +as the one at Arras; I doubt if it has been very greatly fired into. +There is a peculiar beauty in the one long vertical strip of blue sky +between the broken arches in the chief gap where the wall has tumbled +in. And the people are holding on in many cases exactly as they are +doing in Arras; I do not know whether it is habit or courage that is +most apparent in this persistence. About the chief place of the town +there are ruined houses, but some invisible hand still keeps the grass +of the little garden within bounds and has put out a bed of begonias. In +Paris I met a charming American writer, the wife of a French artist, the +lady who wrote _My House on the Field of Honour._ She gave me a queer +little anecdote. On account of some hospital work she had been allowed +to visit Soissons--a rare privilege for a woman--and she stayed the +night in a lodging. The room into which she was shown was like any other +French provincial bedroom, and after her Anglo-Saxon habit she walked +straight to the windows to open them. + +They looked exactly like any other French bedroom windows, with neat, +clean white lace curtains across them. The curtains had been put there, +because they were the proper things to put there. + +"Madame," said the hostess, "need not trouble to open the glass. There +is no more glass in Soissons." + +But there were curtains nevertheless. There was all the precise delicacy +of the neatly curtained home life of France. + +And she told me too of the people at dinner, and how as the little +serving-maid passed about a proud erection of cake and conserve and +cream, came the familiar "Pheeee---woooo---_Bang!_" + +"That must have been the Seminaire," said someone. + +As one speaks of the weather or a passing cart. + +"It was in the Rue de la Bueire, M'sieur," the little maid asserted with +quiet conviction, poising the trophy of confectionery for Madame Huard +with an unshaking hand. + +So stoutly do the roots of French life hold beneath the tramplings of +war. + + + + +II. THE GRADES OF WAR + + +1 Soissons and Arras when I visited them were samples of the deadlock +war; they were like Bloch come true. The living fact about war so far +is that Bloch has not come true--_yet._ I think in the end he will come +true, but not so far as this war is concerned, and to make that clear +it is necessary to trouble the reader with a little disquisition upon +war--omitting as far as humanly possible all mention of Napoleon's +campaigns. + +The development of war has depended largely upon two factors. One of +these is invention. New weapons and new methods have become available, +and have modified tactics, strategy, the relative advantage of offensive +and defensive. The other chief factor in the evolution of the war has +been social organisation. As Machiavelli points out in his _Art of War_, +there was insufficient social stability in Europe to keep a properly +trained and disciplined infantry in the field from the passing of the +Roman legions to the appearance of the Swiss footmen. He makes it very +clear that he considers the fighting of the Middle Ages, though frequent +and bloody, to be a confused, mobbing sort of affair, and politically +and technically unsatisfactory. The knight was an egotist in armour. +Machiavelli does small justice to the English bowmen. It is interesting +to note that Switzerland, that present island of peace, was regarded by +him as the mother of modern war. Swiss aggression was the curse of the +Milanese. That is a remark by the way; our interest here is to note that +modern war emerges upon history as the sixteenth century unfolds, as +an affair in which the essential factor is the drilled and trained +infantryman. The artillery is developing as a means of breaking the +infantry; cavalry for charging them when broken, for pursuit and +scouting. To this day this triple division of forces dominates soldiers' +minds. The mechanical development of warfare has consisted largely in +the development of facilities for enabling or hindering the infantry +to get to close quarters. As that has been made easy or difficult the +offensive or the defensive has predominated. + +A history of military method for the last few centuries would be a +record of successive alternate steps in which offensive and defensive +contrivances pull ahead, first one and then the other. Their relative +fluctuations are marked by the varying length of campaigns. From the +very outset we have the ditch and the wall; the fortified place upon a +pass or main road, as a check to the advance. Artillery improves, then +fortification improves. The defensive holds its own for a long period, +wars are mainly siege wars, and for a century before the advent of +Napoleon there are no big successful sweeping invasions, no marches +upon the enemy capital and so on. There were wars of reduction, wars +of annoyance. Napoleon developed the offensive by seizing upon the +enthusiastic infantry of the republic, improving transport and mobile +artillery, using road-making as an aggressive method. In spite of the +successful experiment of Torres Vedras and the warning of Plevna the +offensive remained dominant throughout the nineteenth century. + +But three things were working quietly towards the rehabilitation of the +defensive; firstly the increased range, accuracy and rapidity of rifle +fire, with which we may include the development of the machine gun; +secondly the increasing use of the spade, and thirdly the invention of +barbed wire. By the end of the century these things had come so far into +military theory as to produce the great essay of Bloch, and to surprise +the British military people, who are not accustomed to read books or +talk shop, in the Boer war. In the thinly populated war region of South +Africa the difficulties of forcing entrenched positions were largely met +by outflanking, the Boers had only a limited amount of barbed wire +and could be held down in their trenches by shrapnel, and even at the +beginning of the present war there can be little doubt that we and +our Allies were still largely unprepared for the full possibilities of +trench warfare, we attempted a war of manoeuvres, war at about the grade +to which war had been brought in 1898, and it was the Germans who first +brought the war up to date by entrenching upon the Aisne. We had, of +course, a few aeroplanes at that time, but they were used chiefly as a +sort of accessory cavalry for scouting; our artillery was light and our +shell almost wholly shrapnel. + +Now the grades of warfare that have been developed since the present +war began, may be regarded as a series of elaborations and counter +elaborations of the problem which begins as a line of trenches behind +wire, containing infantry with rifles and machine guns. Against this an +infantry attack with bayonet, after shrapnel fails. This we will call +Grade A. To this the offensive replies with improved artillery, and +particularly with high explosive shell instead of shrapnel. By this the +wire is blown away, the trench wrecked and the defender held down as +the attack charges up. This is Grade B. But now appear the dug-out +elaborating the trench and the defensive battery behind the trench. The +defenders, under the preliminary bombardment, get into the dug-outs +with their rifles and machine guns, and emerge as fresh as paint as +the attack comes up. Obviously there is much scope for invention and +contrivance in the dug-out as the reservoir of counter attacks. Its +possibilities have been very ably exploited by the Germans. Also the +defensive batteries behind, which have of course the exact range of the +captured trench, concentrate on it and destroy the attack at the moment +of victory. The trench falls back to its former holders under this fire +and a counter attack. Check again for the offensive. Even if it can +take, it cannot hold a position under these conditions. This we will +call Grade A2; a revised and improved A. What is the retort from +the opposite side? Obviously to enhance and extend the range of the +preliminary bombardment behind the actual trench line, to destroy +or block, if it can, the dug-outs and destroy or silence the counter +offensive artillery. If it can do that, it can go on; otherwise Bloch +wins. + +If fighting went on only at ground level Bloch would win at this stage, +but here it is that the aeroplane comes in. From the ground it would +be practically impossible to locate the enemies' dug-outs, secondary +defences, and batteries. But the aeroplane takes us immediately into a +new grade of warfare, in which the location of the defender's secondary +trenches, guns, and even machine-gun positions becomes a matter of +extreme precision--provided only that the offensive has secured command +of the air and can send his aeroplanes freely over the defender lines. +Then the preliminary bombardment becomes of a much more extensive +character; the defender's batteries are tackled by the overpowering fire +of guns they are unable to locate and answer; the secondary dug-outs and +strong places are plastered down, a barrage fire shuts off support +from the doomed trenches, the men in these trenches are held down by a +concentrated artillery fire and the attack goes up at last to hunt +them out of the dug-outs and collect the survivors. Until the attack is +comfortably established in the captured trench, the fire upon the old +counter attack position goes on. This is the grade, Grade B2, to which +modern warfare has attained upon the Somme front. The appearance of +the Tank has only increased the offensive advantage. There at present +warfare rests. + +There is, I believe, only one grade higher possible. The success of B2 +depends upon the completeness of the aerial observation. The invention +of an anti-aircraft gun which would be practically sure of hitting and +bringing down an aeroplane at any height whatever up to 20,000 feet, +would restore the defensive and establish what I should think must be +the final grade of war, A3. But at present nothing of the sort exists +and nothing of the sort is likely to exist for a very long time; at +present hitting an aeroplane by any sort of gun at all is a rare and +uncertain achievement. Such a gun is not impossible and therefore we +must suppose such a gun will some day be constructed, but it will be of +a novel type and character, unlike anything at present in existence. +The grade of fighting that I was privileged to witness on the Somme, the +grade at which a steady successful offensive is possible, is therefore, +I conclude, the grade at which the present war will end. + + +2 + +But now having thus spread out the broad theory of the business, let me +go on to tell some of the actualities of the Somme offensive. They key +fact upon both British and French fronts was the complete ascendancy of +the Allies aeroplanes. It is the necessary preliminary condition for +the method upon which the great generals of the French army rely in this +sanitary task of shoving the German Thing off the soil of Belgium and +France back into its own land. A man who is frequently throwing out +prophecies is bound to score a few successes, and one that I may +legitimately claim is my early insistence upon that fact that the +equality of the German aviator was likely to be inferior to that of his +French or British rival. The ordinary German has neither the flexible +quality of body, the quickness of nerve, the temperament, nor the mental +habits that make a successful aviator. This idea was first put into my +head by considering the way in which Germans walk and carry themselves, +and by nothing the difference in nimbleness between the cyclists in the +streets of German and French towns. It was confirmed by a conversation I +had with a German aviator who was also a dramatist, and who came to +see me upon some copyright matter in 1912. He broached the view that +aviation would destroy democracy, because he said only aristocrats make +aviators. (He was a man of good family.) With a duke or so in my mind I +asked him why. Because, he explained, a man without aristocratic quality +in tradition, cannot possibly endure the "high loneliness" of the air. +That sounded rather like nonsense at the time, and then I reflected that +for a Prussian that might be true. There may be something in the German +composition that does demand association and the support of pride +and training before dangers can be faced. The Germans are social +and methodical, the French and English are by comparison chaotic and +instinctive; perhaps the very readiness for a conscious orderliness +that makes the German so formidable upon the ground, so thorough and +fore-seeking, makes him slow and unsure in the air. At any rate the +experiences of this war have seemed to carry out this hypothesis. The +German aviators will not as a class stand up to those of the Allies. +They are not nimble in the air. Such champions as they have produced +have been men of one trick; one of their great men, Immelmann--he was +put down by an English boy a month or so ago--had a sort of hawk's +swoop. He would go very high and then come down at his utmost pace at +his antagonist, firing his machine gun at him as he came. If he missed +in this hysterical lunge, he went on down.... This does not strike the +Allied aviator as very brilliant. A gentleman of that sort can sooner or +later be caught on the rise by going for him over the German lines. + +The first phase, then, of the highest grade offensive, the ultimate +development of war regardless of expense, is the clearance of the air. +Such German machines as are up are put down by fighting aviators. These +last fly high; in the clear blue of the early morning they look exactly +like gnats; some trail a little smoke in the sunshine; they take +their machine guns in pursuit over the German lines, and the German +anti-aircraft guns, the Archibalds, begin to pattern the sky about them +with little balls of black smoke. From below one does not see men nor +feel that men are there; it is as if it were an affair of midges. Close +after the fighting machines come the photographic aeroplanes, with +cameras as long as a man is high, flying low--at four or five thousand +feet that is--over the enemy trenches. The Archibald leaves these latter +alone; it cannot fire a shell to explode safely so soon after firing; +but they are shot at with rifles and machine guns. They do not mind +being shot at; only the petrol tank and the head and thorax of the pilot +are to be considered vital. They will come back with forty or fifty +bullet holes in the fabric. They will go under this fire along the +length of the German positions exposing plate after plate; one machine +will get a continuous panorama of many miles and then come back straight +to the aerodrome to develop its plates. + +There is no waste of time about the business, the photographs are +developed as rapidly as possible. Within an hour and a half after the +photographs were taken the first prints are going back into the bureau +for the examination of the photographs. Both British and French air +photographs are thoroughly scrutinised and marked. + +An air photograph to an inexperienced eye is not a very illuminating +thing; one makes our roads, blurs of wood, and rather vague buildings. +But the examiner has an eye that has been in training; he is a picked +man; he has at hand yesterday's photographs and last week's photographs, +marked maps and all sorts of aids and records. If he is a Frenchman he +is only too happy to explain his ideas and methods. Here, he will point +out, is a little difference between the German trench beyond the wood +since yesterday. For a number of reasons he thinks that will be a new +machine gun emplacement; here at the centre of the farm wall they have +been making another. This battery here--isn't it plain? Well, it's a +dummy. The grass in front of it hasn't been scorched, and there's been +no serious wear on the road here for a week. Presently the Germans will +send one or two waggons up and down that road and instruct them to make +figures of eight to imitate scorching on the grass in front of the gun. +We know all about that. The real wear on the road, compare this and this +and this, ends here at this spot. It turns off into the wood. There's a +sort of track in the trees. Now look where the trees are just a little +displaced! (This lens is rather better for that.) _That's_ one gun. You +see? Here, I will show you another.... + +That process goes on two or three miles behind the front line. Very +clean young men in white overalls do it as if it were a labour of love. +And the Germans in the trenches, the German gunners, _know it is going +on._ They know that in the quickest possible way these observations of +the aeroplane that was over them just now will go to the gunners. The +careful gunner, firing by the map and marking by aeroplane, kite balloon +or direct observation, will be getting onto the located guns and machine +guns in another couple of hours. The French claim that they have located +new batteries, got their _tir de demolition_ upon them in and destroyed +them within five hours. The British I told of that found it incredible. +Every day the French print special maps showing the guns, sham guns, +trenches, everything of significance behind the German lines, showing +everything that has happened in the last four-and-twenty hours. It is +pitiless. It is indecent. The map-making and printing goes on in the +room next and most convenient to the examination of the photographs. +And, as I say, the German army knows of this, and knows that it cannot +prevent it because of its aerial weakness. That knowledge is not the +last among the forces that is crumpling up the German resistance upon +the Somme. + +I visited some French guns during the _tir de demolition_ phase. I +counted nine aeroplanes and twenty-six kite balloons in the air at the +same time. There was nothing German visible in the air at all. + +It is a case of eyes and no eyes. + +The French attack resolves itself into a triple system of gunfire. First +for a day or so, or two or three days, there is demolition fire to smash +up all the exactly located batteries, organisation, supports, behind the +front line enemy trenches; then comes barrage fire to cut off supplies +and reinforcements; then, before the advance, the hammering down +fire, "heads down," upon the trenches. When at last this stops and the +infantry goes forward to rout out the trenches and the dug-outs, they +go forward with a minimum of inconvenience. The first wave of attack +fights, destroys, or disarms the surviving Germans and sends them back +across the open to the French trenches. They run as fast as they can, +hands up, and are shepherded farther back. The French set to work to +turn over the captured trenches and organise themselves against any +counter attack that may face the barrage fire. + +That is the formula of the present fighting, which the French have +developed. After an advance there is a pause, while the guns move up +nearer the Germans and fresh aeroplane reconnaissance goes on. Nowhere +on this present offensive has a German counter attack had more than the +most incidental success; and commonly they have had frightful losses. +Then after a few days of refreshment and accumulation, the Allied attack +resumes. + +That is the perfected method of the French offensive. I had the pleasure +of learning its broad outlines in good company, in the company of M. +Joseph Reinach and Colonel Carence, the military writer. Their talk +together and with me in the various messes at which we lunched was for +the most part a keen discussion of every detail and every possibility +of the offensive machine; every French officer's mess seems a little +council upon the one supreme question in France, _how to do it best._ +M. Reinach has made certain suggestions about the co-operation of the +French and British that I will discuss elsewhere, but one great theme +was the constitution of "the ideal battery." For years French military +thought has been acutely attentive to the best number of guns for +effective common action, and has tended rather to the small battery +theory. My two companies were playing with the idea that the ideal +battery was a battery of one big gun, with its own aeroplane and kite +balloon marking for it. + +The British seem to be associated with the adventurous self-reliance +needed in the air. The British aeroplanes do not simply fight the +Germans out of the sky; they also make themselves an abominable nuisance +by bombing the enemy trenches. For every German bomb that is dropped by +aeroplane on or behind the British lines, about twenty go down on +the heads of the Germans. British air bombs upon guns, stores and +communications do some of the work that the French effect by their +systematic demolition fire. + +And the British aviator has discovered and is rapidly developing an +altogether fresh branch of air activity in the machine-gun attack at a +very low altitude. Originally I believe this was tried in western Egypt, +but now it is being increasingly used upon the British front in France. +An aeroplane which comes down suddenly, travelling very rapidly, to +a few hundred feet, is quite hard to hit, even if it is not squirting +bullets from a machine gun as it advances. Against infantry in the open +this sort of thing is extremely demoralising. It is a method of attack +still in its infancy, but there are great possibilities for it in the +future, when the bending and cracking German line gives, as ultimately +it must give if this offensive does not relax. If the Allies persist in +their pressure upon the western front, if there is no relaxation in the +supply of munitions from Britain and no lapse into tactical stupidity, a +German retreat eastward is inevitable. + +Now a cavalry pursuit alone may easily come upon disaster, cavalry can +be so easily held up by wire and a few machine guns. I think the Germans +have reckoned on that and on automobiles, probably only the decay of +their _morale_ prevents their opening their lines now on the chance of +the British attempting some such folly as a big cavalry advance, but +I do not think the Germans have reckoned on the use of machine guns in +aeroplanes, supported by and supporting cavalry or automobiles. At the +present time I should imagine there is no more perplexing consideration +amidst the many perplexities of the German military intelligence than +the new complexion put upon pursuit by these low level air developments. +It may mean that in all sorts of positions where they had counted +confidently on getting away, they may not be able to get away--from +the face of a scientific advance properly commanding and using modern +material in a dexterous and intelligent manner. + + + + +III. THE WAR LANDSCAPE + + +1 + +I saw rather more of the British than of the French aviators because +of the vileness of the weather when I visited the latter. It is quite +impossible for me to institute comparisons between these two services. I +should think that the British organisation I saw would be hard to beat, +and that none but the French could hope to beat it. On the Western front +the aviation has been screwed up to a very much higher level than on +the Italian line. In Italy it has not become, as it has in France, the +decisive factor. The war on the Carso front in Italy--I say nothing of +the mountain warfare, which is a thing in itself--is in fact still in +the stage that I have called B. It is good warfare well waged, but not +such an intensity of warfare. It has not, as one says of pianos and +voices, the same compass. + +This is true in spite of the fact that the Italians along of all the +western powers have adopted a type of aeroplane larger and much more +powerful than anything except the big Russian machines. They are not at +all suitable for any present purpose upon the Italian front, but at +a later stage, when the German is retiring and Archibald no longer +searches the air, they would be invaluable on the western front because +of their enormous bomb or machine gun carrying capacity. "But sufficient +for the day is the swat thereof," as the British public schoolboy says, +and no doubt we shall get them when we have sufficiently felt the need +for them. The big Caproni machines which the Italians possess are of 300 +h.p. and will presently be of 500 h.p. One gets up a gangway into them +was one gets into a yacht; they wave a main deck, a forward machine gun +deck and an aft machine gun; one may walk about in them; in addition +to guns and men they carry a very considerable weight of bombs beneath. +They cannot of course beget up with the speed nor soar to the height +of our smaller aeroplanes; it is as carriers in raids behind a force of +fighting machines that they should find their use. + +The British establishment I visited was a very refreshing and reassuring +piece of practical organisation. The air force of Great Britain has +had the good fortune to develop with considerable freedom from old army +tradition; many of its officers are ex-civil engineers and so forth; +Headquarters is a little shy of technical direction; and all this in +a service that is still necessarily experimental and plastic is to the +good. There is little doubt that, given a release from prejudice, +bad associations and the equestrian tradition, British technical +intelligence and energy can do just as well as the French. Our problem +with our army is not to create intelligence, there is an abundance of +it, but to release it from a dreary social and official pressure. The +air service ransacks the army for men with technical training and sees +that it gets them, there is a real keenness upon the work, and the men +in these great mobile hangars talk shop readily and clearly. + +I have already mentioned and the newspapers have told abundantly of +the pluck, daring, and admirable work of our aviators; what is still +untellable in any detail is the energy and ability of the constructive +and repairing branch upon whose efficiency their feats depend. Perhaps +the most interesting thing I saw in connection with the air work was +the hospital for damaged machines and the dump to which those hopelessly +injured are taken, in order that they may be disarticulated and all that +is sound in them used for reconstruction. How excellently this work +is being done may be judged from the fact that our offensive in July +started with a certain number of aeroplanes, a number that would +have seemed fantastic in a story a year before the war began. These +aeroplanes were in constant action; they fought, they were shot down, +they had their share of accidents. Not only did the repair department +make good every loss, but after three weeks of the offensive the army +was fighting with fifty more machines than at the outset. One goes +through a vast Rembrandtesque shed opening upon a great sunny field, in +whose cool shadows rest a number of interesting patients; captured and +slightly damaged German machines, machines of our own with scars of +battle upon them, one or two cases of bad landing. The star case came +over from Peronne. It had come in two days ago. + +I examined this machine and I will tell the state it was in, but I +perceive that what I have to tell will read not like a sober statement +of truth but like strained and silly lying. The machine had had a direct +hit from an Archibald shell. The propeller had been clean blown away; so +had the machine gun and all its fittings. The engines had been stripped +naked and a good deal bent about. The timber stay over the aviator had +been broken, so that it is marvellous the wings of the machine did not +just up at once like the wings of a butterfly. The solitary aviator had +been wounded in the face. He had then come down in a long glide into the +British lines, and made a tolerable landing.... + + +2 + +One consequence of the growing importance of the aeroplane in warfare is +the development of a new military art, the art of camouflage. Camouflage +is humbugging disguise, it is making things--and especially in this +connection, military things--seem not what they are, but something +peaceful and rural, something harmless and quite uninteresting to +aeroplane observers. It is the art of making big guns look like +haystacks and tents like level patches of field. + +Also it includes the art of making attractive models of guns, camps, +trenches and the like that are not bona-fide guns, camps, or trenches at +all, so that the aeroplane bomb-dropper and the aeroplane observer may +waste his time and energies and the enemy gunfire be misdirected. +In Italy I saw dummy guns so made as to deceive the very elect at a +distance of a few thousand feet. The camouflage of concealment aims +either at invisibility or imitation; I have seen a supply train look +like a row of cottages, its smoke-stack a chimney, with the tops of sham +palings running along the back of the engine and creepers painted up +its sides. But that was a flight of the imagination; the commonest +camouflage is merely to conceal. Trees are brought up and planted +near the object to be hidden, it is painted in the same tones as its +background, it is covered with an awning painted to look like grass or +earth. I suppose it is only a matter of development before a dummy cow +or so is put up to chew the cud on the awning. + +But camouflage or no camouflage, the bulk of both the French and British +forces in the new won ground of the great offensive lay necessarily in +the open. Only the big guns and the advanced Red Cross stations had got +into pits and subterranean hiding places. The advance has been too rapid +and continuous for the armies to make much of a toilette as they halted, +and the destruction and the desolation of the country won afforded few +facilities for easy concealment. Tents, transport, munitions, these all +indicated an army on the march--at the rate of half a mile in a week or +so, to Germany. If the wet and mud of November and December have for a +time delayed that advance, the force behind has but accumulated for the +resumption of the thrust. + + +3 + +A journey up from the base to the front trenches shows an interesting +series of phases. One leaves Amiens, in which the normal life threads +its way through crowds of resting men in khaki and horizon blue, in +which staff officers in automobiles whisk hither and thither, in which +there are nurses and even a few inexplicable ladies in worldly costume, +in which restaurants and cafes are congested and busy, through which +there is a perpetual coming and going of processions of heavy vans to +the railway sidings. One dodges past a monstrous blue-black gun going +up to the British front behind two resolute traction engines--the +three sun-blistered young men in the cart that trails behind lounge in +attitudes of haughty pride that would shame the ceiling gods of Hampton +Court. One passes through arcades of waiting motor vans, through arcades +of waiting motor vans, through suburbs still more intensely khaki or +horizon blue, and so out upon the great straight poplar-edged road--to +the front. Sometimes one laces through spates of heavy traffic, +sometimes the dusty road is clear ahead, now we pass a vast aviation +camp, now a park of waiting field guns, now an encampment of cavalry. +One turns aside, and abruptly one is in France--France as one knew it +before the war, on a shady secondary road, past a delightful chateau +behind its iron gates, past a beautiful church, and then suddenly we are +in a village street full of stately Indian soldiers. + +It betrays no military secret to say that commonly the rare tourist to +the British offensive passes through Albert, with its great modern red +cathedral smashed to pieces and the great gilt Madonna and Child +that once surmounted the tower now, as everyone knows, hanging out +horizontally in an attitude that irresistibly suggests an imminent dive +upon the passing traveller. One looks right up under it. + +Presently we begin to see German prisoners. The whole lot look entirely +contented, and are guarded by perhaps a couple of men in khaki. These +German prisoners do not attempt to escape, they have not the slightest +desire for any more fighting, they have done their bit, they say, honour +is satisfied; they give remarkably little trouble. A little way further +on perhaps we pass their cage, a double barbed-wire enclosure with a few +tents and huts within. + +A string of covered waggons passes by. I turn and see a number of men +sitting inside and looking almost as cheerful as a beanfeast in Epping +Forest. They make facetious gestures. They have a subdued sing-song going +on. But one of them looks a little sick, and then I notice not very +obtrusive bandages. "Sitting-up cases," my guide explains. + +These are part of the casualties of last night's fight. + +The fields on either side are now more evidently in the war zone. +The array of carts, the patches of tents, the coming and going of men +increases. But here are three women harvesting, and presently in a +cornfield are German prisoners working under one old Frenchman. Then +the fields become trampled again. Here is a village, not so very much +knocked about, and passing through it we go slowly beside a long column +of men going up to the front. We scan their collars for signs of some +familiar regiment. These are new men going up for the first time; there +is a sort of solemn elation in many of their faces. + +The men coming down are usually smothered in mud or dust, and unless +there has been a fight they look pretty well done up. They stoop under +their equipment, and some of the youngsters drag. One pleasant thing +about this coming down is the welcome of the regimental band, which is +usually at work as soon as the men turn off from the high road. I hear +several bands on the British front; they do much to enhance the general +cheerfulness. On one of these days of my tour I had the pleasure of +seeing the ---th Blankshires coming down after a fight. As we drew +near I saw that they combined an extreme muddiness with an unusual +elasticity. They all seemed to be looking us in the face instead of +being too fagged to bother. Then I noticed a nice grey helmet dangling +from one youngster's bayonet, in fact his eye directed me to it. A man +behind him had a black German helmet of the type best known in English +illustrations; then two more grey appeared. The catch of helmets was +indeed quite considerable. Then I perceived on the road bank above +and marching parallel with this column, a double file of still muddier +Germans. Either they wore caps or went bare-headed. There were no +helmets among them. We do not rob our prisoners but--a helmet is a +weapon. Anyhow, it is an irresistible souvenir. + +Now and then one sees afar off an ammunition dump, many hundreds of +stacks of shells--without their detonators as yet--being unloaded from +railway trucks, transferred from the broad gauge to the narrow gauge +line, or loaded onto motor trolleys. Now and then one crosses a railway +line. The railway lines run everywhere behind the British front, the +construction follows the advance day by day. They go up as fast as the +guns. One's guide remarks as the car bumps over the level +crossing, "That is one of Haig's railways." It is an aspect of the +Commander-in-Chief that has much impressed and pleased the men. And at +last we begin to enter the region of the former Allied trenches, we pass +the old German front line, we pass ruined houses, ruined fields, and +thick patches of clustering wooden crosses and boards where the dead +of the opening assaults lie. There are no more reapers now, there is no +more green upon the fields, there is no green anywhere, scarcely a tree +survives by the roadside, but only overthrown trunks and splintered +stumps; the fields are wildernesses of shell craters and coarse weeds, +the very woods are collections of blasted stems and stripped branches. +This absolutely ravaged and ruined battlefield country extends now along +the front of the Somme offensive for a depth of many miles; across it +the French and British camps and batteries creep forward, the stores, +the dumps, the railways creep forward, in their untiring, victorious +thrust against the German lines. Overhead hum and roar the aeroplanes, +away towards the enemy the humped, blue sausage-shaped kite balloons +brood thoughtfully, and from this point and that, guns, curiously +invisible until they speak, flash suddenly and strike their one short +hammer-blow of sound. + +Then one sees an enemy shell drop among the little patch of trees on +the crest to the right, and kick up a great red-black mass of smoke and +dust. We see it, and then we hear the whine of its arrival and at last +the bang. The Germans are blind now, they have lost the air, they are +firing by guesswork and their knowledge of the abandoned territory. + +"They think they have got divisional headquarters there," someone +remarks.... "They haven't. But they keep on." + +In this zone where shells burst the wise automobile stops and tucks +itself away as inconspicuously as possible close up to a heap of ruins. +There is very little traffic on the road now except for a van or so that +hurries up, unloads, and gets back as soon as possible. Mules and men +are taking the stuff the rest of the journey. We are in a flattened +village, all undermined by dug-outs that were in the original German +second line. We report ourselves to a young troglodyte in one of these, +and are given a guide, and so set out on the last part of the journey +to the ultimate point, across the land of shell craters and barbed +wire litter and old and new trenches. We have all put on British steel +helmets, hard but heavy and inelegant head coverings. I can write little +that is printable about these aesthetic crimes. The French and German +helmets are noble and beautiful things. These lumpish _pans._.. + +They ought to be called by the name of the man who designed them. + +Presently we are advised to get into a communication trench. It is not +a very attractive communication trench, and we stick to our track across +the open. Three or four shells shiver overhead, but we decide they are +British shells, going out. We reach a supporting trench in which men are +waiting in a state of nearly insupportable boredom for the midday +stew, the one event of interest in a day-long vigil. Here we are told +imperatively to come right in at once, and we do. + +All communication trenches are tortuous and practically endless. On +an offensive front they have vertical sides of unsupported earth and +occasional soakaways for rain, covered by wooden gratings, and they go +on and on and on. At rare intervals they branch, and a notice board says +"To Regent Street," or "To Oxford Street," or some such lie. It is all +just trench. For a time you talk, but talking in single file soon palls. +You cease to talk, and trudge. A great number of telephone wires come +into the trench and cross and recross it. You cannot keep clear of them. +Your helmet pings against them and they try to remove it. Sometimes you +have to stop and crawl under wires. Then you wonder what the trench is +like in really wet weather. You hear a shell burst at no great distance. +You pass two pages of _The Strand Magazine._ Perhaps thirty yards on +you pass a cigarette end. After these sensational incidents the trench +quiets down again and continues to wind endlessly--just a sandy, +extremely narrow vertical walled trench. A giant crack. + +At last you reach the front line trench. On an offensive sector it has +none of the architectural interest of first line trenches at such places +as Soissons or Arras. It was made a week or so ago by joining up shell +craters, and if all goes well we move into the German trench along by +the line of scraggy trees, at which we peep discreetly, to-morrow night. +We can peep discreetly because just at present our guns are putting +shrapnel over the enemy at the rate of about three shells a minute, the +puffs follow each other up and down the line, and no Germans are staring +out to see us. + +The Germans "strafed" this trench overnight, and the men are tired and +sleepy. Our guns away behind us are doing their best now to give them +a rest by strafing the Germans. One or two men are in each forward sap +keeping a look out; the rest sleep, a motionless sleep, in the earthy +shelter pits that have been scooped out. One officer sits by a telephone +under an earth-covered tarpaulin, and a weary man is doing the toilet of +a machine gun. We go on to a shallow trench in which we must stoop, and +which has been badly knocked about.... Here we have to stop. The road to +Berlin is not opened up beyond this point. + +My companion on this excursion is a man I have admired for years and +never met until I came out to see the war, a fellow writer. He is a +journalist let loose. Two-thirds of the junior British officers I met +on this journey were really not "army men" at all. One finds that the +apparent subaltern is really a musician, or a musical critic, or an +Egyptologist, or a solicitor, or a cloth manufacturer, or a writer. At +the outbreak of the war my guide dyed his hair to conceal its tell-tale +silver, and having been laughed to scorn by the ordinary recruiting +people, enlisted in the sportsmen's battalion. He was wounded, and then +the authorities discovered that he was likely to be of more use with a +commission and drew him, in spite of considerable resistance, out of the +firing line. To which he always returns whenever he can get a visitor +to take with him as an excuse. He now stood up, fairly high and clear, +explaining casually that the Germans were no longer firing, and showed +me the points of interest. + +I had come right up to No Man's Land at last. It was under my chin. The +skyline, the last skyline before the British could look down on Bapaume, +showed a mangy wood and a ruined village, crouching under repeated +gobbings of British shrapnel. "They've got a battery just there, and +we're making it uncomfortable." No Man's Land itself is a weedy space +broken up by shell craters, with very little barbed wire in front of us +and very little in front of the Germans. "They've got snipers in most of +the craters, and you see them at twilight hopping about from one to the +other." We have very little wire because we don't mean to stay for very +long in this trench, but the Germans have very little wire because they +have not been able to get it up yet. They never will get it up now.... + +I had been led to believe that No Man's Land was littered with the +unburied dead, but I saw nothing of the sort at this place. There had +been no German counter attack since our men came up here. But at one +point as we went along the trench there was a dull stench. "Germans, I +think," said my guide, though I did not see how he could tell. + +He looked at his watch and remarked reluctantly, "If you start at once, +you may just do it." + +I wanted to catch the Boulogne boat. It was then just past one in +the afternoon. We met the stew as we returned along the communication +trench, and it smelt very good indeed.... We hurried across the great +spaces of rusty desolation upon which every now and again a German shell +was bursting.... + +That night I was in my flat in London. I had finished reading the +accumulated letters of some weeks, and I was just going comfortably to +bed. + + + + +IV. NEW ARMS FOR OLD ONES + + +1 + +Such are the landscapes and method of modern war. It is more difficult +in its nature from war as it was waged in the nineteenth century than +that was from the nature of the phalanx or the legion. The nucleus +fact--when I talked to General Joffre he was very insistent upon +this point--is still as ever the ordinary fighting man, but all the +accessories and conditions of his personal encounter with the fighting +man of the other side have been revolutionised in a quarter of a +century. The fighting together in a close disciplined order, shoulder +to shoulder, which has held good for thousands of years as the best and +most successful fighting, has been destroyed; the idea of _breaking_ +infantry formation as the chief offensive operation has disappeared, the +cavalry charge and the cavalry pursuit are as obsolete as the cross-bow. +The modern fighting man is as individualised as a half back or a centre +forward in a football team. Personal fighting has become "scrapping" +again, an individual adventure with knife, club, bomb, revolver or +bayonet. In this war we are working out things instead of thinking them +out, and these enormous changes are still but imperfectly apprehended. +The trained and specialised military man probably apprehends them as +feebly as anyone. + +This is a thing that I want to state as emphatically as possible. It is +the pith of the lesson I have learnt at the front. The whole method of +war has been so altered in the past five and twenty years as to make +it a new and different process altogether. Much the larger part of this +alteration has only become effective in the last two years. Everyone is +a beginner at this new game; everyone is experimenting and learning. + +The idea has been put admirably by _Punch._ That excellent picture +of the old-fashioned sergeant who complains to his officer of the new +recruit; "'E's all right in the trenches, Sir; 'e's all right at a +scrap; but 'e won't never make a soldier," is the quintessence of +everything I am saying here. And were there not the very gravest doubts +about General Smuts in British military circles because he had "had no +military training"? A Canadian expressed the new view very neatly on +being asked, in consequence of a deficient salute, whether he wanted to +be a soldier, by saying, "Not I! I want to be a fighter!" + +The professional officer of the old dispensation was a man specialised +in relation to one of the established "arms." He was an infantryman, a +cavalryman, a gunner or an engineer. It will be interesting to trace the +changes that have happened to all these arms. + +Before this war began speculative writers had argued that infantry drill +in close formation had now no fighting value whatever, that it was no +doubt extremely necessary for the handling, packing, forwarding and +distribution of men, but that the ideal infantry fighter was now a +highly individualised and self-reliant man put into a pit with a machine +gun, and supported by a string of other men bringing him up supplies and +ready to assist him in any forward rush that might be necessary. + +The opening phases of the war seemed to contradict this. It did not +at first suit the German game to fight on this most modern theory, +and isolated individual action is uncongenial to the ordinary German +temperament and opposed to the organised social tendencies of German +life. To this day the Germans attack only in close order; they are +unable to produce a real modern infantry for aggressive purposes, and it +is a matter of astonishment to military minds on the English side that +our hastily trained new armies should turn out to be just as good at +the new fighting as the most "seasoned troops." But there is no reason +whatever why they should not be. "Leading," in the sense of going +ahead of the men and making them move about mechanically at the word of +command, has ceased. On the British side our magnificent new subalterns +and our equally magnificent new non-commissioned officers play the part +of captains of football teams; they talk their men individually into +an understanding of the job before them; they criticise style and +performance. On the French side things have gone even farther. Every man +in certain attacks has been given a large scale map of the ground over +which he has to go, and has had his own individual job clearly marked +and explained to him. All the Allied infantrymen tend to become +specialised, as bombers, as machine-gun men, and so on. The +unspecialised common soldier, the infantryman who has stood and marched +and moved in ranks and ranks, the "serried lines of men," who are the +main substance of every battle story for the last three thousand years, +are as obsolete as the dodo. The rifle and bayonet very probably are +becoming obsolete too. Knives and clubs and revolvers serve better in +the trenches. The krees and the Roman sword would be as useful. The fine +flourish of the bayonet is only possible in the rare infrequent open. +Even the Zulu assegai would serve as well. + +The two operations of the infantry attack now are the rush and the +"scrap." These come after the artillery preparation. Against the rush, +the machine gun is pitted. The machine gun becomes lighter and more and +more controllable by one man; as it does so the days of the rifle draw +to a close. Against the machine gun we are now directing the "Tank," +which goes ahead and puts out the machine gun as soon as it begins to +sting the infantry rush. We are also using the swooping aeroplane with a +machine gun. Both these devices are of British origin, and they promise +very well. + +After the rush and the scrap comes the organisation of the captured +trench. "Digging in" completes the cycle of modern infantry fighting. +You may consider this the first or the last phase of an infantry +operation. It is probably at present the least worked-out part of the +entire cycle. Here lies the sole German superiority; they bunch and +crowd in the rush, they are inferior at the scrap, but they do dig like +moles. The weakness of the British is their failure to settle down. They +like the rush and the scrap; they press on too far, they get outflanked +and lost "in the blue"; they are not naturally clever at the excavating +part of the work, and they are not as yet well trained in making +dug-outs and shelter-pits rapidly and intelligently. They display most +of the faults that were supposed to be most distinctively French before +this war came to revolutionise all our conceptions of French character. + + +2 + +Now the operations of this modern infantry, which unlike any preceding +infantry in the history of war does not fight in disciplined formations +but as highly individualised specialists, are determined almost +completely by the artillery preparation. Artillery is now the most +essential instrument of war. You may still get along with rather bad +infantry; you may still hold out even after the loss of the aerial +ascendancy, but so soon as your guns fail you approach defeat. +The backbone process of the whole art of war is the manufacture in +overwhelming quantities, the carriage and delivery of shell upon the +vulnerable points of the enemy's positions. That is, so to speak, +the essential blow. Even the infantryman is now hardly more than the +residuary legatee after the guns have taken their toll. + +I have now followed nearly every phase in the life history of a shell +from the moment when it is a segment of steel bar just cut off, to the +moment when it is no more than a few dispersed and rusting rags and +fragments of steel--pressed upon the stray visitor to the battlefield as +souvenirs. All good factories are intensely interesting places to visit, +but a good munition factory is romantically satisfactory. It is as +nearly free from the antagonism of employer and employed as any factory +can be. The busy sheds I visited near Paris struck me as being the most +living and active things in the entire war machine. Everywhere else I +saw fitful activity, or men waiting. I have seen more men sitting about +and standing about, more bored inactivity, during my tour than I have +ever seen before in my life. Even the front line trenches seem to +slumber; the Angel of Death drowses over them, and moves in his sleep +to crush out men's lives. The gunfire has an indolent intermittence. +But the munition factories grind on night and day, grinding against +the factories in Central Europe, grinding out the slow and costly and +necessary victory that should end aggressive warfare in the world for +ever. + +It would be very interesting if one could arrange a meeting between +any typical Allied munition maker on the one hand, and the Kaiser and +Hindenburg, those two dominant effigies of the German nationalists' +dream of "world might." Or failing that, Mr. Dyson might draw the +encounter. You imagine these two heroic figures got up for the +interview, very magnificent in shining helms and flowing cloaks, +decorations, splendid swords, spurs. "Here," one would say, "is the +power that has held you. You were bolstered up very loyally by the Krupp +firm and so forth, you piled up shell, guns, war material, you hoped to +snatch your victory before the industrialisation and invention of the +world could turn upon you. But you failed. You were not rapid enough. +The battle of the Marne was your misfortune. And Ypres. You lost some +chances at Ypres. Two can play at destructive industrialism, and now +we out-gun you. We are piling up munitions now faster than you. The +essentials of this Game of the War Lord are idiotically simple, but it +was not of our choosing. It is now merely a question of months before +you make your inevitable admission. This is no war to any great +commander's glory. This gentleman in the bowler hat is the victor, Sire; +not you. Assisted, Sire, by these disrespectful-looking factory girls in +overalls." + +For example, there is M. Citroen. Before the war I understand he made +automobiles; after the war he wants to turn to and make automobiles +again. For the duration of the war he makes shell. He has been +temporarily diverted from constructive to destructive industrialism. He +did me the honours of his factory. He is a compact, active man in dark +clothes and a bowler hat, with a pencil and notebook conveniently at +hand. He talked to me in carefully easy French, and watched my face with +an intelligent eye through his pince-nez for the signs of comprehension. +Then he went on to the next point. + +He took me through every stage of his process. In his office he showed +me the general story. Here were photographs of certain vacant fields +and old sheds--"this place"--he indicated the altered prospect from the +window--"at the outbreak of the war." He showed me a plan of the first +undertaking. "Now we have rather over nine thousand workpeople." + +He showed me a little row of specimens. "These we make for Italy. These +go to Russia. These are the Rumanian pattern." + +Thence to the first stage, the chopping up of the iron bars, the +furnace, the punching out of the first shape of the shell; all this is +men's work. I had seen this sort of thing before in peace ironworks, +but I saw it again with the same astonishment, the absolute precision +of movement on the part of the half-naked sweating men, the calculated +efficiency of each worker, the apparent heedlessness, the real +certitude, with which the blazing hot cylinder is put here, dropped +there, rolls to its next appointed spot, is chopped up and handed on, +the swift passage to the cooling crude, pinkish-purple shell shape. Down +a long line one sees in perspective a practical symmetry, of furnace +and machine group and the shells marching on from this first series +of phases to undergo the long succession of operations, machine after +machine, across the great width of the shed in which eighty per cent +of the workers are women. There is a thick dust of sounds in the air, a +rumble of shafting, sudden thuddings, clankings, and M. Citroen has +to raise his voice. He points out where he has made little changes in +procedures, cut out some wasteful movement.... He has an idea and makes +a note in the ever-ready notebook. + +There is a beauty about all these women, there is extraordinary grace in +their finely adjusted movements. I have come from an after-lunch coffee +upon the boulevards and from watching the ugly fashion of our time; +it is a relief to be reminded that most women can after all be +beautiful--if only they would not "dress." these women wear simple +overalls and caps. In the cap is a rosette. Each shed has its own colour +of rosette. + +"There is much esprit de corps here," says M. Citroen. + +"And also," he adds, showing obverse as well as reverse of the world's +problem of employment and discipline, "we can see at once if a woman is +not in her proper shed." + +Across the great sheds under the shafting--how fine it must look at +night!--the shells march, are shaped, cut, fitted with copper bands, +calibrated, polished, varnished.... + +Then we go on to another system of machines in which lead is reduced to +plastic ribbons and cut into shrapnel bullets as the sweetstuff +makers pull out and cut up sweetstuff. And thence into a warren of hot +underground passages in which run the power cables. There is not a cable +in the place that is not immediately accessible to the electricians. We +visit the dynamos and a vast organisation of switchboards.... + +These things are more familiar to M. Citroen than they are to me. He +wants me to understand, but he does not realise that I would like a +little leisure to wonder. What is interesting him just now, because it +is the newest thing, is his method of paying his workers. He lifts +a hand gravely: "I said, what we must do is abolish altogether the +counting of change." + +At a certain hour, he explained, came pay-time. The people had done; it +was to his interest and their that they should get out of the works +as quickly as possible and rest and amuse themselves. He watched them +standing in queues at the wickets while inside someone counted; so many +francs, so many centimes. It bored him to see this useless, tiresome +waiting. It is abolished. Now at the end of each week the worker goes +to a window under the initial of his name, and is handed a card on which +these items have been entered: + +Balance from last week. So many hours at so much. Premiums. + +The total is so many francs, so many centimes. This is divided into +the nearest round number, 100, 120, 80 francs as the case may be, and a +balance of the odd francs and centimes. The latter is carried forward to +the next week's account. At the bottom of the card is a tear-off coupon +with a stamp, coloured to indicate the round sum, green, let us say, for +100, blue for 130 francs. This is taken to a wicket marked 100 or 130 as +the case may be, and there stands a cashier with his money in piles of +100 or 130 francs counted ready to hand; he sweeps in the coupon, sweeps +out the cash. "_Next!_" + +I became interested in the worker's side of this organisation. I insist +on seeing the entrances, the clothes-changing places, the lavatories, +and so forth of the organisation. As we go about we pass a string of +electric trolleys steered by important-looking girls, and loaded with +shell, finished as far as these works are concerned and on their way +to the railway siding. We visit the hospital, for these works demand a +medical staff. It is not only that men and women faint or fall ill, but +there are accidents, burns, crushings, and the like. The war casualties +begin already here, and they fall chiefly among the women. I saw a +wounded woman with a bandaged face sitting very quietly in the corner. + +The women here face danger, perhaps not quite such obvious danger as the +women who, at the next stage in the shell's career, make and pack the +explosives in their silk casing, but quite considerable risk. And they +work with a real enthusiasm. They know they are fighting the Bloches as +well as any men. Certain of them wear Russian decorations. The women of +this particular factory have been thanked by the Tsar, and a number of +decorations were sent by him for distribution among them. + + +3 + +The shell factory and the explosives shed stand level with the drill +yard as the real first stage in one of the two essential _punches_ in +modern war. When one meets the shell again it is being unloaded from the +railway truck into an ammunition dump. And here the work of control is +much more the work of a good traffic manager than of the old-fashioned +soldier. + +The dump I best remember I visited on a wet and windy day. Over a great +space of ground the sidings of the rail-head spread, the normal gauge +rail-head spread out like a fan and interdigitated with the narrow gauge +lines that go up practically to the guns. And also at the sides camions +were loading, and an officer from the Midi in charge of one of these was +being dramatically indignant at five minutes' delay. Between these +two sets of lines, shells were piled of all sizes, I should think some +hundreds of thousands of shells altogether, wet and shining in the rain. +French reservists, soldiers from Madagascar, and some Senegalese were +busy at different points loading and unloading the precious freights. +A little way from me were despondent-looking German prisoners handling +timber. All this dump was no more than an eddy as it were in the path +of the shell from its birth from the steel bars near Paris to the +accomplishment of its destiny in the destruction or capture of more +Germans. + +And next the visitor meets the shell coming up upon a little trolley to +the gun. He sees the gunners, as drilled and precise as the men he saw +at the forges, swing out the breech block and run the shell, which +has met and combined with its detonators and various other industrial +products since it left the main dump, into the gun. The breech +closes like a safe door, and hides the shell from the visitor. It is +"good-bye." He receives exaggerated warning of the danger to his ears, +stuffs his fingers into them, and opens his mouth as instructed, hears a +loud but by no means deafening report, and sees a spit of flame near the +breech. Regulations of a severe character prevent his watching from an +aeroplane the delivery of the goods upon the customers opposite. + +I have already described the method of locating enemy guns and so forth +by photography. Many of the men at this work are like dentists rather +than soldiers; they are busy in carefully lit rooms, they wear white +overalls, they have clean hands and laboratory manners. The only really +romantic figure in the whole of this process, the only figure that has +anything of the old soldierly swagger about him still, is the aviator. +And, as one friend remarked to me when I visited the work of the +British flying corps, "The real essential strength of this arm is the +organisation of its repairs. Here is one of the repair vans through +which our machine guns go. It is a motor workshop on wheels. But at any +time all this park, everything, can pack up and move forward like +Barnum and Bailey's Circus. The machine guns come through this shop in +rotation; they go out again, cleaned, repaired, made new again. Since we +got all that working we have heard nothing of a machine gun jamming in +any air fight at all."... + +The rest of the career of the shell after it has left the gun one must +imagine chiefly from the incoming shell from the enemy. You see suddenly +a flying up of earth and stones and anything else that is movable in the +neighbourhood of the shell-burst, the instantaneous unfolding of a dark +cloud of dust and reddish smoke, which comes very quickly to a certain +size and then begins slowly to fray out and blow away. Then, after +seeing the cloud of the burst you hear the hiss of the shell's approach, +and finally you are hit by the sound of the explosion. This is the +climax and end of the life history of any shell that is not a dud +shell. Afterwards the battered fuse may serve as some journalist's +paper-weight. The rest is scrap iron. + +Such is, so to speak, the primary process of modern warfare. I will +not draw the obvious pacifist moral of the intense folly of human +concentration upon such a process. The Germans willed it. We Allies +have but obeyed the German will for warfare because we could not do +otherwise, we have taken up this simple game of shell delivery, and we +are teaching them that we can play it better, in the hope that so we +and the world may be freed from the German will-to-power and all its +humiliating and disgusting consequences henceforth for ever. Europe +now is no more than a household engaged in holding up and if possible +overpowering a monomaniac member. + + +4 + +Now the whole of this process of the making and delivery of a shell, +which is the main process of modern warfare, is one that can be far +better conducted by a man accustomed to industrial organisation or +transit work than by the old type of soldier. This is a thing that +cannot be too plainly stated or too often repeated. Germany nearly won +this way because of her tremendously modern industrial resources; but +she blundered into it and she is losing it because she has too many men +in military uniform and because their tradition and interests were to +powerful with her. All the state and glories of soldiering, the bright +uniforms, the feathers and spurs, the flags, the march-past, the +disciplined massed advance, the charge; all these are as needless and +obsolete now in war as the masks and shields of an old-time Chinese +brave. Liberal-minded people talk of the coming dangers of militarism in +the face of events that prove conclusively that professional militarism +is already as dead as Julius Caesar. What is coming is not so much the +conversion of men into soldiers as the socialisation of the economic +organisation of the country with a view to both national and +international necessities. We do not want to turn a chemist or +a photographer into a little figure like a lead soldier, moving +mechanically at the word of command, but we do want to make his +chemistry or photography swiftly available if the national organisation +is called upon to fight. + +We have discovered that the modern economic organisation is in itself a +fighting machine. It is so much so that it is capable of taking on and +defeating quite easily any merely warrior people that is so rash as to +pit itself against it. Within the last sixteen years methods of fighting +have been elaborated that have made war an absolutely hopeless adventure +for any barbaric or non-industrialised people. In the rush of larger +events few people have realised the significance of the rapid squashing +of the Senussi in western Egypt, and the collapse of De Wet's rebellion +in South Africa. Both these struggles would have been long, tedious +and uncertain even in A.D. 1900. This time they have been, so to speak, +child's play. + +Occasionally into the writer's study there come to hand drifting +fragments of the American literature upon the question of +"preparedness," and American papers discussing the Mexican situation. In +none of these is there evident any clear realisation of the fundamental +revolution that has occurred in military methods during the last two +years. It looks as if a Mexican war, for example, was thought of as an +affair of rather imperfectly trained young men with rifles and horses +and old-fashioned things like that. A Mexican war on that level might be +as tedious as the South African war. But if the United States preferred +to go into Mexican affairs with what I may perhaps call a 1916 autumn +outfit instead of the small 1900 outfit she seems to possess at present, +there is no reason why America should not clear up any and every Mexican +guerilla force she wanted to in a few weeks. + +To do that she would need a plant of a few hundred aeroplanes, for the +most part armed with machine guns, and the motor repair vans and so +forth needed to go with the aeroplanes; she would need a comparatively +small army of infantry armed with machine guns, with motor transport, +and a few small land ironclads. Such a force could locate, overtake, +destroy and disperse any possible force that a country in the present +industrial condition of Mexico could put into the field. No sort of +entrenchment or fortification possible in Mexico could stand against +it. It could go from one end of the country to the other without serious +loss, and hunt down and capture anyone it wished.... + +The practical political consequence of the present development of +warfare, of the complete revolution in the conditions of warfare since +this century began, is to make war absolutely hopeless for any +peoples not able either to manufacture or procure the very complicated +appliances and munitions now needed for its prosecution. Countries like +Mexico, Bulgaria, Serbia, Afghanistan or Abyssinia are no more capable +of going to war without the connivance and help of manufacturing states +than horses are capable of flying. And this makes possible such a +complete control of war by the few great states which are at the +necessary level of industrial development as not the most Utopian of us +have hitherto dared to imagine. + + +5 + +Infantrymen with automobile transport, plentiful machine guns, Tanks and +such-like accessories; that is the first Arm in modern war. The factory +hand and all the material of the shell route from the factory to the gun +constitute the second Arm. Thirdly comes the artillery, the guns and the +photographic aeroplanes working with the guns. Next I suppose we +must count sappers and miners as a fourth Arm of greatly increased +importance. The fifth and last combatant Arm is the modern substitute +for cavalry; and that also is essentially a force of aeroplanes +supported by automobiles. Several of the French leaders with whom I +talked seemed to be convinced that the horse is absolutely done with in +modern warfare. There is nothing, they declared, that cavalry ever did +that cannot now be done better by aeroplane. + +This is something to break the hearts of the Prussian junkers and +of old-fashioned British army people. The hunt across the English +countryside, the preservation of the fox as a sacred animal, the race +meeting, the stimulation of betting in all classes of the public; all +these things depend ultimately upon the proposition that the "breed +of horses" is of vital importance to the military strength of Great +Britain. But if the arguments of these able French soldiers are sound, +the cult of the horse ceases to be of any more value to England than the +elegant activities of the Toxophilite Society. Moreover, there has +been a colossal buying of horses for the British army, a tremendous +organisation for the purchase and supply of fodder, then employment +of tens of thousands of men as grooms, minders and the like, who would +otherwise have been in the munition factories or the trenches. + +To what possible use can cavalry be put? Can it be used in attack? +Not against trenches; that is better done by infantrymen following up +gunfire. Can it be used against broken infantry in the open? Not if the +enemy has one or two machine guns covering their retreat. Against expose +infantry the swooping aeroplane with a machine gun is far more deadly +and more difficult to hit. Behind it your infantry can follow to receive +surrenders; in most circumstances they can come up on cycles if it is +a case of getting up quickly across a wide space. Similarly for +pursuit the use of wire and use of the machine gun have abolished the +possibility of a pouring cavalry charge. The swooping aeroplane does +everything that cavalry can do in the way of disorganising the enemy, +and far more than it can do in the way of silencing machine guns. It can +capture guns in retreat much more easily by bombing traction engines +and coming down low and shooting horses and men. An ideal modern +pursuit would be an advance of guns, automobiles full of infantry, motor +cyclists and cyclists, behind a high screen of observation aeroplanes +and a low screen of bombing and fighting aeroplanes. Cavalry _might_ +advance across fields and so forth, but only as a very accessory part of +the general advance.... + +And what else is there for the cavalry to do? + +It may be argued that horses can go over country that is impossible for +automobiles. That is to ignore altogether what has been done in this war +by such devices as caterpillar wheels. So far from cavalry being able to +negotiate country where machines would stick and fail, mechanism can now +ride over places where any horse would flounder. + +I submit these considerations to the horse-lover. They are not my +original observations; they have been put to me and they have convinced +me. Except perhaps as a parent of transport mules I see no further part +henceforth for the horse to play in war. + + +6 + +The form and texture of the coming warfare--if there is still warfare +to come--are not yet to be seen in their completeness upon the modern +battlefield. One swallow does not make a summer, nor a handful of +aeroplanes, a "Tank" or so, a few acres of shell craters, and a village +here and there, pounded out of recognition, do more than foreshadow +the spectacle of modernised war on land. War by these developments has +become the monopoly of the five great industrial powers; it is their +alternative to end or evolve it, and if they continue to disagree, then +it must needs become a spectacle of majestic horror such as no man +can yet conceive. It has been wise of Mr. Pennell therefore, who has +recently been drawing his impressions of the war upon stone, to make +his pictures not upon the battlefield, but among the huge industrial +apparatus that is thrusting behind and thrusting up through the war of +the gentlemen in spurs. He gives us the splendours and immensities of +forge and gun pit, furnace and mine shaft. He shows you how great they +are and how terrible. Among them go the little figures of men, robbed of +all dominance, robbed of all individual quality. He leaves it for you to +draw the obvious conclusion that presently, if we cannot contrive to +put an end to war, blacknessess like these, enormities and flares +and towering threats, will follow in the track of the Tanks and come +trampling over the bickering confusion of mankind. + +There is something very striking in these insignificant and incidental +men that Mr. Pennell shows us. Nowhere does a man dominate in all these +wonderful pictures. You may argue perhaps that that is untrue to the +essential realities; all this array of machine and workshop, all this +marshalled power and purpose, has been the creation of inventor and +business organiser. But are we not a little too free with that word +"_creation_"? Falstaff was a "creation" perhaps, or the Sistine sibyls; +there we have indubitably an end conceived and sought and achieved; but +did these inventors and business organisers do more than heed certain +unavoidable imperatives? Seeking coal they were obliged to mine in a +certain way; seeking steel they had to do this and this and not that and +that; seeking profit they had to obey the imperative of the economy. So +little did they plan their ends that most of these manufacturers speak +with a kind of astonishment of the deadly use to which their works are +put. They find themselves making the new war as a man might wake out of +some drugged condition to find himself strangling his mother. + +So that Mr. Pennell's sketchy and transient human figures