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<h1>ENGLAND AND<br />
GERMANY</h1>
<p class="center" style="padding-top: 4em; font-size: 70%">BY</p>
<p class="center" style="font-size: 130%">DR. E. J. DILLON</p>
<p class="center" style="padding-top: 2em; font-size: 70%; line-height: 250%">WITH AN INTRODUCTION<br />
BY</p>
<p class="center" style="font-size: 120%"><span class="smcap">The Hon. W. M. HUGHES, M.P.</span></p>
<p class="center" style="padding-bottom: 4em; font-size: 70%">PRIME MINISTER OF AUSTRALIA</p>
<table summary="publisher">
<tr><td style="text-align: center; line-height: 150%; padding-right: 6em; font-size: 90%">BRENTANO’S<br />
NEW YORK</td>
<td style="text-align: center; line-height: 150%; font-size: 90%">CHAPMAN & HALL LTD.<br />
LONDON</td></tr>
<tr><td colspan="2" style="text-align: center">1917</td></tr>
</table>
<div style="width: 35%; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto">
<p class="printer"><span class="smcap">Printed in Great Britain by
Richard Clay & Sons, Limited,</span>
BRUNSWICK ST., STAMFORD ST., S.E. 1,
AND BUNGAY SUFFOLK</p>
</div>
<p class="dedication">
TO<br />
<span style="font-size: 140%">H.S.H. ALICE</span><br />
PRINCESS OF MONACO<br />
THIS PARTIAL PRESENTMENT OF THE<br />
BEGINNINGS OF A WORLD<br />
CATACLYSM
</p>
<h2 style="padding-bottom: 1em"><a name="INTRODUCTION" id="INTRODUCTION"></a>INTRODUCTION<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_vii" id="Page_vii">[vii]</a></span></h2>
<p><span class="smcap">Behind</span> any human institution there stand
a few men—perhaps only one man—who direct
its movement, protect its interests, or serve
as its mouthpiece. This applies to nations.
If we wish to know for what a nation stands
and what are its ideals and by what means
it seeks to realise them, we shall do well to
know something of the men who lead its
people or express their feelings.</p>
<p>It is of vital importance that we should
understand the attitude of every one of the
nations—both friends and enemies—involved
in this war. For in this way only can we
know what is necessary to be done to achieve
victory.</p>
<p>And the remarkable man who has written
this book knows those who lead the warring
nations in this titanic conflict very much
better than ordinary men know their own
townsmen.</p>
<p>Dr. Dillon has moved through the chancelleries
of Europe. He has seen and heard what
has been denied to all but very few. In the
Balkans, that cauldron of racial passions which,
overflowing, gave our enemies an ostensible
cause for this war, he moved as though an invisible
and yet keenly observant figure. He<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_viii" id="Page_viii">[viii]</a></span>
could claim the friendship of Venizelos and
other Balkan statesmen. He has travelled as
a monk throughout the mountain fastnesses,
he has slept in the caves of Albania. He
understands the people of all the Balkans,
speaks their tongues as a native, and knows
and assesses at their true value their leaders.</p>
<p>At the time of the murder of the Archduke
Ferdinand and the Archduchess, Dr. Dillon
was in Austria, and he remained there through
those long negotiations in which Germany
tenaciously clung to her design of war.</p>
<p>How well he knows Germany let his book
speak. His knowledge of Russia is profound.
A master of many languages, he occupied a
chair at the Moscow University for many
years, and his insight into Russian politics is
deep.</p>
<p>In this book he speaks out of the depth of
his knowledge, and tells the people of Britain
what this war means to them, and what needs
to be done before we can hope for victory.
He speaks plainly because he feels strongly.</p>
<p>It may be that we cannot agree with him in
everything that he says. But no one, after
reading Dr. Dillon’s remarkable book, will any
longer regard the war as but a passing episode.
It is a timely antidote to that fatal delusion.</p>
<p>For this war is a veritable cataclysm, and
the future of the world hangs upon the result.