seem +altogether right to me. He sees these forges, workshops, cranes and the +like, as inhuman and as wonderful as cliffs or great caves or icebergs +or the stars. They are a new aspect of the logic of physical necessity +that made all these older things, and he seizes upon the majesty and +beauty of their dimensions with an entire impartiality. And they are +as impartial. Through all these lithographs runs one present motif, the +motif of the supreme effort of western civilisation to save itself and +the world from the dominance of the reactionary German Imperialism of +modern science. The pictures are arranged to shape out the life of a +shell, from the mine to the great gun; nothing remains of their +history to show except the ammunition dump, the gun in action and the +shell-burst. Upon this theme all these great appearances are strung +to-day. But to-morrow they may be strung upon some other and nobler +purpose. These gigantic beings of which the engineer is the master +and slave, are neither benevolent nor malignant. To-day they produce +destruction, they are the slaves of the spur; to-morrow we hope they +will bridge and carry and house and help again. + +For that peace we struggle against the dull inflexibility of the German +Will-to-Power. + + + + +V. TANKS + + +1 + +It is the British who have produced the "land ironclad" since I returned +from France, and used it apparently with very good effect. I felt no +little chagrin at not seeing them there, because I have a peculiar +interest in these contrivances. It would be more than human not to +claim a little in this matter. I described one in a story in _The Strand +Magazine_ in 1903, and my story could stand in parallel columns beside +the first account of these monsters in action given by Mr. Beach Thomas +or Mr. Philip Gibbs. My friend M. Joseph Reinach has successfully +passed off long extracts from my story as descriptions of the Tanks upon +British officers who had just seen them. The filiation was indeed quite +traceable. They were my grandchildren--I felt a little like King Lear +when first I read about them. Yet let me state at once that I was +certainly not their prime originator. I took up an idea, manipulated +it slightly, and handed it on. The idea was suggested to me by the +contrivances of a certain Mr. Diplock, whose "ped-rail" notion, the +notion of a wheel that was something more than a wheel, a wheel that +would take locomotives up hill-sides and over ploughed fields, was +public property nearly twenty years ago. Possibly there were others +before Diplock. To the Ped-rail also Commander Murray Sueter, one of the +many experimentalists upon the early tanks, admits his indebtedness, +and it would seem that Mr. Diplock was actually concerned in the earlier +stage of the tanks. + +Since my return I have been able to see the Tank at home, through the +courtesy of the Ministry of Munitions. They have progressed far beyond +any recognisable resemblance to the initiatives of Mr. Diplock; they +have approximated rather to the American caterpillar. As I suspected +when first I heard of these devices, the War Office and the old army +people had practically nothing to do with their development. They took +to it very reluctantly--as they have taken to every novelty in this +war. One brilliant general scrawled over an early proposal the entirely +characteristic comment that it was a pity the inventor could not use his +imagination to better purpose. (That foolish British trick of sneering +at "imagination" has cost us hundreds of thousands of useless casualties +and may yet lose us the war.) Tanks were first mooted at the front about +a year and a half ago; Mr. Winston Churchill was then asking questions +about their practicability; he filled many simple souls with terror; +they thought him a most dangerous lunatic. The actual making of the +Tanks arose as an irregular side development of the armoured-car branch +of the Royal Naval Air Service work. The names most closely associated +with the work are (I quote a reply of Dr. Macnamara's in the House of +Commons) Mr. d'Eyncourt, the Director of Naval Construction, Mr. W. O. +Tritton, Lieut. Wilson, R.N.A.S., Mr. Bussell, Lieut. Stern, R.N.A.S., +who is now Colonel Stern, Captain Symes, and Mr. F. Skeens. There are +many other claims too numerous to mention in detail. + +But however much the Tanks may disconcert the gallant Colonel Newcomes +who throw an air of restraint over our victorious front, there can be no +doubt that they are an important as well as a novel development of the +modern offensive. Of course neither the Tanks nor their very obvious +next developments going to wrest the decisive pre-eminence from the +aeroplane. The aeroplane remains now more than ever the instrument of +victory upon the western front. Aerial ascendancy, properly utilised, is +victory. But the mobile armoured big gun and the Tank as a machine-gun +silencer must enormously facilitate an advance against the blinded +enemy. Neither of them can advance against properly aimed big gun fire. +That has to be disposed of before they make their entrance. It remains +the function of the aeroplane to locate the hostile big guns and +to direct the _tir de demolition_ upon them before the advance +begins--possibly even to bomb them out. But hitherto, after the +destruction of driving back of the defender's big guns has been +effected, the dug-out and the machine gun have still inflicted heavy +losses upon the advancing infantry until the fight is won. So soon as +the big guns are out, the tanks will advance, destroying machine guns, +completing the destruction of the wire, and holding prisoners immobile. +Then the infantry will follow to gather in the sheaves. +Multitudinously produced and--I write it with a defiant eye on Colonel +Newcome--_properly handled_, these land ironclads are going to do very +great things in shortening the war, in pursuit, in breaking up the +retreating enemy. Given the air ascendancy, and I am utterly unable to +imagine any way of conclusively stopping or even greatly delaying an +offensive thus equipped. + + +2 + +The young of even the most horrible beasts have something piquant and +engaging about them, and so I suppose it is in the way of things that +the land ironclad which opens a new and more dreadful and destructive +phase in the human folly of warfare, should appear first as if it were a +joke. Never has any such thing so completely masked its wickedness under +an appearance of genial silliness. The Tank is a creature to which one +naturally flings a pet name; the five or six I was shown wandering, +rooting and climbing over obstacles, round a large field near X, were as +amusing and disarming as a little of lively young pigs. + +At first the War Office prevented the publication of any pictures or +descriptions of these contrivances except abroad; then abruptly the +embargo was relaxed, and the press was flooded with photographs. The +reader will be familiar now with their appearance. They resemble +large slugs with an underside a little like the flattened rockers of +a rocking-horse, slugs between 20 and 40 feet long. They are like +flat-sided slugs, slugs of spirit, who raise an enquiring snout, like +the snout of a dogfish, into the air. They crawl upon their bellies in +a way that would be tedious to describe to the general reader and +unnecessary to describe to the enquiring specialists. They go over the +ground with the sliding speed of active snails. Behind them trail two +wheels, supporting a flimsy tail, wheels that strike one as incongruous +as if a monster began kangaroo and ended doll's perambulator. (These +wheels annoy me.) They are not steely monsters; they are painted with +drab and unassuming colours that are fashionable in modern warfare, so +that the armour seems rather like the integument of a rhinoceros. At the +sides of the head project armoured checks, and from above these stick +out guns that look like stalked eyes. That is the general appearance of +the contemporary tank. + +It slides on the ground; the silly little wheels that so detract from +the genial bestiality of its appearance dandle and bump behind it. It +swings about its axis. It comes to an obstacle, a low wall let us say, +or a heap of bricks, and sets to work to climb it with its snout. It +rears over the obstacle, it raises its straining belly, it overhangs +more and more, and at last topples forward; it sways upon the heap and +then goes plunging downwards, sticking out the weak counterpoise of its +wheeled tail. If it comes to a house or a tree or a wall or such-like +obstruction it rams against it so as to bring all its weight to bear +upon it--it weighs _some_ tons--and then climbs over the debris. I saw +it, and incredulous soldiers of experience watched it at the same time, +cross trenches and wallow amazingly through muddy exaggerations of small +holes. Then I repeated the tour inside. + +Again the Tank is like a slug. The slug, as every biological student +knows, is unexpectedly complicated inside. The Tank is as crowded +with inward parts as a battleship. It is filled with engines, guns and +ammunition, and in the interstices men. + +"You will smash your hat," said Colonel Stern. "No; keep it on, or else +you will smash your head." + +Only Mr. C. R. W. Nevinson could do justice to the interior of a Tank. +You see a hand gripping something; you see the eyes and forehead of +an engineer's face; you perceive that an overall bluishness beyond the +engine is the back of another man. "Don't hold that," says someone; "it +is too hot. Hold on to that." The engines roar, so loudly that I doubt +whether one could hear guns without; the floor begins to slope and +slopes until one seems to be at forty-five degrees or thereabouts; then +the whole concern swings up and sways and slants the other way. You have +crossed a bank. You heel sideways. Through the door which has been left +open you see the little group of engineers, staff officers and naval men +receding and falling away behind you. You straighten up and go up hill. +You halt and begin to rotate. Through the open door, the green field, +with its red walls, rows of worksheds and forests of chimneys in +the background, begins a steady processional movement. The group of +engineers and officers and naval men appears at the other side of the +door and farther off. Then comes a sprint down hill. You descend and +stretch your legs. + +About the field other Tanks are doing their stunts. One is struggling in +an apoplectic way in the mud pit with a cheek half buried. It noses its +way out and on with an air of animal relief. + +They are like jokes by Heath Robinson. One forgets that these things +have already saved the lives of many hundreds of our soldiers and +smashed and defeated thousands of Germans. + +Said one soldier to me: "In the old attacks you used to see the British +dead lying outside the machine-gun emplacements like birds outside a +butt with a good shot inside. _Now_, these things walk through." + + +3 + +I saw other things that day at X. The Tank is only a beginning in a new +phase of warfare. Of these other things I may only write in the most +general terms. + +But though Tanks and their collaterals are being made upon a very +considerable scale in X, already I realised as I walked through gigantic +forges as high and marvellous as cathedrals, and from workshed to +workshed where gun carriages, ammunition carts and a hundred such things +were flowing into existence with the swelling abundance of a river that +flows out of a gorge, that as the demand for the new developments +grows clear and strong, the resources of Britain are capable still of +a tremendous response. _If only we do not rob these great factories and +works of their men._ + +Upon this question certain things need to be said very plainly. The +decisive factor in the sort of war we are now waging is production and +right use of mechanical material; victory in this war depends now +upon three things: the aeroplane, the gun, and the Tank developments. +These--and not crowds of men--are the prime necessity for a successful +offensive. Every man we draw from munition making to the ranks brings +our western condition nearer to the military condition of Russia. In +these things we may be easily misled by military "experts" We have to +remember that the military "expert" is a man who learnt his business +before 1914, and that the business of war has been absolutely +revolutionised since 1914; the military expert is a man trained to think +of war as essentially an affair of cavalry, infantry in formation, and +field guns, whereas cavalry is entirely obsolete, infantry no longer +fights in formation, and the methods of gunnery have been entirely +changed. The military man I observe still runs about the world in spurs, +he travels in trains in spurs, he walks in spurs, he thinks in terms of +spurs. He has still to discover that it is about as ridiculous as if he +were to carry a crossbow. I take it these spurs are only the outward and +visible sign of an inward obsolescence. The disposition of the military +"expert" is still to think too little of machinery and to demand too +much of the men. Behind our front at the time of my visit there were, +for example, many thousands of cavalry, men tending horses, men engaged +in transporting bulky fodder for horses and the like. These men were +doing about as much in this war as if they had been at Timbuctoo. Every +man who is taken from munition making at X to spur-worshipping in khaki, +is a dead loss to the military efficiency of the country. Every man that +is needed or is likely to be needed for the actual operations of +modern warfare can be got by combing out the cavalry, the brewing +and distilling industries, the theatres and music halls, and the like +unproductive occupations. The under-staffing of munition works, the +diminution of their efficiency by the use of aged and female labour, is +the straight course to failure in this war. + +In X, in the forges and machine shops, I saw already too large a +proportion of boys and grey heads. + +War is a thing that changes very rapidly, and we have in the Tanks only +the first of a great series of offensive developments. They are bound to +be improved, at a great pace. The method of using them will change very +rapidly. Any added invention will necessitate the scrapping of old types +and the production of the new patterns in quantity. It is of supreme +necessity to the Allies if they are to win this war outright that the +lead in inventions and enterprise which the British have won over the +Germans in this matter should be retained. It is our game now to press +the advantage for all it is worth. We have to keep ahead to win. We +cannot do so unless we have unstinted men and unstinted material to +produce each new development as its use is realised. + +Given that much, the Tank will enormously enhance the advantage of the +new offensive method on the French front; the method that is of gun +demolition after aerial photography, followed by an advance; it is a +huge addition to our prospect of decisive victory. What does it do? +It solves two problems. The existing Tank affords a means of advancing +against machine-gun fire and of destroying wire and machine guns without +much risk of loss, so soon as the big guns have done their duty by the +enemy guns. And also behind the Tank itself, it is useless to conceal, +lies the possibility of bringing up big guns and big gun ammunition, +across nearly any sort of country, as fast as the advance can press +forward. Hitherto every advance has paid a heavy toll to the machine +gun, and every advance has had to halt after a couple of miles or so +while the big guns (taking five or six days for the job) toiled up to +the new positions. + + +4 + +It is impossible to restrain a note of sharp urgency from what one has +to say about these developments. The Tanks remove the last technical +difficulties in our way to decisive victory and a permanent peace; they +also afford a reason for straining every nerve to bring about a decision +and peace soon. At the risk of seeming an imaginative alarmist I would +like to point out the reasons these things disclose for hurrying this +war to a decision and doing our utmost to arrange the world's affairs +so as to make another war improbable. Already these serio-comic Tanks, +weighing something over twenty tons or so, have gone slithering around +and sliding over dead and wounded men. That is not an incident for +sensitive minds to dwell upon, but it is a mere little child's play +anticipation of what the big land ironclads _that are bound to come if +there is no world pacification_, are going to do. + +What lies behind the Tank depends upon this fact; there is no definable +upward limit of mass. Upon that I would lay all the stress possible, +because everything turns upon that. + +You cannot make a land ironclad so big and heavy but that you cannot +make a caterpillar track wide enough and strong enough to carry it +forward. Tanks are quite possible that will carry twenty-inch or +twenty-five inch guns, besides minor armament. Such Tanks may be +undesirable; the production may exceed the industrial resources of +any empire to produce; but there is no inherent impossibility in such +things. There are not even the same limitations as to draught and +docking accommodation that sets bounds to the size of battleships. It +follows, therefore, as a necessary deduction that if the world's affairs +are so left at the end of the war that the race of armaments continues, +that Tank will develop steadily into a tremendous instrument of warfare, +driven by engines of scores of thousands of horse-power, tracking on +a track scores of hundreds of yards wide and weighing hundreds or +thousands of tons. Nothing but a world agreement not to do so can +prevent this logical development of the land ironclad. Such a structure +will make wheel-ruts scores of feet deep; it will plough up, devastate +and destroy the country it passes over altogether. + +For my own part I never imagined the land ironclad idea would get loose +into war. I thought that the military intelligence was essentially +unimaginative and that such an aggressive military power as Germany, +dominated by military people, would never produce anything of the sort. +I thought that this war would be fought out without Tanks and that then +war would come to an end. For of course it is mere stupidity that makes +people doubt the ultimate ending of war. I have been so far justified +in these expectations of mine, that it is not from military sources that +these things have come. They have been thrust upon the soldiers from +without. But now that they are loose, now that they are in war, we have +to face their full possibilities, to use our advantage in them and press +on to the end of the war. In support of a photo-aero directed artillery, +even our present Tanks can be used to complete an invisible offensive. +We shall not so much push as ram. It is doubtful if the Germans can get +anything of the sort into action before six months are out. We ought to +get the war on to German soil before the Tanks have grown to more than +three or four times their present size. Then it will not matter so much +how much bigger they grow. It will be the German landscape that will +suffer. + +After one has seen the actual Tanks it is not very difficult to close +one's eyes and figure the sort of Tank that may be arguing with Germany +in a few months' time about the restoration of Belgium and Serbia and +France, the restoration of the sunken tonnage, the penalties of the +various Zeppelin and submarine murders, the freedom of seas and land +alike from piracy, the evacuation of all Poland including Posen and +Cracow, and the guarantees for the future peace of Europe. The machine +will be perhaps as big as a destroyer and more heavily armed and +equipped. It will swim over and through the soil at a pace of ten or +twelve miles an hour. In front of it will be corn, land, neat woods, +orchards, pasture, gardens, villages and towns. It will advance upon its +belly with a swaying motion, devouring the ground beneath it. Behind it +masses of soil and rock, lumps of turf, splintered wood, bits of houses, +occasional streaks of red, will drop from its track, and it will leave +a wake, six or seven times as wide as a high road, from which all soil, +all cultivation, all semblance to cultivated or cultivatable land will +have disappeared. It will not even be a track of soil. It will be a +track of subsoil laid bare. It will be a flayed strip of nature. In the +course of its fighting the monster may have to turnabout. It will then +halt and spin slowly round, grinding out an arena of desolation with +a diameter equal to its length. If it has to retreat and advance again +these streaks and holes of destruction will increase and multiply. +Behind the fighting line these monsters will manoeuvre to and fro, +destroying the land for all ordinary agricultural purposes for ages to +come. The first imaginative account of the land ironclad that was ever +written concluded with the words, "They are the _reductio ad absurdum_ +of war." They are, and it is to the engineers, the ironmasters, the +workers and the inventive talent of Great Britain and France that we +must look to ensure that it is in Germany, the great teacher of war, +that this demonstration of war's ultimate absurdity is completed. + +For forty years Frankenstein Germany invoked war, turned every +development of material and social science to aggressive ends, and at +last when she felt the time was ripe she let loose the new monster that +she had made of war to cow the spirit of mankind. She set the thing +trampling through Belgium. She cannot grumble if at last it comes home, +stranger and more dreadful even than she made it, trampling the German +towns and fields with German blood upon it and its eyes towards Berlin. + +This logical development of the Tank idea may seem a gloomy prospect for +mankind. But it is open to question whether the tremendous development +of warfare that has gone on in the last two years does after all open a +prospect of unmitigated gloom. There has been a good deal of cheap and +despondent sneering recently at the phrase, "The war that will end war." +It is still possible to maintain that that may be a correct description +of this war. It has to be remembered that war, as the aeroplane and +the Tank have made it, has already become an impossible luxury for any +barbaric or uncivilised people. War on the grade that has been achieved +on the Somme predicates an immense industrialism behind it. Of all the +States in the world only four can certainly be said to be fully capable +of sustaining war at the level to which it has now been brought upon the +western front. These are Britain, France, Germany, and the United States +of America. Less certainly equal to the effort are Italy, Japan, Russia, +and Austria. These eight powers are the only powers _capable of warfare +under modern conditions._ Five are already Allies and one is incurably +pacific. There is no other power or people in the world that can go to +war now without the consent and connivance of these great powers. If +we consider their alliances, we may count it that the matter rests now +between two groups of Allies and one neutral power. So that while on +the one hand the development of modern warfare of which the Tank is the +present symbol opens a prospect of limitless senseless destruction, it +opens on the other hand a prospect of organised world control. This +Tank development must ultimately bring the need of a real permanent +settlement within the compass of the meanest of diplomatic +intelligences. A peace that will restore competitive armaments has now +become a less desirable prospect for everyone than a continuation of the +war. Things were bad enough before, when the land forces were still in +a primitive phase of infantry, cavalry and artillery, and when the only +real race to develop monsters and destructors was for sea power. But the +race for sea power before 1914 was mere child's play to the breeding +of engineering monstrosities for land warfare that must now follow any +indeterminate peace settlement. I am no blind believer in the wisdom of +mankind, but I cannot believe that men are so insensate and headstrong +as to miss the plain omens of the present situation. + +So that after all the cheerful amusement the sight of a Tank causes may +not be so very unreasonable. These things may be no more than one of +those penetrating flashes of wit that will sometimes light up and dispel +the contentions of an angry man. If they are not that, then they are the +grimmest jest that ever set men grinning. Wait and see, if you do not +believe me. + + + + +HOW PEOPLE THINK ABOUT THE WAR + + + + +I. DO THEY REALLY THINK AT ALL? + +All human affairs are mental affairs; the bright ideas of to-day are the +realities of to-morrow. The real history of mankind is the history of +how ideas have arisen, how they have taken possession of men's minds, +how they have struggled, altered, proliferated, decayed. There is +nothing in this war at all but a conflict of ideas, traditions, and +mental habits. The German Will clothed in conceptions of aggression and +fortified by cynical falsehood, struggles against the fundamental sanity +of the German mind and the confused protest of mankind. So that the most +permanently important thing in the tragic process of this war is the +change of opinion that is going on. What are people making of it? Is it +producing any great common understandings, any fruitful unanimities? + +No doubt it is producing enormous quantities of cerebration, but is it +anything more than chaotic and futile cerebration? We are told all +sorts of things in answer to that, things without a scrap of evidence +or probability to support them. It is, we are assured, turning people to +religion, making them moral and thoughtful. It is also, we are assured +with equal confidence, turning them to despair and moral disaster. It +will be followed by (1) a period of moral renascence, and (2) a debauch. +It is going to make the workers (1) more and (2) less obedient and +industrious. It is (1) inuring men to war and (2) filling them with a +passionate resolve never to suffer war again. And so on. I propose now +to ask what is really happening in this matter? How is human opinion +changing? I have opinions of my own and they are bound to colour my +discussion. The reader must allow for that, and as far as possible I +will remind him where necessary to make his allowance. + +Now first I would ask, is any really continuous and thorough +mental process going on at all about this war? I mean, is there any +considerable number of people who are seeing it as a whole, taking it in +as a whole, trying to get a general idea of it from which they can form +directing conclusions for the future? Is there any considerable number +of people even trying to do that? At any rate let me point out first +that there is quite an enormous mass of people who--in spite of the fact +that their minds are concentrated on aspects of this war, who are at +present hearing, talking, experiencing little else than the war--are +nevertheless neither doing nor trying to do anything that deserves to +be called thinking about it at all. They may even be suffering quite +terribly by it. But they are no more mastering its causes, reasons, +conditions, and the possibility of its future prevention than a monkey +that has been rescued in a scorching condition from the burning of a +house will have mastered the problem of a fire. It is just happening to +and about them. It may, for anything they have learnt about it, happen +to them again. + +A vast majority of people are being swamped by the spectacular side of +the business. It was very largely my fear of being so swamped myself +that made me reluctant to go as a spectator to the front. I knew that my +chances of being hit by a bullet were infinitesimal, but I was extremely +afraid of being hit by some too vivid impression. I was afraid that I +might see some horribly wounded man or some decayed dead body that would +so scar my memory and stamp such horror into me as to reduce me to a +mere useless, gibbering, stop-the-war-at-any-price pacifist. Years ago +my mind was once darkened very badly for some weeks with a kind of fear +and distrust of life through a sudden unexpected encounter one tranquil +evening with a drowned body. But in this journey in Italy and France, +although I have had glimpses of much death and seen many wounded men, +I have had no really horrible impressions at all. That side of the +business has, I think, been overwritten. The thing that haunts me most +is the impression of a prevalent relapse into extreme untidiness, of +a universal discomfort, of fields, and of ruined houses treated +disregardfully.... But that is not what concerns us now in this +discussion. What concerns us now is the fact that this war is producing +spectacular effects so tremendous and incidents so strange, so +remarkable, so vivid, that the mind forgets both causes and consequences +and simply sits down to stare. + +For example, there is this business of the Zeppelin raids in England. It +is a supremely silly business; it is the most conclusive demonstration +of the intellectual inferiority of the German to the Western European +that is should ever have happened. There was the clearest _a priori_ +case against the gas-bag. I remember the discussions ten or twelve years +ago in which it was established to the satisfaction of every reasonable +man that ultimately the "heavier than air" machine (as we called it +then) must fly better than the gas-bag, and still more conclusively +that no gas-bag was conceivable that could hope to fight and defeat +aeroplanes. Nevertheless the German, with that dull faith of his in mere +"Will," persisted along his line. He knew instinctively that he could +not produce aviators to meet the Western European; all his social +instincts made him cling to the idea of a great motherly, almost +sow-like bag of wind above him. At an enormous waste of resources +Germany has produced these futile monsters, that drift in the darkness +over England promiscuously dropping bombs on fields and houses. They +are now meeting the fate that was demonstrably certain ten years ago. +If they found us unready for them it is merely that we were unable to +imagine so idiotic an enterprise would ever be seriously sustained and +persisted in. We did not believe in the probability of Zeppelin raids +any more than we believed that Germany would force the world into war. +It was a thing too silly to be believed. But they came--to their certain +fate. In the month after I returned from France and Italy, no less than +four of these fatuities were exploded and destroyed within thirty miles +of my Essex home.... There in chosen phrases you have the truth about +these things. But now mark the perversion of thought due to spectacular +effect. + +I find over the Essex countryside, which has been for more than a year +and a half a highway for Zeppelins, a new and curious admiration for +them that has arisen out of these very disasters. Previously they were +regarded with dislike and a sort of distrust, as one might regard a +sneaking neighbour who left his footsteps in one's garden at night. But +the Zeppelins of Billericay and Potter's Bar are--heroic things. (The +Cuffley one came down too quickly, and the fourth one which came down +for its crew to surrender is despised.) I have heard people describe the +two former with eyes shining with enthusiasm. + +"First," they say, "you saw a little round red glow that spread. Then +you saw the whole Zeppelin glowing. Oh, it was _beautiful!_ Then it +began to turn over and come down, and it flames and pieces began to +break away. And then down it came, leaving flaming pieces all up the +sky. At last it was a pillar of fire eight thousand feet high.... +Everyone said, 'Ooooo!' And then someone pointed out the little +aeroplane lit up by the flare--such a leetle thing up there in +the night! It is the greatest thing I have ever seen. Oh! the most +wonderful--most wonderful!" + +There is a feeling that the Germans really must after all be a splendid +people to provide such magnificent pyrotechnics. + +Some people in London the other day were pretending to be shocked by an +American who boasted that he had been in "two _bully_ bombardments," +but he was only saying what everyone feels more or less. We are at +a spectacle that--as a spectacle--our grandchildren will envy. I +understand now better the story of the man who stared at the sparks +raining up from his own house as it burnt in the night and whispered +"_Lovely! Lovely!_" + +The spectacular side of the war is really an enormous distraction from +thought. And against thought there also fights the native indolence of +the human mind. The human mind, it seems, was originally developed to +think about the individual; it thinks reluctantly about the species. +It takes refuge from that sort of thing if it possibly can. And so +the second great preventive of clear thinking is the tranquillising +platitude. + +The human mind is an instrument very easily fatigued. Only a few +exceptions go on thinking restlessly--to the extreme exasperation of +their neighbours. The normal mind craves for decisions, even wrong or +false decisions rather than none. It clutches at comforting falsehoods. +It loves to be told, "_There_, don't you worry. That'll be all right. +That's _settled._" This war has come as an almost overwhelming challenge +to mankind. To some of us it seems as it if were the Sphynx proffering +the alternative of its riddle or death. Yet the very urgency of this +challenge to think seems to paralyse the critical intelligence of very +many people altogether. They will say, "This war is going to produce +enormous changes in everything." They will then subside mentally with a +feeling of having covered the whole ground in a thoroughly safe manner. +Or they will adopt an air of critical aloofness. They will say, "How +is it possible to foretell what may happen in this tremendous sea of +change?" And then, with an air of superior modesty, they will go on +doing--whatever they feel inclined to do. Many others, a degree less +simple in their methods, will take some entirely partial aspect, arrive +at some guesswork decision upon that, and then behave as though that met +every question we have to face. Or they will make a sort of admonitory +forecast that is conditional upon the good behaviour of other people. +"Unless the Trade Unions are more reasonable," they will say. Or, +"Unless the shipping interest is grappled with and controlled." Or, +"Unless England wakes up." And with that they seem to wash their hands +of further responsibility for the future. + +One delightful form of put-off is the sage remark, "Let us finish the +war first, and then let us ask what is going to happen after it." One +likes to think of the beautiful blank day after the signing of the peace +when these wise minds swing round to pick up their deferred problems.... + +I submit that a man has not done his duty by himself as a rational +creature unless he has formed an idea of what is going on, as one +complicated process, until he has formed an idea sufficiently definite +for him to make it the basis of a further idea, which is his own +relationship to that process. He must have some notion of what the +process is going to do to him, and some notion of what he means to do, +if he can, to the process. That is to say, he must not only have an idea +how the process is going, but also an idea of how he wants it to go. It +seems so natural and necessary for a human brain to do this that it is +hard to suppose that everyone has not more or less attempted it. But +few people, in Great Britain at any rate, have the habit of frank +expression, and when people do not seem to have made out any of these +things for themselves there is a considerable element of secretiveness +and inexpressiveness to be allowed for before we decide that they have +not in some sort of fashion done so. Still, after all allowances have +been made, there remains a vast amount of jerry-built and ready-made +borrowed stuff in most of people's philosophies of the war. The systems +of authentic opinion in this world of thought about the war are like +comparatively rare thin veins of living mentality in a vast world of +dead repetitions and echoed suggestions. And that being the case, it is +quite possible that history after the war, like history before the war, +will not be so much a display of human will and purpose as a resultant +of human vacillations, obstructions, and inadvertences. We shall still +be in a drama of blind forces following the line of least resistance. + +One of the people who is often spoken of as if he were doing an enormous +amount of concentrated thinking is "the man in the trenches." We are +told--by gentlemen writing for the most part at home--of the most +extraordinary things that are going on in those devoted brains, how they +are getting new views about the duties of labour, religion, morality, +monarchy, and any other notions that the gentleman at home happens to +fancy and wished to push. Now that is not at all the impression of the +khaki mentality I have reluctantly accepted as correct. For the most +part the man in khaki is up against a round of tedious immediate duties +that forbid consecutive thought; he is usually rather crowded and not +very comfortable. He is bored. + +The real horror of modern war, when all is said and done, is the +boredom. To get killed our wounded may be unpleasant, but it is at +any rate interesting; the real tragedy is in the desolated fields, the +desolated houses, the desolated hours and days, the bored and desolated +minds that hang behind the melee and just outside the melee. The +peculiar beastliness of the German crime is the way the German war cant +and its consequences have seized upon and paralysed the mental movement +of Western Europe. Before 1914 war was theoretically unpopular in every +European country; we thought of it as something tragic and dreadful. +Now everyone knows by experience that it is something utterly dirty and +detestable. We thought it was the Nemean lion, and we have found it +is the Augean stable. But being bored by war and hating war is quite +unproductive _unless you are thinking about its nature and causes +so thoroughly that you will presently be able to take hold of it and +control it and end it._ It is no good for everyone to say unanimously, +"We will have no more war," unless you have thought out how to avoid it, +and mean to bring that end about. It is as if everyone said, "We will +have no more catarrh," or "no more flies," or "no more east wind." And +my point is that the immense sorrows at home in every European country +and the vast boredom of the combatants are probably not really producing +any effective remedial mental action at all, and will not do so unless +we get much more thoroughly to work upon the thinking-out process. + +In such talks as I could get with men close up to the front I found +beyond this great boredom and attempts at distraction only very +specialised talk about changes in the future. Men were keen upon +questions of army promotion, of the future of conscription, of the +future of the temporary officer, upon the education of boys in relation +to army needs. But the war itself was bearing them all upon its way, +as unquestioned and uncontrolled as if it were the planet on which they +lived. + + + + +II. THE YIELDING PACIFIST AND THE CONSCIENTIOUS OBJECTOR + + +1 Among the minor topics that people are talking about behind the +western fronts is the psychology of the Yielding Pacifist and the +Conscientious Objector. Of course, we are all pacifists nowadays; I know +of no one who does not want not only to end this war but to put an end +to war altogether, except those blood-red terrors Count Reventlow, Mr. +Leo Maxse--how he does it on a vegetarian dietary I cannot imagine!--and +our wild-eyed desperados of _The Morning Post._ But most of the people +I meet, and most of the people I met on my journey, are pacifists like +myself who want to _make_ peace by beating the armed man until he gives +in and admits the error of his ways, disarming him and reorganising the +world for the forcible suppression of military adventures in the future. +They want belligerency put into the same category as burglary, as a +matter of forcible suppression. The Yielding Pacifist who will accept +any sort of peace, and the Conscientious Objector who will not fight at +all, are not of that opinion. + +Both Italy and France produce parallel types to those latter, but it +would seem that in each case England displays the finer developments. +The Latin mind is directer than the English, and its standards--shall +I say?--more primitive; it gets more directly to the fact that here are +men who will not fight. And it is less charitable. I was asked quite a +number of times for the English equivalent of an _embusque._ "We don't +generalise," I said, "we treat each case on its merits!" + +One interlocutor near Udine was exercised by our Italian Red Cross work. + +"Here," he said, "are sixty or seventy young Englishmen, all fit for +military service.... Of course they go under fire, but it is not like +being junior officers in the trenches. Not one of them has been killed +or wounded." + +He reflected. "One, I think, has been decorated," he said.... + +My French and Italian are only for very rough common jobs; when it came +to explaining the Conscientious Objector sympathetically they broke +down badly. I had to construct long parenthetical explanations of +our antiquated legislative methods to show how it was that the +"conscientious objector" had been so badly defined. The foreigner does +not understand the importance of vague definition in British life. +"Practically, of course, we offered to exempt anyone who conscientiously +objected to fight or serve. Then the Pacifist and German people started +a campaign to enrol objectors. Of course every shirker, every coward and +slacker in the country decided at once to be a conscientious objector. +Anyone but a British legislator could have foreseen that. Then we +started Tribunals to wrangle with the objectors about their _bona +fides._ Then the Pacifists and the Pro-Germans issued little leaflets +and started correspondence courses to teach people exactly how to lie to +the Tribunals. Trouble about freedom of the pamphleteer followed. I had +to admit--it has been rather a sloppy business. The people who made the +law knew their own minds, but we English are not an expressive people." + +These are not easy things to say in Elementary (and slightly Decayed) +French or in Elementary and Corrupt Italian. + +"But why do people support the sham conscientious objector and issue +leaflets to help him--when there is so much big work clamouring to be +done?" + +"That," I said, "is the Whig tradition." + +When they pressed me further, I said: "I am really the questioner. I +am visiting _your_ country, and you have to tell _me_ things. It is +not right that I should do all the telling. Tell me all about Romain +Rolland." + +And so I pressed them about the official socialists in Italy and the +Socialist minority in France until I got the question out of the net +of national comparisons and upon a broader footing. In several +conversations we began to work out in general terms the psychology of +those people who were against the war. But usually we could not get to +that; my interlocutors would insist upon telling me just what they would +like to do or just what they would like to see done to stop-the-war +pacifists and conscientious objectors; pleasant rather than fruitful +imaginative exercises from which I could effect no more than +platitudinous uplifts. + +But the general drift of such talks as did seem to penetrate the +question was this, that among these stop-the-war people there are really +three types. First there is a type of person who hates violence and +the infliction of pain under any circumstances, and who have a mystical +belief in the rightness (and usually the efficacy) of non-resistance. +These are generally Christians, and then their cardinal text is the +instruction to "turn the other cheek." Often they are Quakers. If they +are consistent they are vegetarians and wear _Lederlos_ boots. They do +not desire police protection for their goods. They stand aloof from all +the force and conflict of life. They have always done so. This is an +understandable and respectable type. It has numerous Hindu equivalents. +It is a type that finds little difficulty about exemptions--provided the +individual has not been too recently converted to his present habits. +But it is not the prevalent type in stop-the-war circles. Such genuine +ascetics do not number more than a thousand or so, all three of our +western allied countries. The mass of the stop-the-war people is made up +quite other elements. + + +2 + +In the complex structure of the modern community there are two groups +or strata or pockets in which the impulse of social obligation, the +gregarious sense of a common welfare, is at its lowest; one of these is +the class of the Resentful Employee, the class of people who, without +explanation, adequate preparation or any chance, have been shoved at an +early age into uncongenial work and never given a chance to escape, and +the other is the class of people with small fixed incomes or with small +salaries earnt by routine work, or half independent people practising +some minor artistic or literary craft, who have led uneventful, +irresponsible lives from their youth up, and never came at any point +into relations of service to the state. This latter class was more +difficult to define than the former--because it is more various within +itself. My French friends wanted to talk of the "Psychology of the +Rentier." I was for such untranslatable phrases as the "Genteel Whig," +or the "Donnish Liberal." But I lit up an Italian--he is a Milanese +manufacturer--with "these Florentine English who would keep Italy in a +glass case." "I know," he said. Before I go on to expand this congenial +theme, let me deal first with the Resentful Employee, who is a much +more considerable, and to me a much more sympathetic, figure in European +affairs. I began life myself as a Resentful Employee. By the extremest +good luck I have got my mind and spirit out of the distortions of that +cramping beginning, but I can still recall even the anger of those old +days. + +He becomes an employee between thirteen and fifteen; he is made to do +work he does not like for no other purpose that he can see except the +profit and glory of a fortunate person called his employer, behind whom +stand church and state blessing and upholding the relationship. He is +not allowed to feel that he has any share whatever in the employer's +business, or that any end is served but the employer's profit. He cannot +see that the employer acknowledges any duty to the state. Neither church +nor state seems to insist that the employer has any public function. +At no point does the employee come into a clear relationship of mutual +obligation with the state. There does not seem to be any way out for the +employee from a life spent in this subordinate, toilsome relationship. +He feels put upon and cheated out of life. He is without honour. If +he is a person of ability or stubborn temper he struggles out of his +position; if he is a kindly and generous person he blames his "luck" and +does his work and lives his life as cheerfully as possible--and so live +the bulk of our amazing European workers; if he is a being of great +magnanimity he is content to serve for the ultimate good of the race; if +he has imagination, he says, "Things will not always be like this," +and becomes a socialist or a guild socialist, and tries to educate the +employer to a sense of reciprocal duty; but if he is too human for any +of these things, then he begins to despise and hate the employer and the +system that made him. He wants to hurt them. Upon that hate it is easy +to trade. + +A certain section of what is called the Socialist press and the +Socialist literature in Europe is no doubt great-minded; it seeks to +carve a better world out of the present. But much of it is socialist +only in name. Its spirit is Anarchistic. Its real burthen is not +construction but grievance; it tells the bitter tale of the employee, it +feeds and organises his malice, it schemes annoyance and injury for the +hated employer. The state and the order of the world is confounded with +the capitalist. Before the war the popular so-called socialist press +reeked with the cant of rebellion, the cant of any sort of rebellion. +"I'm a rebel," was the silly boast of the young disciple. "Spoil +something, set fire to something," was held to be the proper text for +any girl or lad of spirit. And this blind discontent carried on into +the war. While on the one hand a great rush of men poured into the army +saying, "Thank God! we can serve our country at last instead of some +beastly profiteer," a sourer remnant, blind to the greater issues of +the war, clung to the reasonless proposition, "the state is only for +the Capitalist. This war is got up by Capitalists. Whatever has to be +done--_we are rebels._" + +Such a typical paper as the British _Labour Leader_, for example, may +be read in vain, number after number, for any sound and sincere +constructive proposal. It is a prolonged scream of extreme +individualism, a monotonous repetition of incoherent discontent with +authority, with direction, with union, with the European effort. It +wants to do nothing. It just wants effort to stop--even at the price of +German victory. If the whole fabric of society in western Europe were to +be handed over to those pseudo-socialists to-morrow, to be administered +for the common good, they would fly the task in terror. They would make +excuses and refuse the undertaking. They do not want the world to go +right. The very idea of the world going right does not exist in their +minds. They are embodied discontent and hatred, making trouble, and that +is all they are. They want to be "rebels"--to be admired as "rebels". + +That is the true psychology of the Resentful Employee. He is a +de-socialised man. His sense of the State has been destroyed. + +The Resentful Employees are the outcome of our social injustices. They +are the failures of our social ad educational systems. We may regret +their pitiful degradation, we may exonerate them from blame; none the +less they are a pitiful crew. I have seen the hardship of the trenches, +the gay and gallant wounded. I do a little understand what our soldiers, +officers and men alike, have endured and done. And though I know I ought +to allow for all that I have stated, I cannot regard these conscientious +objectors with anything but contempt. Into my house there pours a dismal +literature rehearsing the hardships of these men who set themselves +up to be martyrs for liberty; So and So, brave hero, has been sworn +at--positively sworn at by a corporal; a nasty rough man came into +the cell of So and So and dropped several h's; So and So, refusing to +undress and wash, has been undressed and washed, and soap was rubbed +into his eyes--perhaps purposely; the food and accommodation are not of +the best class; the doctors in attendance seem hasty; So and So was put +into a damp bed and has got a nasty cold. Then I recall a jolly vanload +of wounded men I saw out there.... + +But after all, we must be just. A church and state that permitted +these people to be thrust into dreary employment in their early 'teens, +without hope or pride, deserves such citizens as these. The marvel +is that there are so few. There are a poor thousand or so of these +hopeless, resentment-poisoned creatures in Great Britain. Against five +willing millions. The Allied countries, I submit, have not got nearly +all the conscientious objectors they deserve. + + +3 + +If the Resentful Employee provides the emotional impulse of the +resisting pacifist, whose horizon is bounded by his one passionate +desire that the particular social system that has treated him so ill +should collapse and give in, and its leaders and rulers be humiliated +and destroyed, the intellectual direction of a mischievous pacifism +comes from an entirely different class. + +The Genteel Whig, though he differs very widely in almost every other +respect from the Resentful Employee, has this much in common, that he +has never been drawn into the whirl of collective life in any real and +assimilative fashion. This is what is the matter with both of them. +He is a little loose, shy, independent person. Except for eating and +drinking--in moderation, he has never done anything real from the day +he was born. He has frequently not even faced the common challenge of +matrimony. Still more frequently is he childless, or the daring parent +of one particular child. He has never traded nor manufactured. He has +drawn his dividends or his salary with an entire unconsciousness of any +obligations to policemen or navy for these punctual payments. Probably +he has never ventured even to reinvest his little legacy. He is acutely +aware of possessing an exceptionally fine intelligence, but he is +entirely unconscious of a fundamental unreality. Nothing has ever +occurred to him to make him ask why the mass of men were either not +possessed of his security or discontented with it. The impulses that +took his school friends out upon all sorts of odd feats and adventures +struck him as needless. As he grew up he turned with an equal distrust +from passion or ambition. His friends went out after love, after +adventure, after power, after knowledge, after this or that desire, and +became men. But he noted merely that they became fleshly, that effort +strained them, that they were sometimes angry or violent or heated. He +could not but feel that theirs were vulgar experiences, and he sought +some finer exercise for his exceptional quality. He pursued art or +philosophy or literature upon their more esoteric levels, and realised +more and more the general vulgarity and coarseness of the world about +him, and his own detachment. The vulgarity and crudity of the things +nearest him impressed him most; the dreadful insincerity of the Press, +the meretriciousness of success, the loudness of the rich, the baseness +of common people in his own land. The world overseas had by comparison +a certain glamour. Except that when you said "United States" to him he +would draw the air sharply between his teeth and beg you not to... + +Nobody took him by the collar and shook him. + +If our world had considered the advice of William James and insisted +upon national service from everyone, national service in the drains or +the nationalised mines or the nationalised deep-sea fisheries if not +in the army or navy, we should not have had any such men. If it had +insisted that wealth and property are no more than a trust for the +public benefit, we should have had no genteel indispensables. These +discords in our national unanimity are the direct consequence of our bad +social organisation. We permit the profiteer and the usurer; they evoke +the response of the Reluctant Employee, and the inheritor of their +wealth becomes the Genteel Whig. + +But that is by the way. It was of course natural and inevitable that the +German onslaught upon Belgium and civilisation generally should strike +these recluse minds not as a monstrous ugly wickedness to be resisted +and overcome at any cost, but merely as a nerve-racking experience. Guns +were going off on both sides. The Genteel Whig was chiefly conscious +of a repulsive vast excitement all about him, in which many people did +inelegant and irrational things. They waved flags--nasty little flags. +This child of the ages, this last fruit of the gigantic and tragic tree +of life, could no more than stick its fingers in its ears as say, +"Oh, please, do _all_ stop!" and then as the strain grew intenser and +intenser set itself with feeble pawings now to clamber "Au-dessus de la +Melee," and now to--in some weak way--stop the conflict. ("Au-dessus +de la Melee"--as the man said when they asked him where he was when the +bull gored his sister.) The efforts to stop the conflict at any price, +even at the price of entire submission to the German Will, grew more +urgent as the necessity that everyone should help against the German +Thing grew more manifest. + +Of all the strange freaks of distressed thinking that this war has +produced, the freaks of the Genteel Whig have been among the most +remarkable. With an air of profound wisdom he returns perpetually to +his proposition that there are faults on both sides. To say that is his +conception of impartiality. I suppose that if a bull gored his sister he +would say that there were faults on both sides; his sister ought not +to have strayed into the field, she was wearing a red hat of a highly +provocative type; she ought to have been a cow and then everything would +have been different. In the face of the history of the last forty years, +the Genteel Whig struggles persistently to minimise the German outrage +upon civilisation and to find excuses for Germany. He does this, not +because he has any real passion for falsehood, but because by training, +circumstance, and disposition he is passionately averse from action +with the vulgar majority and from self-sacrifice in a common cause, and +because he finds in the justification of Germany and, failing that, in +the blackening of the Allies to an equal blackness, one line of defence +against the wave of impulse that threatens to submerge his private +self. But when at last that line is forced he is driven back upon others +equally extraordinary. You can often find simultaneously in the same +Pacifist paper, and sometimes even in the utterances of the same writer, +two entirely incompatible statements. The first is that Germany is so +invincible that it is useless to prolong the war since no effort of the +Allies is likely to produce any material improvement in their position, +and the second is that Germany is so thoroughly beaten that she is now +ready to abandon militarism and make terms and compensations entirely +acceptable to the countries she has forced into war. And when finally +facts are produced to establish the truth that Germany, though still +largely wicked and impenitent, is being slowly and conclusively beaten +by the sanity, courage and persistence of the Allied common men, then +the Genteel Whig retorts with his last defensive absurdity. He invents a +national psychology for Germany. Germany, he invents, loves us and wants +to be our dearest friend. Germany has always loved us. The Germans are +a loving, unenvious people. They have been a little mislead--but nice +people do not insist upon that fact. But beware of beating Germany, +beware of humiliating Germany; then indeed trouble will come. Germany +will begin to dislike us. She will plan a revenge. Turning aside from +her erstwhile innocent career, she may even think of hate. What are our +obligations to France, Italy, Serbia and Russia, what is the happiness +of a few thousands of the Herero, a few millions of the Belgians--whose +numbers moreover are constantly diminishing--when we might weigh them +against the danger, the most terrible danger, of incurring _permanent +German hostility?..._ + +A Frenchman I talked to knew better than that. "What will happen to +Germany," I asked, "if we are able to do so to her and so; would she +take to dreams of a _Revanche?_" + +"She will take to Anglomania," he said, and added after a flash of +reflection, "In the long run it will be the worse for you." + + + + +III. THE RELIGIOUS REVIVAL + + +1 + +One of the indisputable things about the war, so far as Britain and +France go--and I have reason to believe that on a lesser scale things +are similar in Italy--is that it has produced a very great volume of +religious thought and feeling. About Russia in these matters we hear +but little at the present time, but one guesses at parallelism. People +habitually religious have been stirred to new depths of reality and +sincerity, and people are thinking of religion who never thought of +religion before. But as I have already pointed out, thinking and feeling +about a matter is of no permanent value unless something is _thought +out_, unless there is a change of boundary or relationship, and it an +altogether different question to ask whether any definite change is +resulting from this universal ferment. If it is not doing so, then the +sleeper merely dreams a dream that he will forget again.... + +Now in no sort of general popular mental activity is there so much froth +and waste as in religious excitements. This has been the case in all +periods of religious revival. The number who are rather impressed, who +for a few days or weeks take to reading their Bibles or going to a new +place of worship or praying or fasting or being kind and unselfish, is +always enormous in relation to the people whose lives are permanently +changed. The effort needed if a contemporary is to blow off the froth, +is always very considerable. + +Among the froth that I would blow off is I think most of the tremendous +efforts being made in England by the Anglican church to attract +favourable attention to itself _apropos_ of the war. I came back from +my visit to the Somme battlefields to find the sylvan peace of Essex +invaded by a number of ladies in blue dresses adorned with large +white crosses, who, regardless of the present shortage of nurses, were +visiting every home in the place on some mission of invitation whose +details remained obscure. So far as I was able to elucidate this +project, it was in the nature of a magic incantation; a satisfactory end +of the war was to be brought about by convergent prayer and religious +assiduities. The mission was shy of dealing with me personally, although +as a lapsed communicant I should have thought myself a particularly +hopeful field for Anglican effort, and it came to my wife and myself +merely for our permission and countenance in an appeal to our domestic +servants. My wife consulted the household; it seemed very anxious to +escape from that appeal, and as I respect Christianity sufficiently +to detest the identification of its services with magic processes, the +mission retired--civilly repulsed. But the incident aroused an uneasy +curiosity in my mind with regard to the general trend of Anglican +teaching and Anglican activities at the present time. The trend of my +enquiries is to discover the church much more incoherent and much less +religious--in any decent sense of the word--than I had supposed it to +be. + +Organisation is the life of material and the death of mental and +spiritual processes. There could be no more melancholy exemplification +of this than the spectacle of the Anglican and Catholic churches at the +present time, one using the tragic stresses of war mainly for pew-rent +touting, and the other paralysed by its Austrian and South German +political connections from any clear utterance upon the moral issues of +the war. Through the opening phases of the war the Established Church +of England was inconspicuous; this is no longer the case, but it may be +doubted whether the change is altogether to its advantage. To me this +is a very great disappointment. I have always had a very high opinion of +the intellectual values of the leading divines of both the Anglican and +Catholic communions. The self-styled Intelligentsia of Great Britain +is all too prone to sneer at their equipment; but I do not see how +any impartial person can deny that Father Bernard Vaughn is in mental +energy, vigour of expression, richness of thought and variety of +information fully the equal of such an influential lay publicist as +Mr. Horatio Bottomley. One might search for a long time among prominent +laymen to find the equal of the Bishop of London. Nevertheless it is +impossible to conceal the impression of tawdriness that this latter +gentleman's work as head of the National Mission has left upon my mind. +Attired in khaki he has recently been preaching in the open air to the +people of London upon Tower Hill, Piccadilly, and other conspicuous +places. Obsessed as I am by the humanities, and impressed as I have +always been by the inferiority of material to moral facts, I would +willingly have exchanged the sight of two burning Zeppelins for this +spectacle of ecclesiastical fervour. But as it is, I am obliged to trust +to newspaper reports and the descriptions of hearers and eye-witnesses. +They leave to me but little doubt of the regrettable superficiality of +the bishop's utterances. + +We have a multitude of people chastened by losses, ennobled by a common +effort, needing support in that effort, perplexed by the reality of evil +and cruelty, questioning and seeking after God. What does the National +Mission offer? On Tower Hill the bishop seems to have been chiefly busy +with a wrangling demonstration that ten thousand a year is none too +big a salary for a man subject to such demands and expenses as his +see involves. So far from making anything out of his see he was, he +declared, two thousand a year to the bad. Some day, when the church +has studied efficiency, I suppose that bishops will have the leisure +to learn something about the general state of opinion and education in +their dioceses. The Bishop of London was evidently unaware of the almost +automatic response of the sharp socialists among his hearers. Their +first enquiry would be to learn how he came by that mysterious extra two +thousand a year with which he supplemented his stipend. How did he earn +_that?_ And if he didn't earn it---! And secondly, they would probably +have pointed out to him that his standard of housing, clothing, diet and +entertaining was probably a little higher than theirs. It is really no +proof of virtuous purity that a man's expenditure exceeds his income. +And finally some other of his hearers were left unsatisfied by his +silence with regard to the current proposal to pool all clerical +stipends for the common purposes of the church. It is a reasonable +proposal, and if bishops must dispute about stipends instead of +preaching the kingdom of God, then they are bound to face it. The sooner +they do so, the more graceful will the act be. From these personal +apologetics the bishop took up the question of the exemption, at the +request of the bishops, of the clergy from military service. It is +one of our contrasts with French conditions--and it is all to the +disadvantage of the British churches. + +In his Piccadilly contribution to the National Mission of Repentance and +Hope the bishop did not talk politics but sex. He gave his hearers the +sort of stuff that is handed out so freely by the Cinema Theatres, White +Slave Traffic talk, denunciations of "Night Hawks"--whatever "Night +Hawks" may be--and so on. One this or another occasion the bishop--he +boasts that he himself is a healthy bachelor--lavished his eloquence +upon the Fall in the Birth Rate, and the duty of all married people, +from paupers upward, to have children persistently. Now sex, like diet, +is a department of conduct and a very important department, but _it +isn't religion!_ The world is distressed by international disorder, by +the monstrous tragedy of war; these little hot talks about indulgence +and begetting have about as much to do with the vast issues that concern +us as, let us say, a discussion of the wickedness of eating very new and +indigestible bread. It is talking round and about the essential issue. +It is fogging the essential issue, which is the forgotten and neglected +kingship of God. The sin that is stirring the souls of men is the sin of +this war. It is the sin of national egotism and the devotion of men to +loyalties, ambitions, sects, churches, feuds, aggressions, and divisions +that are an outrage upon God's universal kingdom. + + +2 + +The common clergy of France, sharing the military obligations and the +food and privations of their fellow parishioners, contrast very vividly +with the home-staying types of the ministries of the various British +churches. I met and talked to several. Near Frise there were some barge +gunboats--they have since taken their place in the fighting, but then +they were a surprise--and the men had been very anxious to have their +craft visited and seen. The priest who came after our party to see if +he could still arrange that, had been decorated for gallantry. Of course +the English too have their gallant chaplains, but they are men of the +officer caste, they are just young officers with peculiar collars; not +men among men, as are the French priests. + +There can be no doubt that the behaviour of the French priests in this +war has enormously diminished anti-clerical bitterness in France. There +can be no doubt that France is far more a religious country than it +was before the war. But if you ask whether that means any return to the +church, any reinstatement of the church, the answer is a doubtful +one. Religion and the simple priest are stronger in France to-day; the +church, I think, is weaker. + +I trench on no theological discussion when I record the unfavourable +impression made upon all western Europe by the failure of the Holy +Father to pronounce definitely upon the rights and wrongs of the war. +The church has abrogated its right of moral judgement. Such at least +seemed to be the opinion of the Frenchmen with whom I discussed a +remarkable interview with Cardinal Gasparri that I found one morning in +_Le Journal._ + +It was not the sort of interview to win the hearts of men who were ready +to give their lives to set right what they believe to be the greatest +outrage that has ever been inflicted upon Christendom, that is to +say the forty-three years of military preparation and of diplomacy by +threats that culminated in the ultimatum to Serbia, the invasion of +Belgium and the murder of the Vise villagers. It was adorned with a +large portrait of "Benoit XV.," looking grave and discouraging over his +spectacles, and the headlines insisted it was "_La Pensee du Pape._" +Cross-heads sufficiently indicated the general tone. One read: + +_"Le Saint Siege impartial... Au-dessus de la bataille...."_ The good +Cardinal would have made a good lawyer. He had as little to say about +God and the general righteousness of things as the Bishop of London. But +he got in some smug reminders of the severance of diplomatic relations +with the Vatican. Perhaps now France will be wiser. He pointed out +that the Holy See in its Consistorial Allocution of January 22nd, 1915, +invited the belligerents to observe the rules of war. Could anything +more be done than that? Oh!--in the general issue of the war, if you +want a judgement on the war as a whole, how is it possible that the +Vatican to decide? Surely the French know that excellent principle of +justice, _Audiatur et altera pars_, and how under existing circumstances +can the Vatican do that...? The Vatican is cut off from communication +with Austria and Germany. The Vatican has been deprived of its temporal +power and local independence (another neat point).... + +So France is bowed out. When peace is restored, the Vatican will perhaps +be able to enquire if there was a big German army in 1914, if German +diplomacy was aggressive from 1875 onward, if Belgium was invaded +unrighteously, if (Catholic) Austria forced the pace upon (non-Catholic) +Russia. But now--now the Holy See must remain as impartial as an +unbought mascot in a shop window.... + +The next column of _Le Journal_ contained an account of the Armenian +massacres; the blood of the Armenian cries out past the Holy Father to +heaven; but then Armenians are after all heretics, and here again the +principle of _Audiatur et altera pars_ comes in. Communications are not +open with the Turks. Moreover, Armenians, like Serbs, are worse than +infidels; they are heretics. Perhaps God is punishing them.... + +_Audiatur et altera pars_, and the Vatican has not forgotten the +infidelity and disrespect of both France and Italy in the past. These +are the things, it seems, that really matter to the Vatican. Cardinal +Gasparri's portrait, in the same issue of _Le Journal_, displays a +countenance of serene contentment, a sort of incarnate "Told-you-so." + +So the Vatican lifts its pontifical skirts and shakes the dust of +western Europe off its feet. + +It is the most astounding renunciation in history. + +Indubitably the Christian church took a wide stride from the kingship of +God when it placed a golden throne for the unbaptised Constantine in +the midst of its most sacred deliberations at Nicaea. But it seems to +me that this abandonment of moral judgements in the present case by the +Holy See is an almost wider step from the church's allegiance to God.... + + +3 + +Thought about the great questions of life, thought and reasoned +direction, this is what the multitude demands mutely and weakly, and +what the organised churches are failing to give. They have not the +courage of their creeds. Either their creeds are intellectual flummery +or they are the solution to the riddles with which the world is +struggling. But the churches make no mention of their creeds. They +chatter about sex and the magic effect of church attendance and simple +faith. If simple faith is enough, the churches and their differences are +an imposture. Men are stirred to the deepest questions about life and +God, and the Anglican church, for example, obliges--as I have described. + +It is necessary to struggle against the unfavourable impression made by +these things. They must not blind us to the deeper movement that is in +progress in a quite considerable number of minds in England and France +alike towards the realisation of the kingdom of God. + +What I conceive to be the reality of the religious revival is to be +found in quarters remote from the religious professionals. Let me give +but one instance of several that occur to me. I met soon after my return +from France a man who has stirred my curiosity for years, Mr. David +Lubin, the prime mover in the organisation of the International +Institute of Agriculture in Rome. It is a movement that has always +appealed to my imagination. The idea is to establish and keep up to date +a record of the food supplies in the world with a view to the ultimate +world control of food supply and distribution. When its machinery has +developed sufficiently to a control in the interests of civilisation of +many other staples besides foodstuffs. It is in fact the suggestion and +beginning of the economic world peace and the economic world state, just +as the Hague Tribunal is the first faint sketch of a legal world state. +The King of Italy has met Mr. Lubin's idea with open hands. (It was +because of this profoundly interesting experiment that in a not very +widely known book of mine, _The World Set Free_ (May, 1914), in which I +represented a world state as arising out of Armageddon, I made the +first world conference meet at Brissago in Italian Switzerland under the +presidency of the King of Italy.) So that when I found I could meet Mr. +Lubin I did so very gladly. We lunched together in a pretty little room +high over Knightsbridge, and talked through an afternoon. + +He is a man rather after the type of Gladstone; he could be made to look +like Gladstone in a caricature, and he has that compelling quality of +intense intellectual excitement which was one of the great factors in +the personal effectiveness of Gladstone. He is a Jew, but until I had +talked to him for some time that fact did not occur to me. He is in very +ill health, he has some weakness of the heart that grips him and holds +him at times white and silent. + +At first we talked of his Institute and its work. Then we came to +shipping and transport. Whenever one talks now of human affairs one +comes presently to shipping and transport generally. In Paris, in Italy, +when I returned to England, everywhere I found "cost of carriage" +was being discovered to be a question of fundamental importance. Yet +transport, railroads and shipping, these vitally important services in +the world's affairs, are nearly everywhere in private hands and run +for profit. In the case of shipping they are run for profit on such +antiquated lines that freights vary from day to day and from hour to +hour. It makes the business of food supply a gamble. And it need not be +a gamble. + +But that is by the way in the present discussion. As we talked, the +prospect broadened out from a prospect of the growing and distribution +of food to a general view of the world becoming one economic community. + +I talked of various people I had been meeting in the previous few weeks. +"So many of us," I said, "seem to be drifting away from the ideas of +nationalism and faction and policy, towards something else which is +larger. It is an idea of a right way of doing things for human purposes, +independently of these limited and localised references. Take such +things as international hygiene for example, take _this_ movement. We +are feeling our way towards a bigger rule." + +"The rule of Righteousness," said Mr. Lubin. + +I told him that I had been coming more and more to the idea--not as a +sentimentality or a metaphor, but as the ruling and directing idea, the +structural idea, of all one's political and social activities--of the +whole world as one state and community and of God as the King of that +state. + +"But _I_ say that," cried Mr. Lubin, "I have put my name to that. +And--it is _here!_" + +He struggled up, seized an Old Testament that lay upon a side table. +He stood over it and rapped its cover. "It is _here_," he said, looking +more like Gladstone than ever, "in the Prophets." + + +4 + +That is all I mean to tell at present of that conversation. + +We talked of religion for two hours. Mr. Lubin sees things in terms of +Israel and I do not. For all that we see things very much after the same +fashion. That talk was only one of a number of talks about religion +that I have had with hard and practical men who want to get the world +straighter than it is, and who perceive that they must have a leadership +and reference outside themselves. That is why I assert so confidently +that there is a real deep religious movement afoot in the world. But +not one of those conversations could have gone on, it would have ceased +instantly, if anyone bearing the uniform and brand of any organised +religious body, any clergyman, priest, mollah, of suchlike advocate of +the ten thousand patented religions in the world, had come in. He would +have brought in his sectarian spites, his propaganda of church-going, +his persecution of the heretic and the illegitimate, his ecclesiastical +politics, his taboos, and his doctrinal touchiness.... That is why, +though I perceive there is a great wave of religious revival in the +world to-day, I doubt whether it bodes well for the professional +religions.... + +The other day I was talking to an eminent Anglican among various other +people and someone with an eye to him propounded this remarkable view. + +"There are four stages between belief and utter unbelief. There are +those who believe in God, those who doubt like Huxley the Agnostic, +those who deny him like the Atheists but who do at least keep his place +vacant, and lastly those who have set up a Church in his place. That is +the last outrage of unbelief." + + + + +IV. THE RIDDLE OF THE BRITISH + + +All the French people I met in France seemed to be thinking and talking +about the English. The English bring their own atmosphere with them; +to begin with they are not so talkative, and I did not find among +them anything like the same vigour of examination, the same resolve to +understand the Anglo-French reaction, that I found among the French. +In intellectual processes I will confess that my sympathies are +undisguisedly with the French; the English will never think nor talk +clearly until the get clerical "Greek" and sham "humanities" out of +their public schools and sincere study and genuine humanities in; our +disingenuous Anglican compromise is like a cold in the English head, +and the higher education in England is a training in evasion. This is +an always lamentable state of affairs, but just now it is particularly +lamentable because quite tremendous opportunities for the good of +mankind turn on the possibility of a thorough and entirely frank mutual +understanding between French, Italians, and English. For years there +has been a considerable amount of systematic study in France of English +thought and English developments. Upon almost any question of current +English opinion and upon most current English social questions, the +best studies are in French. But there has been little or no reciprocal +activity. The English in France seem to confine their French studies to +_La Vie Parisienne._ It is what they have been led to expect of French +literature. + +There can be no doubt in any reasonable mind that this war is binding +France and England very closely together. They dare not quarrel for the +next fifty years. They are bound to play a central part in the World +League for the Preservation of Peace that must follow this struggle. +There is no question of their practical union. It is a thing that must +be. But it is remarkable that while the French mind is agog to apprehend +every fact and detail it can about the British, to make the wisest +and fullest use of our binding necessities, that strange English +"incuria"--to use the new slang--attains to its most monumental in this +matter. + +So there is not much to say about how the British think about the +French. They do not think. They feel. At the outbreak of the war, when +the performance of France seemed doubtful, there was an enormous feeling +for France in Great Britain; it was like the formless feeling one has +for a brother. It was as if Britain had discovered a new instinct. If +France had crumpled up like paper, the English would have fought on +passionately to restore her. That is ancient history now. Now the +English still feel fraternal and fraternally proud; but in a mute way +they are dazzled. Since the German attack on Verdun began, the French +have achieved a crescendo. None of us could have imagined it. It did not +seem possible to very many of us at the end of 1915 that either France +or Germany could hold on for another year. There was much secret +anxiety for France. It has given place now to unstinted confidence and +admiration. In their astonishment the British are apt to forget the +impressive magnitude of their own effort, the millions of soldiers, the +innumerable guns, the endless torrent of supplies that pour into France +to avenge the little army of Mons. It seems natural to us that we should +so exert ourselves under the circumstances. I suppose it is wonderful, +but, as a sample Englishman, I do not feel that it is at all wonderful. +I did not feel it wonderful even when I saw the British aeroplanes +lording it in the air over Martinpuich, and not a German to be seen. +Since Michael would have it so, there, at last, they were. + +There was a good deal of doubt in France about the vigour of the British +effort, until the Somme offensive. All that had been dispelled in August +when I reached Paris. There was not the shadow of a doubt remaining +anywhere of the power and loyalty of the British. These preliminary +assurances have to be made, because it is in the nature of the French +mind to criticise, and it must not be supposed that criticisms of detail +and method affect the fraternity and complete mutual confidence which is +the stuff of the Anglo-French relationship. + + +2 + +Now first the French have been enormously astonished by the quality of +the ordinary British soldiers in our new armies. One Colonial colonel +said something almost incredible to me--almost incredible as coming +as from a Frenchman; it was a matter to solemn for any compliments or +polite exaggerations; he said in tones of wonder and conviction, "_They +are as good as ours._" It was his acme of all possible praise. + +That means any sort of British soldier. Unless he is assisted by a kilt +the ordinary Frenchman is unable to distinguish between one sort of +British soldier and another. He cannot tell--let the ardent nationalist +mark the fact!--a Cockney from an Irishman or the Cardiff from the Essex +note. He finds them all extravagantly and unquenchably cheerful and with +a generosity--"like good children." There his praise is a little tinged +by doubt. The British are reckless--recklessness in battle a Frenchman +can understand, but they are also reckless about to-morrow's bread and +whether the tent is safe against a hurricane in the night. He is struck +too by the fact that they are much more vocal than the French troops, +and that they seem to have a passion for bad lugubrious songs. There he +smiles and shrugs his shoulders, and indeed what else can any of us +do in the presence of that mystery? At any rate the legend of the +"phlegmatic" Englishman has been scattered to the four winds of heaven +by the guns of the western front. The men are cool in action, it is +true; but for the rest they are, by the French standards, quicksilver. + +But I will not expand further upon the general impression made by the +English in France. Philippe Millet's _En Liaison avec les Anglais_ gives +in a series of delightful pictures portraits of British types from the +French angle. There can be little doubt that the British quality, genial +naive, plucky and generous, has won for itself a real affection in +France wherever it has had a chance to display itself.... + +But when it comes to British methods then the polite Frenchman's +difficulties begin. Translating hints into statements and guessing at +reservations, I would say that the French fall very short of admiration +of the way in which our higher officers set about their work, they +are disagreeably impressed by a general want of sedulousness and close +method in our leading. They think we economise brains and waste +blood. They are shocked at the way in which obviously incompetent or +inefficient men of the old army class are retained in their positions +even after serious failures, and they were profoundly moved by the bad +staff work and needlessly heavy losses of our opening attacks in July. +They were ready to condone the blunderings and flounderings of the 1915 +offensive as the necessary penalties of an "amateur" army, they had had +to learn their own lesson in Champagne, but they were surprised to +find how much the British had still to learn in July, 1916. The British +officers excuse themselves because, they plead, they are still +amateurs. "That is no reason," says the Frenchman, "why they should be +amateurish." + +No Frenchman said as much as this to me, but their meaning was as plain +as daylight. I tackled one of my guides on this matter; I said that it +was the plain duty of the French military people to criticise British +military methods sharply if they thought they were wrong. "It is not +easy," he said. "Many British officers do not think they have anything +to learn. And English people do not like being told things. What could +we do? We could hardly send a French officer or so to your headquarters +in a tutorial capacity. You have to do things in your own way." When +I tried to draw General Castelnau into this dangerous question by +suggesting that we might borrow a French general or so, he would say +only, "There is only one way to learn war, and that is to make war." +When it was too late, in the lift, I thought of the answer to that. +There is only one way to make war, and that is by the sacrifice of +incapables and the rapid promotion of able men. If old and tried types +fail now, new types must be sought. But to do that we want a standard of +efficiency. We want a conception of intellectual quality in performance +that is still lacking.... + +M. Joseph Reinach, in whose company I visited the French part of the +Somme front, was full of a scheme, which he has since published, for the +breaking up and recomposition of the French and British armies into a +series of composite armies which would blend the magnificent British +manhood and material with French science and military experience. He +pointed out the endless advantages of such an arrangement; the stimulus +of emulation, the promotion of intimate fraternal feeling between the +peoples of the two countries. "At present," he said, "no Frenchman ever +sees an Englishman except at Amiens or on the Somme. Many of them still +have no idea of what the English are doing...." + +"Have I ever told you the story of compulsory Greek at Oxford and +Cambridge?" I asked abruptly. + +"What has that to do with it?" + +"Or how two undistinguished civil service commissioners can hold up the +scientific education of our entire administrative class?" + +M. Reinach protested further. + +"Because you are proposing to loosen the grip of a certain narrow and +limited class upon British affairs, and you propose it as though it were +a job as easy as rearranging railway fares or sending a van to Calais. +That is the problem that every decent Englishman is trying to solve +to-day, every man of that Greater Britain which has supplied these five +million volunteers, these magnificent temporary officers and all this +wealth of munitions. And the oligarchy is so invincibly fortified! Do +you think it will let in Frenchmen to share its controls? It will +not even let in Englishmen. It holds the class schools; the class +universities; the examinations for our public services are its class +shibboleths; it is the church, the squirearchy, the permanent army +class, permanent officialdom; it makes every appointment, it is the +fountain of honour; what it does not know is not knowledge, what it +cannot do must not be done. It rules India ignorantly and obstructively; +it will wreck the empire rather than relinquish its ascendancy in +Ireland. It is densely self-satisfied and instinctively monopolistic. It +is on our backs, and with it on our backs we common English must bleed +and blunder to victory.... And you make this proposal!" + + +3 + +The antagonistic relations of the Anglican oligarchy with the greater +and greater-spirited Britain that thrust behind it in this war +are probably paralleled very closely in Germany, probably they are +exaggerated in Germany with a bigger military oligarchy and a relatively +lesser civil body under it. This antagonism is the oddest outcome of the +tremendous _de-militarisation_ of war that has been going on. In France +it is probably not so marked because of the greater flexibility and +adaptability of the French culture. + +All military people--people, that is, professionally and primarily +military--are inclined to be conservative. For thousands of years the +military tradition has been a tradition of discipline. The conception of +the common soldier has been a mechanically obedient, almost dehumanised +man, of the of officer a highly trained autocrat. In two years all this +has been absolutely reversed. Individual quality, inventive organisation +and industrialism will win this war. And no class is so innocent of +these things as the military caste. Long accustomed as they are to the +importance of moral effect they put a brave face upon the business; +they save their faces astonishingly, but they are no longer guiding and +directing this war, they are being pushed from behind by forces they +never foresaw and cannot control. The aeroplanes and great guns have +bolted with them, the tanks begotten of naval and civilian wits, shove +them to victory in spite of themselves. + +Wherever I went behind the British lines the officers were going about +in spurs. These spurs at last got on my nerves. They became symbolical. +They became as grave an insult to the tragedy of the war as if they were +false noses. The British officers go for long automobile rides in spurs. +They walk about the trenches in spurs. Occasionally I would see a horse; +I do not wish to be unfair in this matter, there were riding horses +sometimes within two or three miles of the ultimate front, but they were +rarely used. + +I do not say that the horse is entirely obsolescent in this war. In +was nothing is obsolete. In the trenches men fight with sticks. In the +Pasubio battle the other day one of the Alpini silenced a machine gun +by throwing stones. In the West African campaign we have employed troops +armed with bows and arrows, and they have done very valuable work. But +these are exceptional cases. The military use of the horse henceforth +will be such an exceptional case. It is ridiculous for these spurs still +to clink about the modern battlefield. What the gross cost of the spurs +and horses and trappings of the British army amount to, and how many men +are grooming and tending horses who might just as well be ploughing +and milking at home, I cannot guess; it must be a total so enormous as +seriously to affect the balance of the war. + +And these spurs and their retention are only the outward and visible +symbol of the obstinate resistance of the Anglican intelligence to +the clear logic of the present situation. It is not only the external +equipment of our leaders that falls behind the times; our political +and administrative services are in the hands of the same desolatingly +inadaptable class. The British are still wearing spurs in Ireland; they +are wearing them in India; and the age of the spur has passed. At the +outset of this war there was an absolute cessation of criticism of the +military and administrative castes; it is becoming a question whether +we may not pay too heavily in blundering and waste, in military and +economic lassitude, in international irritation and the accumulation of +future dangers in Ireland, Egypt, India, and elsewhere, for an apparent +absence of internal friction. These people have no gratitude for tacit +help, no spirit of intelligent service, and no sense of fair play to the +outsider. The latter deficiency indeed they call _esprit de corps_ and +prize it as if it were a noble quality. + +It becomes more and more imperative that the foreign observer should +distinguish between this narrower, older official Britain and +the greater newer Britain that struggles to free itself from the +entanglement of a system outgrown. There are many Englishmen who would +like to say to the French and Irish and the Italians and India, who +indeed feel every week now a more urgent need of saying, "Have patience +with us." The Riddle of the British is very largely solved if you will +think of a great modern liberal nation seeking to slough an exceedingly +tough and tight skin.... + +Nothing is more illuminating and self-educational than to explain one's +home politics to an intelligent foreigner enquirer; it strips off all +the secondary considerations, the allusiveness, the merely tactical +considerations, the allusiveness, the merely tactical considerations. +One sees the forest not as a confusion of trees but as something with +a definite shape and place. I was asked in Italy and in France, "Where +does Lord Northcliffe come into the British system--or Lloyd George? +Who is Mr. Redmond? Why is Lloyd George a Minister, and why does not +Mr. Redmond take office? Isn't there something called an ordnance +department, and why is there a separate ministry of munitions? Can Mr. +Lloyd George remove an incapable general?..." + +I found it M. Joseph Reinach particularly penetrating and persistent. +It is an amusing but rather difficult exercise to recall what I tried +to convey to him by way of a theory of Britain. He is by no means an +uncritical listener. I explained that there is an "inner Britain," +official Britain, which is Anglican or official Presbyterian, which at +the outside in the whole world cannot claim to speak for twenty million +Anglican or Presbyterian communicants, which monopolises official +positions, administration and honours in the entire British empire, +dominates the court, and, typically, is spurred and red-tabbed. (It was +just at this time that the spurs were most on my nerves.) + +This inner Britain, I went on to explain, holds tenaciously to its +positions of advantage, from which it is difficult to dislodge it +without upsetting the whole empire, and it insists upon treating +the rest of the four hundred millions who constitute that empire as +outsiders, foreigners, subject races and suspected persons. + +"To you," I said, "it bears itself with an appearance of faintly +hostile, faintly contemptuous apathy. It is still so entirely insular +that it shudders at the thought of the Channel Tunnel. This is the +Britain which irritates and puzzles you so intensely--that you are quite +unable to conceal these feelings from me. Unhappily it is the Britain +you see most of. Well, outside this official Britain is 'Greater +Britain'--the real Britain with which you have to reckon in the +future." (From this point a faint flavour of mysticism crept into +my dissertation. I found myself talking with something in my voice +curiously reminiscent of those liberal Russians who set themselves to +explain the contrasts and contradictions of "official" Russia and "true" +Russia.) "This Greater Britain," I asserted, "is in a perpetual conflict +with official Britain, struggling to keep it up to its work, shoving it +towards its ends, endeavouring in spite of its tenacious mischievousness +of the privileged to keep the peace and a common aim with the French and +Irish and Italians and Russians and Indians. It is to that outer Britain +that those Englishmen you found so interesting and sympathetic, Lloyd +George and Lord Northcliffe, for example, belong. It is the Britain of +the great effort, the Britain of the smoking factories and the torrent +of munitions, the Britain of the men and subalterns of the new armies, +the Britain which invents and thinks and achieves, and stands now +between German imperialism and the empire of the world. I do not want to +exaggerate the quality of greater Britain. If the inner set are narrowly +educated, the outer set if often crudely educated. If the inner set is +so close knit as to seem like a conspiracy, the outer set is so +loosely knit as to seem like a noisy confusion. Greater Britain is only +beginning to realise itself and find itself. For all its crudity there +is a giant spirit in it feeling its way towards the light. It has quite +other ambitions for the ending of the war than some haggled treaty of +alliance with France and Italy; some advantage that will invalidate +German competition; it begins to realise newer and wider sympathies, +possibilities of an amalgamation of interests and community of aim that +is utterly beyond the habits of the old oligarchy to conceive, beyond +the scope of that tawdry word 'Empire' to express...." + +I descended from my rhetoric to find M. Reinach asking how and when this +greater Britain was likely to become politically effective. + + + + +V. THE SOCIAL CHANGES IN PROGRESS + + +1 + +"Nothing will be the same after the war." This is one of the consoling +platitudes with which people cover over voids of thought. They utter +it with an air of round-eyed profundity. But to ask in reply, "Then how +will things be different?" is in many cases to rouse great resentment. +It is almost as rude as saying, "Was that thought of yours really a +thought?" + +Let us in this chapter confine ourselves to the social-economic +processes that are going on. So far as I am able to distinguish among +the things that are being said in these matters, they may be classified +out into groups that centre upon several typical questions. There is +the question of "How to pay for the war?" There is the question of the +behaviour of labour after the war. "Will there be a Labour Truce or a +violent labour struggle?" There is the question of the reconstruction of +European industry after the war in the face of an America in a state +of monetary and economic repletion through non-intervention. My present +purpose in this chapter is a critical one; it is not to solve problems +but to set out various currents of thought that are flowing through +the general mind. Which current is likely to seize upon and carry human +affairs with it, is not for our present speculation. + +There seem to be two distinct ways of answering the first of the +questions I have noted. They do not necessarily contradict each other. +Of course the war is being largely paid for immediately out of the +accumulated private wealth of the past. We are buying off the "hold-up" +of the private owner upon the material and resources we need, and paying +in paper money and war loans. This is not in itself an impoverishment of +the community. The wealth of individuals is not the wealth of nations; +the two things may easily be contradictory when the rich man's wealth +consists of land or natural resources or franchises or privileges the +use of which he reluctantly yields for high prices. The conversion of +held-up land and material into workable and actively used material in +exchange for national debt may be indeed a positive increase in the +wealth of the community. And what is happening in all the belligerent +countries is the taking over of more and more of the realities of wealth +from private hands and, in exchange, the contracting of great masses of +debt to private people. The nett tendency is towards the disappearance +of a reality holding class and the destruction of realities in warfare, +and the appearance of a vast _rentier_ class in its place. At the end +of the war much material will be destroyed for evermore, transit, food +production and industry will be everywhere enormously socialised, and +the country will be liable to pay every year in interest, a sum of money +exceeding the entire national expenditure before the war. From the point +of view of the state, and disregarding material and moral damages, that +annual interest is the annual instalment of the price to be paid for the +war. + +Now the interesting question arises whether these great belligerent +states may go bankrupt, and if so to what extent. States may go bankrupt +to the private creditor without repudiating their debts or seeming to +pay less to him. They can go bankrupt either by a depreciation of their +currency or--without touching the gold standard--through a rise in +prices. In the end both these things work out to the same end; the +creditor gets so many loaves or pairs of boots or workman's hours of +labour for his pound _less_ than he would have got under the previous +conditions. One may imagine this process of price (and of course wages) +increase going on to a limitless extent. Many people are inclined to +look to such an increase in prices as a certain outcome of the war, and +just so far as it goes, just so far will the burthen of the _rentier_ +class, their call, tat is, for goods and services, be lightened. This +expectation is very generally entertained, and I can see little reason +against it. The intensely stupid or dishonest "labour" press, however, +which in the interests of the common enemy misrepresents socialism and +seeks to misguide labour in Great Britain, ignores these considerations, +and positively holds out this prospect of rising prices as an alarming +one to the more credulous and ignorant of its readers. + +But now comes the second way of meeting the after-the-war obligations. +This second way is by increasing the wealth of the state and by +increasing the national production to such an extent that the payment of +the _rentier_ class will not be an overwhelming burthen. Rising prices +bilk the creditor. Increased production will check the rise in prices +and get him a real payment. The outlook for the national creditor seems +to be that he will be partly bilked and partly paid; how far he will be +bilked and how far depends almost entirely upon this possible increase +in production; and there is consequently a very keen and quite +unprecedented desire very widely diffused among intelligent and active +people, holding War Loan scrip and the like, in all the belligerent +countries, to see bold and hopeful schemes for state enrichment pushed +forward. The movement towards socialism is receiving an impulse from a +new and unexpected quarter, there is now a _rentier_ socialism, and it +is interesting to note that while the London _Times_ is full of schemes +of great state enterprises, for the exploitation of Colonial state +lands, for the state purchase and wholesaling of food and many natural +products, and for the syndication of shipping and the great staple +industries into vast trusts into which not only the British but the +French and Italian governments may enter as partners, the so-called +socialist press of Great Britain is chiefly busy about the draughts in +the cell of Mr. Fenner Brockway and the refusal of Private Scott +Duckers to put on his khaki trousers. _The New Statesman_ and the Fabian +Society, however, display a wider intelligence. + +There is a great variety of suggestions for this increase of public +wealth and production. Many of them have an extreme reasonableness. The +extent to which they will be adopted depends, no doubt, very largely +upon the politician and permanent official, and both these classes are +prone to panic in the presence of reality. In spite of its own interests +in restraining a rise in prices, the old official "salariat" is likely +to be obstructive to any such innovations. It is the resistance of spurs +and red tabs to military innovations over again. This is the resistance +of quills and red tape. On the other hand the organisation of Britain +for war has "officialised" a number of industrial leaders, and created +a large body of temporary and adventurous officials. They may want +to carry on into peace production the great new factories the war has +created. At the end of the war, for example, every belligerent country +will be in urgent need of cheap automobiles for farmers, tradesmen, and +industrial purposes generally, America is now producing such automobiles +at a price of eighty pounds. But Europe will be heavily in debt to +America, her industries will be disorganised, and there will therefore +be no sort of return payment possible for these hundreds of thousands of +automobiles. A country that is neither creditor nor producer cannot be +an importer. Consequently though those cheap tin cars may be stacked +as high as the Washington Monument in America, they will never come to +Europe. On the other hand the great shell factories of Europe will be +standing idle and ready, their staffs disciplined and available, for +conversion to the new task. The imperative common sense of the position +seems to be that the European governments should set themselves straight +away to out-Ford Ford, and provide their own people with cheap road +transport. + +But here comes in the question whether this common-sense course is +inevitable. Suppose the mental energy left in Europe after the war is +insufficient for such a constructive feat as this. There will certainly +be the obstruction of official pedantry, the hold-up of this vested +interest and that, the greedy desire of "private enterprise" to exploit +the occasion upon rather more costly and less productive lines, the +general distrust felt by ignorant and unimaginative people of a new way +of doing things. The process after all may not get done in the obviously +wise way. This will not mean that Europe will buy American cars. It will +be quite unable to buy American cars. It will be unable to make anything +that America will not be able to make more cheaply for itself. But it +will mean that Europe will go on without cheap cars, that is to say +it will go on a more sluggishly and clumsily and wastefully at a lower +economic level. Hampered transport means hampered production of other +things, and in increasing inability to buy abroad. And so we go down and +down. + +It does not follow that because a course is the manifestly right and +advantageous course for the community that it will be taken. I am +reminded of this by a special basket in my study here, into which I +pitch letters, circulars, pamphlets and so forth as they come to hand +from a gentleman named Gattie, and his friends Mr. Adrian Ross, Mr. Roy +Horniman, Mr. Henry Murray and others. His particular project is the +construction of a Railway Clearing House for London. It is an absolutely +admirable scheme. It would cut down the heavy traffic in the streets of +London to about one-third; it would enable us to run the goods traffic +of England with less than half the number of railway trucks we now +employ; it would turn over enormous areas of valuable land from their +present use as railway goods yards and sidings; it would save time +in the transit of goods and labour in their handling. It is a quite +beautifully worked out scheme. For the last eight or ten years this +group of devoted fanatics has been pressing this undertaking upon an +indifferent country with increasing vehemence and astonishment at that +indifference. The point is that its adoption, though it would be of +general benefit, would be of no particular benefit to any leading man +or highly placed official. On the other hand it would upset all sorts +of individuals who are in a position to obstruct it quietly--and they +do so. Meaning no evil. I dip my hand in the accumulation and extract +a leaflet by the all too zealous Mr. Murray. In it he denounces various +public officials by name as he cheats and scoundrels, and invites a +prosecution for libel. + +In that fashion nothing will ever get done. There is no prosecution, +but for all that I do not agree with Mr. Murray about the men he names. +These gentlemen are just comfortable gentlemen, own brothers to these +old generals of ours who will not take off their spurs. They are +probably quite charming people except that they know nothing of that +Fear of God which searches by heart. Why should they bother? + +So many of these after-the-war problems bring one back to the +question of how far the war has put the Fear of God into the hearts of +responsible men. There is really no other reason in existence that I +can imagine why they should ask themselves the question, "Have I done my +best?" and that still more important question, "Am I doing my best now?" +And so while I hear plenty of talk about the great reorganisations that +are to come after the war, while there is the stir of doubt among the +_rentiers_ whether, after all, they will get paid, while the unavoidable +stresses and sacrifices of the war are making many people question the +rightfulness of much that they did as a matter of course, and of much +that they took for granted, I perceive there is also something dull +and not very articulate in this European world, something resistant and +inert, that is like the obstinate rolling over of a heavy sleeper after +he has been called upon to get up. "Just a little longer.... Just for +_my_ time." + +One thought alone seems to make these more intractable people anxious. +I thrust it in as my last stimulant when everything else has failed. +"There will be _frightful_ trouble with labour after the war," I say. + +They try to persuade themselves that military discipline is breaking in +labour.... + + +2 + +What does British labour think of the outlook after the war? + +As a distinctive thing British labour does not think. "Class-conscious +labour," as the Marxists put it, scarcely exists in Britain. The only +convincing case I ever met was a bath-chairman of literary habits +Eastbourne. The only people who are, as a class, class-conscious in +the British community are the Anglican gentry and their fringe of the +genteel. Everybody else is "respectable." The mass of British workers +find their thinking in the ordinary halfpenny papers or in _John Bull._ +The so-called labour papers are perhaps less representative of British +Labour than any other section of the press; the _Labour Leader_, for +example, is the organ of such people as Bertrand Russell, Vernon Lee, +Morel, academic _rentiers_ who know about as much as of the labour side +of industrialism as they do of cock-fighting. All the British peoples +are racially willing and good-tempered people, quite ready to be led +by those they imagine to be abler than themselves. They make the most +cheerful and generous soldiers in the whole world, without insisting +upon that democratic respect which the Frenchman exacts. They do not +criticise and they do not trouble themselves much about the general plan +of operations, so long as they have confidence in the quality and good +will of their leading. But British soldiers will of their loading. But +British soldiers will hiss a general when they think he is selfish, +unfeeling, or a muff. And the socialist propaganda has imported ideas +of public service into private employment. Labour in Britain has been +growing increasingly impatient of bad or selfish industrial leadership. +Labour trouble in Great Britain turns wholly upon the idea crystallised +in the one word "profiteer." Legislation and regulation of hours of +labour, high wages, nothing will keep labour quiet in Great Britain if +labour thinks it is being exploited for private gain. + +Labour feels very suspicious of private gain. For that suspicion a +certain rather common type of employer is mainly to blame. Labour +believes that employers is mainly to blame. Labour believes that +employers as a class cheat workmen as a class, plan to cheat them of +their full share in the common output, and drive hard bargains. It +believes that private employers are equally ready to sacrifice the +welfare of the nation and the welfare of the workers for mere personal +advantage. It has a traditional experience to support these suspicions. + +In no department of morals have ideas changed so completely during the +last eight years as in relation to "profits". Eighty years ago everyone +believed in the divine right of property to do what it pleased its +advantages, a doctrine more disastrous socially than the divine right +of kings. There was no such sense of the immorality of "holding up" as +pervades the public conscience to-day. The worker was expected not only +to work, but to be grateful for employment. The property owner held his +property and handed it out for use and development or not, just as he +thought fit. These ideas are not altogether extinct today. Only a few +days ago I met a magnificent old lady of seventy nine or eighty, who +discoursed upon the wickedness of her gardener in demanding another +shilling a week because of war prices. + +She was a valiant and handsome personage. A face that had still a +healthy natural pinkness looked out from under blond curls, and an +elegant and carefully tended hand tossed back some fine old lace to +gesticulate more freely. She had previously charmed her hearers by +sweeping aside certain rumours that were drifting about. + +"Germans invade _Us!_" she cried. "Who'd _let_ 'em, I'd like to know? +Who'd _let_ 'em?" + +And then she reverted to her grievance about the gardener. + +"I told him that after the war he'd be glad enough to get anything. +Grateful! They'll all be coming back after the war--all of 'em, glad +enough to get anything. Asking for another shilling indeed!" + +Everyone who heard her looked shocked. But that was the tone of everyone +of importance in the dark years that followed the Napoleonic wars. +That is just one survivor of the old tradition. Another is Blight +the solicitor, who goes about bewailing the fact that we writers are +"holding out false hopes of higher agricultural wages after the war." +But these are both exceptions. They are held to be remarkable people +even by their own class. The mass of property owners and influential +people in Europe to-day no more believe in the sacred right of property +to hold up development and dictate terms than do the more intelligent +workers. The ideas of collective ends and of the fiduciary nature of +property, had been soaking through the European community for years +before the war. The necessity for sudden and even violent co-operations +and submersions of individuality in a common purpose, is rapidly +crystallising out these ideas into clear proposals. + +War is an evil thing, but most people who will not learn from reason +must have an ugly teacher. This war has brought home to everyone the +supremacy of the public need over every sort of individual claim. + +One of the most remarkable things in the British war press is the amount +of space given to the discussion of labour developments after the war. +This in its completeness peculiar to the British situation. Nothing on +the same scale is perceptible in the press of the Latin allies. A great +movement on the part of capitalists and business organisers is manifest +to assure the worker of a change of heart and a will to change method. +Labour is suspicious, not foolishly but wisely suspicious. But labour is +considering it. + +"National industrial syndication," say the business organisers. + +"Guild socialism," say the workers. + +There is also a considerable amount of talking and writing about +"profit-sharing" and about giving the workers a share in the business +direction. Neither of these ideas appeals to the shrewder heads among +the workers. So far as direction goes their disposition is to ask +the captain to command the ship. So far as profits go, they think the +captain has no more right than the cabin boy to speculative gains; he +should do his work for his pay whether it is profitable or unprofitable +work. There is little balm for labour discontent in these schemes for +making the worker also an infinitesimal profiteer. + +During my journey in Italy and France I met several men who were keenly +interested in business organisation. Just before I started my friend N, +who has been the chief partner in the building up of a very big and very +extensively advertised American business, came to see me on his way back +to America. He is as interested in his work as a scientific specialist, +and as ready to talk about it to any intelligent and interested +hearer. He was particularly keen upon the question of continuity in the +business, when it behoves the older generation to let in the younger +to responsible management and to efface themselves. He was a man of +five-and-forty. Incidentally he mentioned that he had never taken +anything for his private life out of the great business he had built up +but a salary, "a good salary," and that now he was gong to grant himself +a pension. "I shan't interfere any more. I shall come right away and +live in Europe for a year so as not to be tempted to interfere. The boys +have got to run it some day, and they had better get their experience +while they're young and capable of learning by it. I did." + +I like N's ideas. "Practically," I said, "you've been a public official. +You've treated your business like a public service." + +That was his idea. + +"Would you mind if it was a public service?" + +He reflected, and some disagreeable memory darkened his face. "Under the +politicians?" he said. + +I took the train of thought N had set going abroad with me next day. I +had the good luck to meet men who were interesting industrially. Captain +Pirelli, my guide in Italy, has a name familiar to every motorist; his +name goes wherever cars go, spelt with a big long capital P. Lieutenant +de Tessin's name will recall one of the most interesting experiments +in profit-sharing to the student of social science. I tried over N's +problem on both of them. I found in both their minds just the same +attitude as he takes up towards his business. They think any businesses +that are worthy of respect, the sorts of businesses that interest them, +are public functions. Money-lenders and speculators, merchants and +gambling gentlefolk may think in terms of profit; capable business +directors certainly do nothing of the sort. + +I met a British officer in France who is also a landowner. I got him to +talk about his administrative work upon his property. He was very keen +upon new methods. He said he tried to do his duty by his land. + +"How much land?" I asked. + +"Just over nine thousand acres," he said. + +"But you could manage forty or fifty thousand with little more trouble." + +"If I had it. In some ways it would be easier." + +"What a waste!" I said. "Of course you ought not to _own_ these acres; +what you ought to be is the agricultural controller of just as big an +estate of the public lands as you could manage--with a suitable salary." + +He reflected upon that idea. He said he did not get much of a salary +out of his land as it was, and made a regrettable allusion to Mr. Lloyd +George. "When a man tries to do his duty by his land," he said... + +But here running through the thoughts of the Englishman and the Italian +and the Frenchman and the American alike one finds just the same idea +of a kind of officialdom in ownership. It is an idea that pervades our +thought and public discussion to-day everywhere, and it is an idea that +is scarcely traceable at all in the thought of the early half of the +nineteenth century. The idea of service and responsibility in property +has increased and is increasing, the conception of "hold-up," the +usurer's conception of his right to be bought out of the way, fades. +And the process has been enormously enhanced by the various big-scale +experiments in temporary socialism that have been forced upon the +belligerent powers. Men of the most individualistic quality are being +educated up to the possibilities of concerted collective action. My +friend and fellow-student Y, inventor and business organiser, who used +to make the best steam omnibuses in the world, and who is now making all +sorts of things for the army, would go pink with suspicious anger at the +mere words "inspector" or "socialism" three or four years ago. He does +not do so now. + +A great proportion of this sort of man, this energetic directive sort +of man in England, is thinking socialism to-day. They may not be saying +socialism, but they are thinking it. When labour begins to realise what +is adrift it will be divided between two things: between appreciative +co-operation, for which guild socialism in particular has prepared its +mind, and traditional suspicion. I will not over to guess here which +will prevail. + + +3 + +The impression I have of the present mental process in the European +communities is that while the official class and the _rentier_ class +is thinking very poorly and inadequately and with a merely obstructive +disposition; while the churches are merely wasting their energies in +futile self-advertisement; while the labour mass is suspicious and +disposed to make terms for itself rather than come into any large +schemes of reconstruction that will abolish profit as a primary aim in +economic life, there is still a very considerable movement towards such +a reconstruction. Nothing is so misleading as a careless analogy. In the +dead years that followed the Napoleonic wars, which are often quoted as +a precedent for expectation now, the spirit of collective service +was near its minimum; it was never so strong and never so manifestly +spreading and increasing as it is to-day. + +But service to what? + +I have my own very strong preconceptions here, and since my temperament +is sanguine they necessarily colour my view. I believe that this impulse +to collective service can satisfy itself only under the formula that +mankind is one state of which God is the undying king, and that the +service of men's collective needs is the true worship of God. But +eagerly as I would grasp at any evidence that this idea is being +developed and taken up by the general consciousness, I am quite unable +to persuade myself that anything of the sort is going on. I do perceive +a search for large forms into which the prevalent impulse to devotion +can be thrown. But the organised religious bodies, with their creeds +and badges and their instinct for self-preservation at any cost, +stand between men and their spiritual growth in just the same way the +forestallers stand between men and food. Their activities at present are +an almost intolerable nuisance. One cannot say "God" but some tout is +instantly seeking to pluck one into his particular cave of flummery and +orthodoxy. What a rational man means by God is just God. The more you +define and argue about God the more he remains the same simple thing. +Judaism, Christianity, Islam, modern Hindu religious thought, all agree +in declaring that there is one God, master and leader of all mankind, in +unending conflict with cruelty, disorder, folly and waste. To my mind, +it follows immediately that there can be no king, no government of any +sort, which is not either a subordinate or a rebel government, a local +usurpation, in the kingdom of God. But no organised religious body has +ever had the courage and honesty to insist upon this. They all pander to +nationalism and to powers and princes. They exists so to pander. Every +organised religion in the world exists only to exploit and divert and +waste the religious impulse in man. + +This conviction that the world kingdom of God is the only true method +of human service, is so clear and final in my own mind, it seems +so inevitably the conviction to which all right-thinking men must +ultimately come, that I feel almost like a looker-on at a game of +blind-man's bluff as I watch the discussion of synthetic political +ideas. The blind man thrusts his seeking hands into the oddest corners, +he clutches at chairs and curtains, but at last he must surely find and +hold and feel over and guess the name of the plainly visible quarry. + +Some of the French and Italian people I talked to said they were +fighting for "Civilisation." That is one name for the kingdom of God, +and I have heard English people use it too. But much of the contemporary +thought of England stills wanders with its back to the light. Most of it +is pawing over jerry-built, secondary things. I have before me a +little book, the joint work of Dr. Grey and Mr. Turner, of an ex-public +schoolmaster and a manufacturer, called _Eclipse or Empire?_ (The title +_World Might or Downfall?_ had already been secured in another quarter.) +It is a book that has been enormously advertised; it has been almost +impossible to escape its column-long advertisements; it is billed upon +the hoardings, and it is on the whole a very able and right-spirited +book. It calls for more and better education, for more scientific +methods, for less class suspicion and more social explicitness and +understanding, for a franker and fairer treatment of labour. But why +does it call for these things? Does it call for them because they are +right? Because in accomplishing them one serves God? + +Not at all. But because otherwise this strange sprawling empire of ours +will drop back into a secondary place in the world. These two writers +really seem to think that the slack workman, the slacker wealthy man, +the negligent official, the conservative schoolmaster, the greedy +usurer, the comfortable obstructive, confronted with this alternative, +terrified at this idea of something or other called the Empire being +"eclipsed," eager for the continuance of this undefined glory over their +fellow-creatures called "Empire," will perceive the error of their ways +and become energetic, devoted, capable. They think an ideal of that sort +is going to change the daily lives of men.... I sympathise with their +purpose, and I deplore their conception of motives. If men will not +give themselves for righteousness, they will not give themselves for +a geographical score. If they will not work well for the hatred of bad +work, they will not work well for the hatred of Germans. This "Empire" +idea has been cadging about the British empire, trying to collect +enthusiasm and devotion, since the days of Disraeli. It is, I submit, +too big for the mean-spirited, and too tawdry and limited for the fine +and generous. It leaves out the French and the Italians and the Belgians +and all our blood brotherhood of allies. It has no compelling force +in it. We British are not naturally Imperialist; we are something +greater--or something less. For two years and a half now we have been +fighting against Imperialism in its most extravagant form. It is a +poor incentive to right living to propose to parody the devil we fight +against. + +The blind man must lunge again. + +For when the right answer is seized it answers not only the question why +men should work for their fellow-men but also why nation should cease to +arm and plan and contrive against nation. The social problem is only the +international problem in retail, the international problem is only the +social one in gross. + +My bias rules me altogether here. I see men in social, in economic +and in international affairs alike, eager to put an end to conflict, +inexpressibly weary of conflict and the waste and pain and death it +involves. But to end conflict one must abandon aggressive or uncordial +pretensions. Labour is sick at the idea of more strikes and struggles +after the war, industrialism is sick of competition and anxious for +service, everybody is sick of war. But how can they end any of these +clashes except by the definition and recognition of a common end which +will establish a standard for the trial of every conceivable issue, to +which, that is, every other issue can be subordinated; and what common +end can there be in all the world except this idea of the world kingdom +of God? What is the good of orienting one's devotion to a firm, or to +class solidarity, or _La Republique Francais_, or Poland, or Albania, or +such love and loyalty as people profess for King George or King Albert +or the Duc d'Orleans--it puzzles me why--or any such intermediate object +of self-abandonment? We need a standard so universal that the platelayer +may say to the barrister or the duchess, or the Red Indian to the +Limehouse sailor, or the Anzac soldier to the Sinn Feiner or the +Chinaman, "What are we two doing for it?" And to fill the place of that +"it," no other idea is great enough or commanding enough, but only the +world kingdom of God. + +However long he may have to hunt, the blind man who is seeking service +and an end to bickerings will come to that at last, because of all the +thousand other things he may clutch at, nothing else can satisfy his +manifest need. + + + + +VI. THE ENDING OF THE WAR + + +1 + +About the end of the war there are two chief ways of thinking, there is +a simpler sort of mind which desires merely a date, and a more complex +kind which wants particulars. To the former class belong most of the men +out at the front. They are so bored by this war that they would +welcome any peace that did not definitely admit defeat--and examine +the particulars later. The "tone" of the German army, to judge by its +captured letters, is even lower. It would welcome peace in any form. +Never in the whole history of the world has a war been so universally +unpopular as this war. + +The mind of the soldier is obsessed by a vision of home-coming for +good, so vivid and alluring that it blots out nearly every other +consideration. The visions of people at home are of plenty instead +of privation, lights up, and the cessation of a hundred tiresome +restrictions. And it is natural therefore that a writer rather given to +guesses and forecasts should be asked very frequently to guess how long +the war has still to run. + +All such forecasting is the very wildest of shooting. There are the +chances of war to put one out, and of a war that changes far faster than +the military intelligence. I have made various forecasts. At the outset +I thought that military Germany would fight at about the 1899 level, +would be lavish with cavalry and great attacks, that it would be +reluctant to entrench, and that the French and British had learnt +the lesson of the Boer war better than the Germans. I trusted to +the melodramatic instinct of the Kaiser. I trusted to the quickened +intelligence of the British military caste. The first rush seemed to +bear me out, and I opened my paper day by day expecting to read of the +British and French entrenched and the Germans beating themselves to +death against wire and trenches. In those days I wrote of the French +being over the Rhine before 1915. But it was the Germans who entrenched +first. + +Since then I have made some other attempts. I did not prophesy at all in +1915, so far as I can remember. If I had I should certainly have backed +the Gallipoli attempt to win. It was the right thing to do, and it was +done abominably. It should have given us Constantinople and brought +Bulgaria to our side; it gave us a tragic history of administrative +indolence and negligence, and wasted bravery and devotion. I was very +hopeful of the western offensive in 1915; and in 1916 I counted still on +our continuing push. I believe we were very near something like decision +this last September, but some archaic dream of doing it with cavalry +dashed these hopes. The "Tanks" arrived to late to do their proper work, +and their method of use is being worked out very slowly.... I still +believe in the western push, if only we push it for all we are worth. +If only we push it with our brains, with our available and still +unorganised brains; if only we realise that the art of modern war is to +invent and invent and invent. Hitherto I have always hoped and looked +for decision, a complete victory that would enable the Allies to dictate +peace. But such an expectation is largely conditioned by these delicate +questions of adaptability that my tour of the front has made very urgent +in my mind. A spiteful German American writer has said that the British +would rather kill twenty thousand of their men than break one general. +Even a grain of truth in such a remark is a very valid reasoning for +lengthening one's estimate of the duration of the war. + +There can be no doubt that the Western allies are playing a winning game +upon the western front, and that this is the front of decision now. It +is not in doubt that they are beating the Germans and shoving them back. +The uncertain factor is the rate at which they are shoving them back. +If they can presently get to so rapid an advance as to bring the average +rate since July 1st up to two or three miles a day, then we shall still +see the Allies dictating terms. But if the shove drags on at its present +pace of less than a mile and four thousand prisoners a week over the +limited Somme front only, if nothing is attempted elsewhere to increase +the area of pressure, [*This was written originally before the French +offensive at Verdun.] then the intolerable stress and boredom of the war +will bring about a peace long before the Germans are decisively crushed. +But the war, universally detested, may go on into 1918 or 1919. Food +riots, famine, and general disorganisation will come before 1920, if it +does. The Allies have a winning game before them, but they seem unable +to discover and promote the military genius needed to harvest an +unquestionable victory. In the long run this may not be an unmixed evil. +Victory, complete and dramatic, may be bought too dearly. We need not +triumphs out of this war but the peace of the world. + +This war is altogether unlike any previous war, and its ending, like its +development, will follow a course of its own. For a time people's minds +ran into the old grooves, the Germans were going _nach Paris_ and _nach +London_; Lord Curzon filled our minds with a pleasant image of the +Bombay Lancers riding down _Unter den Linden._ But the Versailles +precedent of a council of victors dictating terms to the vanquished is +not now so evidently in men's minds. The utmost the Allies talk upon +now is to say, "We must end the war on German soil." The Germans talk +frankly of "holding out." I have guessed that the western offensive will +be chiefly on German soil by next June; it is a mere guess, and I admit +it is quite conceivable that the "push" may still be grinding out its +daily tale of wounded and prisoners in 1918 far from that goal. + +None of the combatants expected such a war as this, and the consequence +is that the world at large has no idea how to get out of it. The war may +stay with us like a schoolboy caller, because it does not know how to +go. The Italians said as much to me. "Suppose we get to Innsbruck and +Laibach and Trieste," they said, "it isn't an end!" Lord Northcliffe, +I am told, came away from Italy with the conviction that the war would +last six years. + +There is the clearest evidence that nearly everyone is anxious to get +out of the war now. Nobody at all, except perhaps a few people who may +be called to account, and a handful of greedy profit-seekers, wants to +keep it going. Quietly perhaps and unobtrusively, everyone I know is now +trying to find the way out of the war, and I am convinced that the +same is the case in Germany. That is what makes the Peace-at-any-price +campaign so exasperating. It is like being chased by clamorous geese +across a common in the direction in which you want to go. But how are +we to get out--with any credit--in such a way as to prevent a subsequent +collapse into another war as frightful? + +At present three programmes are before the world of the way in which the +war can be ended. The first of these assumes a complete predominance +of our Allies. It has been stated in general terms by Mr. Asquith. +Evacuation, reparation, due punishment of those responsible for the war, +and guarantees that nothing of the sort shall happen again. There is as +yet no mention of the nature of these guarantees. Just exactly what is +to happen to Poland, Austria, and the Turkish Empire does not appear in +this prospectus. The German Chancellor is equally elusive. The Kaiser +has stampeded the peace-at-any-price people of Great Britain by +proclaiming that Germany wants peace. We knew that. But what sort +of peace? It would seem that we are promised vaguely evacuation and +reparation on the western frontier, and in addition there are to be +guarantees--but it is quite evident that they are altogether different +guarantees from Mr. Asquith's--that nothing of the sort is ever to +happen again. The programme of the British and their Allies seems +to contemplate something like a forcible disarmament and military +occupation of Belgium, the desertion of Serbia and Russia, and the +surrender to Germany of every facility for a later and more successful +German offensive in the west. But it is clear that on these terms as +stated the war must go on to the definite defeat of one side or the +other, or a European chaos. They are irreconcilable sets of terms. + +Yet it is hard to say how they can be modified on either side, if the +war is to be decided only between the belligerents and by standards of +national interest only, without reference to any other considerations. +Our Allies would be insane to leave the Hohenzollern at the end of +the war with a knife in his hand, after the display he has made of +his quality. To surrender his knife means for the Hohenzollern the +abandonment of his dreams, the repudiation of the entire education and +training of Germany for half a century. When we realise the fatality of +this antagonism, we realise how it is that, in this present anticipation +of hell, the weary, wasted and tormented nations must still sustain +their monstrous dreary struggle. And that is why this thought that +possible there may be a side way out, a sort of turning over of the +present endlessly hopeless game into a new and different and manageable +game through the introduction of some external factor, creeps and +spreads as I find it creeping and spreading. + +That is what the finer intelligences of America are beginning to +realise, and why men in Europe continually turn their eyes to America, +with a surmise, with a doubt. + +A point of departure for very much thinking in this matter is the recent +speech of President Wilson that heralded the present discussion. All +Europe was impressed by the truth, and by President Wilson's recognition +of the truth, that from any other great war after this America will +be unable to abstain. Can America come into this dispute at the end to +insist upon something better than a new diplomatic patchwork, and so +obviate the later completer Armageddon? Is there, above the claims +and passions of Germany, France, Britain, and the rest of them, a +conceivable right thing to do for all mankind, that it might also be in +the interest of America to support? Is there a Third Party solution, so +to speak, which may possibly be the way out from this war? + +And further I would go on to ask, is not this present exchange of Notes, +appealing to the common sense of the world, really the beginning, and +the proper beginning, of the unprecedented Peace Negotiations to end +this unprecedented war? And, I submit, the longer this open discussion +goes on before the doors close upon the secret peace congress the better +for mankind. + + +2 + +Let me sketch out here what I conceive to be the essentials of a world +settlement. Some of the items are the mere commonplaces of everyone who +discusses this question; some are less frequently insisted upon. I have +been joining up one thing to another, suggestions I have heard from +this man and that, and I believe that it is really possible to state a +solution that will be acceptable to the bulk of reasonable men all about +the world. Directly we put the panic-massacres of Dinant and Louvain, +the crime of the _Lusitania_ and so on into the category of symptoms +rather than essentials, outrages that call for special punishments and +reparations, but that do not enter further into the ultimate settlement, +we can begin to conceive a possible world treaty. Let me state the broad +outlines of this pacification. The outlines depend one upon the other; +each is a condition of the other. It is upon these lines that the +thoughtful, as distinguished from the merely the combative people, seem +to be drifting everywhere. + +In the first place, it is agreed that there would have to be an +identical treaty between all the great powers of the world binding them +to certain things. It would have to provide:-- + +That the few great industrial states capable of producing modern war +equipment should take over and control completely the manufacture of all +munitions of war in the world. And that they should absolutely close the +supply of such material to all the other states in the world. This is a +far easier task than many people suppose. War has now been so developed +on its mechanical side that the question of its continuance or abolition +rests now entirely upon four or five great powers. + +Next comes the League of Peace idea; that there should be an +International Tribunal for the discussion and settlement of +international disputes. That the dominating powers should maintain land +and sea forces only up to a limit agreed upon and for internal police +use only or for the purpose of enforcing the decisions of the Tribunal. +That they should all be bound to attack and suppress any power amongst +them which increases its war equipment beyond its defined limits. + +That much has already been broached in several quarters. But so far is +not enough. It ignores the chief processes of that economic war that +aids and abets and is inseparably a part of modern international +conflicts. If we are to go as far as we have already stated in the +matter of international controls, then we must go further and provide +that the International Tribunal should have power to consider and set +aside all tariffs and localised privileges that seem grossly unfair or +seriously irritating between the various states of the world. It +should have power to pass or revise all new tariff, quarantine, alien +exclusion, or the like legislation affecting international relations. +Moreover, it should take over and extend the work of the International +Bureau of Agriculture at Rome with a view to the control of all staple +products. It should administer the sea law of the world, and control and +standardise freights in the common interests of mankind. Without these +provisions it would be merely preventing the use of certain weapons; it +would be doing nothing to prevent countries strangling or suffocating +each other by commercial warfare. It would not abolish war. + +Now upon this issue people do not seem to me to be yet thinking very +clearly. It is the exception to find anyone among the peace talkers who +really grasps how inseparably the necessity for free access for everyone +to natural products, to coal and tropical products, e.g. free shipping +at non-discriminating tariffs, and the recognition by a Tribunal of the +principle of common welfare in trade matters, is bound up with the ideal +of a permanent world peace. But any peace that does not provide for +these things will be merely laying down of the sword in order to take up +the cudgel. And a "peace" that did not rehabilitate industrial Belgium, +Poland, and the north of France would call imperatively for the +imposition upon the Allies of a system of tariffs in the interests of +these countries, and for a bitter economic "war after the war" against +Germany. That restoration is, of course, an implicit condition to any +attempt to set up an economic peace in the world. + +These things being arranged for the future, it would be further +necessary to set up an International Boundary Commission, subject to +certain defining conditions agreed upon by the belligerents, to re-draw +the map of Europe, Asia, and Africa. This war does afford an occasion +such as the world may never have again of tracing out the "natural map" +of mankind, the map that will secure the maximum of homogeneity and the +minimum of racial and economic freedom. All idealistic people hope for +a restored Poland. But it is a childish thing to dream of a contented +Poland with Posen still under the Prussian heel, with Cracow cut off, +and without a Baltic port. These claims of Poland to completeness have a +higher sanction than the mere give and take of belligerents in congress. + +Moreover this International Tribunal, if it was indeed to prevent war, +would need also to have power to intervene in the affairs of any country +or region in a state of open and manifest disorder, for the protection +of foreign travellers and of persons and interests localised in that +country but foreign to it. + +Such an agreement as I have here sketched out would at once lift +international politics out of the bloody and hopeless squalor of +the present conflict. It is, I venture to assert, the peace of the +reasonable man in any country whatever. But it needs the attention +of such a disengaged people as the American people to work it out and +supply it with--weight. It needs putting before the world with some sort +of authority greater than its mere entire reasonableness. Otherwise +it will not come before the minds of ordinary men with the effect of a +practicable proposition. I do not see any such plant springing from the +European battlefields. It is America's supreme opportunity. And yet it +is the common sense of the situation, and the solution that must satisfy +a rational German as completely as a rational Frenchman or Englishman. +It has nothing against it but the prejudice against new and entirely +novel things. + + +3 + +In throwing out the suggestion that America should ultimately undertake +the responsibility of proposing a world peace settlement, I admit that +I run counter to a great deal of European feeling. Nowhere in Europe now +do people seem to be in love with the United States. But feeling is +a colour that passes. And the question is above matters of feeling. +Whether the belligerents dislike Americans or the Americans dislike the +belligerents is an incidental matter. The main question is of the duty +of a great and fortunate nation towards the rest of the world and the +future of mankind. + +I do not know how far Americans are aware of the trend of feeling in +Europe at the present time. Both France and Great Britain have a sense +of righteousness in this war such as no nation, no people, has ever felt +in war before. We know we are fighting to save all the world from the +rule of force and the unquestioned supremacy of the military idea. Few +Frenchmen or Englishmen can imagine the war presenting itself to an +American intelligence under any other guise. At the invasion of Belgium +we were astonished that America did nothing. At the sinking of the +_Lusitania_ all Europe looked to America. The British mind contemplates +the spectacle of American destroyers acting as bottleholders to German +submarines with a dazzled astonishment. "Manila," we gasp. In England we +find excuses for America in our own past. In '64 we betrayed Denmark; in +'70 we deserted France. The French have not these memories. They do +not understand the damning temptations of those who feel they are +"_au-dessus de la melee._" They believe they had some share in the +independence of America, that there is a sacred cause in republicanism, +that there are grounds for a peculiar sympathy between France and the +United States in republican institutions. They do not realise that +Germany and America have a common experience in recent industrial +development, and a common belief in the "degeneracy" of all nations with +a lower rate of trade expansion. They do not realise how a political +campaign with the slogan of "Peace and a Full Dinner-Pail" looks in the +middle west, what an honest, simple, rational appeal it makes there. +Atmospheres alter values. In Europe, strung up to tragic and majestic +issues, to Europe gripping a gigantic evil in a death struggle, that +would seem an inscription worthy of a pigsty. A child in Europe would +know now that the context is, "until the bacon-buyer calls," and it is +difficult to realise that adult citizens in America may be incapable of +realising that obvious context. + +I set these things down plainly. There is a very strong disposition in +all the European countries to believe America fundamentally indifferent +to the rights and wrongs of the European struggle; sentimentally +interested perhaps, but fundamentally indifferent. President Wilson +is regarded as a mere academic sentimentalist by a great number of +Europeans. There is a very widespread disposition to treat America +lightly and contemptuously, to believe that America, as one man put it +to me recently, "hasn't the heart to do anything great or the guts to do +anything wicked." There is a strong undercurrent of hostility therefore +to the idea of America having any voice whatever in the final settlement +after the war. It is not for a British writer to analyse the appearance +that have thus affected American world prestige. I am telling what I +have observed. + +Let me relate two trivial anecdotes. + +X came to my hotel in Paris one day to take me to see a certain +munitions organisation. He took from his pocket a picture postcard that +had been sent him by a well-meaning American acquaintance from America. +It bore a portrait of General Lafayette, and under it was printed the +words, "General Lafayette, _Colonel in the United States army._" + +"Oh! These Americans!" said X with a gesture. + +And as I returned to Paris from the French front, our train stopped at +some intermediate station alongside of another train of wounded +men. Exactly opposite our compartment was a car. It arrested our +conversation. It was, as it were, an ambulance _de grand luxe_; it was a +thing of very light, bright wood and very golden decorations; at one end +of it was painted very large and fair the Stars and Stripes, and at the +other fair-sized letters of gold proclaimed--I am sure the lady will +not resent this added gleam of publicity--"Presented by Mrs. William +Vanderbilt." + +My companions were French writers and French military men, and they were +discussing with very keen interest that persistent question, "the ideal +battery." But that ambulance sent a shaft of light into our carriage, +and we stared together. + +Then Colonel Z pointed with two fingers and remarked to us, without any +excess of admiration: + +"_America!