We must change our lives. Insidiously, while
we have called all foreigners brothers and
sought foes amongst ourselves, the great force
of barbarism, in a new guise and with enormous<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_ix" id="Page_ix">[ix]</a></span>
power of penetration and annexation, has
worked for our undoing. This force now
stands bared, in the hideous bestiality of
Germany’s doctrine of Might, and it can be
defeated only by an adaptation of its methods
that will leave nothing as it was before.</p>
<p>Dr. Dillon’s unfolding of the story of German
preparation is, it will be admitted, one of
fascinating interest. Of its value as a contribution
to political and diplomatic history it
is not for me to speak. But to its purpose in
keying all men to the pitch; all to a sense of
the great events in which we are taking part,
I bear my testimony. “Germany is wholly
alive, physically, intellectually, and psychically.
And she lives in the present and future”
(<a href="#Page_311">p. 311</a>). And the living force of Germany
requires us to rise to the very fulness of our
powers; for as the champions of truth and
right we must prove ourselves physically and
morally stronger than the champions of soulless
might.</p>
<p>Germany is wholly alive; but she is alive
for evil. We whose purpose is good, whose
cause is justice and whose triumph is indispensable
if honest industry and human right
are not to disappear from mankind, are as yet
not fully alive to the immensity and necessity
of our task. We must awaken, or be awakened,
ere it be too late.</p>
<p>Germany is living in the present and in the
future. It is a present of determined effort,
of unlimited sacrifice, of colossal hope. The
future for which she strives and suffers is a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_x" id="Page_x">[x]</a></span>
future incompatible with those ideals which
our race cherishes and reveres. Either our
philosophy, our religion and code prevail, or
they fade into decay, and Germany’s aims
remain. The choice is definite.</p>
<p>There can be no parley, no compromise with
the evil thing for which Germany fights. There
is not room for both. One must go down.</p>
<p>We must win outright. And we can and
shall win—if we bend every thought, our whole
will, our every energy, our utmost intensity of
determination to the great work. Failing this,
we shall secure only a victory equivalent to
defeat. We chose the part of free men, and,
when purified by complete self-sacrifice, shall
emerge from the ordeal a great and regenerated
people.</p>
<p class="right"><span class="smcap">W. M. Hughes.</span></p>
<h2 style="padding-bottom: 1em"><a name="CONTENTS" id="CONTENTS"></a>CONTENTS<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xi" id="Page_xi">[xi]</a></span></h2>
<table summary="toc">
<tr><td class="rightalign"><small>CHAP.</small></td><td class="leftalign"> </td><td class="rightalign"><small>PAGE</small></td></tr>
<tr><td class="rightalign"> </td><td class="leftalign">INTRODUCTION BY THE HON. W. M. HUGHES</td><td class="rightalign"><a href="#Page_vii">vii</a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="rightalign"><a href="#CHAPTER_I">I</a></td><td class="leftalign">THE CHARACTER OF GERMANY</td><td class="rightalign"><a href="#Page_1">1</a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="rightalign"><a href="#CHAPTER_II">II</a></td><td class="leftalign">THE GERMAN SYSTEM OF PREPARATION</td><td class="rightalign"><a href="#Page_7">7</a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="rightalign"><a href="#CHAPTER_III">III</a></td><td class="leftalign">GERMANY AND ITALIAN FINANCE</td><td class="rightalign"><a href="#Page_27">27</a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="rightalign"><a href="#CHAPTER_IV">IV</a></td><td class="leftalign">THE ANNEXATION MANIA</td><td class="rightalign"><a href="#Page_37">37</a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="rightalign"><a href="#CHAPTER_V">V</a></td><td class="leftalign">GERMANY AND RUSSIA</td><td class="rightalign"><a href="#Page_53">53</a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="rightalign"><a href="#CHAPTER_VI">VI</a></td><td class="leftalign">THE STATESMANSHIP OF THE ENTENTE</td><td class="rightalign"><a href="#Page_81">81</a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="rightalign"><a href="#CHAPTER_VII">VII</a></td><td class="leftalign">TEUTON POLITICS</td><td class="rightalign"><a href="#Page_88">88</a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="rightalign"><a href="#CHAPTER_VIII">VIII</a></td><td class="leftalign">A MACHIAVELLIAN TRICK BY WHICH RUSSIA’S