_" + +Then he shrugged his shoulders and pulled down the corners of his mouth. + +We felt there was nothing more to add to that, and after a little pause +the previous question was resumed. + +I state these things in order to make it clear that America will start +at a disadvantage when she starts upon the mission of salvage and +reconciliation which is, I believe, her proper role in this world +conflict. One would have to be blind and deaf on this side to be +ignorant of European persuasion of America's triviality. I would not +like to be an American travelling in Europe now, and those I meet here +and there have some of the air of men who at any moment may be +dunned for a debt. They explode without provocation into excuses and +expostulations. + +And I will further confess that when Viscount Grey answered the +intimations of President Wilson and ex-President Taft of an American +initiative to found a World League for Peace, by asking if America +was prepared to back that idea with force, he spoke the doubts of all +thoughtful European men. No one but an American deeply versed in the +idiosyncrasies of the American population can answer that question, or +tell us how far the delusion of world isolation which has prevailed in +America for several generations has been dispelled. But if the answer +to Lord Grey is "Yes," then I think history will emerge with a complete +justification of the obstinate maintenance of neutrality by America. It +is the end that reveals a motive. It is our ultimate act that sometimes +teaches us our original intention. No one can judge the United States +yet. Were you neutral because you are too mean and cowardly, or too +stupidly selfish, or because you had in view an end too great to be +sacrificed to a moment of indignant pride and a force in reserve too +precious to dispel? That is the still open question for America. + +Every country is a mixture of many strands. There is a Base America, +there is a Dull America, there is an Ideal and Heroic America. And I +am convinced that at present Europe underrates and misjudges the +possibilities of the latter. + +All about the world to-day goes a certain freemasonry of thought. It is +an impalpable and hardly conscious union of intention. It thinks not +in terms of national but human experience; it falls into directions and +channels of thinking that lead inevitably to the idea of a world-state +under the rule of one righteousness. In no part of the world is this +modern type of mind so abundantly developed, less impeded by antiquated +and perverse political and religious forms, and nearer the sources of +political and administrative power, than in America. It does not seem to +matter what thousand other things America may happen to be, seeing that +it is also that. And so, just as I cling to the belief, in spite of +hundreds of adverse phenomena, that the religious and social stir of +these times must ultimately go far to unify mankind under the kingship +of God, so do I cling also to the persuasion that there are intellectual +forces among the rational elements in the belligerent centres, among +the other neutrals and in America, that will co-operate in enabling the +United States to play that role of the Unimpassioned Third Party, which +becomes more and more necessary to a generally satisfactory ending of +the war. + + +4 + +The idea that the settlement of this war must be what one might call an +unimpassioned settlement or, if you will, a scientific settlement or a +judicial and not a treaty settlement, a settlement, that is, based upon +some conception of what is right and necessary rather than upon the +relative success or failure of either set of belligerents to make its +Will the standard of decision, is one that, in a great variety of forms +and partial developments, I find gaining ground in the most different +circles. The war was an adventure, it was the German adventure under the +Hohenzollern tradition, to dominate the world. It was to be the last of +the Conquests. It has failed. Without calling upon the reserve strength +of America the civilised world has defeated it, and the war continues +now partly upon the issue whether it shall be made for ever impossible, +and partly because Germany has no organ but its Hohenzollern +organisation through which it can admit its failure and develop its +latent readiness for a new understanding on lines of mutual toleration. +For that purpose nothing more reluctant could be devised than +Hohenzollern imperialism. But the attention of every new combatant--it +is not only Germany now--has been concentrated upon military +necessities; every nation is a clenched nation, with its powers of +action centred in its own administration, bound by many strategic +threats and declarations, and dominated by the idea of getting and +securing advantages. It is inevitable that a settlement made in a +conference of belligerents alone will be shortsighted, harsh, limited by +merely incidental necessities, and obsessed by the idea of hostilities +and rivalries continuing perennially; it will be a trading of advantages +for subsequent attacks. It will be a settlement altogether different in +effect as well as in spirit from a world settlement made primarily to +establish a new phase in the history of mankind. + +Let me take three instances of the impossibility of complete victory +_on either side_ giving a solution satisfactory to the conscience and +intelligence of reasonable men. + +The first--on which I will not expatiate, for everyone knows of its +peculiar difficulty--is Poland. + +The second is a little one, but one that has taken hold of my +imagination. In the settlement of boundaries preceding this war the +boundary between Serbia and north-eastern Albania was drawn with an +extraordinary disregard of the elementary needs of the Albanians of that +region. It ran along the foot of the mountains which form their summer +pastures and their refuge from attack, and it cut their mountains off +from their winter pastures and market towns. Their whole economic life +was cut to pieces and existence rendered intolerable for them. Now an +intelligent Third Party settling Europe would certainly restore these +market towns, Ipek, Jakova, and Prisrend, to Albania. But the Albanians +have no standing in this war; theirs is the happy lot that might have +fallen to Belgium had she not resisted; the war goes to and fro through +Albania; and when the settlement comes, it is highly improbable that +the slightest notice will be taken of Albania's plight in the region. In +which case these particular Albanians will either be driven into exile +to America or they will be goaded to revolt, which will be followed no +doubt by the punitive procedure usual in the Balkan peninsula. + +For my third instance I would step from a matter as small as three +market towns and the grazing of a few thousand head of sheep to a matter +as big as the world. What is going to happen to the shipping of the +world after this war? The Germans, with that combination of cunning +and stupidity which baffles the rest of mankind, have set themselves to +destroy the mercantile marine not merely of Britain and France but of +Norway and Sweden, Holland, and all the neutral countries. The German +papers openly boast that they are building up a big mercantile marine +that will start out to take up the world's overseas trade directly peace +is declared. Every such boast receives careful attention in the British +press. We have heard a very great deal about the German will-to-power +in this war, but there is something very much older and tougher and less +blatant and conspicuous, the British will. In the British papers there +has appeared and gained a permanent footing this phrase, "ton for ton." +This means that Britain will go on fighting until she has exacted and +taken over from Germany the exact equivalent of all the British shipping +Germany has submarined. People do not realise that a time may come when +Germany will be glad and eager to give Russia, France and Italy all that +they require of her, when Great Britain may be quite content to let +her allies make an advantageous peace and herself still go on fighting +Germany. She does not intend to let that furtively created German +mercantile marine ship or coal or exist upon the high seas--so long as +it can be used as an economic weapon against her. Neither Britain nor +France nor Italy can tolerate anything of the sort. + +It has been the peculiar boast of Great Britain that her shipping has +been unpatriotic. She has been the impartial carrier of the whole world. +Her shippers may have served their own profit; they have never served +hers. The fluctuations of freight charges may have been a universal +nuisance, but they have certainly not been an aggressive national +conspiracy. It is Britain's case against any German ascendancy at sea, +an entirely convincing case, that such an ascendancy would be used +ruthlessly for the advancement of German world power. The long-standing +freedom of the seas vanishes at the German touch. So beyond the present +war there opens the agreeable prospect of a mercantile struggle, a +bitter freight war and a war of Navigation Acts for the ultimate control +in the interests of Germany or of the Anti-German allies, of the world's +trade. + +Now how in any of these three cases can the bargaining and trickery of +diplomatists and the advantage-hunting of the belligerents produce any +stable and generally beneficial solution? What all the neutrals want, +what every rational and far-sighted man in the belligerent countries +wants, what the common sense of the whole world demands, is neither the +"ascendancy" of Germany nor the "ascendancy" of Great Britain nor the +"ascendancy" of any state or people or interest in the shipping of the +world. The plain right thing is a world shipping control, as impartial +as the Postal Union. What right and reason and the welfare of coming +generations demand in Poland is a unified and autonomous Poland, +with Cracow, Danzig, and Posen brought into the same Polish-speaking +ring-fence with Warsaw. What everyone who has looked into the Albanian +question desires is that the Albanians shall pasture their flocks and +market their sheepskins in peace, free of Serbian control. In every +country at present at war, the desire of the majority of people is for +a non-contentious solution that will neither crystallise a triumph nor +propitiate an enemy, but which will embody the economic and ethnological +and geographical common sense of the matter. But while the formulae +of national belligerence are easy, familiar, blatant, and instantly +present, the gentler, greater formulae of that wider and newer world +pacifism has still to be generally understood. It is so much easier to +hate and suspect than negotiate generously and patiently; it is so +much harder to think than to let go in a shrill storm of hostility. The +rational pacifist is hampered not only by belligerency, but by a sort +of malignant extreme pacifism as impatient and silly as the extremest +patriotism. + + +5 + +I sketch out these ideas of a world pacification from a third-party +standpoint, because I find them crystallising out in men's minds. I note +how men discuss the suggestion that America may play a large part in +such a permanent world pacification. There I end my account rendered. +These things are as much a part of my impression of the war as a +shell-burst on the Carso or the yellow trenches at Martinpuich. But I +do not know how opinion is going in America, and I am quite unable to +estimate the power of these new ideas I set down, relative to the blind +forces of instinct and tradition that move the mass of mankind. On the +whole I believe more in the reason-guided will-power of men than I did +in the early half of 1914. If I am doubtful whether after all this war +will "end war," I think on the other hand it has had such an effect of +demonstration that it may start a process of thought and conviction, +it may sow the world with organisations and educational movements +considerable enough to grapple with an either arrest or prevent the next +great war catastrophe. I am by no means sure even now that this is not +the last great war in the experience of men. I still believe it may be. + +The most dangerous thing in the business so far is concerned is the wide +disregard of the fact that national economic fighting is bound to cause +war, and the almost universal ignorance of the necessity of subjecting +shipping and overseas and international trade to some kind of +international control. These two things, restraint of trade and +advantage of shipping, are the chief material causes of anger between +modern states. But they would not be in themselves dangerous things if +it were not for the exaggerated delusions of kind and difference, and +the crack-brained "loyalties" arising out of these, that seem still to +rule men's minds. Years ago I came to the conviction that much of the +evil in human life was due to the inherent vicious disposition of the +human mind to intensify classification.[*See my "First and Last Things," +Book I. and my "Modern Utopia," Chapter X.] I do not know how it will +strike the reader, but to me this war, this slaughter of eight or nine +million people, is due almost entirely to this little, almost universal +lack of clear-headedness; I believe that the share of wickedness in +making war is quite secondary to the share of this universal shallow +silliness of outlook. These effigies of emperors and kings and statesmen +that lead men into war, these legends of nationality and glory, would +collapse before our universal derision, if they were not stuffed tight +and full with the unthinking folly of the common man. + +There is in all of us an indolent capacity for suffering evil and +dangerous things, that I contemplate each year of my life with a +deepening incredulity. I perceive we suffer them; I record the futile +protests of the intelligence. It seems to me incredible that men should +not rise up out of this muddy, bloody, wasteful mess of a world war, +with a resolution to end for ever the shams, the prejudices, the +pretences and habits that have impoverished their lives, slaughtered our +sons, and wasted the world, a resolution so powerful and sustained that +nothing could withstand it. + +But it is not apparent that any such will arises. Does it appear at all? +I find it hard to answer that question because my own answer varies with +my mood. There are moods when it seems to me that nothing of the sort +is happening. This war has written its warning in letters of blood and +flame and anguish in the skies of mankind for two years and a half. When +I look for the collective response to that warning, I see a multitude +of little chaps crawling about their private ends like mites in an old +cheese. The kings are still in their places, not a royal prince has been +killed in this otherwise universal slaughter; when the fatuous portraits +of the monarchs flash upon the screen the widows and orphans still break +into loyal song. The ten thousand religions of mankind are still ten +thousand religions, all busy at keeping men apart and hostile. I see +scarcely a measurable step made anywhere towards that world kingdom of +God, which is, I assert, the manifest solution, the only formula that +can bring peace to all mankind. Mankind as a whole seems to have learnt +nothing and forgotten nothing in thirty months of war. + +And then on the other hand I am aware of much quiet talking. This +book tells of how I set out to see the war, and it is largely +conversation.... Perhaps men have always expected miracles to happen; +if one had always lived in the night and only heard tell of the day, I +suppose one would have expected dawn to come as a vivid flash of light. +I suppose one would still think it was night long after the things about +one had crept out of the darkness into visibility. In comparison with +all previous wars there has been much more thinking and much more +discussion. If most of the talk seems to be futile, if it seems as if +everyone were talking and nobody doing, it does not follow that things +are not quietly slipping and sliding out of their old adjustments +amidst the babble and because of the babble. Multitudes of men must be +struggling with new ideas. It is reasonable to argue that there must +be reconsideration, there must be time, before these millions of mental +efforts can develop into a new collective purpose and really _show_--in +consequences. + +But that they will do so is my hope always and, on the whole, except in +moods of depression and impatience, my belief. When one has travelled +to a conviction so great as mine it is difficult to doubt that other men +faced by the same universal facts will not come to the same conclusion. +I believe that only through a complete simplification o religion to its +fundamental idea, to a world-wide realisation of God as the king of the +heart and of all mankind, setting aside monarchy and national egotism +altogether, can mankind come to any certain happiness and security. The +precedent of Islam helps my faith in the creative inspiration of such +a renascence of religion. The Sikh, the Moslem, the Puritan have shown +that men can fight better for a Divine Idea than for any flag or monarch +in the world. It seems to me that illusions fade and effigies lose +credit everywhere. It is a very wonderful thing to me that China is now +a republic.... I take myself to be very nearly an average man, abnormal +only by reason of a certain mental rapidity. I conceive myself to be +thinking as the world thinks, and if I find no great facts, I find a +hundred little indications to reassure me that God comes. Even those who +have neither the imagination nor the faith to apprehend God as a +reality will, I think, realise presently that the Kingdom of God over +a world-wide system of republican states, is the only possible formula +under which we may hope to unify and save mankind. + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of War and the Future, by H. G. 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Behind the Front +The Western War (September, 1916) + I. Ruins + II. The Grades of War +III. The War Landscape + IV. New Arms for Old Ones + V. Tanks +How People Think About the War + I. Do they Really Think at all? + II. The Yielding Pacifist and the Conscientious Objector +III. The Religious Revival + IV. The Riddle of the British + V. The Social Changes in Progress + VI. The Ending of the War + + + + +THE PASSING OF THE EFFIGY + + +1 + +One of the minor peculiarities of this unprecedented war is the +Tour of the Front. After some months of suppressed information-- +in which even the war correspondent was discouraged to the point +of elimination--it was discovered on both sides that this was a +struggle in which Opinion was playing a larger and more important +part than it had ever done before. This wild spreading weed was +perhaps of decisive importance; the Germans at any rate were +attempting to make it a cultivated flower. There was Opinion +flowering away at home, feeding rankly on rumour; Opinion in +neutral countries; Opinion getting into great tangles of +misunderstanding and incorrect valuation between the Allies. The +confidence and courage of the enemy; the amiability and +assistance of the neutral; the zeal, sacrifice, and serenity of +the home population; all were affected. The German cultivation +of opinion began long before the war; it is still the most +systematic and, because of the psychological ineptitude of the +Germans, it is probably the clumsiest. The French /Maison de +la Presse/ is certainly the best organisation in existence for +making things clear, counteracting hostile suggestion, the +British official organisations are comparatively ineffective; but +what is lacking officially is very largely made up for by the +good will and generous efforts of the English and American press. +An interesting monograph might be written upon these various +attempts of the belligerents to get themselves and their +proceedings explained. + +Because there is perceptible in these developments, quite over +and above the desire to influence opinion, a very real effort to +get things explained. It is the most interesting and curious-- +one might almost write touching--feature of these organisations +that they do not constitute a positive and defined propaganda +such as the Germans maintain. The German propaganda is simple, +because its ends are simple; assertions of the moral elevation +and loveliness of Germany; of the insuperable excellences of +German Kultur, the Kaiser, and Crown Prince, and so forth; abuse +of the "treacherous" English who allied themselves with the +"degenerate" French and the "barbaric" Russians; nonsense about +"the freedom of the seas"--the emptiest phrase in history-- +childish attempts to sow suspicion between the Allies, and still +more childish attempts to induce neutrals and simple-minded +pacifists of allied nationality to save the face of Germany by +initiating peace negotiations. But apart from their steady +record and reminder of German brutalities and German aggression, +the press organisations of the Allies have none of this +definiteness in their task. The aim of the national intelligence +in each of the allied countries is not to exalt one's own nation +and confuse and divide the enemy, but to get a real understanding +with the peoples and spirits of a number of different nations, an +understanding that will increase and become a fruitful and +permanent understanding between the allied peoples. Neither the +English, the Russians, the Italians, nor the French, to name only +the bigger European allies, are concerned in setting up a legend, +as the Germans are concerned in setting up a legend of themselves +to impose upon mankind. They are reality dealers in this war, +and the Germans are effigy mongers. Practically the Allies are +saying each to one another, "Pray come to me and see for yourself +that I am very much the human stuff that you are. Come and see +that I am doing my best--and I think that is not so very bad a +best...." And with that is something else still more subtle, +something rather in the form of, "And please tell me what you +think of me--and all this." + +So we have this curious byplay of the war, and one day I find Mr. +Nabokoff, the editor of the /Retch/, and Count Alexy +Tolstoy, that writer of delicate short stories, and Mr. +Chukovsky, the subtle critic, calling in upon me after braving +the wintry seas to see the British fleet; M. Joseph Reinach +follows them presently upon the same errand; and then appear +photographs of Mr. Arnold Bennett wading in the trenches of +Flanders, Mr. Noyes becomes discreetly indiscreet about what he +has seen among the submarines, and Mr. Hugh Walpole catches +things from Mr. Stephen Graham in the Dark Forest of Russia. All +this is quite over and above such writing of facts at first hand +as Mr. Patrick McGill and a dozen other real experiencing +soldiers--not to mention the soldiers' letters Mr. James Milne +has collected, or the unforgettable and immortal /Prisoner of +War/ of Mr. Arthur Green--or such admirable war +correspondents' work as Mr. Philip Gibbs or Mr. Washburne has +done. Some of us writers--I can answer for one--have made our +Tour of the Fronts with a very understandable diffidence. For my +own part I did not want to go. I evaded a suggestion that I +should go in 1915. I travel badly, I speak French and Italian +with incredible atrocity, and am an extreme Pacifist. I hate +soldiering. And also I did not want to write anything "under +instruction". It is largely owing to a certain stiffness in the +composition of General Delme-Radcliffe is resolved that +Italy shall not feel neglected by the refusal of the invitation +from the Comando Supremo by anyone who from the perspective of +Italy may seem to be a representative of British opinion. If +Herbert Spencer had been alive General Radcliffe would have +certainly made him come, travelling-hammock, ear clips and all-- +and I am not above confessing that I wish that Herbert Spencer +was alive--for this purpose. I found Udine warm and gay with +memories of Mr. Belloc, Lord Northcliffe, Mr. Sidney Low, Colonel +Repington and Dr. Conan Doyle, and anticipating the arrival of +Mr. Harold Cox. So we pass, mostly in automobiles that bump +tremendously over war roads, a cloud of witnesses each testifying +after his manner. Whatever else has happened, we have all been +photographed with invincible patience and resolution under the +direction of Colonel Barberich in a sunny little court in Udine. + +My own manner of testifying must be to tell what I have seen and +what I have thought during this extraordinary experience. It has +been my natural disposition to see this war as something +purposeful and epic, as it is great, as an epoch, as "the War +that will end War"--but of that last, more anon. I do not think +I am alone in this inclination to a dramatic and logical +interpretation. The caricatures in the French shops show +civilisation (and particularly Marianne) in conflict with a huge +and hugely wicked Hindenburg Ogre. Well, I come back from this +tour with something not so simple as that. If I were to be tied +down to one word for my impression of this war, I should say that +this war is /Queer./ It is not like anything in a really +waking world, but like something in a dream. It hasn't exactly +that clearness of light against darkness or of good against ill. +But it has the quality of wholesome instinct struggling under a +nightmare. The world is not really awake. This vague appeal for +explanations to all sorts of people, this desire to exhibit the +business, to get something in the way of elucidation at present +missing, is extraordinarily suggestive of the efforts of the mind +to wake up that will sometimes occur at a deep crisis. My memory +of this tour I have just made is full of puzzled-looking men. I +have seen thousands of /poilus/ sitting about in +cafes, by the roadside, in tents, in trenches, thoughtful. +I have seen Alpini sitting restfully and staring with speculative +eyes across the mountain gulfs towards unseen and unaccountable +enemies. I have seen trainloads of wounded staring out of the +ambulance train windows as we passed. I have seen these dim +intimations of questioning reflection in the strangest +juxtapositions; in Malagasy soldiers resting for a spell among +the big shells they were hoisting into trucks for the front, in a +couple of khaki-clad Maoris sitting upon the step of a horse-van +in Amiens station. It is always the same expression one catches, +rather weary, rather sullen, inturned. The shoulders droop. The +very outline is a note of interrogation. They look up as the +privileged tourist of the front, in the big automobile or the +reserved compartment, with his officer or so in charge, passes-- +importantly. One meets a pair of eyes that seems to say: +"Perhaps /you/ understand.... + +"In which case---...?" + +It is a part, I think, of this disposition to investigate what +makes everyone collect "specimens" of the war. Everywhere the +souvenir forces itself upon the attention. The homecoming +permissionaire brings with him invariably a considerable weight +of broken objects, bits of shell, cartridge clips, helmets; it is +a peripatetic museum. It is as if he hoped for a clue. It is +almost impossible, I have found, to escape these pieces in +evidence. I am the least collecting of men, but I have brought +home Italian cartridges, Austrian cartridges, the fuse of an +Austrian shell, a broken Italian bayonet, and a note that is +worth half a franc within the confines of Amiens. But a large +heavy piece of exploded shell that had been thrust very urgently +upon my attention upon the Carso I contrived to lose during the +temporary confusion of our party by the arrival and explosion of +another prospective souvenir in our close proximity. And two +really very large and almost complete specimens of some species +of /Ammonites/ unknown to me, from the hills to the east of +the Adige, partially wrapped in a back number of the /Corriere +della Sera/, that were pressed upon me by a friendly officer, +were unfortunately lost on the line between Verona and Milan +through the gross negligence of a railway porter. But I doubt if +they would have thrown any very conclusive light upon the war. + + +2 + +I avow myself an extreme Pacifist. I am against the man who +first takes up the weapon. I carry my pacifism far beyond the +ambiguous little group of British and foreign sentimentalists who +pretend so amusingly to be socialists in the /Labour +Leader/, whose conception of foreign policy is to give Germany +now a peace that would be no more than a breathing time for a +fresh outrage upon civilisation, and who would even make heroes +of the crazy young assassins of the Dublin crime. I do not +understand those people. I do not merely want to stop this war. +I want to nail down war in its coffin. Modern war is an +intolerable thing. It is not a thing to trifle with in this +Urban District Council way, it is a thing to end forever. I have +always hated it, so far that is as my imagination enabled me to +realise it; and now that I have been seeing it, sometimes quite +closely for a full month, I hate it more than ever. I never +imagined a quarter of its waste, its boredom, its futility, its +desolation. It is merely a destructive and dispersive instead of +a constructive and accumulative industrialism. It is a gigantic, +dusty, muddy, weedy, bloodstained silliness. It is the plain +duty of every man to give his life and all that he has if by so +doing he may help to end it. I hate Germany, which has thrust +this experience upon mankind, as I hate some horrible infectious +disease. The new war, the war on the modern level, is her +invention and her crime. I perceive that on our side and in its +broad outlines, this war is nothing more than a gigantic and +heroic effort in sanitary engineering; an effort to remove German +militarism from the life and regions it has invaded, and to bank +it in and discredit and enfeeble it so that never more will it +repeat its present preposterous and horrible efforts. All human +affairs and all great affairs have their reservations and their +complications, but that is the broad outline of the business as +it has impressed itself on my mind and as I find it conceived in +the mind of the average man of the reading class among the allied +peoples, and as I find it understood in the judgement of honest +and intelligent neutral observers. + +It is my unshakeable belief that essentially the Allies fight for +a permanent world peace, that primarily they do not make war but +resist war, that has reconciled me to this not very congenial +experience of touring as a spectator all agog to see, through the +war zones. At any rate there was never any risk of my playing +Balaam and blessing the enemy. This war is tragedy and sacrifice +for most of the world, for the Germans it is simply the +catastrophic outcome of fifty years of elaborate intellectual +foolery. Militarism, Welt Politik, and here we are! What else +/could/ have happened, with Michael and his infernal War +Machine in the very centre of Europe, but this tremendous +disaster? + +It is a disaster. It may be a necessary disaster; it may teach a +lesson that could be learnt in no other way; but for all that, I +insist, it remains waste, disorder, disaster. + +There is a disposition, I know, in myself as well as in others, +to wriggle away from this verity, to find so much good in the +collapse that has come to the mad direction of Europe for the +past half-century as to make it on the whole almost a beneficial +thing. But at most I can find it in no greater good than the +good of a nightmare that awakens the sleeper in a dangerous place +to a realisation of the extreme danger of his sleep. Better had +he been awake--or never there. In Venetia Captain Pirelli, whose +task it was to keep me out of mischief in the war zone, was +insistent upon the way in which all Venetia was being opened up +by the new military roads; there has been scarcely a new road +made in Venetia since Napoleon drove his straight, poplar- +bordered highways through the land. M. Joseph Reinach, who was +my companion upon the French front, was equally impressed by the +stirring up and exchange of ideas in the villages due to the +movement of the war. Charles Lamb's story of the discovery of +roast pork comes into one's head with an effect of repartee. +More than ideas are exchanged in the war zone, and it is doubtful +how far the sanitary precautions of the military authorities +avails against a considerable propaganda of disease. A more +serious argument for the good of war is that it evokes heroic +qualities that it has brought out almost incredible quantities of +courage, devotion, and individual romance that did not show in +the suffocating peace time that preceded the war. The reckless +and beautiful zeal of the women in the British and French +munition factories, for example, the gaiety and fearlessness of +the common soldiers everywhere; these things have always been +there--like champagne sleeping in bottles in a cellar. But was +there any need to throw a bomb into the cellar? + +I am reminded of a story, or rather of the idea for a story that +I think I must have read in that curious collection of fantasies +and observations, Hawthorne's /Note Book./ It was to be the +story of a man who found life dull and his circumstances +altogether mediocre. He had loved his wife, but now after all +she seemed to be a very ordinary human being. He had begun life +with high hopes--and life was commonplace. He was to grow +fretful and restless. His discontent was to lead to some action, +some irrevocable action; but upon the nature of that action I do +not think the /Note Book/ was very clear. It was to carry +him in such a manner that he was to forget his wife. Then, when +it was too late, he was to see her at an upper window, stripped +and firelit, a glorious thing of light and loveliness and tragic +intensity.... + +The elementary tales of the world are very few, and Hawthorne's +story and Lamb's story are, after all, only variations upon the +same theme. But can we poor human beings never realise our +quality without destruction? + + +3 + +One of the larger singularities of the great war is its failure +to produce great and imposing personalities, mighty leaders, +Napoleons, Caesars. I would indeed make that the essential +thing in my reckoning of the war. It is a drama without a hero; +without countless incidental heroes no doubt, but no star part. +Even the Germans, with a national predisposition for hero-cults +and living still in an atmosphere of Victorian humbug, can +produce nothing better than that timber image, Hindenburg. + +It is not that the war has failed to produce heroes so much as +that it has produced heroism in a torrent. The great man of this +war is the common man. It becomes ridiculous to pick out +particular names. There are too many true stories of splendid +acts in the past two years ever to be properly set down. The +V.C.'s and the palms do but indicate samples. One would need an +encyclopaedia, a row of volumes, of the gloriousness of +human impulses. The acts of the small men in this war dwarf all +the pretensions of the Great Man. Imperatively these +multitudinous heroes forbid the setting up of effigies. When I +was a young man I imitated Swift and posed for cynicism; I will +confess that now at fifty and greatly helped by this war, I have +fallen in love with mankind. + +But if I had to pick out a single figure to stand for the finest +quality of the Allies' war, I should I think choose the figure of +General Joffre. He is something new in history. He is +leadership without vulgar ambition. He is the extreme antithesis +to the Imperial boomster of Berlin. He is as it were the +ordinary common sense of men, incarnate. He is the antithesis of +the effigy. + +By great good luck I was able to see him. I was delayed in Paris +on my way to Italy, and my friend Captain Millet arranged for a +visit to the French front at Soissons and put me in charge of +Lieutenant de Tessin, whom I had met in England studying British +social questions long before this war. Afterwards Lieutenant de +Tessin took me to the great hotel--it still proclaims +"/Restaurant/" in big black letters on the garden wall-- +which shelters the General Headquarters of France, and here I was +able to see and talk to Generals Pelle and Castelnau as +well as to General Joffre. They are three very remarkable and +very different men. They have at least one thing in common; it +is clear that not one of them has spent ten minutes in all his +life in thinking of himself as a Personage or Great Man. They +all have the effect of being active and able men doing an +extremely complicated and difficult but extremely interesting job +to the very best of their ability. With me they had all one +quality in common. They thought I was interested in what they +were doing, and they were quite prepared to treat me as an +intelligent man of a different sort, and to show me as much as I +could understand.... + +Let me confess that de Tessin had had to persuade me to go to +Headquarters. Partly that was because I didn't want to use up +even ten minutes of the time of the French commanders, but much +more was it because I have a dread of Personages. + +There is something about these encounters with personages--as if +one was dealing with an effigy, with something tremendous put up +to be seen. As one approaches they become remoter; great +unsuspected crevasses are discovered. Across these gulfs one +makes ineffective gestures. They do not meet you, they pose at +you enormously. Sometimes there is something more terrible than +dignity; there is condescension. They are affable. I had but +recently had an encounter with an imported Colonial statesman, +who was being advertised like a soap as the coming saviour of +England. I was curious to meet him. I wanted to talk to him +about all sorts of things that would have been profoundly +interesting, as for example his impressions of the Anglican +bishops. But I met a hoarding. I met a thing like a mask, +something surrounded by touts, that was dully trying--as we say +in London--to "come it" over me. He said he had heard of me. He +had read /Kipps./ I intimated that though I had written +/Kipps/ I had continued to exist--but he did not see the +point of that. I said certain things to him about the difference +in complexity between political life in Great Britain and the +colonies, that he was manifestly totally capable of +understanding. But one could as soon have talked with one of the +statesmen at Madame Tussaud's. An antiquated figure. + +The effect of these French commanders upon me was quite different +from my encounter with that last belated adventurer in the effigy +line. I felt indeed that I was a rather idle and flimsy person +coming into the presence of a tremendously compact and busy +person, but I had none of that unpleasant sensation of a +conventional role, of being expected to play the minute +worshipper in the presence of the Great Image. I was so moved by +the common humanity of them all that in each case I broke away +from the discreet interpretations of de Tessin and talked to them +directly in the strange dialect which I have inadvertently made +for myself out of French, a disemvowelled speech of epicene +substantives and verbs of incalculable moods and temperaments, +"/Entente Cordiale./" The talked back as if we had met in a +club. General Pelle pulled my leg very gaily with some +quotations from an article I had written upon the conclusion of +the war. I think he found my accent and my idioms very +refreshing. I had committed myself to a statement that Bloch has +been justified in his theory that under modern conditions the +defensive wins. There were excellent reasons, and General +Pelle pointed them out, for doubting the applicability of +this to the present war. + +Both he and General Castelnau were anxious that I should see a +French offensive sector as well as Soissons. Then I should +understand. And since then I have returned from Italy and I have +seen and I do understand. The Allied offensive was winning; that +is to say, it was inflicting far greater losses than it +experienced; it was steadily beating the spirit out of the German +army and shoving it back towards Germany. Only peace can, I +believe, prevent the western war ending in Germany. And it is +the Frenchmen mainly who have worked out how to do it. + +But of that I will write later. My present concern is with +General Joffre as the antithesis of the Effigy. The effigy, + +"Thou Prince of Peace, +Thou God of War," + +as Mr. Sylvester Viereck called him, prances on a great horse, +wears a Wagnerian cloak, sits on thrones and talks of shining +armour and "unser Gott." All Germany gloats over his Jovian +domesticities; when I was last in Berlin the postcard shops were +full of photographs of a sort of procession of himself and his +sons, all with long straight noses and sidelong eyes. It is all +dreadfully old-fashioned. General Joffre sits in a pleasant +little sitting-room in a very ordinary little villa conveniently +close to Headquarters. He sits among furniture that has no +quality of pose at all, that is neither magnificent nor +ostentatiously simple and hardy. He has dark, rather sleepy eyes +under light eyelashes, eyes that glance shyly and a little +askance at his interlocutor and then, as he talks, away--as if he +did not want to be preoccupied by your attention. He has a +broad, rather broadly modelled face, a soft voice, the sort of +persuasive reasoning voice that many Scotchmen have. I had a +feeling that if he were to talk English he would do so with a +Scotch accent. Perhaps somewhere I have met a Scotchman of his +type. He sat sideways to his table as a man might sit for a +gossip in a cafe. + +He is physically a big man, and in my memory he grows bigger and +bigger. He sits now in my memory in a room like the rooms that +any decent people might occupy, like that vague room that is the +background of so many good portraits, a great blue-coated figure +with a soft voice and rather tired eyes, explaining very simply +and clearly the difficulties that this vulgar imperialism of +Germany, seizing upon modern science and modern appliances, has +created for France and the spirit of mankind. + +He talked chiefly of the strangeness of this confounded war. It +was exactly like a sanitary engineer speaking of the unexpected +difficulties of some particularly nasty inundation. He made +little stiff horizontal gestures with his hands. First one had +to build a dam and stop the rush of it, so; then one had to +organise the push that would send it back. He explained the +organisation of the push. They had got an organisation now that +was working out most satisfactorily. Had I seen a sector? I had +seen the sector of Soissons. Yes, but that was not now an +offensive sector. I must see an offensive sector; see the whole +method. Lieutenant de Tessin must see that that was arranged.... + +Neither he nor his two colleagues spoke of the Germans with +either hostility or humanity. Germany for them is manifestly +merely an objectionable Thing. It is not a nation, not a people, +but a nuisance. One has to build up this great counter-thrust +bigger and stronger until they go back. The war must end in +Germany. The French generals have no such delusions about German +science or foresight or capacity as dominates the smart dinner +chatter of England. One knows so well that detestable type of +English folly, and its voice of despair: "They /plan/ +everything. They foresee everything." This paralysing +Germanophobia is not common among the French. The war, the +French generals said, might take--well, it certainly looked like +taking longer than the winter. Next summer perhaps. Probably, +if nothing unforeseen occurred, before a full year has passed the +job might be done. Were any surprises in store? They didn't +seem to think it was probable that the Germans had any surprises +in store.... The Germans are not an inventive people; they are +merely a thorough people. One never knew for certain. + +Is any greater contrast possible than between so implacable, +patient, reasonable--and above all things /capable/--a being +as General Joffre and the rhetorician of Potsdam, with his talk +of German Might, of Hammer Blows and Hacking Through? Can there +be any doubt of the ultimate issue between them? + +There are stories that sound pleasantly true to me about General +Joffre's ambitions after the war. He is tired; then he will be +very tired. He will, he declares, spend his first free summer in +making a tour of the waterways of France in a barge. So I hope +it may be. One imagines him as sitting quietly on the crumpled +remains of the last and tawdriest of Imperial traditions, with a +fishing line in the placid water and a large buff umbrella +overhead, the good ordinary man who does whatever is given to him +to do--as well as he can. The power that has taken the great +effigy of German imperialism by the throat is something very +composite and complex, but if we personify it at all it is +something more like General Joffre than any other single human +figure I can think of or imagine. + +If I were to set a frontispiece to a book about this War I would +make General Joffre the frontispiece. + + +4 + +As we swung back along the dusty road to Paris at a pace of fifty +miles an hour and upwards, driven by a helmeted driver with an +aquiline profile fit to go upon a coin, whose merits were a +little flawed by a childish and dangerous ambition to run over +every cat he saw upon the road, I talked to de Tessin about this +big blue-coated figure of Joffre, which is not so much a figure +as a great generalisation of certain hitherto rather obscured +French qualities, and of the impression he had made upon me. And +from that I went on to talk about the Super Man, for this +encounter had suddenly crystallised out a set of realisations +that had been for some time latent in my mind. + +How much of what follows I said to de Tessin at the time I do not +clearly remember, but this is what I had in mind. + +The idea of the superman is an idea that has been developed by +various people ignorant of biology and unaccustomed to biological +ways of thinking. It is an obvious idea that follows in the +course of half an hour or so upon one's realisation of the +significance of Darwinism. If man has evolved from something +different, he must now be evolving onward into something sur- +human. The species in the future will be different from the +species of the past. So far at least our Nietzsches and Shaws +and so on went right. + +But being ignorant of the elementary biological proposition that +modification of a species means really a secular change in its +average, they jumped to a conclusion--to which the late Lord +Salisbury also jumped years ago at a very memorable British +Association meeting--that a species is modified by the sudden +appearance of eccentric individuals here and there in the general +mass who interbreed--preferentially. Helped by a streak of antic +egotism in themselves, they conceived of the superman as a +posturing personage, misunderstood by the vulgar, fantastic, +wonderful. But the antic Personage, the thing I have called the +Effigy, is not new but old, the oldest thing in history, the +departing thing. It depends not upon the advance of the species +but upon the uncritical hero-worship of the crowd. You may see +the monster drawn twenty times the size of common men upon the +oldest monuments of Egypt and Assyria. The true superman comes +not as the tremendous personal entry of a star, but in the less +dramatic form of a general increase of goodwill and skill and +common sense. A species rises not by thrusting up peaks but by +the brimming up as a flood does. The coming of the superman +means not an epidemic of personages but the disappearance of the +Personage in the universal ascent. That is the point overlooked +by the megalomaniac school of Nietzsche and Shaw. + +And it is the peculiarity of this war, it is the most reassuring +evidence that a great increase in general ability and critical +ability has been going on throughout the last century, that no +isolated great personages have emerged. Never has there been so +much ability, invention, inspiration, leadership; but the very +abundance of good qualities has prevented our focusing upon those +of any one individual. We all play our part in the realisation +of God's sanity in the world, but, as the strange, dramatic end +of Lord Kitchener has served to remind us, there is no single +individual of all the allied nations whose death can materially +affect the great destinies of this war. + +In the last few years I have developed a religious belief that +has become now to me as real as any commonplace fact. I think +that mankind is still as it were collectively dreaming and hardly +more awakened to reality than a very young child. It has these +dreams that we express by the flags of nationalities and by +strange loyalties and by irrational creeds and ceremonies, and +its dreams at times become such nightmares as this war. But the +time draws near when mankind will awake and the dreams will fade +away, and then there will be no nationality in all the world but +humanity, and no kind, no emperor, nor leader but the one God of +mankind. This is my faith. I am as certain of this as I was in +1900 that men would presently fly. To me it is as if it must be +so. + +So that to me this extraordinary refusal of the allied nations +under conditions that have always hitherto produced a Great Man +to produce anything of the sort, anything that can be used as an +effigy and carried about for the crowd to follow, is a fact of +extreme significance and encouragement. It seems to me that the +twilight of the half gods must have come, that we have reached +the end of the age when men needed a Personal Figure about which +they could rally. The Kaiser is perhaps the last of that long +series of crowned and cloaked and semi-divine personages which +has included Caesar and Alexander and Napoleon the First-- +and Third. In the light of the new time we see the emperor-god +for the guy he is. In the August of 1914 he set himself up to be +the paramount Lord of the World, and it will seem to the +historian to come, who will know our dates so well and our +feelings, our fatigues and efforts so little, it will seem a +short period from that day to this, when the great figure already +sways and staggers towards the bonfire. + + +5 + +I had the experience of meeting a contemporary king upon this +journey. He was the first king I had ever met. The Potsdam +figure--with perhaps some local exceptions behind the Gold Coast-- +is, with its collection of uniforms and its pomps and splendours, +the purest survival of the old tradition of divine monarchy now +that the Emperor at Pekin has followed the Shogun into the +shadows. The modern type of king shows a disposition to intimate +at the outset that he cannot help it, and to justify or at any +rate utilise his exceptional position by sound hard work. It is +an age of working kings, with the manners of private gentlemen. +The King of Italy for example is far more accessible than was the +late Pierpont Morgan or the late Cecil Rhodes, and he seems to +keep a smaller court. + +I went to see him from Udine. He occupied a moderate-sized +country villa about half an hour by automobile from headquarters. +I went over with General Radcliffe; we drove through the gates of +the villa past a single sentinel in an ordinary infantry uniform, +up to the door of the house, and the number of guards, servants, +attendants, officials, secretaries, ministers and the like that I +saw in that house were--I counted very carefully--four. +Downstairs were three people, a tall soldier of the bodyguard in +grey; an A.D.C., Captain Moreno, and Col. Matteoli, the minister +of the household. I went upstairs to a drawing-room of much the +same easy and generalised character as the one in which I had met +General Joffre a few days before. I gave my hat to a second +bodyguard, and as I did so a pleasantly smiling man appeared at +the door of the study whom I thought at first must be some +minister in attendance. I did not recognise him instantly +because on the stamps and coins he is always in profile. He +began to talk in excellent English about my journey, and I +replied, and so talking we went into the study from which he had +emerged. Then I realised I was talking to the king. + +Addicted as I am to the cinematograph, in which the standard of +study furniture is particularly rich and high, I found something +very cooling and simple and refreshing in the sight of the king's +study furniture. He sat down with me at a little useful writing +table, and after asking me what I had seen in Italy and hearing +what I had seen and what I was to see, he went on talking, very +good talk indeed. + +I suppose I did a little exceed the established tradition of +courts by asking several questions and trying to get him to talk +upon certain points as to which I was curious, but I perceived +that he had had to carry on at least so much of the regal +tradition as to control the conversation. He was, however, +entirely un-posed. His talk reminded me somehow of Maurice +Baring's books; it had just the same quick, positive +understanding. And he had just the same detachment from the war +as the French generals. He spoke of it--as one might speak of an +inundation. And of its difficulties and perplexities. + +Here on the Adriatic side there were political entanglements that +by comparison made our western after-the-war problems plain +sailing. He talked of the game of spellicans among the Balkan +nationalities. How was that difficulty to be met? In Macedonia +there were Turkish villages that were Christian and Bulgarians +that were Moslem. There were families that changed the +termination of their names from /ski/ to /off/ as +Serbian or Bulgarian prevailed. I remarked that that showed a +certain passion for peace, and that much of the mischief might be +due to the propaganda of the great Powers. I have a prejudice +against that blessed Whig "principle of nationality," but the +King of Italy was not to be drawn into any statement about that. +He left the question with his admission of its extreme complexity. + +He went on to talk of the strange contrasts of war, of such +things as the indifference of the birds to gunfire and +desolation. One day on the Carso he had been near the newly +captured Austrian trenches, and suddenly from amidst a scattered +mass of Austrian bodies a quail had risen. that had struck him +as odd, and so too had the sight of a pack of cards and a wine +flask on some newly-made graves. The ordinary life was a very +/obstinate/ thing.... + +He talked of the courage of modern men. He was astonished at the +quickness with which they came to disregard shrapnel. And they +were so quietly enduring when they were wounded. He had seen a +lot of the wounded, and he had expected much groaning and crying +out. But unless a man is hit in the head and goes mad he does +not groan or scream! They are just brave. If you ask them how +they feel it is always one of two things: either they say quietly +that they are very bad or else they say there is nothing the +matter.... + +He spoke as if these were mere chance observations, but everyone +tells me that nearly every day the king is at the front and often +under fire. He has taken more risks in a week than the Potsdam +War Lord has taken since the war began. He keeps himself acutely +informed upon every aspect of the war. He was a little inclined +to fatalism, he confessed. There were two stories current of two +families of four sons, in each three had been killed and in each +there was an attempt to put the fourth in a place of comparative +safety. In one case a general took the fourth son in as an +attendant and embarked upon a ship that was immediately +torpedoed; in the other the fourth son was killed by accident +while he was helping to carry dinner in a rest camp. From those +stories we came to the question whether the uneducated Italians +were more superstitious than the uneducated English; the king +thought they were much less so. That struck me as a novel idea. +But then he thought that English rural people believe in witches +and fairies. + +I have given enough of this talk to show the quality of this king +of the new dispensation. It was, you see, the sort of easy talk +one might hear from fine-minded people anywhere. When we had +done talking he came to the door of the study with me and shook +hands and went back to his desk--with that gesture of return to +work which is very familiar and sympathetic to a writer, and with +no gesture of regality at all. + +Just to complete this impression let me repeat a pleasant story +about this king and our Prince of Wales, who recently visited the +Italian front. The Prince is a source of anxiety on these +visits; he has a very strong and very creditable desire to share +the ordinary risks of war. He is keenly interested, and +unobtrusively bent upon getting as near the fighting as line as +possible. But the King of Italy was firm upon keeping him out of +anything more than the most incidental danger. "We don't want +any historical incidents here," he said. I think that might well +become an historical phrase. For the life of the Effigy is a +series of historical incidents. + + +6 + +Manifestly one might continue to multiply portraits of fine +people working upon this great task of breaking and ending the +German aggression, the German legend, the German effigy, and the +effigy business generally; the thesis being that the Allies have +no effigy. One might fill a thick volume with pictures of men up +the scale and down working loyally and devotedly upon the war, to +make this point clear that the essential king and the essential +loyalty of our side is the commonsense of mankind. + +There comes into my head as a picture at the other extreme of +this series, a memory of certain trenches I visited on my last +day in France. They were trenches on an offensive front; they +were not those architectural triumphs, those homes from home, +that grow to perfection upon the less active sections of the +great line. They had been first made by men who had run rapidly +forward with spade and rifle, stooping as they ran, who had +dropped into the craters of big shells, who had organised these +chiefly at night and dug the steep ditches sideways to join up +into continuous trenches. Now they were pushing forward saps +into No Man's Land, linking them across, and so continually +creeping nearer to the enemy and a practicable jumping-off place +for an attack. (It has been made since; the village at which I +peeped was in our hands a week later.) These trenches were dug +into a sort of yellowish sandy clay; the dug-outs were mere holes +in the earth that fell in upon the clumsy; hardly any timber had +been got up the line; a storm might flood them at any time a +couple of feet deep and begin to wash the sides. Overnight they +had been "strafed" and there had been a number of casualties; +there were smashed rifles about and a smashed-up machine gun +emplacement, and the men were dog-tired and many of them sleeping +like logs, half buried in -clay. Some slept on the firing steps. +As one went along one became aware ever and again of two or three +pairs of clay-yellow feet sticking out of a clay hole, and +peering down one saw the shapes of men like rudely modelled +earthen images of soldiers, motionless in the cave. + +I came round the corner upon a youngster with an intelligent face +and steady eyes sitting up on the firing step, awake and +thinking. We looked at one another. There are moments when mind +leaps to mind. It is natural for the man in the trenches +suddenly confronted by so rare a beast as a middle-aged civilian +with an enquiring expression, to feel oneself something of a +spectacle and something generalised. It is natural for the +civilian to look rather in the vein of saying, "Well, how do you +take it?" As I pushed past him we nodded slightly with an effect +of mutual understanding. And we said with our nods just exactly +what General Joffre had said with his horizontal gestures of the +hand and what the King of Italy conveyed by his friendly manner; +we said to each other that here was the trouble those Germans had +brought upon us and here was the task that had to be done. + +Our guide to these trenches was a short, stocky young man, a cob; +with a rifle and a tight belt and projecting skirts and a helmet, +a queer little figure that, had you seen it in a picture a year +or so before the war, you would most certainly have pronounced +Chinese. He belonged to a Northumbrian battalion; it does not +matter exactly which. As we returned from this front line, +trudging along the winding path through the barbed wire tangles +before the smashed and captured German trench that had been taken +a fortnight before, I fell behind my guardian captain and had a +brief conversation wit this individual. He was a lad in the +early twenties, weather-bit and with bloodshot eyes. He was, he +told me, a miner. I asked my stock question in such cases, +whether he would go back to the old work after the war. He said +he would, and then added--with the events of overnight on his +mind: "If A'hm looky." + +Followed a little silence. Then I tried my second stock remark +for such cases. One does not talk to soldiers at the front in +this war of Glory or the "Empire on which the sun never sets" or +"the meteor flag of England" or of King and Country or any of +those fine old headline things. On the desolate path that winds +about amidst the shell craters and the fragments and the red- +rusted wire, with the silken shiver of passing shells in the air +and the blue of the lower sky continually breaking out into +eddying white puffs, it is wonderful how tawdry such panoplies of +the effigy appear. We knew that we and our allies are upon a +greater, graver, more fundamental business than that sort of +thing now. We are very near the waking point. + +"Well," I said, "it's got to be done." + +"Aye," he said, easing the strap of his rifle a little; "it's got +to be done." + + + +THE WAR IN ITALY (AUGUST, 1916) + + +I. THE ISONZO FRONT + + +1 + +My first impressions of the Italian war centre upon Udine. So +far I had had only a visit to Soissons on an exceptionally quiet +day and the sound of a Zeppelin one night in Essex for all my +experience of actual warfare. But my bedroom at the British +mission in Udine roused perhaps extravagant expectations. There +were holes in the plaster ceiling and wall, betraying splintered +laths, holes, that had been caused by a bomb that had burst and +killed several people in the little square outside. Such +excitements seem to be things of the past now in Udine. Udine +keeps itself dark nowadays, and the Austrian sea-planes, which +come raiding the Italian coast country at night very much in the +same aimless, casually malignant way in which the Zeppelins raid +England, apparently because there is nothing else for them to do, +find it easier to locate Venice. + +My earlier rides in Venetia began always with the level roads of +the plain, roads frequently edged by watercourses, with plentiful +willows beside the road, vines and fields of Indian corn and +suchlike lush crops. Always quite soon one came to some old +Austrian boundary posts; almost everywhere the Italians are +fighting upon what is technically enemy territory, but nowhere +does it seem a whit less Italian than the plain of Lombardy. +When at last I motored away from Udine to the northern mountain +front I passed through Campo-Formio and saw the white-faced inn +at which Napoleon dismembered the ancient republic of Venice and +bartered away this essential part of Italy into foreign control. +It just gravitates back now--as though there had been no +Napoleon. + +And upon the roads and beside them was the enormous equipment of +a modern army advancing. Everywhere I saw new roads being made, +railways pushed up, vast store dumps, hospitals; everywhere the +villages swarmed with grey soldiers; everywhere our automobile +was threading its way and taking astonishing risks among +interminable processions of motor lorries, strings of ambulances +or of mule carts, waggons with timber, waggons with wire, waggons +with men's gear, waggons with casks, waggons discreetly veiled, +columns of infantry, cavalry, batteries /en route./ Every +waggon that goes up full comes back empty, and many wounded were +coming down and prisoners and troops returning to rest. Goritzia +had been taken a week or so before my arrival; the Isonzo had +been crossed and the Austrians driven back across the Carso for +several miles; all the resources of Italy seemed to be crowding +up to make good these gains and gather strength for the next +thrust. The roads under all this traffic remained wonderful; +gangs of men were everywhere repairing the first onset of wear, +and Italy is the most fortunate land in the world for road metal; +her mountains are solid road metal, and in this Venetian plain +you need but to scrape through a yard of soil to find gravel. + +One travelled through a choking dust under the blue sky, and +above the steady incessant dusty succession of lorry, lorry, +lorry, lorry that passed one by, one saw, looking up, the tree +tops, house roofs, or the solid Venetian campanile of this or +that wayside village. Once as we were coming out of the great +grey portals of that beautiful old relic of a former school of +fortification, Palmanova, the traffic became suddenly bright +yellow, and for a kilometre or so we were passing nothing but +Sicilian mule carts loaded with hay. These carts seem as strange +among the grey shapes of modern war transport as a Chinese +mandarin in painted silk would be. They are the most individual +of things, all two-wheeled, all bright yellow and the same size +it is true, but upon each there are they gayest of little +paintings, such paintings as one sees in England at times upon an +ice-cream barrow. Sometimes the picture will present a +scriptural subject, sometimes a scene of opera, sometimes a dream +landscape or a trophy of fruits or flowers, and the harness--now +much out of repair--is studded with brass. Again and again I +have passed strings of these gay carts; all Sicily must be swept +of them. + +Through the dust I came to Aquileia, which is now an old +cathedral, built upon the remains of a very early basilica, +standing in a space in a scattered village. But across this +dusty space there was carried the head of the upstart Maximinus +who murdered Alexander Severus, and later Aquileia brought Attila +near to despair. Our party alighted; we inspected a very old +mosaic floor which has been uncovered since the Austrian retreat. +The Austrian priests have gone too, and their Italian successors +are already tracing out a score of Roman traces that it was the +Austrian custom to minimise. Captain Pirelli refreshed my +historical memories; it was rather like leaving a card on Gibbon +/en route/ for contemporary history. + +By devious routes I went on to certain batteries of big guns +which had played their part in hammering the Austrian left above +Monfalcone across an arm of the Adriatic, and which were now +under orders to shift and move up closer. The battery was the +most unobtrusive of batteries; its one desire seemed to be to +appear a simple piece of woodland in the eye of God and the +aeroplane. I went about the network of railways and paths under +the trees that a modern battery requires, and came presently upon +a great gun that even at the first glance seemed a little less +carefully hidden than its fellows. Then I saw that it was a most +ingenious dummy made of a tree and logs and so forth. It was in +the emplacement of a real gun that had been located; it had its +painted sandbags about it just the same, and it felt itself so +entirely a part of the battery that whenever its companions fired +t burnt a flash and kicked up a dust. It was an excellent +example of the great art of camouflage which this war has +developed. + +I went on through the wood to a shady observation post high in a +tree, into which I clambered with my guide. I was able from this +position to get a very good idea of the lie of the Italian +eastern front. I was in the delta of the Isonzo. Directly in +front of me were some marshes and the extreme tip of the Adriatic +Sea, at the head of which was Monfalcone, now in Italian hands. +Behind Monfalcone ran the red ridge of the Carso, of which the +Italians had just captured the eastern half. Behind this again +rose the mountains to the east of the Isonzo which the Austrians +still held. The Isonzo came towards me from out of the +mountains, in a great westward curve. Fifteen or sixteen miles +away where it emerged from the mountains lay the pleasant and +prosperous town of Goritzia, and at the westward point of the +great curve was Sagrado with its broken bridge. The battle of +Goritzia was really not fought at Goritzia at all. What happened +was the brilliant and bloody storming of Mounts Podgora and +Sabotino on the western side of the river above Goritzia, and +simultaneously a crossing at Sagrado below Goritzia and a +magnificent rush up the plateau and across the plateau of the +Carso. Goritzia itself was not organised for defence, and the +Austrians were so surprised by the rapid storm of the mountains +to the north-west of it and of the Carso to the south-east, that +they made no fight in the town itself. + +As a consequence when I visited it I found it very little injured-- +compared, that is, with such other towns as have been fought +through. Here and there the front of a house has been knocked in +by an Austrian shell, or a lamp-post prostrated. But the road +bridge had suffered a good deal; its iron parapet was twisted +about by shell bursts and interwoven with young trees and big +boughs designed to screen the passer-by from the observation of +the Austrian gunners upon Monte Santo. Here and there were huge +holes through which one could look down upon the blue trickles of +water in the stony river bed far below. The driver of our +automobile displayed what seemed to me an extreme confidence in +the margins of these gaps, but his confidence was justified. At +Sagrado the bridge had been much more completely demolished; no +effort had been made to restore the horizontal roadway, but one +crossed by a sort of timber switchback that followed the ups and +downs of the ruins. + +It is not in these places that one must look for the real +destruction of modern war. The real fight on the left of +Goritzia went through the village of Lucinico up the hill of +Podgora. Lucinico is nothing more than a heap of grey stones; +except for a bit of the church wall and the gable end of a house +one cannot even speak of it as ruins. But in one place among the +rubble I saw the splintered top and a leg of a grand piano. +Podgora hill, which was no doubt once neatly terraced and +cultivated, is like a scrap of landscape from some airless, +treeless planet. Still more desolate was the scene upon the +Carso to the right (south) of Goritzia. Both San Martino and +Doberdo are destroyed beyond the limits of ruination. The Carso +itself is a waterless upland with but a few bushy trees; it must +always have been a desolate region, but now it is an +indescribable wilderness of shell craters, smashed-up Austrian +trenches, splintered timber, old iron, rags, and that rusty +thorny vileness of man's invention, worse than all the thorns and +thickets of nature, barbed wire. There are no dead visible; the +wounded have been cleared away; but about the trenches and +particularly near some of the dug-outs there was a faint +repulsive smell.... + +Yet into this wilderness the Italians are now thrusting a sort of +order. The German is a wonderful worker, they say on the Anglo- +French front that he makes his trenches by way of resting, but I +doubt if he can touch the Italian at certain forms of toil. All +the way up to San Martino and beyond, swarms of workmen were +making one of those carefully graded roads that the Italians make +better than any other people. Other swarms were laying water- +pipes. For upon the Carso there are neither roads nor water, and +before the Italians can thrust farther both must be brought up to +the front. + +As we