HAND WAS FORCED</td><td class="rightalign"><a href="#Page_99">99</a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="rightalign"><a href="#CHAPTER_IX">IX</a></td><td class="leftalign">GERMAN PROPAGANDA IN SCANDINAVIA</td><td class="rightalign"><a href="#Page_108">108</a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="rightalign"><a href="#CHAPTER_X">X</a></td><td class="leftalign">GERMANY AND THE BALKANS</td><td class="rightalign"><a href="#Page_116">116</a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="rightalign"><a href="#CHAPTER_XI">XI</a></td><td class="leftalign">THE RIVAL POLICIES</td><td class="rightalign"><a href="#Page_136">136</a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="rightalign"><a href="#CHAPTER_XII">XII</a></td><td class="leftalign">PROBLEMS OF LEADERSHIP</td><td class="rightalign"><a href="#Page_146">146</a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="rightalign"><a href="#CHAPTER_XIII">XIII</a></td><td class="leftalign">PROBLEMS OF FINANCE</td><td class="rightalign"><a href="#Page_161">161</a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="rightalign"><a href="#CHAPTER_XIV">XIV</a></td><td class="leftalign">READJUSTMENTS</td><td class="rightalign"><a href="#Page_175">175</a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="rightalign"><a href="#CHAPTER_XV">XV</a></td><td class="leftalign">THE POSITION OF ITALY</td><td class="rightalign"><a href="#Page_192">192</a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="rightalign"><a href="#CHAPTER_XVI">XVI</a></td><td class="leftalign">ROUMANIA AND GREECE</td><td class="rightalign"><a href="#Page_214">214</a><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_xii" id="Page_xii">[xii]</a></span></td></tr>
<tr><td class="rightalign"><a href="#CHAPTER_XVII">XVII</a></td><td class="leftalign">GERMANY’S RESOURCEFULNESS</td><td class="rightalign"><a href="#Page_227">227</a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="rightalign"><a href="#CHAPTER_XVIII">XVIII</a></td><td class="leftalign">THE PERILS OF PARTY POLITICS</td><td class="rightalign"><a href="#Page_236">236</a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="rightalign"><a href="#CHAPTER_XIX">XIX</a></td><td class="leftalign">PAST AND PRESENT</td><td class="rightalign"><a href="#Page_246">246</a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="rightalign"><a href="#CHAPTER_XX">XX</a></td><td class="leftalign">PROBLEMS OF THE FUTURE</td><td class="rightalign"><a href="#Page_272">272</a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="rightalign"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXI">XXI</a></td><td class="leftalign">THE FINAL ISSUE</td><td class="rightalign"><a href="#Page_296">296</a></td></tr>
</table>
<h2><a name="OURSELVES_AND_GERMANY" id="OURSELVES_AND_GERMANY"></a>OURSELVES AND GERMANY<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_1" id="Page_1">[1]</a></span></h2>
<h2><a name="CHAPTER_I" id="CHAPTER_I"></a>CHAPTER I</h2>
<h3>THE CHARACTER OF GERMANY</h3>
<p><span class="smcap">During</span> the memorable space of time that
separates us from the outbreak of the catastrophic
struggle, out of which a new Europe
will shortly emerge, events have shed a partial
but helpful light on much that at the outset
was blurred or mysterious. They have belied
or confirmed various forecasts, fulfilled some
few hopes, blasted many others, and obliged
the allied peoples to carry forward most of
their cherished anticipations to another year’s
account. Meanwhile the balance as it stands
offers ample food for sobering reflection, but
will doubtless evoke dignified resignation and
grim resolve on the part of those who confidently
looked for better things.</p>
<p>The items of which that balance is made
up are worth careful scrutiny for the sake of
the hints which they offer for future guidance.