approached San Martino an Austrian aeroplane made its +presence felt overhead by dropping a bomb among the tents of some +workmen, in a little scrubby wood on the hillside near at hand. +One heard the report and turned to see the fragments flying and +the dust. Probably they got someone. And then, after a little +pause, the encampment began to spew out men; here, there and +everywhere they appeared among the tents, running like rabbits at +evening-time, down the hill. Soon after and probably in +connection with this signal, Austrian shells began to come over. +They do not use shrapnel because the rocky soil of Italy makes +that unnecessary. They fire a sort of shell that goes bang and +releases a cloud of smoke overhead, and then drops a parcel of +high explosive that bursts on the ground. The ground leaps into +red dust and smoke. But these things are now to be seen on the +cinema. Forthwith the men working on the road about us begin to +down tools and make for the shelter trenches, a long procession +going at a steady but resolute walk. Then like a blow in the +chest came the bang of a big Italian gun somewhere close at +hand.... + +Along about four thousand miles of the various fronts this sort +of thing was going on that morning.... + + +2 + +This Carso front is the practicable offensive front of Italy. +From the left wing on the Isonzo along the Alpine boundary round +to the Swiss boundary there is mountain warfare like nothing else +in the world; it is warfare that pushes the boundary backward, +but it is mountain warfare that will not, for so long a period +that the war will be over first, hold out any hopeful prospects +of offensive movements on a large scale against Austria or +Germany. It is a short distance as the crow flies from Rovereto +to Munich, but not as the big gun travels. The Italians, +therefore, as their contribution to the common effort, are +thrusting rather eastwardly towards the line of the Julian Alps +through Carinthia and Carniola. From my observation post in the +tree near Monfalcone I saw Trieste away along the coast to my +right. It looked scarcely as distant as Folkestone from +Dungeness. The Italian advanced line is indeed scarcely ten +miles from Trieste. But the Italians are not, I think, going to +Trieste just yet. That is not the real game now. They are +playing loyally with the Allies for the complete defeat of the +Central Powers, and that is to be achieved striking home into +Austria. Meanwhile there is no sense in knocking Trieste to +pieces, or using Italians instead of Austrian soldiers to +garrison it. + + +II. THE MOUNTAIN WAR + + +1 + +The mountain warfare of Italy is extraordinarily unlike that upon +any other front. From the Isonzo to the Swiss frontier we are +dealing with high mountains, cut by deep valleys between which +there is usually no practicable lateral communication. Each +advance must have the nature of an unsupported shove along a +narrow channel, until the whole mountain system, that is, is won, +and the attack can begin to deploy in front of the passes. +Geographically Austria has the advantage. She had the gentler +slope of the mountain chains while Italy has the steep side, and +the foresight of old treaties has given her deep bites into what +is naturally Italian territory; she is far nearer the Italian +plain than Italy is near any practicable fighting ground for +large forces; particularly is this the case in the region of the +Adige valley and Lake Garda. + +The legitimate war, so to speak, in this region is a +mountaineering war. The typical position is roughly as follows. +The Austrians occupy valley A which opens northward; the Italians +occupy valley B which opens southward. The fight is for the +crest between A and B. The side that wins that crest gains the +power of looking down into, firing into and outflanking the +positions of the enemy valley. In most cases it is the Italians +now who are pressing, and if the reader will examine a map of the +front and compare it with the official reports he will soon +realise that almost everywhere the Italians are up to the head of +the southward valleys and working over the crests so as to press +down upon the Austrian valleys. But in the Trentino the +Austrians are still well over the crest on the southward slopes. +When I was in Italy they still held Rovereto. + +Now it cannot be said that under modern conditions mountains +favour either the offensive or the defensive. But they certainly +make operations far more deliberate than upon a level. An +engineered road or railway in an Alpine valley is the most +vulnerable of things; its curves and viaducts may be practically +demolished by shell fire or swept by shrapnel, although you hold +the entire valley except for one vantage point. All the +mountains round about a valley must be won before that valley is +safe for the transport of an advance. But on the other hand a +surprise capture of some single mountain crest and the hoisting +of one gun into position there may block the retreat of guns and +material from a great series of positions. Mountain surfaces are +extraordinarily various and subtle. You may understand Picardy +on a map, but mountain warfare is three-dimensional. A struggle +may go on for weeks or months consisting of apparently separate +and incidental skirmishes, and then suddenly a whole valley +organisation may crumble away in retreat or disaster. Italy is +gnawing into the Trentino day by day, and particularly around by +her right wing. At no time I shall be surprised to see a sudden +lunge forward on that front, and hear a tale of guns and +prisoners. This will not mean that she has made a sudden attack, +but that some system of Austrian positions has collapsed under +her continual pressure. + +Such briefly is the /idea/ of mountain struggle. Its +realities, I should imagine, are among the strangest and most +picturesque in all this tremendous world conflict. I know +nothing of the war in the east, of course, but there are things +here that must be hard to beat. Happily they will soon get +justice done to them by an abler pen than mine. I hear that +Kipling is to follow me upon this ground; nothing can be imagined +more congenial to his extraordinary power of vivid rendering than +this struggle against cliffs, avalanches, frost and the +Austrian. + +To go the Italian round needs, among other things, a good head. +Everywhere it has been necessary to make roads where hitherto +there have been only mule tracks or no tracks at all; the roads +are often still in the making, and the automobile of the war +tourist skirts precipices and takes hairpin bends upon tracks of +loose metal not an inch too broad for the operation, or it floats +for a moment over the dizzy edge while a train of mule transport +blunders by. The unruly imagination of man's heart (which is +"only evil continually") speculates upon what would be the +consequences of one good bump from the wheel of a mule cart. +Down below, the trees that one sees through a wisp of cloud look +far too small and spiky and scattered to hold out much hope for a +fallen man of letters. And at the high positions they are too +used to the vertical life to understand the secret feelings of +the visitor from the horizontal. General Bompiani, whose +writings are well known to all English students of military +matters, showed me the Gibraltar he is making of a great mountain +system east of the Adige. + +"Let me show you," he said, and flung himself on to the edge of +the precipice into exactly the position of a lady riding side- +saddle. "You will find it more comfortable to sit down." + +But anxious as I am abroad not to discredit my country by +unseemly exhibitions I felt unequal to such gymnastics without a +proper rehearsal at a lower level. I seated myself carefully at +a yard (perhaps it was a couple of yards) from the edge, advanced +on my trousers without dignity to the verge, and so with an +effort thrust my legs over to dangle in the crystalline +air. + +"That," proceeded General Bompiani, pointing with a giddy +flourish of his riding whip, "is Monte Tomba." + +I swayed and half-extended my hand towards him. But he was still +there--sitting, so to speak, on the half of himself.... I was +astonished that he did not disappear abruptly during his +exposition.... + + +2 + +The fighting man in the Dolomites has been perhaps the most +wonderful of all these separate campaigns. I went up by +automobile as far as the clambering new road goes up the flanks +of Tofana No. 2; thence for a time by mule along the flank of +Tofana No. 1, and thence on foot to the vestiges of the famous +Castelletto. + +The aspect of these mountains is particularly grim and wicked; +they are worn old mountains, they tower overhead in enormous +vertical cliffs of sallow grey, with the square jointings and +occasional clefts and gullies, their summits are toothed and +jagged; the path ascends and passes round the side of the +mountain upon loose screes, which descend steeply to a lower wall +of precipices. In the distance rise other harsh and desolate- +looking mountain masses, with shining occasional scars of old +snow. Far below is a bleak valley of stunted pine trees through +which passes the road of the Dolomites. + +As I ascended the upper track two bandages men were coming down +on led mules. It was mid-August, and they were suffering from +frostbite. Across the great gap between the summits a minute +traveller with some provisions was going up by wire to some post +upon the crest. For everywhere upon the icy pinnacles are +observation posts directing the fire of the big guns on the +slopes below, or machine-gun stations, or little garrisons that +sit and wait through the bleak days. Often they have no link +with the world below but a precipitous climb or a "teleferic" +wire. Snow and frost may cut them off absolutely for weeks from +the rest of mankind. The sick and wounded must begin their +journey down to help and comfort in a giddy basket that swings +down to the head of the mule track below. + +Originally all these crests were in Austrian hands; they were +stormed by the Alpini under almost incredible conditions. For +fifteen days, for example, they fought their way up these screes +on the flanks of Tofana No. 2 to the ultimate crags, making +perhaps a hundred metres of ascent each day, hiding under rocks +and in holes in the daylight and receiving fresh provisions and +ammunition and advancing by night. They were subjected to rifle +fire, machine-gun fire and bombs of a peculiar sort, big iron +balls of the size of a football filled with explosive that were +just flung down the steep. They dodged flares and star shells. +At one place they went up a chimney that would be far beyond the +climbing powers of any but a very active man. It must have been +like storming the skies. The dead and wounded rolled away often +into inaccessible ravines. Stray skeletons, rags of uniform, +fragments of weapons, will add to the climbing interest of these +gaunt masses for many years to come. In this manner it was that +Tofana No. 2 was taken. + +Now the Italians are organising this prize, and I saw winding up +far above me on the steep grey slope a multitudinous string of +little things that looked like black ants, each carrying a small +bright yellow egg. They were mules bringing back balks of +timber.... + +But one position held out invincibly; this was the Castelletto, a +great natural fortress of rock standing out at an angle of the +mountain in such a position that it commanded the Italian +communications (the Dolomite road) in the valley below, and +rendered all their positions uncomfortable and insecure. This +obnoxious post was practically inaccessible either from above or +below, and it barred the Italians even from looking into the Val +Travenanzes which it defended. It was, in fact, an impregnable +position, and against it was pitted the invincible 5th Group of +the Alpini. It was the old problem of the irresistible force in +conflict with the immovable object. And the outcome has been the +biggest military mine in all history. + +The business began in January, 1916, with surveys of the rock in +question. The work of surveying for excavations, never a very +simple one, becomes much more difficult when the site is occupied +by hostile persons with machine guns. In March, as the winter's +snows abated, the boring machinery began to arrive, by mule as +far as possible and then by hand. Altogether about half a +kilometre of gallery had to be made to the mine chamber, and +meanwhile the explosive was coming up load by load and resting +first here, then there, in discreetly chosen positions. There +were at the last thirty-five tons of it in the inner chamber. +And while the boring machines bored and the work went on, +Lieutenant Malvezzi was carefully working out the problem of "il +[Our Webmaster, who is Italian, says, "il massimo effetto dirompente"] +massimo effetto dirompimento" and deciding exactly how to pack +and explode his little hoard. On the eleventh of July, at 3.30, +as he rejoices to state in his official report, "the mine +responded perfectly both in respect of the calculations made and +of the practical effects," that is to say, the Austrians were +largely missing and the Italians were in possession of the crater +of the Castelletto and looking down the Val Travenanzes from +which they had been barred for so long. Within a month things +had been so tidied up, and secured by further excavations and +sandbags against hostile fire, that even a middle-aged English +writer, extremely fagged and hot and breathless, could enjoy the +same privilege. All this, you must understand, had gone on at a +level to which the ordinary tourist rarely climbs, in a rarefied, +chest-tightening atmosphere, with wisps of clouds floating in the +clear air below and club-huts close at hand.... + +Among these mountains avalanches are frequent; and they come down +regardless of human strategy. In many cases the trenches cross +avalanche tracks; they and the men in them are periodically swept +away and periodically replaced. They are positions that must be +held; if the Italians will not face such sacrifices, the +Austrians will. Avalanches and frostbite have slain and disabled +their thousands; they have accounted perhaps for as many Italians +in this austere and giddy campaign as the Austrians.... + + +3 + +It seems to be part of the stern resolve of Fate that this, the +greatest of wars, shall be the least glorious; it is manifestly +being decided not by victories but by blunders. It is indeed a +history of colossal stupidities. Among the most decisive of +these blunders, second only perhaps of the blunder of the Verdun +attack and far outshining the wild raid of the British towards +Bagdad, was the blunder of the Trentino offensive. It does not +need the equipment of a military expert, it demands only quite +ordinary knowledge and average intelligence, to realise the folly +of that Austrian adventure. There is some justification for a +claim that the decisive battle of the war was fought upon the +soil of Italy. There is still more justification for saying that +it might have been. + +There was only one good point about the Austrian thrust. No one +could have foretold it. And it did so completely surprise the +Italians as to catch them without any prepared line of positions +in the rear. On the very eve of the big Russian offensive, the +Austrians thrust eighteen divisions hard at the Trentino +frontier. The Italian posts were then in Austrian territory; +they held on the left wing and the right, but they were driven by +the sheer weight of men and guns in the centre; they lost guns +and prisoners because of the difficulty of mountain retreats to +which I have alluded, and the Austrians pouring through reached +not indeed the plain of Venetia, but to the upland valleys +immediately above it, to Asiago and Arsiero. They probably saw +the Venetian plain through gaps in the hills, but they were still +separated from it even at Arsiero by what are mountains to an +English eye, mountains as high as Snowdon. But the Italians of +such beautiful old places and Vicenza, Marostica, and Bassano +could watch the Austrian shells bursting on the last line of +hills above the plain, and I have no doubt they felt extremely +uneasy. + +As one motors through these ripe and beautiful towns and through +the rich valleys that link them--it is a smiling land abounding +in old castles and villas, Vicenza is a rich museum of Palladio's +architecture and Bassano is full of irreplaceable painted +buildings--one feels that the things was a narrow escape, but +from the military point of view it was merely an insane escapade. +The Austrians had behind them--and some way behind them--one +little strangulated railway and no good pass road; their right +was held at Pasubio, their left was similarly bent back. In +front of them was between twice and three times their number of +first class troops, with an unlimited equipment. If they had +surmounted that last mountain crest they would have come down to +almost certain destruction in the plain. They could never have +got back. For a time it was said that General Cadorna considered +that possibility. From the point of view of purely military +considerations, the Trentino offensive should perhaps have ended +in the capitulation of Vicenza. + +I will confess I am glad it did not do so. This tour of the +fronts has made me very sad and weary with a succession of ruins. +I can bear no more ruins unless they are the ruins of Dusseldorf, +Cologne, Berlin, or suchlike modern German city. Anxious as I am +to be a systematic Philistine, to express my preference for +Marinetti over the Florentine British and generally to antagonise +aesthetic prigs, I rejoiced over that sunlit land as one +might rejoice over a child saved from beasts. + +On the hills beyond Schio I walked out through the embrasure of a +big gun in a rock gallery, and saw the highest points upon the +hillside to which the Austrian infantry clambered in their futile +last attacks. Below me were the ruins of Arsiero and Velo +d'Astico recovered, and across the broad valley rose Monte Cimone +with the Italian trenches upon its crest and the Austrians a +little below to the north. A very considerable bombardment was +going on and it reverberated finely. (It is only among mountains +that one hears anything that one can call the thunder of guns. +The heaviest bombardments I heard in France sounded merely like +Brock's benefit on a much large scale, and disappointed me +extremely.) As I sat and listened to the uproar and watched the +shells burst on Cimone and far away up the valley over +Castelletto above Pedescala, Captain Pirelli pointed out the +position of the Austrian frontier. I doubt if the English people +realise that the utmost depth to which this great Trentino +offensive, which exhausted Austria, wasted the flower of the +Hungarian army and led directly to the Galician disasters and the +intervention of Rumania, penetrated into Italian territory was +about six miles. + + +III. BEHIND THE FRONT + + +1 + +I have a peculiar affection for Verona and certain things in +Verona. Italians must forgive us English this little streak of +impertinent proprietorship in the beautiful things of their +abundant land. It is quite open to them to revenge themselves by +professing a tenderness for Liverpool or Leeds. It was, for +instance, with a peculiar and personal indignation that I saw +where an Austrian air bomb had killed five-and-thirty people in +the Piazza Erbe. Somehow in that jolly old place, a place that +have very much of the quality of a very pretty and cheerful old +woman, it seemed exceptionally an outrage. And I made a special +pilgrimage to see how it was with that monument of Can Grande, +the equestrian Scaliger with the sidelong grin, for whom I +confess a ridiculous admiration. Can Grande, I rejoice to say, +has retired into a case of brickwork, surmounted by a steep roof +of thick iron plates; no aeroplane exists to carry bombs enough +to smash that covering; there he will smile securely in the +darkness until peace comes again. + +All over Venetia the Austrian seaplanes are making the same sort +of idiot raid on lighted places that the Zeppelins have been +making over England. These raids do no effective military work. +What conceivable military advantage can there be in dropping +bombs into a marketing crowd? It is a sort of anti-Teutonic +propaganda by the Central Powers to which they seem to have been +incited by their own evil genius. It is as if they could +convince us that there is an essential malignity in Germans, that +until the German powers are stamped down into the mud they will +continue to do evil things. All of the Allies have borne the +thrusting and boasting of Germany with exemplary patience for +half a century; England gave her Heligoland and stood out of the +way of her colonial expansion, Italy was a happy hunting ground +for her business enterprise, France had come near resignation on +the score of Alsace-Lorraine. And then over and above the great +outrage of the war come these incessant mean-spirited atrocities. +A great and simple wickedness it is possible to forgive; the war +itself, had it been fought greatly by Austria and Germany, would +have made no such deep and enduring breach as these silly, futile +assassinations have down between the Austro-Germans and the rest +of the civilised world. One great misdeed is a thing +understandable and forgivable; what grows upon the consciousness +of the world is the persuasion that here we fight not a national +sin but a national insanity; that we dare not leave the German +the power to attack other nations any more for ever.... + +Venice has suffered particularly from this ape-like impulse to +hurt and terrorise enemy non-combatants. Venice has indeed +suffered from this war far more than any other town in Italy. +Her trade has largely ceased; she has no visitors. I woke up on +my way to Udine and found my train at Venice with an hour to +spare; after much examining and stamping of my passport I was +allowed outside the station wicket to get coffee in the +refreshment room and a glimpse of a very sad and silent Grand +Canal. There was nothing doing; a black despondent remnant of +the old crowd of gondolas browsed dreamily among against the quay +to stare at me the better. The empty palaces seemed to be +sleeping in the morning sunshine because it was not worth while +to wake up.... + + +2 + +Except in the case of Venice, the war does not seem as yet to +have made nearly such a mark upon life in Italy as it has in +England or provincial France. People speak of Italy as a poor +country, but that is from a banker's point of view. In some +respects she is the richest country on earth, and in the matter +of staying power I should think she is better off than any other +belligerent. She produces food in abundance everywhere; her +women are agricultural workers, so that the interruption of food +production by the war has been less serious in Italy than in any +other part of Europe. In peace time, she has constantly exported +labour; the Italian worker has been a seasonal emigrant to +America, north and south, to Switzerland, Germany and the south +of France. The cessation of this emigration has given her great +reserves of man power, so that she has carried on her admirable +campaign with less interference with her normal economic life +than any other power. The first person I spoke to upon the +platform at Modane was a British officer engaged in forwarding +Italian potatoes to the British front in France. Afterwards, on +my return, when a little passport irregularity kept me for half a +day in Modane, I went for a walk with him along the winding pass +road that goes down into France. "You see hundreds and hundreds +of new Fiat cars," he remarked, "along here--going up to the +French front." + +But there is a return trade. Near Paris I saw scores of +thousands of shells piled high to go to Italy.... + +I doubt if English people fully realise either the economic +sturdiness or the political courage of their Italian ally. Italy +is not merely fighting a first-class war in first-class fashion +but she is doing a big, dangerous, generous and far-sighted thing +in fighting at all. France and England were obliged to fight; +the necessity was as plain as daylight. The participation of +Italy demanded a remoter wisdom. In the long run she would have +been swallowed up economically and politically by Germany if she +had not fought; but that was not a thing staring her plainly in +the face as the danger, insult and challenge stared France and +England in the face. What did stare her in the face was not +merely a considerable military and political risk, but the +rupture of very close financial and commercial ties. I found +thoughtful men talking everywhere I have been in Italy of two +things, of the Jugo-Slav riddle and of the question of post war +finance. So far as the former matter goes, I think the Italians +are set upon the righteous solution of all such riddles, they are +possessed by an intelligent generosity. They are clearly set +upon deserving Jugo-Slav friendship; they understand the plain +necessity of open and friendly routes towards Roumania. It was +an Italian who set out to explain to me that Fiume must be at +least a free port; it would be wrong and foolish to cut the trade +of Hungary off from the Mediterranean. But the banking puzzle is +a more intricate and puzzling matter altogether than the +possibility of trouble between Italian and Jugo-Slav. + +I write of these things with the simplicity of an angel, but +without an angelic detachment. Here are questions into which one +does not so much rush as get reluctantly pushed. Currency and +banking are dry distasteful questions, but it is clear that they +are too much in the hands of mystery-mongers; it is as much the +duty of anyone who talks and writes of affairs, it is as much the +duty of every sane adult, to bring his possibly poor and +unsuitable wits to bear upon these things, as it is for him to +vote or enlist or pay his taxes. Behind the simple ostensible +spectacle of Italy recovering the unredeemed Italy of the +Trentino and East Venetia, goes on another drama. Has Italy been +sinking into something rather hard to define called "economic +slavery"? Is she or is she not escaping from that magical +servitude? Before this question has been under discussion for a +minute comes a name--for a time I was really quite unable to +decide whether it is the name of the villain in the piece or of +the maligned heroine, or a secret society or a gold mine, or a +pestilence or a delusion--the name of the /Banca Commerciale +Italiana./ + +Banking in a country undergoing so rapid and vigorous an economic +development as Italy is very different from the banking we simple +English know of at home. Banking in England, like land-owning, +has hitherto been a sort of hold up. There were always +borrowers, there were always tenants, and all that had to be done +was to refuse, obstruct, delay and worry the helpless borrower or +would-be tenant until the maximum of security and profit was +obtained. I have never borrowed but I have built, and I know +something of the extreme hauteur of property of England towards a +man who wants to do anything with land, and with money I gather +the case is just the same. But in Italy, which already possessed +a sunny prosperity of its own upon mediaeval lines, the +banker has had to be suggestive and persuasive, sympathetic and +helpful. These are unaccustomed attitudes for British capital. +The field has been far more attractive to the German banker, who +is less of a proudly impassive usurer and more of a partner, who +demands less than absolute security because he investigates more +industriously and intelligently. This great bank, the Banca +Commerciale Italiana, is a bank of the German type: to begin +with, it was certainly dominated by German directors; it was a +bank of stimulation, and its activities interweave now into the +whole fabric of Italian commercial life. But it has already +liberated itself from German influence, and the bulk of its +capital is Italian. Nevertheless I found discussion ranging +about firstly what the Banca Commerciale essentially /was/, +secondly what it might /become/, thirdly what it might +/do/, and fourthly what, if anything, had to be done to it. + +It is a novelty to an English mind to find banking thus mixed up +with politics, but it is not a novelty in Italy. All over +Venetia there are agricultural banks which are said to be +"clerical." I grappled with this mystery. "How are they +clerical?" I asked Captain Pirelli. "Do they lend money on bad +security to clerical voters, and on no terms whatever to anti- +clericals?" He was quite of my way of thinking. "/Pecunia non +olet/," he said; "I have never yet smelt a clerical fifty lira +note."... But on the other hand Italy is very close to Germany; +she wants easy money for development, cheap coal, a market for +various products. The case against the Germans--this case in +which the Banca Commerciale Italiana appears, I am convinced +unjustly, as a suspect--is that they have turned this natural and +proper interchange with Italy into the acquisition of German +power. That they have not been merely easy traders, but +patriotic agents. It is alleged that they used their early +"pull" in Italian banking to favour German enterprises and German +political influence against the development of native Italian +business; that their merchants are not bona-fide individuals, but +members of a nationalist conspiracy to gain economic controls. +The German is a patriotic monomaniac. He is not a man but a +limb, the worshipper of a national effigy, the digit of an +insanely proud and greedy Germania, and here are the natural +consequences. + +The case of the individual Italian compactly is this: "We do not +like the Austrians and Germans. These Imperialisms look always +over the Alps. Whatever increases German influence here +threatens Italian life. The German is a German first and a human +being afterwards.... But on the other hand England seems +commercially indifferent to us and France has been economically +hostile..." + +"After all," I said presently, after reflection, "in that matter +of /Pecunia non olet/; there used to be fusses about +European loans in China. And one of the favourite themes of +British fiction and drama before the war was the unfortunate +position of the girl who accepted a loan from the wicked man to +pay her debts at bridge." + +"Italy," said Captain Pirelli, "isn't a girl. And she hasn't +been playing bridge." + +I incline on the whole to his point of view. Money is facile +cosmopolitan stuff. I think that any bank that settles down in +Italy is going to be slowly and steadily naturalised Italian, it +will become more and more Italian until it is wholly Italian. I +would trust Italy to make and keep the Banca Commerciale Italiana +Italian. I believe the Italian brain is a better brain than the +German article. But still I heard people talking of the +implicated organisation as if it were engaged in the most +insidious duplicities. "Wait for only a year or so after the +war," said one English authority to me, "and the mask will be off +and it will be frankly a 'Deutsche Bank' once more." They assure +me that then German enterprises will be favoured again, Italian +and Allied enterprises blockaded and embarrassed, the good +understanding of Italians and English poisoned, entirely through +this organisation.... + +The reasonable uncommercial man would like to reject all this +last sort of talk as "suspicion mania." So far as the Banca +Commerciale Italiana goes, I at least find that easy enough; I +quote that instance simply because it is a case where suspicion +has been dispelled, but in regard to a score of other business +veins it is not so easy to dispel suspicion. This war has been a +shock to reasonable men the whole world over. They have been +forced to realise that after all a great number of Germans have +been engaged in a crack-brained conspiracy against the non-German +world; that in a great number of cases when one does business +with a German the business does not end with the individual +German. We hated to believe that a business could be tainted by +German partners or German associations. If now we err on the +side of over-suspicion, it is the German's little weakness for +patriotic disingenuousness that is most to blame.... + +But anyhow I do not think there is much good in a kind of witch- +smelling among Italian enterprises to find the hidden German. +Certain things are necessary for Italian prosperity and Italy +must get them. The Italians want intelligent and helpful +capital. They want a helpful France. They want bituminous coal +for metallurgical purposes. They want cheap shipping. The +French too want metallurgical coal. It is more important for +civilisation, for the general goodwill of the Allies and for +Great Britain that these needs should be supplied than that +individual British money-owners or ship-owners should remain +sluggishly rich by insisting upon high security or high freights. +The control of British coal-mining and shipping is in the +national interests--for international interests--rather than for +the creation of that particularly passive, obstructive, and +wasteful type of wealth, the wealth of the mere profiteer, is as +urgent a necessity for the commercial welfare of France and Italy +and the endurance of the Great Alliance as it is for the well- +being of the common man in Britain. + + +3 + +I left my military guide at Verona on Saturday afternoon and +reached Milan in time to dine outside Salvini's in the Galleria +Vittorio Emanuele, with an Italian fellow story-writer. The +place was as full as ever; we had to wait for a table. It is +notable that there were still great numbers of young men not in +uniform in Milan and Turin and Vicenza and Verona; there was no +effect anywhere of a depletion of men. The whole crowded place +was smouldering with excitement. The diners looked about them as +they talked, some talked loudly and seemed to be expressing +sentiments. Newspaper vendors appeared at the intersection of +the arcades, uttering ambiguous cries, and did a brisk business +of flitting white sheets among the little tables. + +"To-night," said my companion, "I think we shall declare war upon +Germany. The decision is being made." + +I asked intelligently why this had not been done before. I +forget the precise explanation he gave. A young soldier in +uniform, who had been dining at an adjacent table and whom I had +not recognised before as a writer I had met some years previously +in London, suddenly joined in our conversation, with a slightly +different explanation. I had been carrying on a conversation in +slightly ungainly French, but now I relapsed into English. + +But indeed the matter of that declaration of war is as plain as +daylight; the Italian national consciousness has not at first +that direct sense of the German danger that exists in the minds +of the three northern Allies. To the Italian the traditional +enemy is Austria, and this war is not primarily a war for any +other end than the emancipation of Italy. Moreover we have to +remember that for years there has been serious commercial +friction between France and Italy, and considerable mutual +elbowing in North Africa. Both Frenchmen and Italians are +resolute to remedy this now, but the restoration of really +friendly and trustful relations is not to be done in a day. It +has been an extraordinary misfortune for Great Britain that +instead of boldly taking over her shipping from its private +owners and using it all, regardless of their profit, in the +interests of herself and her allies, her government has permitted +so much of it as military and naval needs have not requisitioned +to continue to ply for gain, which the government itself has +shared by a tax on war profits. The Anglophobe elements in +Italian public life have made the utmost of this folly or laxity +in relation more particularly to the consequent dearness of coal +in Italy. They have carried on an amazingly effective campaign +in which this British slackness with the individual profiteer, is +represented as if it were the deliberate greed of the British +state. This certainly contributed very much to fortify Italy's +disinclination to slam the door on the German connection. + +I did my best to make it clear to my two friends that so far from +England exploiting Italy, I myself suffered in exactly the same +way as any Italian, through the extraordinary liberties of our +shipping interest. "I pay as well as you do," I said; "the +shippers' blockade of Great Britain is more effective than the +submarines'. My food, my coal, my petrol are all restricted in +the sacred name of private property. You see, capital in England +has hitherto been not an exploitation but a hold-up. We are +learning differently now.... And anyhow, Mr. Runciman has been +here and given Italy assurances...." + +In the train to Modane this old story recurred again. It is +imperative that English readers should understand clearly how +thoroughly these little matters have been /worked/ by the +enemy. + +Some slight civilities led to a conversation that revealed the +Italian lady in the corner as an Irishwoman married to an +Italian, and also brought out the latent English of a very +charming elderly lady opposite to her. She had heard a speech, a +wonderful speech from a railway train, by "the Lord Runciman." He +had said the most beautiful things about Italy. + +I did my best to echo these beautiful things. + +Then the Irishwoman remarked that Mr. Runciman had not satisfied +everybody. She and her husband had met a minister--I found +afterwards he was one of the members of the late Giolotti +government--who had been talking very loudly and scornfully of +the bargain Italy was making with England. I assured her that +the desire of England was simply to give Italy all that she +needed. + +"But," said the husband casually, "Mr. Runciman is a shipowner." + +I explained that he was nothing of the sort. It was true that he +came of a shipowning family--and perhaps inherited a slight +tendency to see things from a shipowning point of view--but in +England we did not suspect a man on such a score as that. + +"In Italy I think we should," said the husband of the Irish +lady. + + +4 + +This incidental discussion is a necessary part of my impression +of Italy at war. The two western allies and Great Britain in +particular have to remember Italy's economic needs, and to +prepare to rescue them from the blind exploitation of private +profit. They have to remember these needs too, because, if they +are left out of the picture, then it becomes impossible to +understand the full measure of the risk Italy has faced in +undertaking this war for an idea. With a Latin lucidity she has +counted every risk, and with a Latin idealism she has taken her +place by the side of those who fight for a liberal civilisation +against a Byzantine imperialism. + +As I came out of the brightly lit Galleria Vittorio Emanuele into +the darkened Piazza del Duomo I stopped under the arcade and +stood looking up at the shadowy darkness of that great pinnacled +barn, that marble bride-cake, which is, I suppose, the last +southward fortress of the Franco-English Gothic. + +"It was here," said my host, "that we burnt the German stuff." + +"What German stuff?" + +"Pianos and all sorts of things. From the shops. It is +possible, you know, to buy things too cheaply--and to give too +much for the cheapness." + + + +THE WESTERN WAR (SEPTEMBER, 1916) + + +I. RUINS + + +1 + +If I had to present some particular scene as typical of the +peculiar vileness and mischief wrought by this modern warfare +that Germany has elaborated and thrust upon the world, I do not +think I should choose as my instance any of those great +architectural wrecks that seem most to impress contemporary +writers. I have seen the injuries and ruins of the cathedrals at +Arras and Soissons and the wreckage of the great church at Saint +Eloi, I have visited the Hotel de Ville at Arras and seen +photographs of the present state of the Cloth Hall at Ypres--a +building I knew very well indeed in its days of pride--and I have +not been very deeply moved. I suppose that one is a little +accustomed to Gothic ruins, and that there is always something +monumental about old buildings; it is only a question of degree +whether they are more or less tumble-down. I was far more +desolated by the obliteration of such villages as Fricourt and +Dompierre, and by the horrible state of the fields and gardens +round about them, and my visit to Arras railway station gave me +all the sensations of coming suddenly on a newly murdered body. + +Before I visited the recaptured villages in the zone of the +actual fighting, I had an idea that their evacuation was only +temporary, that as soon as the war line moved towards Germany the +people of the devastated villages would return to build their +houses and till their fields again. But I see now that not only +are homes and villages destroyed almost beyond recognition, but +the very fields are destroyed. They are wildernesses of shell +craters; the old worked soil is buried and great slabs of crude +earth have been flung up over it. No ordinary plough will travel +over this frozen sea, let along that everywhere chunks of timber, +horrible tangles of rusting wire, jagged fragments of big shells, +and a great number of unexploded shells are entangled in the +mess. Often this chaos is stained bright yellow by high +explosives, and across it run the twisting trenches and +communication trenches eight, ten, or twelve feet deep. These +will become water pits and mud pits into which beasts will fall. +It is incredible that there should be crops from any of this +region of the push for many years to come. There is no shade +left; the roadside trees are splintered stumps with scarcely the +spirit to put forth a leaf; a few stunted thistles and weeds are +the sole proofs that life may still go on. + +The villages of this wide battle region are not ruined; they are +obliterated. It is just possible to trace the roads in them, +because the roads have been cleared and repaired for the passing +of the guns and ammunition. Fricourt is a tangle of German dug- +outs. One dug-out in particular there promises to become a show +place. It must be the masterpiece of some genius for dug-outs; +it is made as if its makers enjoyed the job; it is like the work +of some horrible badger among the vestiges of what were pleasant +human homes. You are taken down a timbered staircase into its +warren of rooms and passages; you are shown the places under the +craters of the great British shells, where the wood splintered +but did not come in. (But the arrival of those shells must have +been a stunning moment.) There are a series of ingenious bolting +shafts set with iron climbing bars. In this place German +officers and soldiers have lived continually for nearly two +years. This war is, indeed, a troglodytic propaganda. You come +up at last at the far end into what was once a cellar of a decent +Frechman's home. + +But there are stranger subterranean refuges than that at +Fricourt. At Dompierre the German trenches skirted the cemetery, +and they turned the dead out of their vaults and made lurking +places of the tombs. I walked with M. Joseph Reinach about this +place, picking our way carefully amidst the mud holes and the +wire, and watched the shells bursting away over the receding +battle line to the west. The wreckage of the graves was +Durereqsue. And here would be a fragment of marble angle and +here a split stone with an inscription. Splinters of coffins, +rusty iron crosses and the petals of tin flowers were trampled +into the mud, amidst the universal barbed wire. A little +distance down the slope is a brand new cemetery, with new metal +wreaths and even a few flowers; it is a disciplined array of +uniform wooden crosses, each with its list of soldiers' names. +Unless I am wholly mistaken in France no Germans will ever get a +chance for ever more to desecrate that second cemetery as they +have done its predecessor. + +We walked over the mud heaps and litter that had once been houses +towards the centre of Dompierre village, and tried to picture to +ourselves what the place had been. Many things are recognisable +in Dompierre that have altogether vanished at Fricourt; for +instance, there are quire large triangular pieces of the church +wall upstanding at Dompierre. And a mile away perhaps down the +hill on the road towards Amiens, the ruins of the sugar refinery +are very distinct. A sugar refinery is an affair of big iron +receptacles and great flues and pipes and so forth, and iron does +not go down under gun fire as stone or brick does. The whole +fabric wars rust, bent and twisted, gaping with shell holes, that +raggedest display of old iron, but it still kept its general +shape, as a smashed, battered, and sunken ironclad might do at +the bottom of the sea. + +There wasn't a dog left of the former life of Dompierre. There +was not even much war traffic that morning on the worn and muddy +road. The guns muttered some miles away to the west, and a lark +sang. But a little way farther on up the road was an +intermediate dressing station, rigged up with wood and +tarpaulins, and orderlies were packing two wounded men into an +ambulance. The men on the stretchers were grey faced, as though +they had been trodden on by some gigantic dirty boot. + +As we came back towards where our car waited by the cemetery I +heard the jingle of a horseman coming across the space behind us. +I turned and beheld one of the odd contrasts that seem always to +be happening in this incredible war. This man was, I suppose, a +native officer of some cavalry force from French north Africa. +He was a handsome dark brown Arab, wearing a long yellow-white +robe and a tall cap about which ran a band of sheepskin. He was +riding one of those little fine lean horses with long tails that +I think are Barbary horses, his archaic saddle rose fore and aft +of him, and the turned-up toes of his soft leather boots were +stuck into great silver stirrups. He might have ridden straight +out of the Arabian nights. He passed thoughtfully, picking his +way delicately among the wire and the shell craters, and coming +into the road, broke into a canter and vanished in the direction +of the smashed-up refinery. + + +2 + +About such towns as Rheims or Arras or Soissons there is an +effect of waiting stillness like nothing else I have ever +experienced. At Arras the situation is almost incredible to the +civilian mind. The British hold the town, the Germans hold a +northern suburb; at one point near the river the trenches are +just four metres apart. This state of tension has lasted for +long months. + +Unless a very big attack is contemplated, I suppose there is no +advantage in an assault; across that narrow interval we should +only get into trenches that might be costly or impossible to +hold, and so it would be for the Germans on our side. But there +is a kind of etiquette observed; loud vulgar talking on either +side of the four-metre gap leads at once to bomb throwing. And +meanwhile on both sides guns of various calibre keep up an +intermittent fire, the German guns register--I think that is the +right term--on the cross of Arras cathedral, the British guns +search lovingly for the German batteries. As one walks about the +silent streets one hears, "/Bang/---Pheeee---woooo" and then far +away "/dump./" One of ours. Then presently back comes +"Pheeee---woooo---/Bang!/" One of theirs. + +Amidst these pleasantries, the life of the town goes on. /Le +Lion d'Arras/, an excellent illustrated paper, produces its +valiant sheets, and has done so since the siege began. + +The current number of /Le Lion d'Arras/ had to report a +local German success. Overnight they had killed a gendarme. +There is to be a public funeral and much ceremony. It is rare +for anyone now to get killed; everything is so systematised. + +You may buy postcards with views of the destruction at various +angles, and send them off with the Arras postmark. The town is +not without a certain business activity. There is, I am told, a +considerable influx of visitors of a special sort; they wear +khaki and lead the troglodytic life. They play cards and gossip +and sleep in the shadows, and may not walk the streets. I had +one glimpse of a dark crowded cellar. Now and then one sees a +British soldier on some special errand; he keeps to the pavement, +mindful of the spying German sausage balloon in the air. The +streets are strangely quite and grass grows between the stones. + +The Hotel de Ville and the cathedral are now mostly heaps of +litter, but many streets of the town have suffered very little. +Here and there a house has been crushed and one or two have been +bisected, the front reduced to a heap of splinters and the back +halves of the rooms left so that one sees the bed, the hanging +end of the carpet, the clothes cupboard yawning open, the +pictures still on the wall. In one place a lamp stands on a +chest of drawers, on a shelf of floor cut off completely from the +world below.... Pheeee---woooo---/Bang!/ One would be +irresistibly reminded of a Sunday afternoon in the city of +London, if it were not for those unmeaning explosions. + +I went to the station, a dead railway station. A notice-board +requested us to walk around the silent square on the outside +pavement and not across it. The German sausage balloon had not +been up for days; it had probably gone off to the Somme; the +Somme was a terrible vortex just then which was sucking away the +resources of the whole German line; but still discipline is +discipline. The sausage might come peeping up at any moment over +the station roof, and so we skirted the square. Arras was fought +for in the early stages of the war; two lines of sand-bagged +breastworks still run obliquely through the station; one is where +the porters used to put luggage upon cabs and one runs the length +of the platform. The station was a fine one of the modern type, +with a glass roof whose framework still remains, though the glass +powders the floor and is like a fine angular gravel underfoot. +The rails are rails of rust, and cornflowers and mustard and tall +grasses grow amidst the ballast. The waiting-rooms have suffered +from a shell or so, but there are still the sofas of green plush, +askew, a little advertisement hung from the wall, the glass +smashed. The ticket bureau is as if a giant had scattered a +great number of tickets, mostly still done up in bundles, to +Douai, to Valenciennes, to Lens and so on. These tickets are +souvenirs too portable to resist. I gave way to that common +weakness. + +I went out and looked up and down the line; two deserted goods +trucks stood as if they sheltered under a footbridge. The grass +poked out through their wheels. The railway signals seemed +uncertain in their intimations; some were up and some were down. +And it was as still and empty as a summer afternoon in Pompeii. +No train has come into Arras for two long years now. + +We lunched in a sunny garden with various men who love Arras but +are weary of it, and we disputed about Irish politics. We +discussed the political future of Sir F. E. Smith. We also +disputed whether there was an equivalent in English for +/embusque./ Every now and then a shell came over--an +aimless shell. + +A certain liveliness marked our departure from the town. +Possibly the Germans also listen for the rare infrequent +automobile. At any rate, as we were just starting our way back-- +it is improper to mention the exact point from which we started-- +came "Pheeee---woooo." Quite close. But there was no /Bang!/ +One's mind hung expectant and disappointed. It was a dud shell. + +And then suddenly I became acutely aware of the personality of +our chauffeur. It was not his business to talk to us, but he +turned his head, showed a sharp profile, wry lips and a bright +excited eye, and remarked, "/That/ was a near one--anyhow." +He then cut a corner over the pavement and very nearly cut it +through a house. He bumped us over a shell hole and began to +toot his horn. At every gateway, alley, and cross road on this +silent and empty streets of Arras and frequently in between, he +tooted punctiliously. (It is not proper to sound motor horns in +Arras.) I cannot imagine what the listening Germans made of it. +We passed the old gates of that city of fear, still tooting +vehemently, and then with shoulders eloquent of his feelings, our +chauffeur abandoned the horn altogether and put his whole soul +into the accelerator.... + + +3 + +Soissons was in very much the same case as Arras. There was the +same pregnant silence in her streets, the same effect of waiting +for the moment which draws nearer and nearer, when the brooding +German lines away there will be full of the covert activities of +retreat, when the streets of the old town will stir with the +joyous excitement of the conclusive advance. + +The organisation of Soissons for defence is perfect. I may not +describe it, but think of whatever would stop and destroy an +attacking party or foil the hostile shell. It is there. Men +have had nothing else to do and nothing else to think of for two +years. I crossed the bridge the English made in the pursuit +after the Marne, and went into the first line trenches and peeped +towards the invisible enemy. To show me exactly where to look a +seventy-five obliged with a shell. In the crypt of the Abbey of +St. Medard near by it--it must provoke the Germans bitterly to +think that all the rest of the building vanished ages ago--the +French boys sleep beside the bones of King Childebert the Second. +They shelter safely in the prison of Louis the Pious. An +ineffective shell from a German seventy-seven burst in the walled +garden close at hand as I came out from those thousand-year-old +memories again. + +The cathedral at Soissons had not been nearly so completely +smashed up as the one at Arras; I doubt if it has been very +greatly fired into. There is a peculiar beauty in the one long +vertical strip of blue sky between the broken arches in the chief +gap where the wall has tumbled in. And the people are holding on +in many cases exactly as they are doing in Arras; I do not know +whether it is habit or courage that is most apparent in this +persistence. About the chief place of the town there are ruined +houses, but some invisible hand still keeps the grass of the +little garden within bounds and has put out a bed of begonias. +In Paris I met a charming American writer, the wife of a French +artist, the lady who wrote /My House on the Field of +Honour./ She gave me a queer little anecdote. On account of +some hospital work she had been allowed to visit Soissons--a rare +privilege for a woman--and she stayed the night in a lodging. +The room into which she was shown was like any other French +provincial bedroom, and after her Anglo-Saxon habit she walked +straight to the windows to open them. + +They looked exactly like any other French bedroom windows, with +neat, clean white lace curtains across them. The curtains had +been put there, because they were the proper things to put +there. + +"Madame," said the hostess, "need not trouble to open the glass. +There is no more glass in Soissons." + +But there were curtains nevertheless. There was all the precise +delicacy of the neatly curtained home life of France. + +And she told me too of the people at dinner, and how as the +little serving-maid passed about a proud erection of cake and +conserve and cream, came the familiar "Pheeee---woooo--- +/Bang!/" + +"That must have been the Seminaire," said someone. + +As one speaks of the weather or a passing cart. + +"It was in the Rue de la Bueire, M'sieur," the little maid +asserted with quiet conviction, poising the trophy of +confectionery for Madame Huard with an unshaking hand. + +So stoutly do the roots of French life hold beneath the +tramplings of war. + + +II. THE GRADES OF WAR + + +1 +Soissons and Arras when I visited them were samples of the +deadlock war; they were like Bloch come true. The living fact +about war so far is that Bloch has not come true--/yet./ I +think in the end he will come true, but not so far as this war is +concerned, and to make that clear it is necessary to trouble the +reader with a little disquisition upon war--omitting as far as +humanly possible all mention of Napoleon's campaigns. + +The development of war has depended largely upon two factors. +One of these is invention. New weapons and new methods have +become available, and have modified tactics, strategy, the +relative advantage of offensive and defensive. The other chief +factor in the evolution of the war has been social organisation. +As Machiavelli points out in his /Art of War/, there was +insufficient social stability in Europe to keep a properly +trained and disciplined infantry in the field from the passing of +the Roman legions to the appearance of the Swiss footmen. he +makes it very clear that he considers the fighting of the Middle +Ages, though frequent and bloody, to be a confused, mobbing sort +of affair, and politically and technically unsatisfactory. The +knight was an egotist in armour. Machiavelli does small justice +to the English bowmen. It is interesting to note that +Switzerland, that present island of peace, was regarded by him as +the mother of modern war. Swiss aggression was the curse of the +Milanese. That is a remark by the way; our interest here is to +note that modern war emerges upon history as the sixteenth +century unfolds, as an affair in which the essential factor is +the drilled and trained infantryman. The artillery is developing +as a means of breaking the infantry; cavalry for charging them +when broken, for pursuit and scouting. To this day this triple +division of forces dominates soldiers' minds. The mechanical +development of warfare has consisted largely in the development +of facilities for enabling or hindering the infantry to get to +close quarters. As that has been made easy or difficult the +offensive or the defensive has predominated. + +A history of military method for the last few centuries would be +a record of successive alternate steps in which offensive and +defensive contrivances pull ahead, first one and then the other. +Their relative fluctuations are marked by the varying length of +campaigns. From the very outset we have the ditch and the wall; +the fortified place upon a pass or main road, as a check to the +advance. Artillery improves, then fortification improves. The +defensive holds its own for a long period, wars are mainly siege +wars, and for a century before the advent of Napoleon there are +no big successful sweeping invasions, no marches upon the enemy +capital and so on. There were wars of reduction, wars of +annoyance. Napoleon developed the offensive by seizing upon the +enthusiastic infantry of the republic, improving transport and +mobile artillery, using road-making as an aggressive method. In +spite of the successful experiment of Torres Vedras and the +warning of Plevna the offensive remained dominant throughout the +nineteenth century. + +But three things were working quietly towards the rehabilitation +of the defensive; firstly the increased range, accuracy and +rapidity of rifle fire, with which we may include the development +of the machine gun; secondly the increasing use of the spade, and +thirdly the invention of barbed wire. By the end of the century +these things had come so far into military theory as to produce +the great essay of Bloch, and to surprise the British military +people, who are not accustomed to read books or talk shop, in the +Boer war. In the thinly populated war region of South Africa the +difficulties of forcing entrenched positions were largely met by +outflanking, the Boers had only a limited amount of barbed wire +and could be held down in their trenches by shrapnel, and even at +the beginning of the present war there can be little doubt that +we and our Allies were still largely unprepared for the full +possibilities of trench warfare, we attempted a war of +manoeuvres, war at about the grade to which war had been +brought in 1898, and it was the Germans who first brought the war +up to date by entrenching upon the Aisne. We had, of course, a +few aeroplanes at that time, but they were used chiefly as a sort +of accessory cavalry for scouting; our artillery was light and +our shell almost wholly shrapnel. + +Now the grades of warfare that have been developed since the +present war began, may be regarded as a series of elaborations +and counter elaborations of the problem which begins as a line of +trenches behind wire, containing infantry with rifles and machine +guns. Against this an infantry attack with bayonet, after +shrapnel fails. This we will call Grade A. To this the +offensive replies with improved artillery, and particularly with +high explosive shell instead of shrapnel. By this the wire is +blown away, the trench wrecked and the defender held down as the +attack charges up. This is Grade B. But now appear the dug-out +elaborating the trench and the defensive battery behind the +trench. The defenders, under the preliminary bombardment, get +into the dug-outs with their rifles and machine guns, and emerge +as fresh as paint as the attack comes up. Obviously there is +much scope for invention and contrivance in the dug-out as the +reservoir of counter attacks. Its possibilities have been very +ably exploited by the Germans. Also the defensive batteries +behind, which have of course the exact range of the captured +trench, concentrate on it and destroy the attack at the moment of +victory. The trench falls back to its former holders under this +fire and a counter attack. Check again for the offensive. Even +if it can take, it cannot hold a position under these conditions. +This we will call Grade A2; a revised and improved A. What is +the retort from the opposite side? Obviously to enhance and +extend the range of the preliminary bombardment behind the actual +trench line, to destroy or block, if it can, the dug-outs and +destroy or silence the counter offensive artillery. If it can do +that, it can go on; otherwise Bloch wins. + +If fighting went on only at ground level Bloch would win at this +stage, but here it is that the aeroplane comes in. From the +ground it would be practically impossible to locate the enemies' +dug-outs, secondary defences, and batteries. But the aeroplane +takes us immediately into a new grade of warfare, in which the +location of the defender's secondary trenches, guns, and even +machine-gun positions becomes a matter of extreme precision-- +provided only that the offensive has secured command of the air +and can send his aeroplanes freely over the defender lines. Then +the preliminary bombardment becomes of a much more extensive +character; the defender's batteries are tackled by the +overpowering fire of guns they are unable to locate and answer; +the secondary dug-outs and strong places are plastered down, a +barrage fire shuts off support from the doomed trenches, the men +in these trenches are held down by a concentrated artillery fire +and the attack goes up at last to hunt them out of the dug-outs +and collect the survivors. Until the attack is comfortably +established in the captured trench, the fire upon the old counter +attack position goes on. This is the grade, Grade B2, to which +modern warfare has attained upon the Somme front. The appearance +of the Tank has only increased the offensive advantage. There at +present warfare rests. + +There is, I believe, only one grade higher possible. The success +of B2 depends upon the completeness of the aerial observation. +The invention of an anti-aircraft gun which would be practically +sure of hitting and bringing down an aeroplane at any height +whatever up to 20,000 feet, would restore the defensive and +establish what I should think must be the final grade of war, A3. +But at present nothing of the sort exists and nothing of the sort +is likely to exist for a very long time; at present hitting an +aeroplane by any sort of gun at all is a rare and uncertain +achievement. Such a gun is not impossible and therefore we must +suppose such a gun will some day be constructed, but it will be +of a novel type and character, unlike anything at present in +existence. The grade of fighting that I was privileged to +witness on the Somme, the grade at which a steady successful +offensive is possible, is therefore, I conclude, the grade at +which the present war will end. + + +2 + +But now having thus spread out the broad theory of the business, +let me go on to tell some of the actualities of the Somme +offensive. They key fact upon both British and French fronts was +the complete ascendancy of the Allies aeroplanes. It is the +necessary preliminary condition for the method upon which the +great generals of the French army rely in this sanitary task of +shoving the German Thing off the soil of Belgium and France back +into its own land. A man who is frequently throwing out +prophecies is bound to score a few successes, and one that I may +legitimately claim is my early insistence upon that fact that the +equality of the German aviator was likely to be inferior to that +of his French or British rival. The ordinary German has neither +the flexible quality of body, the quickness of nerve, the +temperament, nor the mental habits that make a successful +aviator. This idea was first put into my head by considering the +way in which Germans walk and carry themselves, and by nothing +the difference in nimbleness between the cyclists in the streets +of German and French towns. It was confirmed by a conversation I +had with a German aviator who was also a dramatist, and who came +to see me upon some copyright matter in 1912. He broached the +view that aviation would destroy democracy, because he said only +aristocrats make aviators. (He was a man of good family.) With a +duke or so in my mind I asked him why. Because, he explained, a +man without aristocratic quality in tradition, cannot possibly +endure the "high loneliness" of the air. That sounded rather +like nonsense at the time, and then I reflected that for a +Prussian that might be true. There may be something in the +German composition that does demand association and the support +of pride and training before dangers can be faced. The Germans +are social and methodical, the French and English are by +comparison chaotic and instinctive; perhaps the very readiness +for a conscious orderliness that makes the German so formidable +upon the ground, so thorough and fore-seeking, makes him slow and +unsure in the air. At any rate the experiences of this war have +seemed to carry out this hypothesis. The German aviators will +not as a class stand up to those of the Allies. They are not +nimble in the air. Such champions as they have produced have +been men of one trick; one of their great men, Immelmann--he was +put down by an English boy a month or so ago--had a sort of +hawk's swoop. He would go very high and then come down at his +utmost pace at his antagonist, firing his machine gun at him as +he came. If he missed in this hysterical lunge, he went on +down.... This does not strike the Allied aviator as very +brilliant. A gentleman of that sort can sooner or later be +caught on the rise by going for him over the German +lines. + +The first phase, then, of the highest grade offensive, the +ultimate development of war regardless of expense, is the +clearance of the air. Such German machines as are up are put +down by fighting aviators. These last fly high; in the clear +blue of the early morning they look exactly like gnats; some +trail a little smoke in the sunshine; they take their machine +guns in pursuit over the German lines, and the German anti- +aircraft guns, the Archibalds, begin to pattern the sky about +them with little balls of black smoke. From below one does not +see men nor feel that men are there; it is as if it were an +affair of midges. Close after the fighting machines come the +photographic aeroplanes, with cameras as long as a man is high, +flying low--at four or five thousand feet that is--over the enemy +trenches. The Archibald leaves these latter alone; it cannot +fire a shell to explode safely so soon after firing; but they are +shot at with rifles and machine guns. They do not mind being +shot at; only the petrol tank and the head and thorax of the +pilot are to be considered vital. They will come back with forty +or fifty bullet holes in the fabric. They will go under this +fire along the length of the German positions exposing plate +after plate; one machine will get a continuous panorama of many +miles and then come back straight to the aerodrome to develop its +plates. + +There is no waste of time about the business, the photographs are +developed as rapidly as possible. Within an hour and a half +after the photographs were taken the first prints are going back +into the bureau for the examination of the photographs. Both +British and French air photographs are thoroughly scrutinised and +marked. + +An air photograph to an inexperienced eye is not a very +illuminating thing; one makes our roads, blurs of wood, and +rather vague buildings. But the examiner has an eye that has +been in training; he is a picked man; he has at hand yesterday's +photographs and last week's photographs, marked maps and all +sorts of aids and records. If he is a Frenchman he is only too +happy to explain his ideas and methods. Here, he will point out, +is a little difference between the German trench beyond the wood +since yesterday. For a number of reasons he thinks that will be +a new machine gun emplacement; here at the centre of the farm +wall they have been making another. This battery here--isn't it +plain? Well, it's a dummy. The grass in front of it hasn't been +scorched, and there's been no serious wear on the road here for a +week. Presently the Germans will send one or two waggons up and +down that road and instruct them to make figures of eight to +imitate scorching on the grass in front of the gun. We know all +about that. The real wear on the road, compare this and this and +this, ends here at this spot. It turns off into the wood. +There's a sort of track in the trees. Now look where the trees +are just a little displaced! (This lens is rather better for +that.) /That's/ one gun. You see? Here, I will show you +another.... + +That process goes on two or three miles behind the front line. +Very clean young men in white overalls do it as if it were a +labour of love. And the Germans in the trenches, the German +gunners, /know it is going on./ They know that in the +quickest possible way these observations of the aeroplane that +was over them just now will go to the gunners. The careful +gunner, firing by the map and marking by aeroplane, kite balloon +or direct observation, will be getting onto the located guns and +machine guns in another couple of hours. The French claim that +they have located new batteries, got their /tir de +demolition/ upon them in and destroyed them within five +hours. The British I told of that found it incredible. Every +day the French print special maps showing the guns, sham guns, +trenches, everything of significance behind the German lines, +showing everything that has happened in the last four-and-twenty +hours. It is pitiless. It is indecent. The map-making and +printing goes on in the room next and most convenient to the +examination of the photographs. And, as I say, the German army +knows of this, and knows that it cannot prevent it because of its +aerial weakness. That knowledge is not the last among the forces +that is crumpling up the German resistance upon the Somme. + +I visited some French guns during the /tir de +demolition/ phase. I counted nine aeroplanes and +twenty-six kite balloons in the air at the same time. There was +nothing German visible in the air at all. + +It is a case of eyes and no eyes. + +The French attack resolves itself into a triple system of gun- +fire. First for a day or so, or two or three days, there is +demolition fire to smash up all the exactly located batteries, +organisation, supports, behind the front line enemy trenches; +then comes barrage fire to cut off supplies and reinforcements; +then, before the advance, the hammering down fire, "heads down," +upon the trenches. When at last this stops and the infantry goes +forward to rout out the trenches and the dug-outs, they go +forward with a minimum of inconvenience. The first wave of +attack fights, destroys, or disarms the surviving Germans and +sends them back across the open to the French trenches. They run +as fast as they can, hands up, and are shepherded farther back. +The French set to work to turn over the captured trenches and +organise themselves against any counter attack that may face the +barrage fire. + +That is the formula of the present fighting, which the French +have developed. After an advance there is a pause, while the +guns move up nearer the Germans and fresh aeroplane +reconnaissance goes on. Nowhere on this present offensive has a +German counter attack had more than the most incidental success; +and commonly they have had frightful losses. Then after a few +days of refreshment and accumulation, the Allied attack resumes. + +That is the perfected method of the French offensive. I had the +pleasure of learning its broad outlines in good company, in the +company of M. Joseph Reinach and Colonel Carence, the military +writer. Their talk together and with me in the various messes at +which we lunched was for the most part a keen discussion of every +detail and every possibility of the offensive machine; every +French officer's mess seems a little council upon the one supreme +question in France, /how to do it best./ M. Reinach has +made certain suggestions about the co-operation of the French and +British that I will discuss elsewhere, but one great theme was +the constitution of "the ideal battery." For years French +military thought has been acutely attentive to the best number of +guns for effective common action, and has tended rather to the +small battery theory. My two companies were playing with the +idea that the ideal battery was a battery of one big gun, with +its own aeroplane and kite balloon marking for it. + +The British seem to be associated with the adventurous self- +reliance needed in the air. The British aeroplanes do not simply +fight the Germans out of the sky; they also make themselves an +abominable nuisance by bombing the enemy trenches. For every +German bomb that is dropped by aeroplane on or behind the British +lines, about twenty go down on the heads of the Germans. British +air bombs upon guns, stores and communications do some of the +work that the French effect by their systematic demolition fire. + +And the British aviator has discovered and