The essence of their teaching is that we Allies
are engaged not in a war of the by-past type
in which only our armies and navies are contending
with those of the adversary according
to accepted rules, but in a tremendous struggle
wherein our enemies are deploying all their
resources without reserve or scruple for the
purpose of destroying or crippling our peoples.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_2" id="Page_2">[2]</a></span>
Unless, therefore, we have the will and the
means to mobilize our admittedly vaster
facilities and materials and make these subservient
to our aim, we are at a disadvantage
which will profoundly influence the final
result. It will be a source of comfort to
optimists to think that, looking back on the
vicissitudes of the first twenty months’ campaign,
they can discern evidences that there
is somewhere a statesman’s hand methodically
moulding events to our advantage, or attempering
their most sinister effects. Those
who fail to perceive any such traces must
look for solace to future developments. For
there are many who fancy that the economy
of our energies has been carried to needless
lengths, that the adjustment of means to
ends lacks thoroughness and precision, and
that our leaders have kept over rigorously
within the narrow range of partial aims, instead
of surveying the problem in its totality
and enlarging the permanent efficacy of their
precautions against unprecedented dangers.</p>
<p>The twenty months that have just lapsed
into history have done much to loosen the
hold of some of the baleful insular prejudices
which heretofore held sway over the minds
of nearly all sections of the British nation. It
may well be, therefore, that we are now better
able to grasp the significance of the principal
events of the war, and to seek it not in their
immediate effects on the course of the struggle,
but in the roots—still far from lifeless—whence
they sprang. For it is not so much the upshot
of the first phases of the campaign as the
deep-lying causes which rendered them a foregone
conclusion that force themselves on our
consideration. Those causes are still operative,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_3" id="Page_3">[3]</a></span>
and unless they be speedily uprooted will
continue to work havoc with our hopes.</p>
<p>It is now fairly evident that the present
war is but a violent phase in the unfolding
of a grandiose ground idea—the subjugation
of Europe by the Teuton—which was being
steadily realized ever since the close of the
Franco-German campaign of 1870. It is likewise
clear that, despite her “swelled head,”
Germany’s estimate of her ability to try issues
with all continental Europe was less erroneous
than the faith of her destined victims in their
superior powers of resistance. The original
plan, having been limited to the continental
states, was upset by Great Britain’s co-operation
with France and Russia. But, despite
this additional drag, Germany has achieved the
remarkable results recorded in recent history.
And with some show of reason she looks forward
to successes more decisive still. For in
her mode of conceiving the problem and her
methods of solving it lie the secret of her
progress. But there, too, is to be found the
counter-spell by which that progress may be
effectually checked; and it is only by mastering
that secret and applying it to the future
conduct of the struggle that we can hope to
ward off the dangers that encompass us.</p>
<p>Germany is like no other State known to
human history. She exercises the authority
of an infallible and intolerant Church while
disposing of the flawless mechanism of an
absolute State. She is armed with the most
deadly engines of destruction that advanced
science can forge, and in order to use them
ruthlessly she mixes the subtlest poisons to
corrupt the wells of truth and debase the
standards of right and wrong. And this she<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_4" id="Page_4">[4]</a></span>
can do without the least qualms of conscience,
in virtue of her firm belief in the amorality
of political conduct. Her members at home
and abroad, whose number is not fewer than
a hundred and twenty millions, form a political
community of whose compactness, social sense
and single-mindedness the annals of the human
race offer no other example. All are fired by
the same zeal, all obey the same lead, all work
for the same object. She sent and is still
sending forth missionaries of her political
faith, preachers of the gospel of the mailed
fist, to every country in which their services
may prove helpful. Diplomatists, journalists,
bankers, contrabandists, social agitators, spies,
incendiaries, assassins and courtesans, willing
to offer up their energies and their lives in
order to circumvent, despoil or slay the supposed
enemies of their race, address themselves
each one to his own allotted task and discharge