is rapidly developing +an altogether fresh branch of air activity in the machine-gun +attack at a very low altitude. Originally I believe this was +tried in western Egypt, but now it is being increasingly used +upon the British front in France. An aeroplane which comes down +suddenly, travelling very rapidly, to a few hundred feet, is +quite hard to hit, even if it is not squirting bullets from a +machine gun as it advances. Against infantry in the open this +sort of thing is extremely demoralising. It is a method of +attack still in its infancy, but there are great possibilities +for it in the future, when the bending and cracking German line +gives, as ultimately it must give if this offensive does not +relax. If the Allies persist in their pressure upon the western +front, if there is no relaxation in the supply of munitions from +Britain and no lapse into tactical stupidity, a German retreat +eastward is inevitable. + +Now a cavalry pursuit alone may easily come upon disaster, +cavalry can be so easily held up by wire and a few machine guns. +I think the Germans have reckoned on that and on automobiles, +probably only the decay of their /morale/ prevents their +opening their lines now on the chance of the British attempting +some such folly as a big cavalry advance, but I do not think the +Germans have reckoned on the use of machine guns in aeroplanes, +supported by and supporting cavalry or automobiles. At the +present time I should imagine there is no more perplexing +consideration amidst the many perplexities of the German military +intelligence than the new complexion put upon pursuit by these +low level air developments. It may mean that in all sorts of +positions where they had counted confidently on getting away, +they may not be able to get away--from the face of a scientific +advance properly commanding and using modern material in a +dexterous and intelligent manner. + + +III. THE WAR LANDSCAPE + + +1 + +I saw rather more of the British than of the French aviators +because of the vileness of the weather when I visited the latter. +It is quite impossible for me to institute comparisons between +these two services. I should think that the British organisation +I saw would be hard to beat, and that none but the French could +hope to beat it. On the Western front the aviation has been +screwed up to a very much higher level than on the Italian line. +In Italy it has not become, as it has in France, the decisive +factor. The war on the Carso front in Italy--I say nothing of +the mountain warfare, which is a thing in itself--is in fact +still in the stage that I have called B. It is good warfare well +waged, but not such an intensity of warfare. It has not, as one +says of pianos and voices, the same compass. + +This is true in spite of the fact that the Italians along of all +the western powers have adopted a type of aeroplane larger and +much more powerful than anything except the big Russian machines. +They are not at all suitable for any present purpose upon the +Italian front, but at a later stage, when the German is retiring +and Archibald no longer searches the air, they would be +invaluable on the western front because of their enormous bomb or +machine gun carrying capacity. "But sufficient for the day is +the swat thereof," as the British public schoolboy says, and no +doubt we shall get them when we have sufficiently felt the need +for them. The big Caproni machines which the Italians possess +are of 300 h.p. and will presently be of 500h.p. One gets up a +gangway into them was one gets into a yacht; they wave a main +deck, a forward machine gun deck and an aft machine gun; one may +walk about in them; in addition to guns and men they carry a very +considerable weight of bombs beneath. They cannot of course +beget up with the speed nor soar to the height of our smaller +aeroplanes; it is as carriers in raids behind a force of fighting +machines that they should find their use. + +The British establishment I visited was a very refreshing and +reassuring piece of practical organisation. The air force of +Great Britain has had the good fortune to develop with +considerable freedom from old army tradition; many of its +officers are ex-civil engineers and so forth; Headquarters is a +little shy of technical direction; and all this in a service that +is still necessarily experimental and plastic is to the good. +There is little doubt that, given a release from prejudice, bad +associations and the equestrian tradition, British technical +intelligence and energy can do just as well as the French. Our +problem with our army is not to create intelligence, there is an +abundance of it, but to release it from a dreary social and +official pressure. The air service ransacks the army for men +with technical training and sees that it gets them, there is a +real keenness upon the work, and the men in these great mobile +hangars talk shop readily and clearly. + +I have already mentioned and the newspapers have told abundantly +of the pluck, daring, and admirable work of our aviators; what is +still untellable in any detail is the energy and ability of the +constructive and repairing branch upon whose efficiency their +feats depend. Perhaps the most interesting thing I saw in +connection with the air work was the hospital for damaged +machines and the dump to which those hopelessly injured are +taken, in order that they may be disarticulated and all that is +sound in them used for reconstruction. How excellently this work +is being done may be judged from the fact that our offensive in +July started with a certain number of aeroplanes, a number that +would have seemed fantastic in a story a year before the war +began. These aeroplanes were in constant action; they fought, +they were shot down, they had their share of accidents. Not only +did the repair department make good every loss, but after three +weeks of the offensive the army was fighting with fifty more +machines than at the outset. One goes through a vast +Rembrandtesque shed opening upon a great sunny field, in whose +cool shadows rest a number of interesting patients; captured and +slightly damaged German machines, machines of our own with scars +of battle upon them, one or two cases of bad landing. The star +case came over from Peronne. It had come in two days ago. + +I examined this machine and I will tell the state it was in, but +I perceive that what I have to tell will read not like a sober +statement of truth but like strained and silly lying. The +machine had had a direct hit from an Archibald shell. The +propeller had been clean blown away; so had the machine gun and +all its fittings. The engines had been stripped naked and a good +deal bent about. The timber stay over the aviator had been +broken, so that it is marvellous the wings of the machine did not +just up at once like the wings of a butterfly. The solitary +aviator had been wounded in the face. He had then come down in a +long glide into the British lines, and made a tolerable +landing.... + + +2 + +One consequence of the growing importance of the aeroplane in +warfare is the development of a new military art, the art of +camouflage. Camouflage is humbugging disguise, it is making +things--and especially in this connection, military things--seem +not what they are, but something peaceful and rural, something +harmless and quite uninteresting to aeroplane observers. It is +the art of making big guns look like haystacks and tents like +level patches of field. + +Also it includes the art of making attractive models of guns, +camps, trenches and the like that are not bona-fide guns, camps, +or trenches at all, so that the aeroplane bomb-dropper and the +aeroplane observer may waste his time and energies and the enemy +gunfire be misdirected. In Italy I saw dummy guns so made as to +deceive the very elect at a distance of a few thousand feet. The +camouflage of concealment aims either at invisibility or +imitation; I have seen a supply train look like a row of +cottages, its smoke-stack a chimney, with the tops of sham +palings running along the back of the engine and creepers painted +up its sides. But that was a flight of the imagination; the +commonest camouflage is merely to conceal. Trees are brought up +and planted near the object to be hidden, it is painted in the +same tones as its background, it is covered with an awning +painted to look like grass or earth. I suppose it is only a +matter of development before a dummy cow or so is put up to chew +the cud on the awning. + +But camouflage or no camouflage, the bulk of both the French and +British forces in the new won ground of the great offensive lay +necessarily in the open. Only the big guns and the advanced Red +Cross stations had got into pits and subterranean hiding places. +The advance has been too rapid and continuous for the armies to +make much of a toilette as they halted, and the destruction and +the desolation of the country won afforded few facilities for +easy concealment. Tents, transport, munitions, these all +indicated an army on the march--at the rate of half a mile in a +week or so, to Germany. If the wet and mud of November and +December have for a time delayed that advance, the force behind +has but accumulated for the resumption of the thrust. + + +3 + +A journey up from the base to the front trenches shows an +interesting series of phases. One leaves Amiens, in which the +normal life threads its way through crowds of resting men in +khaki and horizon blue, in which staff officers in automobiles +whisk hither and thither, in which there are nurses and even a +few inexplicable ladies in worldly costume, in which restaurants +and cafes are congested and busy, through which there is a +perpetual coming and going of processions of heavy vans to the +railway sidings. One dodges past a monstrous blue-black gun +going up to the British front behind two resolute traction +engines--the three sun-blistered young men in the cart that +trails behind lounge in attitudes of haughty pride that would +shame the ceiling gods of Hampton Court. One passes through +arcades of waiting motor vans, through arcades of waiting motor +vans, through suburbs still more intensely khaki or horizon blue, +and so out upon the great straight poplar-edged road--to the +front. Sometimes one laces through spates of heavy traffic, +sometimes the dusty road is clear ahead, now we pass a vast +aviation camp, now a park of waiting field guns, now an +encampment of cavalry. One turns aside, and abruptly one is in +France--France as one knew it before the war, on a shady +secondary road, past a delightful chateau behind its iron gates, +past a beautiful church, and then suddenly we are in a village +street full of stately Indian soldiers. + +It betrays no military secret to say that commonly the rare +tourist to the British offensive passes through Albert, with its +great modern red cathedral smashed to pieces and the great gilt +Madonna and Child that once surmounted the tower now, as everyone +knows, hanging out horizontally in an attitude that irresistibly +suggests an imminent dive upon the passing traveller. One looks +right up under it. + +Presently we begin to see German prisoners. The whole lot look +entirely contented, and are guarded by perhaps a couple of men in +khaki. These German prisoners do not attempt to escape, they +have not the slightest desire for any more fighting, they have +done their bit, they say, honour is satisfied; they give +remarkably little trouble. A little way further on perhaps we +pass their cage, a double barbed-wire enclosure with a few tents +and huts within. + +A string of covered waggons passes by. I turn and see a number +of men sitting inside and looking almost as cheerful as a +beanfeast in Epping Forest. the make facetious gestures. They +have a subdued sing-song going on. But one of them looks a +little sick, and then I notice not very obtrusive bandages. +"Sitting-up cases," my guide explains. + +These are part of the casualties of last night's fight. + +The fields on either side are now more evidently in the war zone. +The array of carts, the patches of tents, the coming and going of +men increases. But here are three women harvesting, and +presently in a cornfield are German prisoners working under one +old Frenchman. Then the fields become trampled again. Here is a +village, not so very much knocked about, and passing through it +we go slowly beside a long column of men going up to the front. +We scan their collars for signs of some familiar regiment. These +are new men going up for the first time; there is a sort of +solemn elation in many of their faces. + +The men coming down are usually smothered in mud or dust, and +unless there has been a fight they look pretty well done up. +They stoop under their equipment, and some of the youngsters +drag. One pleasant thing about this coming down is the welcome +of the regimental band, which is usually at work as soon as the +men turn off from the high road. I hear several bands on the +British front; they do much to enhance the general cheerfulness. +On one of these days of my tour I had the pleasure of seeing the +---th Blankshires coming down after a fight. As we drew near I +saw that they combined an extreme muddiness with an unusual +elasticity. They all seemed to be looking us in the face instead +of being too fagged to bother. Then I noticed a nice grey helmet +dangling from one youngster's bayonet, in fact his eye directed +me to it. A man behind him had a black German helmet of the type +best known in English illustrations; then two more grey appeared. +The catch of helmets was indeed quite considerable. Then I +perceived on the road bank above and marching parallel with this +column, a double file of still muddier Germans. Either they wore +caps or went bare-headed. There were no helmets among them. We +do not rob our prisoners but--a helmet is a weapon. Anyhow, it +is an irresistible souvenir. + +Now and then one sees afar off an ammunition dump, many hundreds +of stacks of shells--without their detonators as yet--being +unloaded from railway trucks, transferred from the broad gauge to +the narrow gauge line, or loaded onto motor trolleys. Now and +then one crosses a railway line. The railway lines run +everywhere behind the British front, the construction follows the +advance day by day. They go up as fast as the guns. One's guide +remarks as the car bumps over the level crossing, "That is one of +Haig's railways." It is an aspect of the Commander-in-Chief that +has much impressed and pleased the men. And at last we begin to +enter the region of the former Allied trenches, we pass the old +German front line, we pass ruined houses, ruined fields, and +thick patches of clustering wooden crosses and boards where the +dead of the opening assaults lie. There are no more reapers now, +there is no more green upon the fields, there is no green +anywhere, scarcely a tree survives by the roadside, but only +overthrown trunks and splintered stumps; the fields are +wildernesses of shell craters and coarse weeds, the very woods +are collections of blasted stems and stripped branches. This +absolutely ravaged and ruined battlefield country extends now +along the front of the Somme offensive for a depth of many miles; +across it the French and British camps and batteries creep +forward, the stores, the dumps, the railways creep forward, in +their untiring, victorious thrust against the German lines. +Overhead hum and roar the aeroplanes, away towards the enemy the +humped, blue sausage-shaped kite balloons brood thoughtfully, and +from this point and that, guns, curiously invisible until they +speak, flash suddenly and strike their one short hammer-blow of +sound. + +Then one sees an enemy shell drop among the little patch of trees +on the crest to the right, and kick up a great red-black mass of +smoke and dust. We see it, and then we hear the whine of its +arrival and at last the bang. The Germans are blind now, they +have lost the air, they are firing by guesswork and their +knowledge of the abandoned territory. + +"They think they have got divisional headquarters there," someone +remarks.... "They haven't. But they keep on." + +In this zone where shells burst the wise automobile stops and +tucks itself away as inconspicuously as possible close up to a +heap of ruins. There is very little traffic on the road now +except for a van or so that hurries up, unloads, and gets back as +soon as possible. Mules and men are taking the stuff the rest of +the journey. We are in a flattened village, all undermined by +dug-outs that were in the original German second line. We report +ourselves to a young troglodyte in one of these, and are given a +guide, and so set out on the last part of the journey to the +ultimate point, across the land of shell craters and barbed wire +litter and old and new trenches. We have all put on British +steel helmets, hard but heavy and inelegant head coverings. I +can write little that is printable about these aesthetic crimes. +The French and German helmets are noble and beautiful things. +These lumpish /pans./.. + +They ought to be called by the name of the man who designed +them. + +Presently we are advised to get into a communication trench. It +is not a very attractive communication trench, and we stick to +our track across the open. Three or four shells shiver overhead, +but we decide they are British shells, going out. We reach a +supporting trench in which men are waiting in a state of nearly +insupportable boredom for the midday stew, the one event of +interest in a day-long vigil. Here we are told imperatively to +come right in at once, and we do. + +All communication trenches are tortuous and practically endless. +On an offensive front they have vertical sides of unsupported +earth and occasional soakaways for rain, covered by wooden +gratings, and they go on and on and on. At rare intervals they +branch, and a notice board says "To Regent Street," or "To Oxford +Street," or some such lie. It is all just trench. For a time +you talk, but talking in single file soon palls. You cease to +talk, and trudge. A great number of telephone wires come into +the trench and cross and recross it. You cannot keep clear of +them. Your helmet pings against them and they try to remove it. +Sometimes you have to stop and crawl under wires. Then you +wonder what the trench is like in really wet weather. You hear a +shell burst at no great distance. You pass two pages of /The +Strand Magazine./ Perhaps thirty yards on you pass a +cigarette end. After these sensational incidents the trench +quiets down again and continues to wind endlessly--just a sandy, +extremely narrow vertical walled trench. A giant crack. + +At last you reach the front line trench. On an offensive sector +it has none of the architectural interest of first line trenches +at such places as Soissons or Arras. It was made a week or so +ago by joining up shell craters, and if all goes well we move +into the German trench along by the line of scraggy trees, at +which we peep discreetly, to-morrow night. We can peep +discreetly because just at present our guns are putting shrapnel +over the enemy at the rate of about three shells a minute, the +puffs follow each other up and down the line, and no Germans are +staring out to see us. + +The Germans "strafed" this trench overnight, and the men are +tired and sleepy. Our guns away behind us are doing their best +now to give them a rest by strafing the Germans. One or two men +are in each forward sap keeping a look out; the rest sleep, a +motionless sleep, in the earthy shelter pits that have been +scooped out. One officer sits by a telephone under an earth- +covered tarpaulin, and a weary man is doing the toilet of a +machine gun. We go on to a shallow trench in which we must +stoop, and which has been badly knocked about.... Here we have +to stop. The road to Berlin is not opened up beyond this point. + +My companion on this excursion is a man I have admired for years +and never met until I came out to see the war, a fellow writer. +He is a journalist let loose. Two-thirds of the junior British +officers I met on this journey were really not "army men" at all. +One finds that the apparent subaltern is really a musician, or a +musical critic, or an Egyptologist, or a solicitor, or a cloth +manufacturer, or a writer. At the outbreak of the war my guide +dyed his hair to conceal its tell-tale silver, and having been +laughed to scorn by the ordinary recruiting people, enlisted in +the sportsmen's battalion. He was wounded, and then the +authorities discovered that he was likely to be of more use with +a commission and drew him, in spite of considerable resistance, +out of the firing line. To which he always returns whenever he +can get a visitor to take with him as an excuse. He now stood +up, fairly high and clear, explaining casually that the Germans +were no longer firing, and showed me the points of interest. + +I had come right up to No Man's Land at last. It was under my +chin. The skyline, the last skyline before the British could +look down on Bapaume, showed a mangy wood and a ruined village, +crouching under repeated gobbings of British shrapnel. "They've +got a battery just there, and we're making it uncomfortable." No +Man's Land itself is a weedy space broken up by shell craters, +with very little barbed wire in front of us and very little in +front of the Germans. "They've got snipers in most of the +craters, and you see them at twilight hopping about from one to +the other." We have very little wire because we don't mean to +stay for very long in this trench, but the Germans have very +little wire because they have not been able to get it up yet. +They never will get it up now.... + +I had been led to believe that No Man's Land was littered with +the unburied dead, but I saw nothing of the sort at this place. +There had been no German counter attack since our men came up +here. But at one point as we went along the trench there was a +dull stench. "Germans, I think," said my guide, though I did not +see how he could tell. + +He looked at his watch and remarked reluctantly, "If you start at +once, you may just do it." + +I wanted to catch the Boulogne boat. It was then just past one +in the afternoon. We met the stew as we returned along the +communication trench, and it smelt very good indeed.... We +hurried across the great spaces of rusty desolation upon which +every now and again a German shell was bursting.... + +That night I was in my flat in London. I had finished reading +the accumulated letters of some weeks, and I was just going +comfortably to bed. + + +IV. NEW ARMS FOR OLD ONES + + +1 + +Such are the landscapes and method of modern war. It is more +difficult in its nature from war as it was waged in the +nineteenth century than that was from the nature of the phalanx +or the legion. The nucleus fact--when I talked to General Joffre +he was very insistent upon this point--is still as ever the +ordinary fighting man, but all the accessories and conditions of +his personal encounter with the fighting man of the other side +have been revolutionised in a quarter of a century. The fighting +together in a close disciplined order, shoulder to shoulder, +which has held good for thousands of years as the best and most +successful fighting, has been destroyed; the idea of +/breaking/ infantry formation as the chief offensive +operation has disappeared, the cavalry charge and the cavalry +pursuit are as obsolete as the cross-bow. The modern fighting +man is as individualised as a half back or a centre forward in a +football team. Personal fighting has become "scrapping" again, +an individual adventure with knife, club, bomb, revolver or +bayonet. In this war we are working out things instead of +thinking them out, and these enormous changes are still but +imperfectly apprehended. The trained and specialised military +man probably apprehends them as feebly as anyone. + +This is a thing that I want to state as emphatically as possible. +It is the pith of the lesson I have learnt at the front. The +whole method of war has been so altered in the past five and +twenty years as to make it a new and different process +altogether. Much the larger part of this alteration has only +become effective in the last two years. Everyone is a beginner +at this new game; everyone is experimenting and learning. + +The idea has been put admirably by /Punch./ That excellent +picture of the old-fashioned sergeant who complains to his +officer of the new recruit; "'E's all right in the trenches, Sir; +'e's all right at a scrap; but 'e won't never make a soldier," is +the quintessence of everything I am saying here. And were there +not the very gravest doubts about General Smuts in British +military circles because he had "had no military training"? A +Canadian expressed the new view very neatly on being asked, in +consequence of a deficient salute, whether he wanted to be a +soldier, by saying, "Not I! I want to be a fighter!" + +The professional officer of the old dispensation was a man +specialised in relation to one of the established "arms." He was +an infantryman, a cavalryman, a gunner or an engineer. It will +be interesting to trace the changes that have happened to all +these arms. + +Before this war began speculative writers had argued that +infantry drill in close formation had now no fighting value +whatever, that it was no doubt extremely necessary for the +handling, packing, forwarding and distribution of men, but that +the ideal infantry fighter was now a highly individualised and +self-reliant man put into a pit with a machine gun, and supported +by a string of other men bringing him up supplies and ready to +assist him in any forward rush that might be necessary. + +The opening phases of the war seemed to contradict this. It did +not at first suit the German game to fight on this most modern +theory, and isolated individual action is uncongenial to the +ordinary German temperament and opposed to the organised social +tendencies of German life. To this day the Germans attack only +in close order; they are unable to produce a real modern infantry +for aggressive purposes, and it is a matter of astonishment to +military minds on the English side that our hastily trained new +armies should turn out to be just as good at the new fighting as +the most "seasoned troops." But there is no reason whatever why +they should not be. "Leading," in the sense of going ahead of +the men and making them move about mechanically at the word of +command, has ceased. On the British side our magnificent new +subalterns and our equally magnificent new non-commissioned +officers play the part of captains of football teams; they talk +their men individually into an understanding of the job before +them; they criticise style and performance. On the French side +things have gone even farther. Every man in certain attacks has +been given a large scale map of the ground over which he has to +go, and has had his own individual job clearly marked and +explained to him. All the Allied infantrymen tend to become +specialised, as bombers, as machine-gun men, and so on. The +unspecialised common soldier, the infantryman who has stood and +marched and moved in ranks and ranks, the "serried lines of men," +who are the main substance of every battle story for the last +three thousand years, are as obsolete as the dodo. The rifle and +bayonet very probably are becoming obsolete too. Knives and +clubs and revolvers serve better in the trenches. The krees and +the Roman sword would be as useful. The fine flourish of the +bayonet is only possible in the rare infrequent open. Even the +Zulu assegai would serve as well. + +The two operations of the infantry attack now are the rush and +the "scrap." These come after the artillery preparation. Against +the rush, the machine gun is pitted. The machine gun becomes +lighter and more and more controllable by one man; as it does so +the days of the rifle draw to a close. Against the machine gun +we are now directing the "Tank," which goes ahead and puts out +the machine gun as soon as it begins to sting the infantry rush. +We are also using the swooping aeroplane with a machine gun. +Both these devices are of British origin, and they promise very +well. + +After the rush and the scrap comes the organisation of the +captured trench. "Digging in" completes the cycle of modern +infantry fighting. You may consider this the first or the last +phase of an infantry operation. It is probably at present the +least worked-out part of the entire cycle. Here lies the sole +German superiority; they bunch and crowd in the rush, they are +inferior at the scrap, but they do dig like moles. The weakness +of the British is their failure to settle down. they like the +rush and the scrap; they press on too far, they get outflanked +and lost "in the blue"; they are not naturally clever at the +excavating part of the work, and they are not as yet well trained +in making dug-outs and shelter-pits rapidly and intelligently. +they display most of the faults that were supposed to be most +distinctively French before this war came to revolutionise all +our conceptions of French character. + + +2 + +Now the operations of this modern infantry, which unlike any +preceding infantry in the history of war does not fight in +disciplined formations but as highly individualised specialists, +are determined almost completely by the artillery preparation. +Artillery is now the most essential instrument of war. You may +still get along with rather bad infantry; you may still hold out +even after the loss of the aerial ascendancy, but so soon as your +guns fail you approach defeat. The backbone process of the whole +art of war is the manufacture in overwhelming quantities, the +carriage and delivery of shell upon the vulnerable points of the +enemy's positions. That is, so to speak, the essential blow. +Even the infantryman is now hardly more than the residuary +legatee after the guns have taken their toll. + +I have now followed nearly every phase in the life history of a +shell from the moment when it is a segment of steel bar just cut +off, to the moment when it is no more than a few dispersed and +rusting rags and fragments of steel--pressed upon the stray +visitor to the battlefield as souvenirs. All good factories are +intensely interesting places to visit, but a good munition +factory is romantically satisfactory. It is as nearly free from +the antagonism of employer and employed as any factory can be. +The busy sheds I visited near Paris struck me as being the most +living and active things in the entire war machine. Everywhere +else I saw fitful activity, or men waiting. I have seen more men +sitting about and standing about, more bored inactivity, during +my tour than I have ever seen before in my life. Even the front +line trenches seem to slumber; the Angel of Death drowses over +them, and moves in his sleep to crush out men's lives. The +gunfire has an indolent intermittence. But the munition +factories grind on night and day, grinding against the factories +in Central Europe, grinding out the slow and costly and necessary +victory that should end aggressive warfare in the world for ever. + +It would be very interesting if one could arrange a meeting +between any typical Allied munition maker on the one hand, and +the Kaiser and Hindenburg, those two dominant effigies of the +German nationalists' dream of "world might." Or failing that, Mr. +Dyson might draw the encounter. You imagine these two heroic +figures got up for the interview, very magnificent in shining +helms and flowing cloaks, decorations, splendid swords, spurs. +"Here," one would say, "is the power that has held you. You were +bolstered up very loyally by the Krupp firm and so forth, you +piled up shell, guns, war material, you hoped to snatch your +victory before the industrialisation and invention of the world +could turn upon you. But you failed. You were not rapid enough. +The battle of the Marne was your misfortune. And Ypres. You +lost some chances at Ypres. Two can play at destructive +industrialism, and now we out-gun you. We are piling up +munitions now faster than you. The essentials of this Game of +the War Lord are idiotically simple, but it was not of our +choosing. It is now merely a question of months before you make +your inevitable admission. This is no war to any great +commander's glory. This gentleman in the bowler hat is the +victor, Sire; not you. Assisted, Sire, by these disrespectful- +looking factory girls in overalls." + +For example, there is M. Citroen. Before the war I understand he +made automobiles; after the war he wants to turn to and make +automobiles again. For the duration of the war he makes shell. +He has been temporarily diverted from constructive to destructive +industrialism. He did me the honours of his factory. He is a +compact, active man in dark clothes and a bowler hat, with a +pencil and notebook conveniently at hand. He talked to me in +carefully easy French, and watched my face with an intelligent +eye through his pince-nez for the signs of comprehension. Then +he went on to the next point. + +He took me through every stage of his process. In his office he +showed me the general story. Here were photographs of certain +vacant fields and old sheds--"this place"--he indicated the +altered prospect from the window--"at the outbreak of the war." +He showed me a plan of the first undertaking. "Now we have +rather over nine thousand workpeople." + +He showed me a little row of specimens. "These we make for +Italy. These go to Russia. These are the Rumanian pattern." + +Thence to the first stage, the chopping up of the iron bars, the +furnace, the punching out of the first shape of the shell; all +this is men's work. I had seen this sort of thing before in +peace ironworks, but I saw it again with the same astonishment, +the absolute precision of movement on the part of the half-naked +sweating men, the calculated efficiency of each worker, the +apparent heedlessness, the real certitude, with which the blazing +hot cylinder is put here, dropped there, rolls to its next +appointed spot, is chopped up and handed on, the swift passage to +the cooling crude, pinkish-purple shell shape. Down a long line +one sees in perspective a practical symmetry, of furnace and +machine group and the shells marching on from this first series +of phases to undergo the long succession of operations, machine +after machine, across the great width of the shed in which eighty +per cent of the workers are women. There is a thick dust of +sounds in the air, a rumble of shafting, sudden thuddings, +clankings, and M. Citroen has to raise his voice. He points out +where he has made little changes in procedures, cut out some +wasteful movement.... He has an idea and makes a note in the +ever-ready notebook. + +There is a beauty about all these women, there is extraordinary +grace in their finely adjusted movements. I have come from an +after-lunch coffee upon the boulevards and from watching the ugly +fashion of our time; it is a relief to be reminded that most +women can after all be beautiful--if only they would not "dress." +these women wear simple overalls and caps. In the cap is a +rosette. Each shed has its own colour of rosette. + +"There is much esprit de corps here," says M. Citroen. + +"And also," he adds, showing obverse as well as reverse of the +world's problem of employment and discipline, "we can see at once +if a woman is not in her proper shed." + +Across the great sheds under the shafting--how fine it must look +at night!--the shells march, are shaped, cut, fitted with copper +bands, calibrated, polished, varnished.... + +Then we go on to another system of machines in which lead is +reduced to plastic ribbons and cut into shrapnel bullets as the +sweetstuff makers pull out and cut up sweetstuff. And thence +into a warren of hot underground passages in which run the power +cables. There is not a cable in the place that is not +immediately accessible to the electricians. We visit the dynamos +and a vast organisation of switchboards.... + +These things are more familiar to M. Citroen than they are to me. +He wants me to understand, but he does not realise that I would +like a little leisure to wonder. What is interesting him just +now, because it is the newest thing, is his method of paying his +workers. He lifts a hand gravely: "I said, what we must do is +abolish altogether the counting of change." + +At a certain hour, he explained, came pay-time. The people had +done; it was to his interest and their that they should get out +of the works as quickly as possible and rest and amuse +themselves. He watched them standing in queues at the wickets +while inside someone counted; so many francs, so many centimes. +It bored him to see this useless, tiresome waiting. It is +abolished. Now at the end of each week the worker goes to a +window under the initial of his name, and is handed a card on +which these items have been entered: + +Balance from last week. +So many hours at so much. +Premiums. + +The total is so many francs, so many centimes. This is divided +into the nearest round number, 100, 120, 80 francs as the case +may be, and a balance of the odd francs and centimes. The latter +is carried forward to the next week's account. At the bottom of +the card is a tear-off coupon with a stamp, coloured to indicate +the round sum, green, let us say, for 100, blue for 130 francs. +This is taken to a wicket marked 100 or 130 as the case may be, +and there stands a cashier with his money in piles of 100 or 130 +francs counted ready to hand; he sweeps in the coupon, sweeps out +the cash. "/Next!/" + +I became interested in the worker's side of this organisation. I +insist on seeing the entrances, the clothes-changing places, the +lavatories, and so forth of the organisation. As we go about we +pass a string of electric trolleys steered by important-looking +girls, and loaded with shell, finished as far as these works are +concerned and on their way to the railway siding. We visit the +hospital, for these works demand a medical staff. It is not only +that men and women faint or fall ill, but there are accidents, +burns, crushings, and the like. The war casualties begin already +here, and they fall chiefly among the women. I saw a wounded +woman with a bandaged face sitting very quietly in the corner. + +The women here face danger, perhaps not quite such obvious danger +as the women who, at the next stage in the shell's career, make +and pack the explosives in their silk casing, but quite +considerable risk. And they work with a real enthusiasm. They +know they are fighting the Bloches as well as any men. Certain +of them wear Russian decorations. The women of this particular +factory have been thanked by the Tsar, and a number of +decorations were sent by him for distribution among them. + + +3 + +The shell factory and the explosives shed stand level with the +drill yard as the real first stage in one of the two essential +/punches/ in modern war. When one meets the shell again it +is being unloaded from the railway truck into an ammunition dump. +And here the work of control is much more the work of a good +traffic manager than of the old-fashioned soldier. + +The dump I best remember I visited on a wet and windy day. Over +a great space of ground the sidings of the rail-head spread, the +normal gauge rail-head spread out like a fan and interdigitated +with the narrow gauge lines that go up practically to the guns. +And also at the sides camions were loading, and an officer from +the Midi in charge of one of these was being dramatically +indignant at five minutes' delay. Between these two sets of +lines, shells were piled of all sizes, I should think some +hundreds of thousands of shells altogether, wet and shining in +the rain. French reservists, soldiers from Madagascar, and some +Senegalese were busy at different points loading and unloading +the precious freights. A little way from me were despondent- +looking German prisoners handling timber. All this dump was no +more than an eddy as it were in the path of the shell from its +birth from the steel bars near Paris to the accomplishment of its +destiny in the destruction or capture of more Germans. + +And next the visitor meets the shell coming up upon a little +trolley to the gun. He sees the gunners, as drilled and precise +as the men he saw at the forges, swing out the breech block and +run the shell, which has met and combined with its detonators and +various other industrial products since it left the main dump, +into the gun. The breech closes like a safe door, and hides the +shell from the visitor. It is "good-bye." He receives +exaggerated warning of the danger to his ears, stuffs his fingers +into them, and opens his mouth as instructed, hears a loud but by +no means deafening report, and sees a spit of flame near the +breech. Regulations of a severe character prevent his watching +from an aeroplane the delivery of the goods upon the customers +opposite. + +I have already described the method of locating enemy guns and so +forth by photography. Many of the men at this work are like +dentists rather than soldiers; they are busy in carefully lit +rooms, they wear white overalls, they have clean hands and +laboratory manners. The only really romantic figure in the whole +of this process, the only figure that has anything of the old +soldierly swagger about him still, is the aviator. And, as one +friend remarked to me when I visited the work of the British +flying corps, "The real essential strength of this arm is the +organisation of its repairs. Here is one of the repair vans +through which our machine guns go. It is a motor workshop on +wheels. But at any time all this park, everything, can pack up +and move forward like Barnum and Bailey's Circus. The machine +guns come through this shop in rotation; they go out again, +cleaned, repaired, made new again. Since we got all that working +we have heard nothing of a machine gun jamming in any air fight +at all."... + +The rest of the career of the shell after it has left the gun one +must imagine chiefly from the incoming shell from the enemy. You +see suddenly a flying up of earth and stones and anything else +that is movable in the neighbourhood of the shell-burst, the +instantaneous unfolding of a dark cloud of dust and reddish +smoke, which comes very quickly to a certain size and then begins +slowly to fray out and blow away. Then, after seeing the cloud +of the burst you hear the hiss of the shell's approach, and +finally you are hit by the sound of the explosion. This is the +climax and end of the life history of any shell that is not a dud +shell. Afterwards the battered fuse may serve as some +journalist's paper-weight. The rest is scrap iron. + +Such is, so to speak, the primary process of modern warfare. I +will not draw the obvious pacifist moral of the intense folly of +human concentration upon such a process. The Germans willed it. +We Allies have but obeyed the German will for warfare because we +could not do otherwise, we have taken up this simple game of +shell delivery, and we are teaching them that we can play it +better, in the hope that so we and the world may be freed from +the German will-to-power and all its humiliating and disgusting +consequences henceforth for ever. Europe now is no more than a +household engaged in holding up and if possible overpowering a +monomaniac member. + + +4 + +Now the whole of this process of the making and delivery of a +shell, which is the main process of modern warfare, is one that +can be far better conducted by a man accustomed to industrial +organisation or transit work than by the old type of soldier. +This is a thing that cannot be too plainly stated or too often +repeated. Germany nearly won this way because of her +tremendously modern industrial resources; but she blundered into +it and she is losing it because she has too many men in military +uniform and because their tradition and interests were to +powerful with her. All the state and glories of soldiering, the +bright uniforms, the feathers and spurs, the flags, the march- +past, the disciplined massed advance, the charge; all these are +as needless and obsolete now in war as the masks and shields of +an old-time Chinese brave. Liberal-minded people talk of the +coming dangers of militarism in the face of events that prove +conclusively that professional militarism is already as dead as +Julius Caesar. What is coming is not so much the conversion +of men into soldiers as the socialisation of the economic +organisation of the country with a view to both national and +international necessities. We do not want to turn a chemist or a +photographer into a little figure like a lead soldier, moving +mechanically at the word of command, but we do want to make his +chemistry or photography swiftly available if the national +organisation is called upon to fight. + +We have discovered that the modern economic organisation is in +itself a fighting machine. It is so much so that it is capable +of taking on and defeating quite easily any merely warrior people +that is so rash as to pit itself against it. Within the last +sixteen years methods of fighting have been elaborated that have +made war an absolutely hopeless adventure for any barbaric or non- +industrialised people. In the rush of larger events few people +have realised the significance of the rapid squashing of the +Senussi in western Egypt, and the collapse of De Wet's rebellion +in South Africa. Both these struggles would have been long, +tedious and uncertain even in A.D. 1900. This time they have +been, so to speak, child's play. + +Occasionally into the writer's study there come to hand drifting +fragments of the American literature upon the question of +"preparedness," and American papers discussing the Mexican +situation. In none of these is there evident any clear +realisation of the fundamental revolution that has occurred in +military methods during the last two years. It looks as if a +Mexican war, for example, was thought of as an affair of rather +imperfectly trained young men with rifles and horses and old- +fashioned things like that. A Mexican war on that level might be +as tedious as the South African war. But if the United States +preferred to go into Mexican affairs with what I may perhaps call +a 1916 autumn outfit instead of the small 1900 outfit she seems +to possess at present, there is no reason why America should not +clear up any and every Mexican guerilla force she wanted to in a +few weeks. + +To do that she would need a plant of a few hundred aeroplanes, +for the most part armed with machine guns, and the motor repair +vans and so forth needed to go with the aeroplanes; she would +need a comparatively small army of infantry armed with machine +guns, with motor transport, and a few small land ironclads. Such +a force could locate, overtake, destroy and disperse any possible +force that a country in the present industrial condition of +Mexico could put into the field. No sort of entrenchment or +fortification possible in Mexico could stand against it. It +could go from one end of the country to the other without serious +loss, and hunt down and capture anyone it wished.... + +The practical political consequence of the present development of +warfare, of the complete revolution in the conditions of warfare +since this century began, is to make war absolutely hopeless for +any peoples not able either to manufacture or procure the very +complicated appliances and munitions now needed for its +prosecution. Countries like Mexico, Bulgaria, Serbia, +Afghanistan or Abyssinia are no more capable of going to war +without the connivance and help of manufacturing states than +horses are capable of flying. And this makes possible such a +complete control of war by the few great states which are at the +necessary level of industrial development as not the most Utopian +of us have hitherto dared to imagine. + + +5 + +Infantrymen with automobile transport, plentiful machine guns, +Tanks and such-like accessories; that is the first Arm in modern +war. The factory hand and all the material of the shell route +from the factory to the gun constitute the second Arm. Thirdly +comes the artillery, the guns and the photographic aeroplanes +working with the guns. Next I suppose we must count sappers and +miners as a fourth Arm of greatly increased importance. The +fifth and last combatant Arm is the modern substitute for +cavalry; and that also is essentially a force of aeroplanes +supported by automobiles. Several of the French leaders with +whom I talked seemed to be convinced that the horse is absolutely +done with in modern warfare. There is nothing, they declared, +that cavalry ever did that cannot now be done better by +aeroplane. + +This is something to break the hearts of the Prussian junkers and +of old-fashioned British army people. The hunt across the +English countryside, the preservation of the fox as a sacred +animal, the race meeting, the stimulation of betting in all +classes of the public; all these things depend ultimately upon +the proposition that the "breed of horses" is of vital importance +to the military strength of Great Britain. But if the arguments +of these able French soldiers are sound, the cult of the horse +ceases to be of any more value to England than the elegant +activities of the Toxophilite Society. Moreover, there has been +a colossal buying of horses for the British army, a tremendous +organisation for the purchase and supply of fodder, then +employment of tens of thousands of men as grooms, minders and the +like, who would otherwise have been in the munition factories or +the trenches. + +To what possible use can cavalry be put? Can it be used in +attack? Not against trenches; that is better done by infantrymen +following up gunfire. Can it be used against broken infantry in +the open? Not if the enemy has one or two machine guns covering +their retreat. Against expose infantry the swooping aeroplane +with a machine gun is far more deadly and more difficult to hit. +Behind it your infantry can follow to receive surrenders; in most +circumstances they can come up on cycles if it is a case of +getting up quickly across a wide space. Similarly for pursuit +the use of wire and use of the machine gun have abolished the +possibility of a pouring cavalry charge. The swooping aeroplane +does everything that cavalry can do in the way of disorganising +the enemy, and far more than it can do in the way of silencing +machine guns. It can capture guns in retreat much more easily by +bombing traction engines and coming down low and shooting horses +and men. An ideal modern pursuit would be an advance of guns, +automobiles full of infantry, motor cyclists and cyclists, behind +a high screen of observation aeroplanes and a low screen of +bombing and fighting aeroplanes. Cavalry /might/ advance +across fields and so forth, but only as a very accessory part of +the general advance.... + +And what else is there for the cavalry to do? + +It may be argued that horses can go over country that is +impossible for automobiles. That is to ignore altogether what +has been done in this war by such devices as caterpillar wheels. +So far from cavalry being able to negotiate country where +machines would stick and fail, mechanism can now ride over places +where any horse would flounder. + +I submit these considerations to the horse-lover. They are not +my original observations; they have been put to me and they have +convinced me. Except perhaps as a parent of transport mules I +see no further part henceforth for the horse to play in war. + + +6 + +The form and texture of the coming warfare--if there is still +warfare to come--are not yet to be seen in their completeness +upon the modern battlefield. One swallow does not make a summer, +nor a handful of aeroplanes, a "Tank" or so, a few acres of shell +craters, and a village here and there, pounded out of +recognition, do more than foreshadow the spectacle of modernised +war on land. War by these developments has become the monopoly +of the five great industrial powers; it is their alternative to +end or evolve it, and if they continue to disagree, then it must +needs become a spectacle of majestic horror such as no man can +yet conceive. It has been wise of Mr. Pennell therefore, who has +recently been drawing his impressions of the war upon stone, to +make his pictures not upon the battlefield, but among the huge +industrial apparatus that is thrusting behind and thrusting up +through the war of the gentlemen in spurs. He gives us the +splendours and immensities of forge and gun pit, furnace and mine +shaft. He shows you how great they are and how terrible. Among +them go the little figures of men, robbed of all dominance, +robbed of all individual quality. He leaves it for you to draw +the obvious conclusion that presently, if we cannot contrive to +put an end to war, blacknessess like these, enormities and flares +and towering threats, will follow in the track of the Tanks and +come trampling over the bickering confusion of mankind. + +There is something very striking in these insignificant and +incidental men that Mr. Pennell shows us. Nowhere does a man +dominate in all these wonderful pictures. You may argue perhaps +that that is untrue to the essential realities; all this array of +machine and workshop, all this marshalled power and purpose, has +been the creation of inventor and business organiser. But are we +not a little too free with that word "/creation/"? Falstaff +was a "creation" perhaps, or the Sistine sibyls; there we have +indubitably an end conceived and sought and achieved; but did +these inventors and business organisers do more than heed certain +unavoidable imperatives? Seeking coal they were obliged to mine +in a certain way; seeking steel they had to do this and this and +not that and that; seeking profit they had to obey the imperative +of the economy. So little did they plan their ends that most of +these manufacturers speak with a kind of astonishment of the +deadly use to which their works are put. They find themselves +making the new war as a man might wake out of some drugged +condition to find himself strangling his mother. + +So that Mr. Pennell's sketchy and transient human figures seem +altogether right to me. He sees these forges, workshops, cranes +and the like, as inhuman and as wonderful as cliffs or great +caves or icebergs or the stars. They are a new aspect of the +logic of physical necessity that made all these older things, and +he seizes upon the majesty and beauty of their dimensions with an +entire impartiality. And they are as impartial. Through all +these lithographs runs one present motif, the motif of the +supreme effort of western civilisation to save itself and the +world from the dominance of the reactionary German Imperialism of +modern science. The pictures are arranged to shape out the life +of a shell, from the mine to the great gun; nothing remains of +their history to show except the ammunition dump, the gun in +action and the shell-burst. Upon this theme all these great +appearances are strung to-day. But to-morrow they may be strung +upon some other and nobler purpose. These gigantic beings of +which the engineer is the master and slave, are neither +benevolent nor malignant. To-day they produce destruction, they +are the slaves of the spur; to-morrow we hope they will bridge +and carry and house and help again. + +For that peace we struggle against the dull inflexibility of the +German Will-to-Power. + + +V. TANKS + + +1 + +It is the British who have produced the "land ironclad" since I +returned from France, and used it apparently with very good +effect. I felt no little chagrin at not seeing them there, +because I have a peculiar interest in these contrivances. It +would be more than human not to claim a little in this matter. I +described one in a story in /The Strand Magazine/ in 1903, +and my story could stand in parallel columns beside the first +account of these monsters in action given by Mr. Beach Thomas or +Mr. Philip Gibbs. My friend M. Joseph Reinach has successfully +passed off long extracts from my story as descriptions of the +Tanks upon British officers who had just seen them. The +filiation was indeed quite traceable. They were my grandchildren-- +I felt a little like King Lear when first I read about them. Yet +let me state at once that I was certainly not their prime +originator. I took up an idea, manipulated it slightly, and +handed it on. The idea was suggested to me by the contrivances +of a certain Mr. Diplock, whose "ped-rail" notion, the notion of +a wheel that was something more than a wheel, a wheel that would +take locomotives up hill-sides and over ploughed fields, was +public property nearly twenty years ago. Possibly there were +others before Diplock. To the Ped-rail also Commander Murray +Sueter, one of the many experimentalists upon the early tanks, +admits his indebtedness, and it would seem that Mr. Diplock was +actually concerned in the earlier stage of the tanks. + +Since my return I have been able to see the Tank at home, through +the courtesy of the Ministry of Munitions. They have progressed +far beyond any recognisable resemblance to the initiatives of Mr. +Diplock; they have approximated rather to the American +caterpillar. As I suspected when first I heard of these devices, +the War Office and the old army people had practically nothing to +do with their development. They took to it very reluctantly--as +they have taken to every novelty in this war. One brilliant +general scrawled over an early proposal the entirely +characteristic comment that it was a pity the inventor could not +use his imagination to better purpose. (That foolish British +trick of sneering at "imagination" has cost us hundreds of +thousands of useless casualties and may yet lose us the war.) +Tanks were first mooted at the front about a year and a half ago; +Mr. Winston Churchill was then asking questions about their +practicability; he filled many simple souls with terror; they +thought him a most dangerous lunatic. The actual making of the +Tanks arose as an irregular side development of the armoured-car +branch of the Royal Naval Air Service work. The names most +closely associated with the work are (I quote a reply of Dr. +Macnamara's in the House of Commons) Mr. d'Eyncourt, the Director +of Naval Construction, Mr. W. O. Tritton, Lieut. Wilson, +R.N.A.S., Mr. Bussell, Lieut. Stern, R.N.A.S., who is now Colonel +Stern, Captain Symes, and Mr. F. Skeens. There are many other +claims too numerous to mention in detail. + +But however much the Tanks may disconcert the gallant Colonel +Newcomes who throw an air of restraint over our victorious front, +there can be no doubt that they are an important as well as a +novel development of the modern offensive. Of course neither the +Tanks nor their very obvious next developments going to wrest the +decisive pre-eminence from the aeroplane. The aeroplane remains +now more than ever the instrument of victory upon the western +front. Aerial ascendancy, properly utilised, is victory. But +the mobile armoured big gun and the Tank as a machine-gun +silencer must enormously facilitate an advance against the +blinded enemy. Neither of them can advance against properly +aimed big gun fire. That has to be disposed of before they make +their entrance. It remains the function of the aeroplane to +locate the hostile big guns and to direct the /tir de +demolition/ upon them before the advance begins-- +possibly even to bomb them out. But hitherto, after the +destruction of driving back of the defender's big guns has been +effected, the dug-out and the machine gun have still inflicted +heavy losses upon the advancing infantry until the fight is won. +So soon as the big guns are out, the tanks will advance, +destroying machine guns, completing the destruction of the wire, +and holding prisoners immobile. Then the infantry will follow to +gather in the sheaves. Multitudinously produced and--I write it +with a defiant eye on Colonel Newcome--/properly handled/, +these land ironclads are going to do very great things in +shortening the war, in pursuit, in breaking up the retreating +enemy. Given the air ascendancy, and I am utterly unable to +imagine any way of conclusively stopping or even greatly delaying +an offensive thus equipped. + + +2 + +The young of even the most horrible beasts have something piquant +and engaging about them, and so I suppose it is in the way of +things that the land ironclad which opens a new and more dreadful +and destructive phase in the human folly of warfare, should +appear first as if it were a joke. Never has any such thing so +completely masked its wickedness under an appearance of genial +silliness. The Tank is a creature to which one naturally flings +a pet name; the five or six I was shown wandering, rooting and +climbing over obstacles, round a large field near X, were as +amusing and disarming as a little of lively young pigs. + +At first the War Office prevented the publication of any pictures +or descriptions of these contrivances except abroad; then +abruptly the embargo was relaxed, and the press was flooded with +photographs. The reader will be familiar now with their +appearance. They resemble large slugs with an underside a little +like the flattened rockers of a rocking-horse, slugs between 20 +and 40 feet long. They are like flat-sided slugs, slugs of +spirit, who raise an enquiring snout, like the snout of a +dogfish, into the air. They crawl upon their bellies in a way +that would be tedious to describe to the general reader and +unnecessary to describe to the enquiring specialists. They go +over the ground with the sliding speed of active snails. Behind +them trail two wheels, supporting a flimsy tail, wheels that +strike one as incongruous as if a monster began kangaroo and +ended doll's perambulator. (These wheels annoy me.) They are not +steely monsters; they are painted with drab and unassuming +colours that are fashionable in modern warfare, so that the +armour seems rather like the integument of a rhinoceros. At the +sides of the head project armoured checks, and from above these +stick out guns that look like stalked eyes. That is the general +appearance of the contemporary tank. + +It slides on the ground; the silly little wheels that so detract +from the genial bestiality of its appearance dandle and bump +behind it. It swings about its axis. It comes to an obstacle, a +low wall let us say, or a heap of bricks, and sets to work to +climb it with its snout. It rears over the obstacle, it raises +its straining belly, it overhangs more and more, and at last +topples forward; it sways upon the heap and then goes plunging +downwards, sticking out the weak counterpoise of its wheeled +tail. If it comes to a house or a tree or a wall or such-like +obstruction it rams against it so as to bring all its weight to +bear upon it--it weighs /some/ tons--and then climbs over +the debris. I saw it, and incredulous soldiers of experience +watched it at the same time, cross trenches and wallow amazingly +through muddy exaggerations of small holes. Then I repeated the +tour inside. + +Again the Tank is like a slug. The slug, as every biological +student knows, is unexpectedly complicated inside. The Tank is +as crowded with inward parts as a battleship. It is filled with +engines, guns and ammunition, and in the interstices men. + +"You will smash your hat," said Colonel Stern. "No; keep it on, +or else you will smash your head." + +Only Mr. C. R. W. Nevinson could do justice to the interior of a +Tank. You see a hand gripping something; you see the eyes and +forehead of an engineer's face; you perceive that an overall +bluishness beyond the engine is the back of another man. "Don't +hold that," says someone; "it is too hot. Hold on to that." The +engines roar, so loudly that I doubt whether one could hear guns +without; the floor begins to slope and slopes until one seems to +be at forty-five degrees or thereabouts; then the whole concern +swings up and sways and slants the other way. You have crossed a +bank. You heel sideways. Through the door which has been left +open you see the little group of engineers, staff officers and +naval men receding and falling away behind you. You straighten +up and go up hill. You halt and begin to rotate. Through the +open door, the green field, with its red walls, rows of worksheds +and forests of chimneys in the background, begins a steady +processional movement. The group of engineers and officers and +naval men appears at the other side of the door and farther off. +Then comes a sprint down hill. You descend and stretch your +legs. + +About the field other Tanks are doing their stunts. One is +struggling in an apoplectic way in the mud pit with a cheek half +buried. It noses its way out and on with an air of animal +relief. + +They are like jokes by Heath Robinson. One forgets that these +things have already saved the lives of many hundreds of our +soldiers and smashed and defeated thousands of Germans. + +Said one soldier to me: "In the old attacks you used to see the +British dead lying outside the machine-gun emplacements like +birds outside a butt with a good shot inside. /Now/, these +things walk through." + + +3 + +I saw other things that day at X. The Tank is only a beginning +in a new phase of warfare. Of these other things I may only +write in the most general terms. + +But though Tanks and their collaterals are being made upon a very +considerable scale in X, already I realised as I walked through +gigantic forges as high and marvellous as cathedrals, and from +workshed to workshed where gun carriages, ammunition carts and a +hundred such things were flowing into existence with the swelling +abundance of a river that flows out of a gorge, that as the +demand for the new developments grows clear and strong, the +resources of Britain are capable still of a tremendous response. +/If only we do not rob these great factories and works of their +men./ + +Upon this question certain things need to be said very plainly. +The decisive factor in the sort of war we are now waging is +production and right use of mechanical material; victory in this +war depends now upon three things: the aeroplane, the gun, and +the Tank developments. These--and not crowds of men--are the +prime necessity for a successful offensive. Every man we draw +from munition making to the ranks brings our western condition +nearer to the military condition of Russia. In these things we +may be easily misled by military "experts" We have to remember +that the military "expert" is a man who learnt his business +before 1914, and that the business of war has been absolutely +revolutionised since 1914; the military expert is a man trained +to think of war as essentially an affair of cavalry, infantry in +formation, and field guns, whereas cavalry is entirely obsolete, +infantry no longer fights in formation, and the methods of +gunnery have been entirely changed. The military man I observe +still runs about the world in spurs, he travels in trains in +spurs, he walks in spurs, he thinks in terms of spurs. He has +still to discover that it is about as ridiculous as if he were to +carry a crossbow. I take it these spurs are only the outward and +visible sign of an inward obsolescence. The disposition of the +military "expert" is still to think too little of machinery and +to demand too much of the men. Behind our front at the time of +my visit there were, for example, many thousands of cavalry, men +tending horses, men engaged in transporting bulky fodder for +horses and the like. These men were doing about as much in this +war as if they had been at Timbuctoo. Every man who is taken +from munition making at X to spur-worshipping in khaki, is a dead +loss to the military efficiency of the country. Every man that +is needed or is likely to be needed for the actual operations of +modern warfare can be got by combing out the cavalry, the brewing +and distilling industries, the theatres and music halls, and the +like unproductive occupations. The under-staffing of munition +works, the diminution of their efficiency by the use of aged and +female labour, is the straight course to failure in this war. + +In X, in the forges and machine shops, I saw already too large a +proportion of boys and grey heads. + +War is a thing that changes very rapidly, and we have in the +Tanks only the first of a great series of offensive developments. +They are bound to be improved, at a great pace. The method of +using them will change very rapidly. Any added invention will +necessitate the scrapping of old types and the production of the +new patterns in quantity. It is of supreme necessity to the +Allies if they are to win this war outright that the lead in +inventions and enterprise which the British have won over the +Germans in this matter should be retained. It is our game now to +press the advantage for all it is worth. We have to keep ahead +to win. We cannot do so unless we have unstinted men and +unstinted material to produce each new development as its use is +realised. + +Given that much, the Tank will enormously enhance the advantage +of the new offensive method on the French front; the method that +is of gun demolition after aerial photography, followed by an +advance; it is a huge addition to our prospect of decisive +victory. What does it do? It solves two problems. The existing +Tank affords a means of advancing against machine-gun fire and of +destroying wire and machine guns without much risk of loss, so +soon as the big guns have done their duty by the enemy guns. And +also behind the Tank itself, it is useless to conceal, lies the +possibility of bringing up big guns and big gun ammunition, +across nearly any sort of country, as fast as the advance can +press forward. Hitherto every advance has paid a heavy toll to +the machine gun, and every advance has had to halt after a couple +of miles or so while the big guns (taking five or six days for +the job) toiled up to the new positions. + + +4 + +It is impossible to restrain a note of sharp urgency from what +one has to say about these developments. The Tanks remove the +last technical difficulties in our way to decisive victory and a +permanent peace; they also afford a reason for straining every +nerve to bring about a decision and peace soon. At the risk of +seeming an imaginative alarmist I would like to point out the +reasons these things disclose for hurrying this war to a decision +and doing our utmost to arrange the world's affairs so as to make +another war improbable. Already these serio-comic Tanks, +weighing something over twenty tons or so, have gone slithering +around and sliding over dead and wounded men. That is not an +incident for sensitive minds to dwell upon, but it is a mere +little child's play anticipation of what the big land ironclads +/that are bound to come if there is no world pacification/, +are going to do. + +What lies behind the Tank depends upon this fact; there is no +definable upward limit of mass. Upon that I would lay all the +stress possible, because everything turns upon that. + +You cannot make a land ironclad so big and heavy but that you +cannot make a caterpillar track wide enough and strong enough to +carry it forward. Tanks are quite possible that will carry +twenty-inch or twenty-five inch guns, besides minor armament. +Such Tanks may be undesirable; the production may exceed the +industrial resources of any empire to produce; but there is no +inherent impossibility in such things. There are not even the +same limitations as to draught and docking accommodation that +sets bounds to the size of battleships. It follows, therefore, +as a necessary deduction that if the world's affairs are so left +at the end of the war that the race of armaments continues, that +Tank will develop steadily into a tremendous instrument of +warfare, driven by engines of scores of thousands of horse-power, +tracking on a track scores of hundreds of yards wide and weighing +hundreds or thousands of tons. Nothing but a world agreement not +to do so can prevent this logical development of the land +ironclad. Such a structure will make wheel-ruts scores of feet +deep; it will plough up, devastate and destroy the country it +passes over altogether. + +For my own part I never imagined the land ironclad idea would get +loose into war. I thought that the military intelligence was +essentially unimaginative and that such an aggressive military +power as Germany, dominated by military people, would never +produce anything of the sort. I thought that this war would be +fought out without Tanks and that then war would come to an end. +For of course it is mere stupidity that makes people doubt the +ultimate ending of war. I have been so far justified in these +expectations of mine, that it is not from military sources that +these things have come. They have been thrust upon the soldiers +from without. But now that they are loose, now that they are in +war, we have to face their full possibilities, to use our +advantage in them and press on to the end of the war. In support +of a photo-aero directed artillery, even our present Tanks can be +used to complete an invisible offensive. We shall not so much +push as ram. It is doubtful if the Germans can get anything of +the sort into action before six months are out. We ought to get +the war on to German soil before the Tanks have grown to more +than three or four times their present size. Then it will not +matter so much how much bigger they grow. It will be the German +landscape that will suffer. + +After one has seen the actual Tanks it is not very difficult to +close one's eyes and figure the sort of Tank that may be arguing +with Germany in a few months' time about the restoration of +Belgium and Serbia and France, the restoration of the sunken +tonnage, the penalties of the various Zeppelin and submarine +murders, the freedom of seas and land alike from piracy, the +evacuation of all Poland including Posen and Cracow, and the +guarantees for the future peace of Europe. The machine will be +perhaps as big as a destroyer and more heavily armed and +equipped. It will swim over and through the soil at a pace of +ten or twelve miles an hour. In front of it will be corn, land, +neat woods, orchards, pasture, gardens, villages and towns. It +will advance upon its belly with a swaying motion, devouring the +ground beneath it. Behind it masses of soil and rock, lumps of +turf, splintered wood, bits of houses, occasional streaks of red, +will drop from its track, and it will leave a wake, six or seven +times as wide as a high road, from which all soil, all +cultivation, all semblance to cultivated or cultivatable land +will have disappeared. It will not even be a track of soil. It +will be a track of subsoil laid bare. It will be a flayed strip +of nature. In the course of its fighting the monster may have to +turnabout. It will then halt and spin slowly round, grinding out +an arena of desolation with a diameter equal to its length. If +it has to retreat and advance again these streaks and holes of +destruction will increase and multiply. Behind the fighting line +these monsters will manoeuvre to and fro, destroying the +land for all ordinary agricultural purposes for ages to come. +The first imaginative account of the land ironclad that was ever +written concluded with the words, "They are the /reductio ad +absurdum/ of war." They are, and it is to the engineers, the +ironmasters, the workers and the inventive talent of Great +Britain and France that we must look to ensure that it is in +Germany, the great teacher of war, that this demonstration of +war's ultimate absurdity is completed. + +For forty years Frankenstein Germany invoked war, turned every +development of material and social science to aggressive ends, +and at last when she felt the time was ripe she let loose the new +monster that she had made of war to cow the spirit of mankind. +She set the thing trampling through Belgium. She cannot grumble +if at last it comes home, stranger and more dreadful even than +she made it, trampling the German towns and fields with German +blood upon it and its eyes towards Berlin. + +This logical development of the Tank idea may seem a gloomy +prospect for mankind. But it is open to question whether the +tremendous development of warfare that has gone on in the last +two years does after all open a prospect of unmitigated gloom. +There has been a good deal of cheap and despondent sneering +recently at the phrase, "The war that will end war." It is still +possible to maintain that that may be a correct description of +this war. It has to be remembered that war, as the aeroplane and +the Tank have made it, has already become an impossible luxury +for any barbaric or uncivilised people. War on the grade that +has been achieved on the Somme predicates an immense +industrialism behind it. Of all the States in the world only +four can certainly be said to be fully capable of sustaining war +at the level to which it has now been brought upon the western +front. These are Britain, France, Germany, and the United States +of America. Less certainly equal to the effort are Italy, Japan, +Russia, and Austria. These eight powers are the only powers +/capable of warfare under modern conditions./ Five are +already Allies and one is incurably pacific. There is no other +power or people in the world that can go to war now without the +consent and connivance of these great powers. If we consider +their alliances, we may count it that the matter rests now +between two groups of Allies and one neutral power. So that +while on the one hand the development of modern warfare of which +the Tank is the present symbol opens a prospect of limitless +senseless destruction, it opens on the other hand a prospect of +organised world control. This Tank development must ultimately +bring the need of a real permanent settlement within the compass +of the meanest of diplomatic intelligences. A peace that will +restore competitive armaments has now become a less desirable +prospect for everyone than a continuation of the war. Things +were bad enough before, when the land forces were still in a +primitive phase of infantry, cavalry and artillery, and when the +only real race to develop monsters and destructors was for sea +power. But the race for sea power before 1914 was mere child's +play to the breeding of engineering monstrosities for land +warfare that must now follow any indeterminate peace settlement. +I am no blind believer in the wisdom of mankind, but I cannot +believe that men are so insensate and headstrong as to miss the +plain omens of the present situation. + +So that after all the cheerful amusement the sight of a Tank +causes may not be so very unreasonable. These things may be no +more than one of those penetrating flashes of wit that will +sometimes light up and dispel the contentions of an angry man. +If they are not that, then they are the grimmest jest that ever +set men grinning. Wait and see, if you do not believe me. + + +HOW PEOPLE THINK ABOUT THE WAR + + +I. DO THEY REALLY THINK AT ALL? +All human affairs are mental affairs; the bright ideas of to-day +are the realities of to-morrow. The real history of mankind is +the history of how ideas have arisen, how they have taken +possession of men's minds, how they have struggled, altered, +proliferated, decayed. There is nothing in this war at all but a +conflict of ideas, traditions, and mental habits. The German +Will clothed in conceptions of aggression and fortified by +cynical falsehood, struggles against the fundamental sanity of +the German mind and the confused protest of mankind. So that the +most permanently important thing in the tragic process of this +war is the change of opinion that is going on. What are people +making of it? Is it producing any great common understandings, +any fruitful unanimities? + +No doubt it is producing enormous quantities of cerebration, but +is it anything more than chaotic and futile cerebration? We are +told all sorts of things in answer to that, things without a +scrap of evidence or probability to support them. It is, we are +assured, turning people to religion, making them moral and +thoughtful. It is also, we are assured with equal confidence, +turning them to despair and moral disaster. It will be followed +by (1) a period of moral renascence, and (2) a debauch. It is +going to make the workers (1) more and (2) less obedient and +industrious. It is (1) inuring men to war and (2) filling them +with a passionate resolve never to suffer war again. And so on. +I propose now to ask what is really happening in this matter? How +is human opinion changing? I have opinions of my own and they are +bound to colour my discussion. The reader must allow for that, +and as far as possible I will remind him where necessary to make +his allowance. + +Now first I would ask, is any really continuous and thorough +mental process going on at all about this war? I mean, is there +any considerable number of people who are seeing it as a whole, +taking it in as a whole, trying to get a general idea of it from +which they can form directing conclusions for the future? Is +there any considerable number of people even trying to do that? +At any rate let me point out first that there is quite an +enormous mass of people who--in spite of the fact that their +minds are concentrated on aspects of this war, who are at present +hearing, talking, experiencing little else than the war--are +nevertheless neither doing nor trying to do anything that +deserves to be called thinking about it at all. They may even be +suffering quite terribly by it. But they are no more mastering +its causes, reasons, conditions, and the possibility of its +future prevention than a monkey that has been rescued in a +scorching condition from the burning of a house will have +mastered the problem of a fire. It is just happening to and +about them. It may, for anything they have learnt about it, +happen to them again. + +A vast majority of people are being swamped by the spectacular +side of the business. It was very largely my fear of being so +swamped myself that made me reluctant to go as a spectator to the +front. I knew that my chances of being hit by a bullet were +infinitesimal, but I was extremely afraid of being hit by some +too vivid impression. I was afraid that I might see some +horribly wounded man or some decayed dead body that would so scar +my memory and stamp such horror into me as to reduce me to a mere +useless, gibbering, stop-the-war-at-any-price pacifist. Years +ago my mind was once darkened very badly for some weeks with a +kind of fear and distrust of life through a sudden unexpected +encounter one tranquil evening with a drowned body. But in this +journey in Italy and France, although I have had glimpses of much +death and seen many wounded men, I have had no really horrible +impressions at all. That side of the business has, I think, been +overwritten. The thing that haunts me most is the impression of +a prevalent relapse into extreme untidiness, of a universal +discomfort, of fields, and of ruined houses treated +disregardfully.... But that is not what concerns us now in this +discussion. What concerns us now is the fact that this war is +producing spectacular effects so tremendous and incidents so +strange, so remarkable, so vivid, that the mind forgets both +causes and consequences and simply sits down to stare. + +For example, there is this business of the Zeppelin raids in +England. It is a supremely silly business; it is the most +conclusive demonstration of the intellectual inferiority of the +German to the Western European that is should ever have happened. +There was the clearest /a priori/ case against the gas-bag. +I remember the discussions ten or twelve years ago in which it +was established to the satisfaction of every reasonable man that +ultimately the "heavier than air" machine (as we called it then) +must fly better than the gas-bag, and still more conclusively +that no gas-bag was conceivable that could hope to fight and +defeat aeroplanes. Nevertheless the German, with that dull faith +of his in mere "Will," persisted along his line. He knew +instinctively that he could not produce aviators to meet the +Western European; all his social instincts made him cling to the +idea of a great motherly, almost sow-like bag of wind above him. +At an enormous waste of resources Germany has produced these +futile monsters, that drift in the darkness over England +promiscuously dropping bombs on fields and houses. They are now +meeting the fate that was demonstrably certain ten years ago. If +they found us unready for them it is merely that we were unable +to imagine so idiotic an enterprise would ever be seriously +sustained and persisted in. We did not believe in the +probability of Zeppelin raids any more than we believed that +Germany would force the world into war. It was a thing too silly +to be believed. But they came--to their certain fate. In the +month after I returned from France and Italy, no less than four +of these fatuities were exploded and destroyed within thirty +miles of my Essex home.... There in chosen phrases you have the +truth about these things. But now mark the perversion of thought +due to spectacular effect. + +I find over the Essex countryside, which has been for more than a +year and a half a highway for Zeppelins, a new and curious +admiration for them that has arisen out of these very disasters. +Previously they were regarded with dislike and a sort of +distrust, as one might regard a sneaking neighbour who left his +footsteps in one's garden at night. But the Zeppelins of +Billericay and Potter's Bar are--heroic things. (The Cuffley one +came down too quickly, and the fourth one which came down for its +crew to surrender is despised.) I have heard people describe the +two former with eyes shining with enthusiasm. + +"First," they say, "you saw a little round red glow that spread. +Then you saw the whole Zeppelin glowing. Oh, it was +/beautiful!/ Then it began to turn over and come down, and +it flames and pieces began to break away. And then down it came, +leaving flaming pieces all up the sky. At last it was a pillar +of fire eight thousand feet high.... Everyone said, 'Ooooo!' And +then someone pointed out the little aeroplane lit up by the flare-- +such a leetle thing up there in the night! It is the greatest +thing I have ever seen. Oh! the most wonderful--most wonderful!" + +There is a feeling that the Germans really must after all be a +splendid people to provide such magnificent pyrotechnics. + +Some people in London the other day were pretending to be shocked +by an American who boasted that he had been in "two /bully/ +bombardments," but he was only saying what everyone feels more or +less. We are at a spectacle that--as a spectacle--our +grandchildren will envy. I understand now better the story of +the man who stared at the sparks raining up from his own house as +it burnt in the night and whispered "/Lovely! Lovely!/" + +The spectacular side of the war is really an enormous distraction +from thought. And against thought there also fights the native +indolence of the human mind. The human mind, it seems, was +originally developed to think about the individual; it thinks +reluctantly about the species. It takes refuge from that sort of +thing if it possibly can. And so the second great preventive of +clear thinking is the tranquillising platitude. + +The human mind is an instrument very easily fatigued. Only a few +exceptions go on thinking restlessly--to the extreme exasperation +of their neighbours. The normal mind craves for decisions, even +wrong or false decisions rather than none. It clutches at +comforting falsehoods. It loves to be told, "/There/, don't +you worry. That'll be all right. That's /settled./" This +war has come as an almost overwhelming challenge to mankind. To +some of us it seems as it if were the Sphynx proffering the +alternative of its riddle or death. Yet the very urgency of this +challenge to think seems to paralyse the critical intelligence of +very many people altogether. They will say, "This war is going +to produce enormous changes in everything." They will then +subside mentally with a feeling of having covered the whole +ground in a thoroughly safe manner. Or they will adopt an air of +critical aloofness. They will say, "How is it possible to +foretell what may happen in this tremendous sea of change?" And +then, with an air of superior modesty, they will go on doing-- +whatever they feel inclined to do. Many others, a degree less +simple in their methods, will take some entirely partial aspect, +arrive at some guesswork decision upon that, and then behave as +though that met every question we have to face. Or they will +make a sort of admonitory forecast that is conditional upon the +good behaviour of other people. "Unless the Trade Unions are +more reasonable," they will say. Or, "Unless the shipping +interest is grappled with and controlled." Or, "Unless England +wakes up." And with that they seem to wash their hands of further +responsibility for the future. + +One delightful form of put-off is the sage remark, "Let us finish +the war first, and then let us ask what is going to happen after +it." One likes to think of the beautiful blank day after the +signing of the peace when these wise minds swing round to pick up +their deferred problems.... + +I submit that a man has not done his duty by himself as a +rational creature unless he has formed an idea of what is going +on, as one complicated process, until he has formed an idea +sufficiently definite for him to make it the basis of a further +idea, which is his own relationship to that process. He must +have some notion of what the process is going to do to him, and +some notion of what he means to do, if he can, to the process. +That is to say, he must not only have an idea how the process is +going, but also an idea of how he wants it to go. It seems so +natural and necessary for a human brain to do this that it is +hard to suppose that everyone has not more or less attempted it. +But few people, in Great Britain at any rate, have the habit of +frank expression, and when people do not seem to have made out +any of these things for themselves there is a considerable +element of secretiveness and inexpressiveness to be allowed for +before we decide that they have not in some sort of fashion done +so. Still, after all allowances have been made, there remains a +vast amount of jerry-built and ready-made borrowed stuff in most +of people's philosophies of the war. The systems of authentic +opinion in this world of thought about the war are like +comparatively rare thin veins of living mentality in a vast world +of dead repetitions and echoed suggestions. And that being the +case, it is quite possible that history after the war, like +history before the war, will not be so much a display of human +will and purpose as a resultant of human vacillations, +obstructions, and inadvertences. We shall still be in a drama of +blind forces following the line of least resistance. + +One of the people who is often spoken of as if he were doing an +enormous amount of concentrated thinking is "the man in the +trenches." We are told--by gentlemen writing for the most part at +home--of the most extraordinary things that are going on in those +devoted brains, how they are getting new views about the duties +of labour, religion, morality, monarchy, and any other notions +that the gentleman at home happens to fancy and wished to push. +Now that is not at all the impression of the khaki mentality I +have reluctantly accepted as correct. For the most part the man +in khaki is up against a round of tedious immediate duties that +forbid consecutive thought; he is usually rather crowded and not +very comfortable. He is bored. + +The real horror of modern war, when all is said and done, is the +boredom. To get killed our wounded may be unpleasant, but it is +at any rate interesting; the real tragedy is in the desolated +fields, the desolated houses, the desolated hours and days, the +bored and desolated minds that hang behind the melee +and just outside the melee. The peculiar +beastliness of the German crime is the way the German war cant +and its consequences have seized upon and paralysed the mental +movement of Western Europe. Before 1914 war was theoretically +unpopular in every European country; we thought of it as +something tragic and dreadful. Now everyone knows by experience +that it is something utterly dirty and detestable. We thought it +was the Nemean lion, and we have found it is the Augean stable. +But being bored by war and hating war is quite unproductive +/unless you are thinking about its nature and causes so +thoroughly that you will presently be able to take hold of it and +control it and end it./ It is no good for everyone to say +unanimously, "We will have no more war," unless you have thought +out how to avoid it, and mean to bring that end about. It is as +if everyone said, "We will have no more catarrh," or "no more +flies," or "no more east wind." And my point is that the immense +sorrows at home in every European country and the vast boredom of +the combatants are probably not really producing any effective +remedial mental action at all, and will not do so unless we get +much more thoroughly to work upon the thinking-out process. + +In such talks as I could get with men close up to the front I +found beyond this great boredom and attempts at distraction only +very specialised talk about changes in the future. Men were keen +upon questions of army promotion, of the future of conscription, +of the future of the temporary officer, upon the education of +boys in relation to army needs. But the war itself was bearing +them all upon its way, as unquestioned and uncontrolled as if it +were the planet on which they lived. + + +II. THE YIELDING PACIFIST AND THE CONSCIENTIOUS OBJECTOR + + +1 +Among the minor topics that people are talking about behind the +western fronts is the psychology of the Yielding Pacifist and the +Conscientious Objector. Of course, we are all pacifists +nowadays; I know of no one who does not want not only to end this +war but to put an end to war altogether, except those blood-red +terrors Count Reventlow, Mr. Leo Maxse--how he does it on a +vegetarian dietary I cannot imagine!--and our wild-eyed +desperados of /The Morning Post./ But most of the people I +meet, and most of the people I met on my journey, are pacifists +like myself who want to /make/ peace by beating the armed +man until he gives in and admits the error of his ways, disarming +him and reorganising the world for the forcible suppression of +military adventures in the future. They want belligerency put +into the same category as burglary, as a matter of forcible +suppression. The Yielding Pacifist who will accept any sort of +peace, and the Conscientious Objector who will not fight at all, +are not of that opinion. + +Both Italy and France produce parallel types to those latter, but +it would seem that in each case England displays the finer +developments. The Latin mind is directer than the English, and +its standards--shall I say?--more primitive; it gets more +directly to the fact that here are men who will not fight. And +it is less charitable. I was asked quite a number of times for +the English equivalent of an /embusque./ "We don't +generalise," I said, "we treat each case on its merits!" + +One interlocutor near Udine was exercised by our Italian Red +Cross work. + +"Here," he said, "are sixty or seventy young Englishmen, all fit +for military service.... Of course they go under fire, but it is +not like being junior officers in the trenches. Not one of them +has been killed or wounded." + +He reflected. "One, I think, has been decorated," he said.... + +My French and Italian are only for very rough common jobs; when +it came to explaining the Conscientious Objector sympathetically +they broke down badly. I had to construct long parenthetical +explanations of our antiquated legislative methods to show how it +was that the "conscientious objector" had been so badly defined. +The foreigner does not understand the importance of vague +definition in British life. "Practically, of course, we offered +to exempt anyone who conscientiously objected to fight or serve. +Then the Pacifist and German people started a campaign to enrol +objectors. Of course every shirker, every coward and slacker in +the country decided at once to be a conscientious objector. +Anyone but a British legislator could have foreseen that. Then +we started Tribunals to wrangle with the objectors about their +/bona fides./ Then the Pacifists and the Pro-Germans issued +little leaflets and started correspondence courses to teach +people exactly how to lie to the Tribunals. Trouble about +freedom of the pamphleteer followed. I had to admit--it has been +rather a sloppy business. "The people who made the law knew +their own minds, but we English are not an expressive people." + +These are not easy things to say in Elementary (and slightly +Decayed) French or in Elementary and Corrupt Italian. + +"But why do people support the sham conscientious objector and +issue leaflets to help him--when there is so much big work +clamouring to be done?" + +"That," I said, "is the Whig tradition." + +When they pressed me further, I said: "I am really the +questioner. I am visiting /your/ country, and you have to +tell /me/ things. It is not right that I should do all the +telling. Tell me all about Romain Rolland." + +And so I pressed them about the official socialists in Italy and +the Socialist minority in France until I got the question out of +the net of national comparisons and upon a broader footing. In +several conversations we began to work out in general terms the +psychology of those people who were against the war. But usually +we could not get to that; my interlocutors would insist upon +telling me just what they would like to do or just what they +would like to see done to stop-the-war pacifists and +conscientious objectors; pleasant rather than fruitful +imaginative exercises from which I could effect no more than +platitudinous uplifts. + +But the general drift of such talks as did seem to penetrate the +question was this, that among these stop-the-war people there are +really three types. First there is a type of person who hates +violence and the infliction of pain under any circumstances, and +who have a mystical belief in the rightness (and usually the +efficacy) of non-resistance. These are generally Christians, and +then their cardinal text is the instruction to "turn the other +cheek." Often they are Quakers. If they are consistent they are +vegetarians and wear /Lederlos/ boots. They do not desire +police protection for their goods. They stand aloof from all the +force and conflict of life. They have always done so. This is +an understandable and respectable type. It has numerous Hindu +equivalents. It is a type that finds little difficulty about +exemptions--provided the individual has not been too recently +converted to his present habits. But it is not the prevalent +type in stop-the-war circles. Such genuine ascetics do not +number more than a thousand or so, all three of our western +allied countries. The mass of the stop-the-war people is made up +quite other elements. + + +2 + +In the complex structure of the modern community there are two +groups or strata or pockets in which the impulse of social +obligation, the gregarious sense of a common welfare, is at its +lowest; one of these is the class of the Resentful Employee, the +class of people who, without explanation, adequate preparation or +any chance, have been shoved at an early age into uncongenial +work and never given a chance to escape, and the other is the +class of people with small fixed incomes or with small salaries +earnt by routine work, or half independent people practising some +minor artistic or literary craft, who have led uneventful, +irresponsible lives from their youth up, and never came at any +point into relations of service to the state. This latter class +was more difficult to define than the former--because it is more +various within itself. My French friends wanted to talk of the +"Psychology of the Rentier." I was for such untranslatable +phrases as the "Genteel Whig," or the "Donnish Liberal." But I +lit up an Italian--he is a Milanese manufacturer--with "these +Florentine English who would keep Italy in a glass case." "I +know," he said. Before I go on to expand this congenial theme, +let me deal first with the Resentful Employee, who is a much more +considerable, and to me a much more sympathetic, figure in +European affairs. I began life myself as a Resentful Employee. +By the extremest good luck I have got my mind and spirit out of +the distortions of that cramping beginning, but I can still +recall even the anger of those old days. + +He becomes an employee between thirteen and fifteen; he is made +to do work he does not like for no other purpose that he can see +except the profit and glory of a fortunate person called his +employer, behind whom stand church and state blessing and +upholding the relationship. He is not allowed to feel that he +has any share whatever in the employer's business, or that any +end is served but the employer's profit. He cannot see that the +employer acknowledges any duty to the state. Neither church nor +state seems to insist that the employer has any public function. +At no point does the employee come into a clear relationship of +mutual obligation with the state. There does not seem to be any +way out for the employee from a life spent in this subordinate, +toilsome relationship. He feels put upon and cheated out of +life. He is without honour. If he is a person of ability or +stubborn temper he struggles out of his position; if he is a +kindly and generous person he blames his "luck" and does his work +and lives his life as cheerfully as possible--and so live the +bulk of our amazing European workers; if he is a being of great +magnanimity he is content to serve for the ultimate good of the +race; if he has imagination, he says, "Things will not always be +like this," and becomes a socialist or a guild socialist, and +tries to educate the employer to a sense of reciprocal duty; but +if he is too human for any of these things, then he begins to +despise and hate the employer and the system that made him. He +wants to hurt them. Upon that hate it is easy to trade. + +A certain section of what is called the Socialist press and the +Socialist literature in Europe is no doubt great-minded; it seeks +to carve a better world out of the present. But much of it is +socialist only in name. Its spirit is Anarchistic. Its real +burthen is not construction but grievance; it tells the bitter +tale of the employee, it feeds and organises his malice, it +schemes annoyance and injury for the hated employer. The state +and the order of the world is confounded with the capitalist. +Before the war the popular so-called socialist press reeked with +the cant of rebellion, the cant of any sort of rebellion. "I'm a +rebel," was the silly boast of the young disciple. "Spoil +something, set fire to something," was held to be the proper text +for any girl or lad of spirit. And this blind discontent carried +on into the war. While on the one hand a great rush of men +poured into the army saying, "Thank God! we can serve our +country at last instead of some beastly profiteer," a sourer +remnant, blind to the greater issues of the war, clung to the +reasonless proposition, "the state is only for the Capitalist. +This war is got up by Capitalists. Whatever has to be done-- +/we are rebels./" + +Such a typical paper as the British /Labour Leader/, for +example, may be read in vain, number after number, for any sound +and sincere constructive proposal. It is a prolonged scream of +extreme individualism, a monotonous repetition of incoherent +discontent with authority, with direction, with union, with the +European effort. It wants to do nothing. It just wants effort +to stop--even at the price of German victory. If the whole +fabric of society in western Europe were to be handed over to +those pseudo-socialists to-morrow, to be administered for the +common good, they would fly the task in terror. They would make +excuses and refuse the undertaking. They do not want the world +to go right. The very idea of the world going right does not +exist in their minds. They are embodied discontent and hatred, +making trouble, and that is all they are. They want to be +"rebels"--to be admired as "rebels". + +That is the true psychology of the Resentful Employee. He is a +de-socialised man. His sense of the State has been destroyed. + +The Resentful Employees are the outcome of our social injustices. +They are the failures of our social ad educational systems. We +may regret their pitiful degradation, we may exonerate them from +blame; none the less they are a pitiful crew. I have seen the +hardship of the trenches, the gay and gallant wounded. I do a +little understand what our soldiers, officers and men alike, have +endured and done. And though I know I ought to allow for all +that I have stated, I cannot regard these conscientious objectors +with anything but contempt. Into my house there pours a dismal +literature rehearsing the hardships of these men who set +themselves up to be martyrs for liberty; So and So, brave hero, +has been sworn at--positively sworn at by a corporal; a nasty +rough man came into the cell of So and So and dropped several +h's; So and So, refusing to undress and wash, has been undressed +and washed, and soap was rubbed into his eyes--perhaps purposely; +the food and accommodation are not of the best class; the doctors +in attendance seem hasty; So and So was put into a damp bed and +has got a nasty cold. Then I recall a jolly vanload of wounded +men I saw out there.... + +But after all, we must be just. A church and state that +permitted these people to be thrust into dreary employment in +their early 'teens, without hope or pride, deserves such citizens +as these. The marvel is that there are so few. There are a poor +thousand or so of these hopeless, resentment-poisoned creatures +in Great Britain. Against five willing millions. The Allied +countries, I submit, have not got nearly all the conscientious +objectors they deserve. + + +3 + +If the Resentful Employee provides the emotional impulse of the +resisting pacifist, whose horizon is bounded by his one +passionate desire that the particular social system that has +treated him so ill should collapse and give in, and its leaders +and rulers be humiliated and destroyed, the intellectual +direction of a mischievous pacifism comes from an entirely +different class. + +The Genteel Whig, though he differs very widely in almost every +other respect from the Resentful Employee, has this much in +common, that he has never been drawn into the whirl of collective +life in any real and assimilative fashion. This is what is the +matter with both of them. He is a little loose, shy, independent +person. Except for eating and drinking--in moderation, he has +never done anything real from the day he was born. He has +frequently not even faced the common challenge of matrimony. +Still more frequently is he childless, or the daring parent of +one particular child. He has never traded nor manufactured. He +has drawn his dividends or his salary with an entire +unconsciousness of any obligations to policemen or navy for these +punctual payments. Probably he has never ventured even to +reinvest his little legacy. He is acutely aware of possessing an +exceptionally fine intelligence, but he is entirely unconscious +of a fundamental unreality. Nothing has ever occurred to him to +make him ask why the mass of men were either not possessed of his +security or discontented with it. The impulses that took his +school friends out upon all sorts of odd feats and adventures +struck him as needless. As he grew up he turned with an equal +distrust from passion or ambition. His friends went out after +love, after adventure, after power, after knowledge, after this +or that desire, and became men. But he noted merely that they +became fleshly, that effort strained them, that they were +sometimes angry or violent or heated. He could not but feel that +theirs were vulgar experiences, and he sought some finer exercise +for his exceptional quality. He pursued art or philosophy or +literature upon their more esoteric levels, and realised more and +more the general vulgarity and coarseness of the world about him, +and his own detachment. The vulgarity and crudity of the things +nearest him impressed him most; the dreadful insincerity of the +Press, the meretriciousness of success, the loudness of the rich, +the baseness of common people in his own land. The world +overseas had by comparison a certain glamour. Except that when +you said "United States" to him he would draw the air sharply +between his teeth and beg you not to... + +Nobody took him by the collar and shook him. + +If our world had considered the advice of William James and +insisted upon national service from everyone, national service in +the drains or the nationalised mines or the nationalised deep-sea +fisheries if not in the army or navy, we should not have had any +such men. If it had insisted that wealth and property are no +more than a trust for the public benefit, we should have had no +genteel indispensables. These discords in our national unanimity +are the direct consequence of our bad social organisation. We +permit the profiteer and the usurer; they evoke the response of +the Reluctant Employee, and the inheritor of their wealth becomes +the Genteel Whig. + +But that is by the way. It was of course natural and inevitable +that the German onslaught upon Belgium and civilisation generally +should strike these recluse minds not as a monstrous ugly +wickedness to be resisted and overcome at any cost, but merely as +a nerve-racking experience. Guns were going off on both sides. +The Genteel Whig was chiefly conscious of a repulsive vast +excitement all about him, in which many people did inelegant and +irrational things. They waved flags--nasty little flags. This +child of the ages, this last fruit of the gigantic and tragic +tree of life, could no more than stick its fingers in its ears as +say, "Oh, please, do /all/ stop!" and then as the strain +grew intenser and intenser set itself with feeble pawings now to +clamber "Au-dessus de la Melee," and now to--in some +weak way--stop the conflict. ("Au-dessus de la +Melee"--as the man said when they asked him where he +was when the bull gored his sister.) The efforts to stop the +conflict at any price, even at the price of entire submission to +the German Will, grew more urgent as the necessity that everyone +should help against the German Thing grew more manifest. + +Of all the strange freaks of distressed thinking that this war +has produced, the freaks of the Genteel Whig have been among the +most remarkable. With an air of profound wisdom he returns +perpetually to his proposition that there are faults on both +sides. To say that is his conception of impartiality. I suppose +that if a bull gored his sister he would say that there were +faults on both sides; his sister ought not to have strayed into +the field, she was wearing a red hat of a highly provocative +type; she ought to have been a cow and then everything would have +been different. In the face of the history of the last forty +years, the Genteel Whig struggles persistently to minimise the +German outrage upon civilisation and to find excuses for Germany. +He does this, not because he has any real passion for falsehood, +but because by training, circumstance, and disposition he is +passionately averse from action with the vulgar majority and from +self-sacrifice in a common cause, and because he finds in the +justification of Germany and, failing that, in the blackening of +the Allies to an equal blackness, one line of defence against the +wave of impulse that threatens to submerge his private self. But +when at last that line is forced he is driven back upon others +equally extraordinary. You can often find simultaneously in the +same Pacifist paper, and sometimes even in the utterances of the +same writer, two entirely incompatible statements. The first is +that Germany is so invincible that it is useless to prolong the +war since no effort of the Allies is likely to produce any +material improvement in their position, and the second is that +Germany is so thoroughly beaten that she is now ready to abandon +militarism and make terms and compensations entirely acceptable +to the countries she has forced into war. And when finally facts +are produced to establish the truth that Germany, though still +largely wicked and impenitent, is being slowly and conclusively +beaten by the sanity, courage and persistence of the Allied +common men, then the Genteel Whig retorts with his last defensive +absurdity. He invents a national psychology for Germany. +Germany, he invents, loves us and wants to be our dearest friend. +Germany has always loved us. The Germans are a loving, unenvious +people. They have been a little mislead--but nice people do not +insist upon that fact. But beware of beating Germany, beware of +humiliating Germany; then indeed trouble will come. Germany will +begin to dislike us. She will plan a revenge. Turning aside +from her erstwhile innocent career, she may even think of hate. +What are our obligations to France, Italy, Serbia and Russia, +what is the happiness of a few thousands of the Herero, a few +millions of the Belgians--whose numbers moreover are constantly +diminishing--when we might weigh them against the danger, the +most terrible danger, of incurring /permanent German +hostility?.../ + +A Frenchman I talked to knew better than that. "What will happen +to Germany," I asked, "if we are able to do so to her and so; +would she take to dreams of a /Revanche?/" + +"She will take to Anglomania," he said, and added after a flash +of reflection, "In the long run it will be the worse for you." + + +III. THE RELIGIOUS REVIVAL + + +1 + +One of the indisputable things about the war, so far as Britain +and France go--and I have reason to believe that on a lesser +scale things are similar in Italy--is that it has produced a very +great volume of religious thought and feeling. About Russia in +these matters we hear but little at the present time, but one +guesses at parallelism. People habitually religious have been +stirred to new depths of reality and sincerity, and people are +thinking of religion who never thought of religion before. But +as I have already pointed out, thinking and feeling about a +matter is of no permanent value unless something is /thought +out/, unless there is a change of boundary or relationship, +and it an altogether different question to ask whether any +definite change is resulting from this universal ferment. If it +is not doing so, then the sleeper merely dreams a dream that he +will forget again.... + +Now in no sort of general popular mental activity is there so +much froth and waste as in religious excitements. This has been +the case in all periods of religious revival. The number who are +rather impressed, who for a few days or weeks take to reading +their Bibles or going to a new place of worship or praying or +fasting or being kind and unselfish, is always enormous in +relation to the people whose lives are permanently changed. The +effort needed if a contemporary is to blow off the froth, is +always very considerable. + +Among the froth that I would blow off is I think most of the +tremendous efforts being made in England by the Anglican church +to attract favourable attention to itself /apropos/ +of the war. I came back from my visit to the Somme battlefields +to find the sylvan peace of Essex invaded by a number of ladies +in blue dresses adorned with large white crosses, who, regardless +of the present shortage of nurses, were visiting every home in +the place on some mission of invitation whose details remained +obscure. So far as I was able to elucidate this project, it was +in the nature of a magic incantation; a satisfactory end of the +war was to be brought about by convergent prayer and religious +assiduities. The mission was shy of dealing with me personally, +although as a lapsed communicant I should have thought myself a +particularly hopeful field for Anglican effort, and it came to my +wife and myself merely for our permission and countenance in an +appeal to our domestic servants. My wife consulted the +household; it seemed very anxious to escape from that appeal, and +as I respect Christianity sufficiently to detest the +identification of its services with magic processes, the mission +retired--civilly repulsed. But the incident aroused an uneasy +curiosity in my mind with regard to the general trend of Anglican +teaching and Anglican activities at the present time. The trend +of my enquiries is to discover the church much more incoherent +and much less religious--in any decent sense of the word--than I +had supposed it to be. + +Organisation is the life of material and the death of mental and +spiritual processes. There could be no more melancholy +exemplification of this than the spectacle of the Anglican and +Catholic churches at the present time, one using the tragic +stresses of war mainly for pew-rent touting, and the other +paralysed by its Austrian and South German political connections +from any clear utterance upon the moral issues of the war. +Through the opening phases of the war the Established Church of +England was inconspicuous; this is no longer the case, but it may +be doubted whether the change is altogether to its advantage. To +me this is a very great disappointment. I have always had a very +high opinion of the intellectual values of the leading divines of +both the Anglican and Catholic communions. The self-styled +Intelligentsia of Great Britain is all too prone to sneer at +their equipment; but I do not see how any impartial person can +deny that Father Bernard Vaughn is in mental energy, vigour of +expression, richness of thought and variety of information fully +the equal of such an influential lay publicist as Mr. Horatio +Bottomley. One might search for a long time among prominent +laymen to find the equal of the Bishop of London. Nevertheless +it is impossible to conceal the impression of tawdriness that +this latter gentleman's work as head of the National Mission has +left upon my mind. Attired in khaki he has recently been +preaching in the open air to the people of London upon Tower +Hill, Piccadilly, and other conspicuous places. Obsessed as I am +by the humanities, and impressed as I have always been by the +inferiority of material to moral facts, I would willingly have +exchanged the sight of two burning Zeppelins for this spectacle +of ecclesiastical fervour. But as it is, I am obliged to trust +to newspaper reports and the descriptions of hearers and eye- +witnesses. They leave to me but little doubt of the regrettable +superficiality of the bishop's utterances. + +We have a multitude of people chastened by losses, ennobled by a +common effort, needing support in that effort, perplexed by the +reality of evil and cruelty, questioning and seeking after God. +What does the National Mission offer? On Tower Hill the bishop +seems to have been chiefly busy with a wrangling demonstration +that ten thousand a year is none too big a salary for a man +subject to such demands and expenses as his see involves. So far +from making anything out of his see he was, he declared, two +thousand a year to the bad. Some day, when the church has +studied efficiency, I suppose that bishops will have the leisure +to learn something about the general state of opinion and +education in their dioceses. The Bishop of London was evidently +unaware of the almost automatic response of the sharp socialists +among his hearers. Their first enquiry would be to learn how he +came by that mysterious extra two thousand a year with which he +supplemented his stipend. How did he earn /that?/ And if he +didn't earn it---! And secondly, they would probably have +pointed out to him that his standard of housing, clothing, diet +and entertaining was probably a little higher than theirs. It is +really no proof of virtuous purity that a man's expenditure +exceeds his income. And finally some other of his hearers were +left unsatisfied by his silence with regard to the current +proposal to pool all clerical stipends for the common purposes of +the church. It is a reasonable proposal, and if bishops must +dispute about stipends instead of preaching the kingdom of God, +then they are bound to face it. The sooner they do so, the more +graceful will the act be. From these personal apologetics the +bishop took up the question of the exemption, at the request of +the bishops, of the clergy from military service. It is one of +our contrasts with French conditions--and it is all to the +disadvantage of the British churches. + +In his Piccadilly contribution to the National Mission of +Repentance and Hope the bishop did not talk politics but sex. He +gave his hearers the sort of stuff that is handed out so freely +by the Cinema Theatres, White Slave Traffic talk, denunciations +of "Night Hawks"--whatever "Night Hawks" may be--and so on. One +this or another occasion the bishop--he boasts that he himself is +a healthy bachelor--lavished his eloquence upon the Fall in the +Birth Rate, and the duty of all married people, from paupers +upward, to have children persistently. Now sex, like diet, is a +department of conduct and a very important department, but /it +isn't religion!/ The world is distressed by international +disorder, by the monstrous tragedy of war; these little hot talks +about indulgence and begetting have about as much to do with the +vast issues that concern us as, let us say, a discussion of the +wickedness of eating very new and indigestible bread. It is +talking round and about the essential issue. It is fogging the +essential issue, which is the forgotten and neglected kingship of +God. The sin that is stirring the souls of men is the sin of +this war. It is the sin of national egotism and the devotion of +men to loyalties, ambitions, sects, churches, feuds, aggressions, +and divisions that are an outrage upon God's universal +kingdom. + + +2 + +The common clergy of France, sharing the military obligations and +the food and privations of their fellow parishioners, contrast +very vividly with the home-staying types of the ministries of the +various British churches. I met and talked to several. Near +Frise there were some barge gunboats--they have since taken their +place in the fighting, but then they were a surprise--and the men +had been very anxious to have their craft visited and seen. The +priest who came after our party to see if he could still arrange +that, had been decorated for gallantry. Of course the English +too have their gallant chaplains, but they are men of the officer +caste, they are just young officers with peculiar collars; not +men among men, as are the French priests. + +There can be no doubt that the behaviour of the French priests in +this war has enormously diminished anti-clerical bitterness in +France. There can be no doubt that France is far more a +religious country than it was before the war. But if you ask +whether that means any return to the church, any reinstatement of +the church, the answer is a doubtful one. Religion and the +simple priest are stronger in France to-day; the church, I think, +is weaker. + +I trench on no theological discussion when I record the +unfavourable impression made upon all western Europe by the +failure of the Holy Father to pronounce definitely upon the +rights and wrongs of the war. The church has abrogated its right +of moral judgement. Such at least seemed to be the opinion of +the Frenchmen with whom I discussed a remarkable interview with +Cardinal Gasparri that I found one morning in /Le Journal./ + +It was not the sort of interview to win the hearts of men who +were ready to give their lives to set right what they believe to +be the greatest outrage that has ever been inflicted upon +Christendom, that is to say the forty-three years of military +preparation and of diplomacy by threats that culminated in the +ultimatum to Serbia, the invasion of Belgium and the murder of +the Vise villagers. It was adorned with a large portrait +of "Benoit XV.," looking grave and discouraging over his +spectacles, and the headlines insisted it was "/La +Pensee du Pape./" Cross-heads sufficiently indicated +the general tone. One read: + +/"Le Saint Siege impartial... +Au-dessus de la bataille...."/ +The good Cardinal would have made a good lawyer. He had as +little to say about God and the general righteousness of things +as the Bishop of London. But he got in some smug reminders of +the severance of diplomatic relations with the Vatican. Perhaps +now France will be wiser. He pointed out that the Holy See in +its Consistorial Allocution of January 22nd, 1915, invited the +belligerents to observe the rules of war. Could anything more be +done than that? Oh!--in the general issue of the war, if you +want a judgement on the war as a whole, how is it possible that +the Vatican to decide? Surely the French know that excellent +principle of justice, /Audiatur et altera pars/, and how +under existing circumstances can the Vatican do that...? The +Vatican is cut off from communication with Austria and Germany. +The Vatican has been deprived of its temporal power and local +independence (another neat point).... + +So France is bowed out. When peace is restored, the Vatican will +perhaps be able to enquire if there was a big German army in +1914, if German diplomacy was aggressive from 1875 onward, if +Belgium was invaded unrighteously, if (Catholic) Austria forced +the pace upon (non-Catholic) Russia. But now--now the Holy See +must remain as impartial as an unbought mascot in a shop +window.... + +The next column of /Le Journal/ contained an account of the +Armenian massacres; the blood of the Armenian cries out past the +Holy Father to heaven; but then Armenians are after all heretics, +and here again the principle of /Audiatur et altera pars/ +comes in. Communications are not open with the Turks. Moreover, +Armenians, like Serbs, are worse than infidels; they are +heretics. Perhaps God is punishing them.... + +/Audiatur et altera pars/, and the Vatican has not forgotten +the infidelity and disrespect of both France and Italy in the +past. These are the things, it seems, that really matter to the +Vatican. Cardinal Gasparri's portrait, in the same issue of +/Le Journal/, displays a countenance of serene contentment, +a sort of incarnate "Told-you-so." + +So the Vatican lifts its pontifical skirts and shakes the dust of +western Europe off its feet. + +It is the most astounding renunciation in history. + +Indubitably the Christian church took a wide stride from the +kingship of God when it placed a golden throne for the unbaptised +Constantine in the midst of its most sacred deliberations at +Nicaea. But it seems to me that this abandonment of moral +judgements in the present case by the Holy See is an almost wider +step from the church's allegiance to God.... + + +3 + +Thought about the great questions of life, thought and reasoned +direction, this is what the multitude demands mutely and weakly, +and what the organised churches are failing to give. They have +not the courage of their creeds. Either their creeds are +intellectual flummery or they are the solution to the riddles +with which the world is struggling. But the churches make no +mention of their creeds. They chatter about sex and the magic +effect of church attendance and simple faith. If simple faith is +enough, the churches and their differences are an imposture. Men +are stirred to the deepest questions about life and God, and the +Anglican church, for example, obliges--as I have described. + +It is necessary to struggle against the unfavourable impression +made by these things. They must not blind us to the deeper +movement that is in progress in a quite considerable number of +minds in England and France alike towards the realisation of the +kingdom of God. + +What I conceive to be the reality of the religious revival is to +be found in quarters remote from the religious professionals. +Let me give but one instance of several that occur to me. I met +soon after my return from France a man who has stirred my +curiosity for years, Mr. David Lubin, the prime mover in the +organisation of the International Institute of Agriculture in +Rome. It is a movement that has always appealed to my +imagination. The idea is to establish and keep up to date a +record of the food supplies in the world with a view to the +ultimate world control of food supply and distribution. When its +machinery has developed sufficiently to a control in the +interests of civilisation of many other staples besides +foodstuffs. It is in fact the suggestion and beginning of the +economic world peace and the economic world state, just as the +Hague Tribunal is the first faint sketch of a legal world state. +The King of Italy has met Mr. Lubin's idea with open hands. (It +was because of this profoundly interesting experiment that in a +not very widely known book of mine, /The World Set Free/ +(May, 1914), in which I represented a world state as arising out +of Armageddon, I made the first world conference meet at Brissago +in Italian Switzerland under the presidency of the King of +Italy.) So that when I found I could meet Mr. Lubin I did so very +gladly. We lunched together in a pretty little room high over +Knightsbridge, and talked through an afternoon. + +He is a man rather after the type of Gladstone; he could be made +to look like Gladstone in a caricature, and he has that +compelling quality of intense intellectual excitement which was +one of the great factors in the personal effectiveness of +Gladstone. He is a Jew, but until I had talked to him for some +time that fact did not occur to me. He is in very ill health, he +has some weakness of the heart that grips him and holds him at +times white and silent. + +At first we talked of his Institute and its work. Then we came +to shipping and transport. Whenever one talks now of human +affairs one comes presently to shipping and transport generally. +In Paris, in Italy, when I returned to England, everywhere I +found "cost of carriage" was being discovered to be a question of +fundamental importance. Yet transport, railroads and shipping, +these vitally important services in the world's affairs, are +nearly everywhere in private hands and run for profit. In the +case of shipping they are run for profit on such antiquated lines +that freights vary from day to day and from hour to hour. It +makes the business of food supply a gamble. And it need not be a +gamble. + +But that is by the way in the present discussion. As we talked, +the prospect broadened out from a prospect of the growing and +distribution of food to a general view of the world becoming one +economic community. + +I talked of various people I had been meeting in the previous few +weeks. "So many of us," I said, "seem to be drifting away from +the ideas of nationalism and faction and policy, towards +something else which is larger. It is an idea of a right way of +doing things for human purposes, independently of these limited +and localised references. Take such things as international +hygiene for example, take /this/ movement. We are feeling +our way towards a bigger rule." + +"The rule of Righteousness," said Mr. Lubin. + +I told him that I had been coming more and more to the idea--not +as a sentimentality or a metaphor, but as the ruling and +directing idea, the structural idea, of all one's political and +social activities--of the whole world as one state and community +and of God as the King of that state. + +"But /I/ say that," cried Mr. Lubin, "I have put my name to that. And--it is /here!/" + +He struggled up, seized an Old Testament that lay upon a side +table. He stood over it and rapped its cover. "It is +/here/," he said, looking more like Gladstone than ever, "in +the Prophets." + + +4 + +That is all I mean to tell at present of that conversation. + +We talked of religion for two hours. Mr. Lubin sees things in +terms of Israel and I do not. For all that we see things very +much after the same fashion. That talk was only one of a number +of talks about religion that I have had with hard and practical +men who want to get the world straighter than it is, and who +perceive that they must have a leadership and reference outside +themselves. That is why I assert so confidently that there is a +real deep religious movement afoot in the world. But not one of +those conversations could have gone on, it would have ceased +instantly, if anyone bearing the uniform and brand of any +organised religious body, any clergyman, priest, mollah, of +suchlike advocate of the ten thousand patented religions in the +world, had come in. He would have brought in his sectarian +spites, his propaganda of church-going, his persecution of the +heretic and the illegitimate, his ecclesiastical politics, his +taboos, and his doctrinal touchiness.... That is why, though I +perceive there is a great wave of religious revival in the world +to-day, I doubt whether it bodes well for the professional +religions.... + +The other day I was talking to an eminent Anglican among various +other people and someone with an eye to him propounded this +remarkable view. + +"There are four stages between belief and utter unbelief. There +are those who believe in God, those who doubt like Huxley the +Agnostic, those who deny him like the Atheists but who do at +least keep his place vacant, and lastly those who have set up a +Church in his place. That is the last outrage of unbelief." + + +IV. THE RIDDLE OF THE BRITISH +All the French people I met in France seemed to be thinking and +talking about the English. The English bring their own +atmosphere with them; to begin with they are not so talkative, +and I did not find among them anything like the same vigour of +examination, the same resolve to understand the Anglo-French +reaction, that I found among the French. In intellectual +processes I will confess that my sympathies are undisguisedly +with the French; the English will never think nor talk clearly +until the get clerical "Greek" and sham "humanities" out of their +public schools and sincere study and genuine humanities in; our +disingenuous Anglican compromise is like a cold in the English +head, and the higher education in England is a training in +evasion. This is an always lamentable state of affairs, but just +now it is particularly lamentable because quite tremendous +opportunities for the good of mankind turn on the possibility of +a thorough and entirely frank mutual understanding between +French, Italians, and English. For years there has been a +considerable amount of systematic study in France of English +thought and English developments. Upon almost any question of +current English opinion and upon most current English social +questions, the best studies are in French. But there has been +little or no reciprocal activity. The English in France seem to +confine their French studies to /La Vie Parisienne./ It is +what they have been led to expect of French literature. + +There can be no doubt in any reasonable mind that this war is +binding France and England very closely together. They dare not +quarrel for the next fifty years. They are bound to play a +central part in the World League for the Preservation of Peace +that must follow this struggle. There is no question of their +practical union. It is a thing that must be. But it is +remarkable that while the French mind is agog to apprehend every +fact and detail it can about the British, to make the wisest and +fullest use of our binding necessities, that strange English +"incuria"--to use the new slang--attains to its most monumental +in this matter. + +So there is not much to say about how the British think about the +French. They do not think. They feel. At the outbreak of the +war, when the performance of France seemed doubtful, there was an +enormous feeling for France in Great Britain; it was like the +formless feeling one has for a brother. It was as if Britain had +discovered a new instinct. If France had crumpled up like paper, +the English would have fought on passionately to restore her. +That is ancient history now. Now the English still feel +fraternal and fraternally proud; but in a mute way they are +dazzled. Since the German attack on Verdun began, the French +have achieved a crescendo. None of us could have imagined it. +It did not seem possible to very many of us at the end of 1915 +that either France or Germany could hold on for another year. +There was much secret anxiety for France. It has given place now +to unstinted confidence and admiration. In their astonishment +the British are apt to forget the impressive magnitude of their +own effort, the millions of soldiers, the innumerable guns, the +endless torrent of supplies that pour into France to avenge the +little army of Mons. It seems natural to us that we should so +exert ourselves under the circumstances. I suppose it is +wonderful, but, as a sample Englishman, I do not feel that it is +at all wonderful. I did not feel it wonderful even when I saw +the British aeroplanes lording it in the air over Martinpuich, +and not a German to be seen. Since Michael would have it so, +there, at last, they were. + +There was a good deal of doubt in France about the vigour of the +British effort, until the Somme offensive. All that had been +dispelled in August when I reached Paris. There was not the +shadow of a doubt remaining anywhere of the power and loyalty of +the British. These preliminary assurances have to be made, +because it is in the nature of the French mind to criticise, and +it must not be supposed that criticisms of detail and method +affect the fraternity and complete mutual confidence which is the +stuff of the Anglo-French relationship. + + +2 + +Now first the French have been enormously astonished by the +quality of the ordinary British soldiers in our new armies. One +Colonial colonel said something almost incredible to me--almost +incredible as coming as from a Frenchman; it was a matter to +solemn for any compliments or polite exaggerations; he said in +tones of wonder and conviction, "/They are as good as +ours./" It was his acme of all possible praise. + +That means any sort of British soldier. Unless he is assisted by +a kilt the ordinary Frenchman is unable to distinguish between +one sort of British soldier and another. He cannot tell--let the +ardent nationalist mark the fact!--a Cockney from an Irishman or +the Cardiff from the Essex note. He finds them all extravagantly +and unquenchably cheerful and with a generosity--"like good +children." There his praise is a little tinged by doubt. The +British are reckless--recklessness in battle a Frenchman can +understand, but they are also reckless about to-morrow's bread +and whether the tent is safe against a hurricane in the night. +He is struck too by the fact that they are much more vocal than +the French troops, and that they seem to have a passion for bad +lugubrious songs. There he smiles and shrugs his shoulders, and +indeed what else can any of us do in the presence of that +mystery? At any rate the legend of the "phlegmatic" Englishman +has been scattered to the four winds of heaven by the guns of the +western front. The men are cool in action, it is true; but for +the rest they are, by the French standards, quicksilver. + +But I will not expand further upon the general impression made by +the English in France. Philippe Millet's /En Liaison avec les +Anglais/ gives in a series of delightful pictures portraits of +British types from the French angle. There can be little doubt +that the British quality, genial naive, plucky and generous, has +won for itself a real affection in France wherever it has had a +chance to display itself.... + +But when it comes to British methods then the polite Frenchman's +difficulties begin. Translating hints into statements and +guessing at reservations, I would say that the French fall very +short of admiration of the way in which our higher officers set +about their work, they are disagreeably impressed by a general +want of sedulousness and close method in our leading. They think +we economise brains and waste blood. They are shocked at the way +in which obviously incompetent or inefficient men of the old army +class are retained in their positions even after serious +failures, and they were profoundly moved by the bad staff work +and needlessly heavy losses of our opening attacks in July. They +were ready to condone the blunderings and flounderings of the +1915 offensive as the necessary penalties of an "amateur" army, +they had had to learn their own lesson in Champagne, but they +were surprised to find how much the British had still to learn in +July, 1916. The British officers excuse themselves because, they +plead, they are still amateurs. "That is no reason," says the +Frenchman, "why they should be amateurish." + +No Frenchman said as much as this to me, but their meaning was as +plain as daylight. I tackled one of my guides on this matter; I +said that it was the plain duty of the French military people to +criticise British military methods sharply if they thought they +were wrong. "It is not easy," he said. "Many British officers +do not think they have anything to learn. And English people do +not like being told things. What could we do? We could hardly +send a French officer or so to your headquarters in a tutorial +capacity. You have to do things in your own way." When I tried +to draw General Castelnau into this dangerous question by +suggesting that we might borrow a French general or so, he would +say only, "There is only one way to learn war, and that is to +make war." When it was too late, in the lift, I thought of the +answer to that. There is only one way to make war, and that is +by the sacrifice of incapables and the rapid promotion of able +men. If old and tried types fail now, new types must be sought. +But to do that we want a standard of efficiency. We want a +conception of intellectual quality in performance that is still +lacking.... + +M. Joseph Reinach, in whose company I visited the French part of +the Somme front, was full of a scheme, which he has since +published, for the breaking up and recomposition of the French +and British armies into a series of composite armies which would +blend the magnificent British manhood and material with French +science and military experience. He pointed out the endless +advantages of such an arrangement; the stimulus of emulation, the +promotion of intimate fraternal feeling between the peoples of +the two countries. "At present," he said, "no Frenchman ever +sees an Englishman except at Amiens or on the Somme. Many of +them still have no idea of what the English are doing...." + +"Have I ever told you the story of compulsory Greek at Oxford and +Cambridge?" I asked abruptly. + +"What has that to do with it?" + +"Or how two undistinguished civil service commissioners can hold +up the scientific education of our entire administrative class?" + +M. Reinach protested further. + +"Because you are proposing to loosen the grip of a certain narrow +and limited class upon British affairs, and you propose it as +though it were a job as easy as rearranging railway fares or +sending a van to Calais. That is the problem that every decent +Englishman is trying to solve to-day, every man of that Greater +Britain which has supplied these five million volunteers, these +magnificent temporary officers and all this wealth of munitions. +And the oligarchy is so invincibly fortified! Do you think it +will let in Frenchmen to share its controls? It will not even +let in Englishmen. It holds the class schools; the class +universities; the examinations for our public services are its +class shibboleths; it is the church, the squirearchy, the +permanent army class, permanent officialdom; it makes every +appointment, it is the fountain of honour; what it does not know +is not knowledge, what it cannot do must not be done. It rules +India ignorantly and obstructively; it will wreck the empire +rather than relinquish its ascendancy in Ireland. It is densely +self-satisfied and instinctively monopolistic. It is on our +backs, and with it on our backs we common English must bleed and +blunder to victory.... And you make this proposal!" + + +3 + +The antagonistic relations of the Anglican oligarchy with the +greater and greater-spirited Britain that thrust behind it in +this war are probably paralleled very closely in Germany, +probably they are exaggerated in Germany with a bigger military +oligarchy and a relatively lesser civil body under it. This +antagonism is the oddest outcome of the tremendous /de- +militarisation/ of war that has been going on. In France it +is probably not so marked because of the greater flexibility and +adaptability of the French culture. + +All military people--people, that is, professionally and +primarily military--are inclined to be conservative. For +thousands of years the military tradition has been a tradition of +discipline. The conception of the common soldier has been a +mechanically obedient, almost dehumanised man, of the of officer +a highly trained autocrat. In two years all this has been +absolutely reversed. Individual quality, inventive organisation +and industrialism will win this war. And no class is so innocent +of these things as the military caste. Long accustomed as they +are to the importance of moral effect they put a brave face upon +the business; they save their faces astonishingly, but they are +no longer guiding and directing this war, they are being pushed +from behind by forces they never foresaw and cannot control. The +aeroplanes and great guns have bolted with them, the tanks +begotten of naval and civilian wits, shove them to victory in +spite of themselves. + +Wherever I went behind the British lines the officers were going +about in spurs. These spurs at last got on my nerves. They +became symbolical. They became as grave an insult to the tragedy +of the war as if they were false noses. The British officers go +for long automobile rides in spurs. They walk about the trenches +in spurs. Occasionally I would see a horse; I do not wish to be +unfair in this matter, there were riding horses sometimes within +two or three miles of the ultimate front, but they were rarely +used. + +I do not say that the horse is entirely obsolescent in this war. +In was nothing is obsolete. In the trenches men fight with +sticks. In the Pasubio battle the other day one of the Alpini +silenced a machine gun by throwing stones. In the West African +campaign we have employed troops armed with bows and arrows, and +they have done very valuable work. But these are exceptional +cases. The military use of the horse henceforth will be such an +exceptional case. It is ridiculous for these spurs still to +clink about the modern battlefield. What the gross cost of the +spurs and horses and trappings of the British army amount to, and +how many men are grooming and tending horses who might just as +well be ploughing and milking at home, I cannot guess; it must be +a total so enormous as seriously to affect the balance of the +war. + +And these spurs and their retention are only the outward and +visible symbol of the obstinate resistance of the Anglican +intelligence to the clear logic of the present situation. It is +not only the external equipment of our leaders that falls behind +the times; our political and administrative services are in the +hands of the same desolatingly inadaptable class. The British +are still wearing spurs in Ireland; they are wearing them in +India; and the age of the spur has passed. At the outset of this +war there was an absolute cessation of criticism of the military +and administrative castes; it is becoming a question whether we +may not pay too heavily in blundering and waste, in military and +economic lassitude, in international irritation and the +accumulation of future dangers in Ireland, Egypt, India, and +elsewhere, for an apparent absence of internal friction. These +people have no gratitude for tacit help, no spirit of intelligent +service, and no sense of fair play to the outsider. The latter +deficiency indeed they call /esprit de corps/ and prize it +as if it were a noble quality. + +It becomes more and more imperative that the foreign observer +should distinguish between this narrower, older official Britain +and the greater newer Britain that struggles to free itself from +the entanglement of a system outgrown. There are many Englishmen +who would like to say to the French and Irish and the Italians +and India, who indeed feel every week now a more urgent need of +saying, "Have patience with us." The Riddle of the British is +very largely solved if you will think of a great modern liberal +nation seeking to slough an exceedingly tough and tight skin.... + +Nothing is more illuminating and self-educational than to explain +one's home politics to an intelligent foreigner enquirer; it +strips off all the secondary considerations, the allusiveness, +the merely tactical considerations, the allusiveness, the merely +tactical considerations. One sees the forest not as a confusion +of trees but as something with a definite shape and place. I was +asked in Italy and in France, "Where does Lord Northcliffe come +into the British system--or Lloyd George? Who is Mr. Redmond? +Why is Lloyd George a Minister, and why does not Mr. Redmond take +office? Isn't there something called an ordnance department, and +why is there a separate ministry of munitions? Can Mr. Lloyd +George remove an incapable general?..." + +I found it M. Joseph Reinach particularly penetrating and +persistent. It is an amusing but rather difficult exercise to +recall what I tried to convey to him by way of a theory of +Britain. He is by no means an uncritical listener. I explained +that there is an "inner Britain," official Britain, which is +Anglican or official Presbyterian, which at the outside in the +whole world cannot claim to speak for twenty million Anglican or +Presbyterian communicants, which monopolises official positions, +administration and honours in the entire British empire, +dominates the court, and, typically, is spurred and red-tabbed. +(It was just at this time that the spurs were most on my +nerves.) + +This inner Britain, I went on to explain, holds tenaciously to +its positions of advantage, from which it is difficult to +dislodge it without upsetting the whole empire, and it insists +upon treating the rest of the four hundred millions who +constitute that empire as outsiders, foreigners, subject races +and suspected persons. + +"To you," I said, "it bears itself with an appearance of faintly +hostile, faintly contemptuous apathy. It is still so entirely +insular that it shudders at the thought of the Channel Tunnel. +This is the Britain which irritates and puzzles you so intensely-- +that you are quite unable to conceal these feelings from me. +Unhappily it is the Britain you see most of. Well, outside this +official Britain is 'Greater Britain'--the real Britain with +which you have to reckon in the future." (From this point a +faint flavour of mysticism crept into my dissertation. I found +myself talking with something in my voice curiously reminiscent +of those liberal Russians who set themselves to explain the +contrasts and contradictions of "official" Russia and "true" +Russia.) "This Greater Britain," I asserted, "is in a perpetual +conflict with official Britain, struggling to keep it up to its +work, shoving it towards its ends, endeavouring in spite of its +tenacious mischievousness of the privileged to keep the peace and +a common aim with the French and Irish and Italians and Russians +and Indians. It is to that outer Britain that those Englishmen +you found so interesting and sympathetic, Lloyd George and Lord +Northcliffe, for example, belong. It is the Britain of the great +effort, the Britain of the smoking factories and the torrent of +munitions, the Britain of the men and subalterns of the new +armies, the Britain which invents and thinks and achieves, and +stands now between German imperialism and the empire of the +world. I do not want to exaggerate the quality of greater +Britain. If the inner set are narrowly educated, the outer set +if often crudely educated. If the inner set is so close knit as +to seem like a conspiracy, the outer set is so loosely knit as to +seem like a noisy confusion. Greater Britain is only beginning +to realise itself and find itself. For all its crudity there is +a giant spirit in it feeling its way towards the light. It has +quite other ambitions for the ending of the war than some haggled +treaty of alliance with France and Italy; some advantage that +will invalidate German competition; it begins to realise newer +and wider sympathies, possibilities of an amalgamation of +interests and community of aim that is utterly beyond the habits +of the old oligarchy to conceive, beyond the scope of that tawdry +word 'Empire' to express...." + +I descended from my rhetoric to find M. Reinach asking how and +when this greater Britain was likely to become politically +effective. + + +V. THE SOCIAL CHANGES IN PROGRESS + + +1 + +"Nothing will be the same after the war." This is one of the +consoling platitudes with which people cover over voids of +thought. They utter it with an air of round-eyed profundity. +But to ask in reply, "Then how will things be different?" is in +many cases to rouse great resentment. It is almost as rude as +saying, "Was that thought of yours really a thought?" + +Let us in this chapter confine ourselves to the social-economic +processes that are going on. So far as I am able to distinguish +among the things that are being said in these matters, they may +be classified out into groups that centre upon several typical +questions. There is the question of "How to pay for the war?" +There is the question of the behaviour of labour after the war. +"Will there be a Labour Truce or a violent labour struggle?" +There is the question of the reconstruction of European industry +after the war in the face of an America in a state of monetary +and economic repletion through non-intervention. My present +purpose in this chapter is a critical one; it is not to solve +problems but to set out various currents of thought that are +flowing through the general mind. Which current is likely to +seize upon and carry human affairs with it, is not for our +present speculation. + +There seem to be two distinct ways of answering the first of the +questions I have noted. They do not necessarily contradict each +other. Of course the war is being largely paid for immediately +out of the accumulated private wealth of the past. We are buying +off the "hold-up" of the private owner upon the material and +resources we need, and paying in paper money and war loans. This +is not in itself an impoverishment of the community. The wealth +of individuals is not the wealth of nations; the two things may +easily be contradictory when the rich man's wealth consists of +land or natural resources or franchises or privileges the use of +which he reluctantly yields for high prices. The conversion of +held-up land and material into workable and actively used +material in exchange for national debt may be indeed a positive +increase in the wealth of the community. And what is happening +in all the belligerent countries is the taking over of more and +more of the realities of wealth from private hands and, in +exchange, the contracting of great masses of debt to private +people. The nett tendency is towards the disappearance of a +reality holding class and the destruction of realities in +warfare, and the appearance of a vast /rentier/ class in its +place. At the end of the war much material will be destroyed for +evermore, transit, food production and industry will be +everywhere enormously socialised, and the country will be liable +to pay every year in interest, a sum of money exceeding the +entire national expenditure before the war. From the point of +view of the state, and disregarding material and moral damages, +that annual interest is the annual instalment of the price to be +paid for the war. + +Now the interesting question arises whether these great +belligerent states may go bankrupt, and if so to what extent. +States may go bankrupt to the private creditor without +repudiating their debts or seeming to pay less to him. They can +go bankrupt either by a depreciation of their currency or-- +without touching the gold standard--through a rise in prices. In +the end both these things work out to the same end; the creditor +gets so many loaves or pairs of boots or workman's hours of +labour for his pound /less/ than he would have got under the +previous conditions. One may imagine this process of price (and +of course wages) increase going on to a limitless extent. Many +people are inclined to look to such an increase in prices as a +certain outcome of the war, and just so far as it goes, just so +far will the burthen of the /rentier/ class, their call, tat +is, for goods and services, be lightened. This expectation is +very generally entertained, and I can see little reason against +it. The intensely stupid or dishonest "labour" press, however, +which in the interests of the common enemy misrepresents +socialism and seeks to misguide labour in Great Britain, ignores +these considerations, and positively holds out this prospect of +rising prices as an alarming one to the more credulous and +ignorant of its readers. + +But now comes the second way of meeting the after-the-war +obligations. This second way is by increasing the wealth of the +state and by increasing the national production to such an extent +that the payment of the /rentier/ class will not be an +overwhelming burthen. Rising prices bilk the creditor. +Increased production will check the rise in prices and get him a +real payment. The outlook for the national creditor seems to be +that he will be partly bilked and partly paid; how far he will be +bilked and how far depends almost entirely upon this possible +increase in production; and there is consequently a very keen and +quite unprecedented desire very widely diffused among intelligent +and active people, holding War Loan scrip and the like, in all +the belligerent countries, to see bold and hopeful schemes for +state enrichment pushed forward. The movement towards socialism +is receiving an impulse from a new and unexpected quarter, there +is now a /rentier/ socialism, and it is interesting to note +that while the London /Times/ is full of schemes of great +state enterprises, for the exploitation of Colonial state lands, +for the state purchase and wholesaling of food and many natural +products, and for the syndication of shipping and the great +staple industries into vast trusts into which not only the +British but the French and Italian governments may enter as +partners, the so-called socialist press of Great Britain is +chiefly busy about the draughts in the cell of Mr. Fenner +Brockway and the refusal of Private Scott Duckers to put on his +khaki trousers. /The New Statesman/ and the Fabian Society, +however, display a wider intelligence. + +There is a great variety of suggestions for this increase of +public wealth and production. Many of them have an extreme +reasonableness. The extent to which they will be adopted +depends, no doubt, very largely upon the politician and permanent +official, and both these classes are prone to panic in the +presence of reality. In spite of its own interests in +restraining a rise in prices, the old official "salariat" is +likely to be obstructive to any such innovations. It is the +resistance of spurs and red tabs to military innovations over +again. This is the resistance of quills and red tape. On the +other hand the organisation of Britain for war has "officialised" +a number of industrial leaders, and created a large body of +temporary and adventurous officials. They may want to carry on +into peace production the great new factories the war has +created. At the end of the war, for example, every belligerent +country will be in urgent need of cheap automobiles for farmers, +tradesmen, and industrial purposes generally, America is now +producing such automobiles at a price of eighty pounds. But +Europe will be heavily in debt to America, her industries will be +disorganised, and there will therefore be no sort of return +payment possible for these hundreds of thousands of automobiles. +A country that is neither creditor nor producer cannot be an +importer. Consequently though those cheap tin cars may be +stacked as high as the Washington Monument in America, they will +never come to Europe. On the other hand the great shell +factories of Europe will be standing idle and ready, their staffs +disciplined and available, for conversion to the new task. The +imperative common sense of the position seems to be that the +European governments should set themselves straight away to out- +Ford Ford, and provide their own people with cheap road +transport. + +But here comes in the question whether this common-sense course +is inevitable. Suppose the mental energy left in Europe after +the war is insufficient for such a constructive feat as this. +There will certainly be the obstruction of official pedantry, the +hold-up of this vested interest and that, the greedy desire of +"private enterprise" to exploit the occasion upon rather more +costly and less productive lines, the general distrust felt by +ignorant and unimaginative people of a new way of doing things. +The process after all may not get done in the obviously wise way. +This will not mean that Europe will buy American cars. It will +be quite unable to buy American cars. It will be unable to make +anything that America will not be able to make more cheaply for +itself. But it will mean that Europe will go on without cheap +cars, that is to say it will go on a more sluggishly and clumsily +and wastefully at a lower economic level. Hampered transport +means hampered production of other things, and in increasing +inability to buy abroad. And so we go down and down. + +It does not follow that because a course is the manifestly right +and advantageous course for the community that it will be taken. +I am reminded of this by a special basket in my study here, into +which I pitch letters, circulars, pamphlets and so forth as they +come to hand from a gentleman named Gattie, and his friends Mr. +Adrian Ross, Mr. Roy Horniman, Mr. Henry Murray and others. His +particular project is the construction of a Railway Clearing +House for London. It is an absolutely admirable scheme. It +would cut down the heavy traffic in the streets of London to +about one-third; it would enable us to run the goods traffic of +England with less than half the number of railway trucks we now +employ; it would turn over enormous areas of valuable land from +their present use as railway goods yards and sidings; it would +save time in the transit of goods and labour in their handling. +It is a quite beautifully worked out scheme. For the last eight +or ten years this group of devoted fanatics has been pressing +this undertaking upon an indifferent country with increasing +vehemence and astonishment at that indifference. The point is +that its adoption, though it would be of general benefit, would +be of no particular benefit to any leading man or highly placed +official. On the other hand it would upset all sorts of +individuals who are in a position to obstruct it quietly--and +they do so. Meaning no evil. I dip my hand in the accumulation +and extract a leaflet by the all too zealous Mr. Murray. In it +he denounces various public officials by name as he cheats and +scoundrels, and invites a prosecution for libel. + +In that fashion nothing will ever get done. There is no +prosecution, but for all that I do not agree with Mr. Murray +about the men he names. These gentlemen are just comfortable +gentlemen, own brothers to these old generals of ours who will +not take off their spurs. They are probably quite charming +people except that they know nothing of that Fear of God which +searches by heart. Why should they bother? + +So many of these after-the-war problems bring one back to the +question of how far the war has put the Fear of God into the +hearts of responsible men. There is really no other reason in +existence that I can imagine why they should ask themselves the +question, "Have I done my best?" and that still more important +question, "Am I doing my best now?" And so while I hear plenty +of talk about the great reorganisations that are to come after +the war, while there is the stir of doubt among the +/rentiers/ whether, after all, they will get paid, while the +unavoidable stresses and sacrifices of the war are making many +people question the rightfulness of much that they did as a +matter of course, and of much that they took for granted, I +perceive there is also something dull and not very articulate in +this European world, something resistant and inert, that is like +the obstinate rolling over of a heavy sleeper after he has been +called upon to get up. "Just a little longer.... Just for +/my/ time." + +One thought alone seems to make these more intractable people +anxious. I thrust it in as my last stimulant when everything +else has failed. "There will be /frightful/ trouble with +labour after the war," I say. + +They try to persuade themselves that military discipline is +breaking in labour.... + + +2 + +What does British labour think of the outlook after the war? + +As a distinctive thing British labour does not think. "Class- +conscious labour," as the Marxists put it, scarcely exists in +Britain. The only convincing case I ever met was a bath-chairman +of literary habits Eastbourne. The only people who are, as a +class, class-conscious in the British community are the Anglican +gentry and their fringe of the genteel. Everybody else is +"respectable." The mass of British workers find their thinking +in the ordinary halfpenny papers or in /John Bull./ The so- +called labour papers are perhaps less representative of British +Labour than any other section of the press; the /Labour +Leader/, for example, is the organ of such people as Bertrand +Russell, Vernon Lee, Morel, academic /rentiers/ who know +about as much as of the labour side of industrialism as they do +of cock-fighting. All the British peoples are racially willing +and good-tempered people, quite ready to be led by those they +imagine to be abler than themselves. They make the most cheerful +and generous soldiers in the whole world, without insisting upon +that democratic respect which the Frenchman exacts. They do not +criticise and they do not trouble themselves much about the +general plan of operations, so long as they have confidence in +the quality and good will of their leading. But British soldiers +will of their loading. But British soldiers will hiss a general +when they think he is selfish, unfeeling, or a muff. And the +socialist propaganda has imported ideas of public service into +private employment. Labour in Britain has been growing +increasingly impatient of bad or selfish industrial leadership. +Labour trouble in Great Britain turns wholly upon the idea +crystallised in the one word "profiteer." Legislation and +regulation of hours of labour, high wages, nothing will keep +labour quiet in Great Britain if labour thinks it is being +exploited for private gain. + +Labour feels very suspicious of private gain. For that suspicion +a certain rather common type of employer is mainly to blame. +Labour believes that employers is mainly to blame. Labour +believes that employers as a class cheat workmen as a class, plan +to cheat them of their full share in the common output, and drive +hard bargains. It believes that private employers are equally +ready to sacrifice the welfare of the nation and the welfare of +the workers for mere personal advantage. It has a traditional +experience to support these suspicions. + +In no department of morals have ideas changed so completely +during the last eight years as in relation to "profits". Eighty +years ago everyone believed in the divine right of property to do +what it pleased its advantages, a doctrine more disastrous +socially than the divine right of kings. There was no such sense +of the immorality of "holding up" as pervades the public +conscience to-day. The worker was expected not only to work, but +to be grateful for employment. The property owner held his +property and handed it out for use and development or not, just +as he thought fit. These ideas are not altogether extinct today. +Only a few days ago I met a magnificent old lady of seventy nine +or eighty, who discoursed upon the wickedness of her gardener in +demanding another shilling a week because of war prices. + +She was a valiant and handsome personage. A face that had still +a healthy natural pinkness looked out from under blond curls, and +an elegant and carefully tended hand tossed back some fine old +lace to gesticulate more freely. She had previously charmed her +hearers by sweeping aside certain rumours that were drifting +about. + +"Germans invade /Us!/" she cried. "Who'd /let/ 'em, +I'd like to know? Who'd /let/ 'em?" + +And then she reverted to her grievance about the gardener. + +"I told him that after the war he'd be glad enough to get +anything. Grateful! They'll all be coming back after the war-- +all of 'em, glad enough to get anything. Asking for another +shilling indeed!" + +Everyone who heard her looked shocked. But that was the tone of +everyone of importance in the dark years that followed the +Napoleonic wars. That is just one survivor of the old tradition. +Another is Blight the solicitor, who goes about bewailing the +fact that we writers are "holding out false hopes of higher +agricultural wages after the war." But these are both +exceptions. They are held to be remarkable people even by their +own class. The mass of property owners and influential people in +Europe to-day no more believe in the sacred right of property to +hold up development and dictate terms than do the more +intelligent workers. The ideas of collective ends and of the +fiduciary nature of property, had been soaking through the +European community for years before the war. The necessity for +sudden and even violent co-operations and submersions of +individuality in a common purpose, is rapidly crystallising out +these ideas into clear proposals. + +War is an evil thing, but most people who will not learn from +reason must have an ugly teacher. This war has brought home to +everyone the supremacy of the public need over every sort of +individual claim. + +One of the most remarkable things in the British war press is the +amount of space given to the discussion of labour developments +after the war. This in its completeness peculiar to the British +situation. Nothing on the same scale is perceptible in the press +of the Latin allies. A great movement on the part of capitalists +and business organisers is manifest to assure the worker of a +change of heart and a will to change method. Labour is +suspicious, not foolishly but wisely suspicious. But labour is +considering it. + +"National industrial syndication," say the business organisers. + +"Guild socialism," say the workers. + +There is also a considerable amount of talking and writing about +"profit-sharing" and about giving the workers a share in the +business direction. Neither of these ideas appeals to the +shrewder heads among the workers. So far as direction goes their +disposition is to ask the captain to command the ship. So far as +profits go, they think the captain has no more right than the +cabin boy to speculative gains; he should do his work for his pay +whether it is profitable or unprofitable work. There is little +balm for labour discontent in these schemes for making the worker +also an infinitesimal profiteer. + +During my journey in Italy and France I met several men who were +keenly interested in business organisation. Just before I +started my friend N, who has been the chief partner in the +building up of a very big and very extensively advertised +American business, came to see me on his way back to America. He +is as interested in his work as a scientific specialist, and as +ready to talk about it to any intelligent and interested hearer. +He was particularly keen upon the question of continuity in the +business, when it behoves the older generation to let in the +younger to responsible management and to efface themselves. He +was a man of five-and-forty. Incidentally he mentioned that he +had never taken anything for his private life out of the great +business he had built up but a salary, "a good salary," and that +now he was gong to grant himself a pension. "I shan't interfere +any more. I shall come right away and live in Europe for a year +so as not to be tempted to interfere. The boys have got to run +it some day, and they had better get their experience while +they're young and capable of learning by it. I did." + +I like N's ideas. "Practically," I said, "you've been a public +official. You've treated your business like a public service." + +That was his idea. + +"Would you mind if it was a public service?" + +He reflected, and some disagreeable memory darkened his face. +"Under the politicians?" he said. + +I took the train of thought N had set going abroad with me next +day. I had the good luck to meet men who were interesting +industrially. Captain Pirelli, my guide in Italy, has a name +familiar to every motorist; his name goes wherever cars go, spelt +with a big long capital P. Lieutenant de Tessin's name will +recall one of the most interesting experiments in profit-sharing +to the student of social science. I tried over N's problem on +both of them. I found in both their minds just the same attitude +as he takes up towards his business. They think any businesses +that are worthy of respect, the sorts of businesses that interest +them, are public functions. Money-lenders and speculators, +merchants and gambling gentlefolk may think in terms of profit; +capable business directors certainly do nothing of the sort. + +I met a British officer in France who is also a landowner. I got +him to talk about his administrative work upon his property. He +was very keen upon new methods. He said he tried to do his duty +by his land. + +"How much land?" I asked. + +"Just over nine thousand acres," he said. + +"But you could manage forty or fifty thousand with little more +trouble." + +"If I had it. In some ways it would be easier." + +"What a waste!" I said. "Of course you ought not to /own/ +these acres; what you ought to be is the agricultural controller +of just as big an estate of the public lands as you could manage-- +with a suitable salary." + +He reflected upon that idea. He said he did not get much of a +salary out of his land as it was, and made a regrettable allusion +to Mr. Lloyd George. "When a man tries to do his duty by his +land," he said... + +But here running through the thoughts of the Englishman and the +Italian and the Frenchman and the American alike one finds just +the same idea of a kind of officialdom in ownership. It is an +idea that pervades our thought and public discussion to-day +everywhere, and it is an idea that is scarcely traceable at all +in the thought of the early half of the nineteenth century. The +idea of service and responsibility in property has increased and +is increasing, the conception of "hold-up," the usurer's +conception of his right to be bought out of the way, fades. And +the process has been enormously enhanced by the various big-scale +experiments in temporary socialism that have been forced upon the +belligerent powers. Men of the most individualistic quality are +being educated up to the possibilities of concerted collective +action. My friend and fellow-student Y, inventor and business +organiser, who used to make the best steam omnibuses in the +world, and who is now making all sorts of things for the army, +would go pink with suspicious anger at the mere words "inspector" +or "socialism" three or four years ago. He does not do so now. + +A great proportion of this sort of man, this energetic directive +sort of man in England, is thinking socialism to-day. They may +not be saying socialism, but they are thinking it. When labour +begins to realise what is adrift it will be divided between two +things: between appreciative co-operation, for which guild +socialism in particular has prepared its mind, and traditional +suspicion. I will not over to guess here which will prevail. + + +3 + +The impression I have of the present mental process in the +European communities is that while the official class and the +/rentier/ class is thinking very poorly and inadequately and +with a merely obstructive disposition; while the churches are +merely wasting their energies in futile self-advertisement; while +the labour mass is suspicious and disposed to make terms for +itself rather than come into any large schemes of reconstruction +that will abolish profit as a primary aim in economic life, there +is still a very considerable movement towards such a +reconstruction. Nothing is so misleading as a careless analogy. +In the dead years that followed the Napoleonic wars, which are +often quoted as a precedent for expectation now, the spirit of +collective service was near its minimum; it was never so strong +and never so manifestly spreading and increasing as it is to-day. + +But service to what? + +I have my own very strong preconceptions here, and since my +temperament is sanguine they necessarily colour my view. I +believe that this impulse to collective service can satisfy +itself only under the formula that mankind is one state of which +God is the undying king, and that the service of men's collective +needs is the true worship of God. But eagerly as I would grasp +at any evidence that this idea is being developed and taken up by +the general consciousness, I am quite unable to persuade myself +that anything of the sort is going on. I do perceive a search +for large forms into which the prevalent impulse to devotion can +be thrown. But the organised religious bodies, with their creeds +and badges and their instinct for self-preservation at any cost, +stand between men and their spiritual growth in just the same way +the forestallers stand between men and food. Their activities at +present are an almost intolerable nuisance. One cannot say "God" +but some tout is instantly seeking to pluck one into his +particular cave of flummery and orthodoxy. What a rational man +means by God is just God. The more you define and argue about +God the more he remains the same simple thing. Judaism, +Christianity, Islam, modern Hindu religious thought, all agree in +declaring that there is one God, master and leader of all +mankind, in unending conflict with cruelty, disorder, folly and +waste. To my mind, it follows immediately that there can be no +king, no government of any sort, which is not either a +subordinate or a rebel government, a local usurpation, in the +kingdom of God. But no organised religious body has ever had the +courage and honesty to insist upon this. They all pander to +nationalism and to powers and princes. They exists so to pander. +Every organised religion in the world exists only to exploit and +divert and waste the religious impulse in man. + +This conviction that the world kingdom of God is the only true +method of human service, is so clear and final in my own mind, it +seems so inevitably the conviction to which all right-thinking +men must ultimately come, that I feel almost like a looker-on at +a game of blind-man's bluff as I watch the discussion of +synthetic political ideas. The blind man thrusts his seeking +hands into the oddest corners, he clutches at chairs and +curtains, but at last he must surely find and hold and feel over +and guess the name of the plainly visible quarry. + +Some of the French and Italian people I talked to said they were +fighting for "Civilisation." That is one name for the kingdom of +God, and I have heard English people use it too. But much of the +contemporary thought of England stills wanders with its back to +the light. Most of it is pawing over jerry-built, secondary +things. I have before me a little book, the joint work of Dr. +Grey and Mr. Turner, of an ex-public schoolmaster and a +manufacturer, called /Eclipse or Empire?/ (The title +/World Might or Downfall?/ had already been secured in +another quarter.) It is a book that has been enormously +advertised; it has been almost impossible to escape its column- +long advertisements; it is billed upon the hoardings, and it is +on the whole a very able and right-spirited book. It calls for +more and better education, for more scientific methods, for less +class suspicion and more social explicitness and understanding, +for a franker and fairer treatment of labour. But why does it +call for these things? Does it call for them because they are +right? Because in accomplishing them one serves God? + +Not at all. But because otherwise this strange sprawling empire +of ours will drop back into a secondary place in the world. +These two writers really seem to think that the slack workman, +the slacker wealthy man, the negligent official, the conservative +schoolmaster, the greedy usurer, the comfortable obstructive, +confronted with this alternative, terrified at this idea of +something or other called the Empire being "eclipsed," eager for +the continuance of this undefined glory over their fellow- +creatures called "Empire," will perceive the error of their ways +and become energetic, devoted, capable. They think an ideal of +that sort is going to change the daily lives of men.... I +sympathise with their purpose, and I deplore their conception of +motives. If men will not give themselves for righteousness, they +will not give themselves for a geographical score. If they will +not work well for the hatred of bad work, they will not work well +for the hatred of Germans. This "Empire" idea has been cadging +about the British empire, trying to collect enthusiasm and +devotion, since the days of Disraeli. It is, I submit, too big +for the mean-spirited, and too tawdry and limited for the fine +and generous. It leaves out the French and the Italians and the +Belgians and all our blood brotherhood of allies. It has no +compelling force in it. We British are not naturally +Imperialist; we are something greater--or something less. For +two years and a half now we have been fighting against +Imperialism in its most extravagant form. It is a poor incentive +to right living to propose to parody the devil we fight against. + +The blind man must lunge again. + +For when the right answer is seized it answers not only the +question why men should work for their fellow-men but also why +nation should cease to arm and plan and contrive against nation. +The social problem is only the international problem in retail, +the international problem is only the social one in gross. + +My bias rules me altogether here. I see men in social, in +economic and in international affairs alike, eager to put an end +to conflict, inexpressibly weary of conflict and the waste and +pain and death it involves. But to end conflict one must abandon +aggressive or uncordial pretensions. Labour is sick at the idea +of more strikes and struggles after the war, industrialism is +sick of competition and anxious for service, everybody is sick of +war. But how can they end any of these clashes except by the +definition and recognition of a common end which will establish a +standard for the trial of every conceivable issue, to which, that +is, every other issue can be subordinated; and what common end +can there be in all the world except this idea of the world +kingdom of God? What is the good of orienting one's devotion to +a firm, or to class solidarity, or /La Republique +Francais/, or Poland, or Albania, or such love and +loyalty as people profess for King George or King Albert or the +Duc d'Orleans--it puzzles me why--or any such intermediate object +of self-abandonment? We need a standard so universal that the +platelayer may say to the barrister or the duchess, or the Red +Indian to the Limehouse sailor, or the Anzac soldier to the Sinn +Feiner or the Chinaman, "What are we two doing for it?" And to +fill the place of that "it," no other idea is great enough or +commanding enough, but only the world kingdom of God. + +However long he may have to hunt, the blind man who is seeking +service and an end to bickerings will come to that at last, +because of all the thousand other things he may clutch at, +nothing else can satisfy his manifest need. + + +VI. THE ENDING OF THE WAR + + +1 + +About the end of the war there are two chief ways of thinking, +there is a simpler sort of mind which desires merely a date, and +a more complex kind which wants particulars. To the former class +belong most of the men out at the front. They are so bored by +this war that they would welcome any peace that did not +definitely admit defeat--and examine the particulars later. The +"tone" of the German army, to judge by its captured letters, is +even lower. It would welcome peace in any form. Never in the +whole history of the world has a war been so universally +unpopular as this war. + +The mind of the soldier is obsessed by a vision of home-coming +for good, so vivid and alluring that it blots out nearly every +other consideration. The visions of people at home are of plenty +instead of privation, lights up, and the cessation of a hundred +tiresome restrictions. And it is natural therefore that a writer +rather given to guesses and forecasts should be asked very +frequently to guess how long the war has still to run. + +All such forecasting is the very wildest of shooting. There are +the chances of war to put one out, and of a war that changes far +faster than the military intelligence. I have made various +forecasts. At the outset I thought that military Germany would +fight at about the 1899 level, would be lavish with cavalry and +great attacks, that it would be reluctant to entrench, and that +the French and British had learnt the lesson of the Boer war +better than the Germans. I trusted to the melodramatic instinct +of the Kaiser. I trusted to the quickened intelligence of the +British military caste. The first rush seemed to bear me out, +and I opened my paper day by day expecting to read of the British +and French entrenched and the Germans beating themselves to death +against wire and trenches. In those days I wrote of the French +being over the Rhine before 1915. But it was the Germans who +entrenched first. + +Since then I have made some other attempts. I did not prophesy +at all in 1915, so far as I can remember. If I had I should +certainly have backed the Gallipoli attempt to win. It was the +right thing to do, and it was done abominably. It should have +given us Constantinople and brought Bulgaria to our side; it gave +us a tragic history of administrative indolence and negligence, +and wasted bravery and devotion. I was very hopeful of the +western offensive in 1915; and in 1916 I counted still on our +continuing push. I believe we were very near something like +decision this last September, but some archaic dream of doing it +with cavalry dashed these hopes. The "Tanks" arrived to late to +do their proper work, and their method of use is being worked out +very slowly.... I still believe in the western push, if only we +push it for all we are worth. If only we push it with our +brains, with our available and still unorganised brains; if only +we realise that the art of modern war is to invent and invent and +invent. Hitherto I have always hoped and looked for decision, a +complete victory that would enable the Allies to dictate peace. +But such an expectation is largely conditioned by these delicate +questions of adaptability that my tour of the front has made very +urgent in my mind. A spiteful German American writer has said +that the British would rather kill twenty thousand of their men +than break one general. Even a grain of truth in such a remark +is a very valid reasoning for lengthening one's estimate of the +duration of the war. + +There can be no doubt that the Western allies are playing a +winning game upon the western front, and that this is the front +of decision now. It is not in doubt that they are beating the +Germans and shoving them back. The uncertain factor is the rate +at which they are shoving them back. If they can presently get +to so rapid an advance as to bring the average rate since July +1st up to two or three miles a day, then we shall still see the +Allies dictating terms. But if the shove drags on at its present +pace of less than a mile and four thousand prisoners a week over +the limited Somme front only, if nothing is attempted elsewhere +to increase the area of pressure, [*This was written originally +before the French offensive at Verdun.] then the intolerable +stress and boredom of the war will bring about a peace long +before the Germans are decisively crushed. But the war, +universally detested, may go on into 1918 or 1919. Food riots, +famine, and general disorganisation will come before 1920, if it +does. The Allies have a winning game before them, but they seem +unable to discover and promote the military genius needed to +harvest an unquestionable victory. In the long run this may not +be an unmixed evil. Victory, complete and dramatic, may be +bought too dearly. We need not triumphs out of this war but the +peace of the world. + +This war is altogether unlike any previous war, and its ending, +like its development, will follow a course of its own. For a +time people's minds ran into the old grooves, the Germans were +going /nach Paris/ and /nach London/; Lord Curzon +filled our minds with a pleasant image of the Bombay Lancers +riding down /Unter den Linden./ But the Versailles +precedent of a council of victors dictating terms to the +vanquished is not now so evidently in men's minds. The utmost +the Allies talk upon now is to say, "We must end the war on +German soil." The Germans talk frankly of "holding out." I have +guessed that the western offensive will be chiefly on German soil +by next June; it is a mere guess, and I admit it is quite +conceivable that the "push" may still be grinding out its daily +tale of wounded and prisoners in 1918 far from that goal. + +None of the combatants expected such a war as this, and the +consequence is that the world at large has no idea how to get out +of it. The war may stay with us like a schoolboy caller, because +it does not know how to go. The Italians said as much to me. +"Suppose we get to Innsbruck and Laibach and Trieste," they said, +"it isn't an end!" Lord Northcliffe, I am told, came away from +Italy with the conviction that the war would last six years. + +There is the clearest evidence that nearly everyone is anxious to +get out of the war now. Nobody at all, except perhaps a few +people who may be called to account, and a handful of greedy +profit-seekers, wants to keep it going. Quietly perhaps and +unobtrusively, everyone I know is now trying to find the way out +of the war, and I am convinced that the same is the case in +Germany. That is what makes the Peace-at-any-price campaign so +exasperating. It is like being chased by clamorous geese across +a common in the direction in which you want to go. But how are +we to get out--with any credit--in such a way as to prevent a +subsequent collapse into another war as frightful? + +At present three programmes are before the world of the way in +which the war can be ended. The first of these assumes a +complete predominance of our Allies. It has been stated in +general terms by Mr. Asquith. Evacuation, reparation, due +punishment of those responsible for the war, and guarantees that +nothing of the sort shall happen again. There is as yet no +mention of the nature of these guarantees. Just exactly what is +to happen to Poland, Austria, and the Turkish Empire does not +appear in this prospectus. The German Chancellor is equally +elusive. The Kaiser has stampeded the peace-at-any-price people +of Great Britain by proclaiming that Germany wants peace. We +knew that. But what sort of peace? It would seem that we are +promised vaguely evacuation and reparation on the western +frontier, and in addition there are to be guarantees--but it is +quite evident that they are altogether different guarantees from +Mr. Asquith's--that nothing of the sort is ever to happen again. +The programme of the British and their Allies seems to +contemplate something like a forcible disarmament and military +occupation of Belgium, the desertion of Serbia and Russia, and +the surrender to Germany of every facility for a later and more +successful German offensive in the west. But it is clear that on +these terms as stated the war must go on to the definite defeat +of one side or the other, or a European chaos. They are +irreconcilable sets of terms. + +Yet it is hard to say how they can be modified on either side, if +the war is to be decided only between the belligerents and by +standards of national interest only, without reference to any +other considerations. Our Allies would be insane to leave the +Hohenzollern at the end of the war with a knife in his hand, +after the display he has made of his quality. To surrender his +knife means for the Hohenzollern the abandonment of his dreams, +the repudiation of the entire education and training of Germany +for half a century. When we realise the fatality of this +antagonism, we realise how it is that, in this present +anticipation of hell, the weary, wasted and tormented nations +must still sustain their monstrous dreary struggle. And that is +why this thought that possible there may be a side way out, a +sort of turning over of the present endlessly hopeless game into +a new and different and manageable game through the introduction +of some external factor, creeps and spreads as I find it creeping +and spreading. + +That is what the finer intelligences of America are beginning to +realise, and why men in Europe continually turn their eyes to +America, with a surmise, with a doubt. + +A point of departure for very much thinking in this matter is the +recent speech of President Wilson that heralded the present +discussion. All Europe was impressed by the truth, and by +President Wilson's recognition of the truth, that from any other +great war after this America will be unable to abstain. Can +America come into this dispute at the end to insist upon +something better than a new diplomatic patchwork, and so obviate +the later completer Armageddon? Is there, above the claims and +passions of Germany, France, Britain, and the rest of them, a +conceivable right thing to do for all mankind, that it might also +be in the interest of America to support? Is there a Third Party +solution, so to speak, which may possibly be the way out from +this war? + +And further I would go on to ask, is not this present exchange of +Notes, appealing to the common sense of the world, really the +beginning, and the proper beginning, of the unprecedented Peace +Negotiations to end this unprecedented war? And, I submit, the +longer this open discussion goes on before the doors close upon +the secret peace congress the better for mankind. + + +2 + +Let me sketch out here what I conceive to be the essentials of a +world settlement. Some of the items are the mere commonplaces of +everyone who discusses this question; some are less frequently +insisted upon. I have been joining up one thing to another, +suggestions I have heard from this man and that, and I believe +that it is really possible to state a solution that will be +acceptable to the bulk of reasonable men all about the world. +Directly we put the panic-massacres of Dinant and Louvain, the +crime of the /Lusitania/ and so on into the category of +symptoms rather than essentials, outrages that call for special +punishments and reparations, but that do not enter further into +the ultimate settlement, we can begin to conceive a possible +world treaty. Let me state the broad outlines of this +pacification. The outlines depend one upon the other; each is a +condition of the other. It is upon these lines that the +thoughtful, as distinguished from the merely the combative +people, seem to be drifting everywhere. + +In the first place, it is agreed that there would have to be an +identical treaty between all the great powers of the world +binding them to certain things. It would have to provide:--- + + +That the few great industrial states capable of producing modern +war equipment should take over and control completely the +manufacture of all munitions of war in the world. And that they +should absolutely close the supply of such material to all the +other states in the world. This is a far easier task than many +people suppose. War has now been so developed on its mechanical +side that the question of its continuance or abolition rests now +entirely upon four or five great powers. + +Next comes the League of Peace idea; that there should be an +International Tribunal for the discussion and settlement of +international disputes. That the dominating powers should +maintain land and sea forces only up to a limit agreed upon and +for internal police use only or for the purpose of enforcing the +decisions of the Tribunal. That they should all be bound to +attack and suppress any power amongst them which increases its +war equipment beyond its defined limits. + +That much has already been broached in several quarters. But so +far is not enough. It ignores the chief processes of that +economic war that aids and abets and is inseparably a part of +modern international conflicts. If we are to go as far as we +have already stated in the matter of international controls, then +we must go further and provide that the International Tribunal +should have power to consider and set aside all tariffs and +localised privileges that seem grossly unfair or seriously +irritating between the various states of the world. It should +have power to pass or revise all new tariff, quarantine, alien +exclusion, or the like legislation affecting international +relations. Moreover, it should take over and extend the work of +the International Bureau of Agriculture at Rome with a view to +the control of all staple products. It should administer the sea +law of the world, and control and standardise freights in the +common interests of mankind. Without these provisions it would +be merely preventing the use of certain weapons; it would be +doing nothing to prevent countries strangling or suffocating each +other by commercial warfare. It would not abolish war. + +Now upon this issue people do not seem to me to be yet thinking +very clearly. It is the exception to find anyone among the peace +talkers who really grasps how inseparably the necessity for free +access for everyone to natural products, to coal and tropical +products, e.g. free shipping at non-discriminating tariffs, and +the recognition by a Tribunal of the principle of common welfare +in trade matters, is bound up with the ideal of a permanent world +peace. But any peace that does not provide for these things will +be merely laying down of the sword in order to take up the +cudgel. And a "peace" that did not rehabilitate industrial +Belgium, Poland, and the north of France would call imperatively +for the imposition upon the Allies of a system of tariffs in the +interests of these countries, and for a bitter economic "war +after the war" against Germany. That restoration is, of course, +an implicit condition to any attempt to set up an economic peace +in the world. + +These things being arranged for the future, it would be further +necessary to set up an International Boundary Commission, subject +to certain defining conditions agreed upon by the belligerents, +to re-draw the map of Europe, Asia, and Africa. This war does +afford an occasion such as the world may never have again of +tracing out the "natural map" of mankind, the map that will +secure the maximum of homogeneity and the minimum of racial and +economic freedom. All idealistic people hope for a restored +Poland. But it is a childish thing to dream of a contented +Poland with Posen still under the Prussian heel, with Cracow cut +off, and without a Baltic port. These claims of Poland to +completeness have a higher sanction than the mere give and take +of belligerents in congress. + +Moreover this International Tribunal, if it was indeed to prevent +war, would need also to have power to intervene in the affairs of +any country or region in a state of open and manifest disorder, +for the protection of foreign travellers and of persons and +interests localised in that country but foreign to it. + +Such an agreement as I have here sketched out would at once lift +international politics out of the bloody and hopeless squalor of +the present conflict. It is, I venture to assert, the peace of +the reasonable man in any country whatever. But it needs the +attention of such a disengaged people as the American people to +work it out and supply it with--weight. It needs putting before +the world with some sort of authority greater than its mere +entire reasonableness. Otherwise it will not come before the +minds of ordinary men with the effect of a practicable +proposition. I do not see any such plant springing from the +European battlefields. It is America's supreme opportunity. And +yet it is the common sense of the situation, and the solution +that must satisfy a rational German as completely as a rational +Frenchman or Englishman. It has nothing against it but the +prejudice against new and entirely novel things. + + +3 + +In throwing out the suggestion that America should ultimately +undertake the responsibility of proposing a world peace +settlement, I admit that I run counter to a great deal of +European feeling. Nowhere in Europe now do people seem to be in +love with the United States. But feeling is a colour that +passes. And the question is above matters of feeling. Whether +the belligerents dislike Americans or the Americans dislike the +belligerents is an incidental matter. The main question is of +the duty of a great and fortunate nation towards the rest of the +world and the future of mankind. + +I do not know how far Americans are aware of the trend of feeling +in Europe at the present time. Both France and Great Britain +have a sense of righteousness in this war such as no nation, no +people, has ever felt in war before. We know we are fighting to +save all the world from the rule of force and the unquestioned +supremacy of the military idea. Few Frenchmen or Englishmen can +imagine the war presenting itself to an American intelligence +under any other guise. At the invasion of Belgium we were +astonished that America did nothing. At the sinking of the +/Lusitania/ all Europe looked to America. The British mind +contemplates the spectacle of American destroyers acting as +bottleholders to German submarines with a dazzled astonishment. +"Manila," we gasp. In England we find excuses for America in our +own past. In '64 we betrayed Denmark; in '70 we deserted France. +The French have not these memories. They do not understand the +damning temptations of those who feel they are "/au-dessus de +la melee./" They believe they had some share in +the independence of America, that there is a sacred cause in +republicanism, that there are grounds for a peculiar sympathy +between France and the United States in republican institutions. +They do not realise that Germany and America have a common +experience in recent industrial development, and a common belief +in the "degeneracy" of all nations with a lower rate of trade +expansion. They do not realise how a political campaign with the +slogan of "Peace and a Full Dinner-Pail" looks in the middle +west, what an honest, simple, rational appeal it makes there. +Atmospheres alter values. In Europe, strung up to tragic and +majestic issues, to Europe gripping a gigantic evil in a death +struggle, that would seem an inscription worthy of a pigsty. A +child in Europe would know now that the context is, "until the +bacon-buyer calls," and it is difficult to realise that adult +citizens in America may be incapable of realising that obvious +context. + +I set these things down plainly. There is a very strong +disposition in all the European countries to believe America +fundamentally indifferent to the rights and wrongs of the +European struggle; sentimentally interested perhaps, but +fundamentally indifferent. President Wilson is regarded as a +mere academic sentimentalist by a great number of Europeans. +There is a very widespread disposition to treat America lightly +and contemptuously, to believe that America, as one man put it to +me recently, "hasn't the heart to do anything great or the guts +to do anything wicked." There is a strong undercurrent of +hostility therefore to the idea of America having any voice +whatever in the final settlement after the war. It is not for a +British writer to analyse the appearance that have thus affected +American world prestige. I am telling what I have observed. + +Let me relate two trivial anecdotes. + +X came to my hotel in Paris one day to take me to see a certain +munitions organisation. He took from his pocket a picture +postcard that had been sent him by a well-meaning American +acquaintance from America. It bore a portrait of General +Lafayette, and under it was printed the words, "General +Lafayette, /Colonel in the United States army./" + +"Oh! These Americans!" said X with a gesture. + +And as I returned to Paris from the French front, our train +stopped at some intermediate station alongside of another train +of wounded men. Exactly opposite our compartment was a car. It +arrested our conversation. It was, as it were, an ambulance +/de grand luxe/; it was a thing of very light, bright wood +and very golden decorations; at one end of it was painted very +large and fair the Stars and Stripes, and at the other fair-sized +letters of gold proclaimed--I am sure the lady will not resent +this added gleam of publicity--"Presented by Mrs. William +Vanderbilt." + +My companions were French writers and French military men, and +they were discussing with very keen interest that persistent +question, "the ideal battery." But that ambulance sent a shaft +of light into our carriage, and we stared together. + +Then Colonel Z pointed with two fingers and remarked to us, +without any excess of admiration: + +"/America!/" + +Then he shrugged his shoulders and pulled down the corners of his +mouth. + +We felt there was nothing more to add to that, and after a little +pause the previous question was resumed. + +I state these things in order to make it clear that America will +start at a disadvantage when she starts upon the mission of +salvage and reconciliation which is, I believe, her proper +role in this world conflict. One would have to be blind +and deaf on this side to be ignorant of European persuasion of +America's triviality. I would not like to be an American +travelling in Europe now, and those I meet here and there have +some of the air of men who at any moment may be dunned for a +debt. They explode without provocation into excuses and +expostulations. + +And I will further confess that when Viscount Grey answered the +intimations of President Wilson and ex-President Taft of an +American initiative to found a World League for Peace, by asking +if America was prepared to back that idea with force, he spoke +the doubts of all thoughtful European men. No one but an +American deeply versed in the idiosyncrasies of the American +population can answer that question, or tell us how far the +delusion of world isolation which has prevailed in America for +several generations has been dispelled. But if the answer to +Lord Grey is "Yes," then I think history will emerge with a +complete justification of the obstinate maintenance of neutrality +by America. It is the end that reveals a motive. It is our +ultimate act that sometimes teaches us our original intention. +No one can judge the United States yet. Were you neutral because +you are too mean and cowardly, or too stupidly selfish, or +because you had in view an end too great to be sacrificed to a +moment of indignant pride and a force in reserve too precious to +dispel? That is the still open question for America. + +Every country is a mixture of many strands. There is a Base +America, there is a Dull America, there is an Ideal and Heroic +America. And I am convinced that at present Europe underrates +and misjudges the possibilities of the latter. + +All about the world to-day goes a certain freemasonry of thought. +It is an impalpable and hardly conscious union of intention. It +thinks not in terms of national but human experience; it falls +into directions and channels of thinking that lead inevitably to +the idea of a world-state under the rule of one righteousness. +In no part of the world is this modern type of mind so abundantly +developed, less impeded by antiquated and perverse political and +religious forms, and nearer the sources of political and +administrative power, than in America. It does not seem to +matter what thousand other things America may happen to be, +seeing that it is also that. And so, just as I cling to the +belief, in spite of hundreds of adverse phenomena, that the +religious and social stir of these times must ultimately go far +to unify mankind under the kingship of God, so do I cling also to +the persuasion that there are intellectual forces among the +rational elements in the belligerent centres, among the other +neutrals and in America, that will co-operate in enabling the +United States to play that role of the Unimpassioned Third +Party, which becomes more and more necessary to a generally +satisfactory ending of the war. + + +4 + +The idea that the settlement of this war must be what one might +call an unimpassioned settlement or, if you will, a scientific +settlement or a judicial and not a treaty settlement, a +settlement, that is, based upon some conception of what is right +and necessary rather than upon the relative success or failure of +either set of belligerents to make its Will the standard of +decision, is one that, in a great variety of forms and partial +developments, I find gaining ground in the most different +circles. The war was an adventure, it was the German adventure +under the Hohenzollern tradition, to dominate the world. It was +to be the last of the Conquests. It has failed. Without calling +upon the reserve strength of America the civilised world has +defeated it, and the war continues now partly upon the issue +whether it shall be made for ever impossible, and partly because +Germany has no organ but its Hohenzollern organisation through +which it can admit its failure and develop its latent readiness +for a new understanding on lines of mutual toleration. For that +purpose nothing more reluctant could be devised than Hohenzollern +imperialism. But the attention of every new combatant--it is not +only Germany now--has been concentrated upon military +necessities; every nation is a clenched nation, with its powers +of action centred in its own administration, bound by many +strategic threats and declarations, and dominated by the idea of +getting and securing advantages. It is inevitable that a +settlement made in a conference of belligerents alone will be +shortsighted, harsh, limited by merely incidental necessities, +and obsessed by the idea of hostilities and rivalries continuing +perennially; it will be a trading of advantages for subsequent +attacks. It will be a settlement altogether different in effect +as well as in spirit from a world settlement made primarily to +establish a new phase in the history of mankind. + +Let me take three instances of the impossibility of complete +victory /on either side/ giving a solution satisfactory to +the conscience and intelligence of reasonable men. + +The first--on which I will not expatiate, for everyone knows of +its peculiar difficulty--is Poland. + +The second is a little one, but one that has taken hold of my +imagination. In the settlement of boundaries preceding this war +the boundary between Serbia and north-eastern Albania was drawn +with an extraordinary disregard of the elementary needs of the +Albanians of that region. It ran along the foot of the mountains +which form their summer pastures and their refuge from attack, +and it cut their mountains off from their winter pastures and +market towns. Their whole economic life was cut to pieces and +existence rendered intolerable for them. Now an intelligent +Third Party settling Europe would certainly restore these market +towns, Ipek, Jakova, and Prisrend, to Albania. But the Albanians +have no standing in this war; theirs is the happy lot that might +have fallen to Belgium had she not resisted; the war goes to and +fro through Albania; and when the settlement comes, it is highly +improbable that the slightest notice will be taken of Albania's +plight in the region. In which case these particular Albanians +will either be driven into exile to America or they will be +goaded to revolt, which will be followed no doubt by the punitive +procedure usual in the Balkan peninsula. + +For my third instance I would step from a matter as small as +three market towns and the grazing of a few thousand head of +sheep to a matter as big as the world. What is going to happen +to the shipping of the world after this war? The Germans, with +that combination of cunning and stupidity which baffles the rest +of mankind, have set themselves to destroy the mercantile marine +not merely of Britain and France but of Norway and Sweden, +Holland, and all the neutral countries. The German papers openly +boast that they are building up a big mercantile marine that will +start out to take up the world's overseas trade directly peace is +declared. Every such boast receives careful attention in the +British press. We have heard a very great deal about the German +will-to-power in this war, but there is something very much older +and tougher and less blatant and conspicuous, the British will. +In the British papers there has appeared and gained a permanent +footing this phrase, "ton for ton." This means that Britain will +go on fighting until she has exacted and taken over from Germany +the exact equivalent of all the British shipping Germany has +submarined. People do not realise that a time may come when +Germany will be glad and eager to give Russia, France and Italy +all that they require of her, when Great Britain may be quite +content to let her allies make an advantageous peace and herself +still go on fighting Germany. She does not intend to let that +furtively created German mercantile marine ship or coal or exist +upon the high seas--so long as it can be used as an economic +weapon against her. Neither Britain nor France nor Italy can +tolerate anything of the sort. + +It has been the peculiar boast of Great Britain that her shipping +has been unpatriotic. She has been the impartial carrier of the +whole world. Her shippers may have served their own profit; they +have never served hers. The fluctuations of freight charges may +have been a universal nuisance, but they have certainly not been +an aggressive national conspiracy. It is Britain's case against +any German ascendancy at sea, an entirely convincing case, that +such an ascendancy would be used ruthlessly for the advancement +of German world power. The long-standing freedom of the seas +vanishes at the German touch. So beyond the present war there +opens the agreeable prospect of a mercantile struggle, a bitter +freight war and a war of Navigation Acts for the ultimate control +in the interests of Germany or of the Anti-German allies, of the +world's trade. + +Now how in any of these three cases can the bargaining and +trickery of diplomatists and the advantage-hunting of the +belligerents produce any stable and generally beneficial +solution? What all the neutrals want, what every rational and +far-sighted man in the belligerent countries wants, what the +common sense of the whole world demands, is neither the +"ascendancy" of Germany nor the "ascendancy" of Great Britain nor +the "ascendancy" of any state or people or interest in the +shipping of the world. The plain right thing is a world shipping +control, as impartial as the Postal Union. What right and reason +and the welfare of coming generations demand in Poland is a +unified and autonomous Poland, with Cracow, Danzig, and Posen +brought into the same Polish-speaking ring-fence with Warsaw. +What everyone who has looked into the Albanian question desires +is that the Albanians shall pasture their flocks and market their +sheepskins in peace, free of Serbian control. In every country +at present at war, the desire of the majority of people is for a +non-contentious solution that will neither crystallise a triumph +nor propitiate an enemy, but which will embody the economic and +ethnological and geographical common sense of the matter. But +while the formulae of national belligerence are easy, +familiar, blatant, and instantly present, the gentler, greater +formulae of that wider and newer world pacifism has still to +be generally understood. It is so much easier to hate and +suspect than negotiate generously and patiently; it is so much +harder to think than to let go in a shrill storm of hostility. +The rational pacifist is hampered not only by belligerency, but +by a sort of malignant extreme pacifism as impatient and silly as +the extremest patriotism. + + +5 + +I sketch out these ideas of a world pacification from a third- +party standpoint, because I find them crystallising out in men's +minds. I note how men discuss the suggestion that America may +play a large part in such a permanent world pacification. There +I end my account rendered. These things are as much a part of my +impression of the war as a shell-burst on the Carso or the yellow +trenches at Martinpuich. But I do not know how opinion is going +in America, and I am quite unable to estimate the power of these +new ideas I set down, relative to the blind forces of instinct +and tradition that move the mass of mankind. On the whole I +believe more in the reason-guided will-power of men than I did in +the early half of 1914. If I am doubtful whether after all this +war will "end war," I think on the other hand it has had such an +effect of demonstration that it may start a process of thought +and conviction, it may sow the world with organisations and +educational movements considerable enough to grapple with an +either arrest or prevent the next great war catastrophe. I am by +no means sure even now that this is not the last great war in the +experience of men. I still believe it may be. + +The most dangerous thing in the business so far is concerned is +the wide disregard of the fact that national economic fighting is +bound to cause war, and the almost universal ignorance of the +necessity of subjecting shipping and overseas and international +trade to some kind of international control. These two things, +restraint of trade and advantage of shipping, are the chief +material causes of anger between modern states. But they would +not be in themselves dangerous things if it were not for the +exaggerated delusions of kind and difference, and the crack- +brained "loyalties" arising out of these, that seem still to rule +men's minds. Years ago I came to the conviction that much of the +evil in human life was due to the inherent vicious disposition of +the human mind to intensify classification.[*See my "First and +Last Things," Book I. and my "Modern Utopia," Chapter X.] I do +not know how it will strike the reader, but to me this war, this +slaughter of eight or nine million people, is due almost entirely +to this little, almost universal lack of clear-headedness; I +believe that the share of wickedness in making war is quite +secondary to the share of this universal shallow silliness of +outlook. These effigies of emperors and kings and statesmen that +lead men into war, these legends of nationality and glory, would +collapse before our universal derision, if they were not stuffed +tight and full with the unthinking folly of the common man. + +There is in all of us an indolent capacity for suffering evil and +dangerous things, that I contemplate each year of my life with a +deepening incredulity. I perceive we suffer them; I record the +futile protests of the intelligence. It seems to me incredible +that men should not rise up out of this muddy, bloody, wasteful +mess of a world war, with a resolution to end for ever the shams, +the prejudices, the pretences and habits that have impoverished +their lives, slaughtered our sons, and wasted the world, a +resolution so powerful and sustained that nothing could withstand +it. + +But it is not apparent that any such will arises. Does it appear +at all? I find it hard to answer that question because my own +answer varies with my mood. There are moods when it seems to me +that nothing of the sort is happening. This war has written its +warning in letters of blood and flame and anguish in the skies of +mankind for two years and a half. When I look for the collective +response to that warning, I see a multitude of little chaps +crawling about their private ends like mites in an old cheese. +The kings are still in their places, not a royal prince has been +killed in this otherwise universal slaughter; when the fatuous +portraits of the monarchs flash upon the screen the widows and +orphans still break into loyal song. The ten thousand religions +of mankind are still ten thousand religions, all busy at keeping +men apart and hostile. I see scarcely a measurable step made +anywhere towards that world kingdom of God, which is, I assert, +the manifest solution, the only formula that can bring peace to +all mankind. Mankind as a whole seems to have learnt nothing and +forgotten nothing in thirty months of war. + +And then on the other hand I am aware of much quiet talking. +This book tells of how I set out to see the war, and it is +largely conversation.... Perhaps men have always expected +miracles to happen; if one had always lived in the night and only +heard tell of the day, I suppose one would have expected dawn to +come as a vivid flash of light. I suppose one would still think +it was night long after the things about one had crept out of the +darkness into visibility. In comparison with all previous wars +there has been much more thinking and much more discussion. If +most of the talk seems to be futile, if it seems as if everyone +were talking and nobody doing, it does not follow that things are +not quietly slipping and sliding out of their old adjustments +amidst the babble and because of the babble. Multitudes of men +must be struggling with new ideas. It is reasonable to argue +that there must be reconsideration, there must be time, before +these millions of mental efforts can develop into a new +collective purpose and really /show/--in consequences. + +But that they will do so is my hope always and, on the whole, +except in moods of depression and impatience, my belief. When +one has travelled to a conviction so great as mine it is +difficult to doubt that other men faced by the same universal +facts will not come to the same conclusion. I believe that only +through a complete simplification o religion to its fundamental +idea, to a world-wide realisation of God as the king of the heart +and of all mankind, setting aside monarchy and national egotism +altogether, can mankind come to any certain happiness and +security. The precedent of Islam helps my faith in the creative +inspiration of such a renascence of religion. The Sikh, the +Moslem, the Puritan have shown that men can fight better for a +Divine Idea than for any flag or monarch in the world. It seems +to me that illusions fade and effigies lose credit everywhere. +It is a very wonderful thing to me that China is now a +republic.... I take myself to be very nearly an average man, +abnormal only by reason of a certain mental rapidity. I conceive +myself to be thinking as the world thinks, and if I find no great +facts, I find a hundred little indications to reassure me that +God comes. Even those who have neither the imagination nor the +faith to apprehend God as a reality will, I think, realise +presently that the Kingdom of God over a world-wide system of +republican states, is the only possible formula under which we +may hope to unify and save mankind. + + + + + +End of The Project Gutenberg Etext of War and the Future by H. G. 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