it conscientiously.</p>
<p>Those German colonists abroad are the eyes
and arms and tongues of the monster organism
of which the brain-centre is Berlin. They
endeavoured to stir up dissension between
class and class in Russia, France, Britain,
Belgium, to plant suspicion in the breast of
Bulgaria and Roumania, to create a prussophile
atmosphere in Greece, Switzerland and
Sweden, and to bring pressure to bear on the
Government of the United States in the hope
of fomenting discord between the American
and British peoples. They have occupied posts
of influence in the Vatican, are devoted to
the Moslem Caliph, cultivate friendship with
the Senussi and the ex-Khedive of Egypt, are
intriguing with the Negus of Abyssinia, and
spreading lying rumours, false news and vile<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_5" id="Page_5">[5]</a></span>
calumnies throughout the world. During the
years that passed between the war of 1870
and the outbreak of the present European
struggle, that stupendous organism contrived
by those and kindred means to possess itself
of the principal strongholds of international
opinion and influence, the centres of the chief
religions, the press, the exchanges, the world’s
“key industries,” the great marts of commerce
and the banks. It has friends at every
Court, in every Cabinet, in every European
Parliament, and its agents are alert and active
in every branch of the administration of
foreign lands. And while suppleness marked
their dealings with others, they were inflexible
only in their fidelity to the Teuton cause.
Thus in Russia they were conservative and
autocratic in their intercourse with the ruling
spheres, and revolutionary in their relations
with the Socialists and working classes; in
France and Britain they were democrats and
pacifists; in Italy they were rabid nationalists
or neutralists according to the political sentiments
of their environment; in Turkey,
Morocco, Egypt and Persia staunch friends
of Islam. They intrigued against dynasties,
conspired against cabinets, reviled influential
publicists, fostered strikes and tumults, set
political parties and entire states by the ears,
dispelled grounded suspicions and armed
various bands of incendiaries and assassins.</p>
<p>But in spite of cogged dice and poisoned
weapons, the comprehensive way in which
the enterprise was conceived, the consummate
skill with which it was wrought out towards
a satisfactory issue, the whole-heartedness of
the nation which, although animated by a
fiery patriotism that fuses all parties and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_6" id="Page_6">[6]</a></span>
classes into one, is yet governed with military
discipline, offer a wide field for imitation and
emulation. For the changes brought about
by the first phases of the war are but fruits
of seed sown years ago and tended ever since
with unfailing care, and unless suitable implements,
willing hands and combined energies
are employed in digging them up and casting
them to the winds, the second crop may prove
even more bitter than the first.</p>
<h2><a name="CHAPTER_II" id="CHAPTER_II"></a>CHAPTER II<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_7" id="Page_7">[7]</a></span></h2>
<h3>THE GERMAN SYSTEM OF PREPARATION</h3>
<p><span class="smcap">On</span> the historic third of August when war
was formally declared, its nature was as little
understood by the Allies as had been its
imminence. The statesmen who had to full-front
its manifestations were those who had
persistently refused to believe in its possibility,
and who had no inkling of its nature
and momentousness. Most of them, judging
other peoples by their own, had formed a high
opinion of the character of the German nation
and of the pacific intentions of its Government,
and continued to ground their policy in war
time on this generous estimate, which even
when upset by subsequent experience still
seems to linger on in a subconscious but not inoperative
state. At first their preparations to
meet the emergency hardly went beyond the
expedients to which they would have resorted
for any ordinary campaign. In this they resembled
a sea-captain who should make ready
to encounter a gale when his ship was threatened
by a typhoon. Hence their unco-ordinated
efforts, their chivalrous treatment of a dastardly
foe, their high-minded refusal to
credit the circumstantial stories of sickening
savagery emanating first from Belgium and
then from France, their gentle remonstrances
with the enemy, their carefully worded arguments,
their generous understatement of their<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_8" id="Page_8">[8]</a></span>
country’s case, and their suppression of any
emotion among their own folk akin to hatred
or passion. In an insular people for whom
peace was an ideal, neighbourliness a sacred
duty, and the psychology of foreign nations
a sealed book, this way of reading the bearings
of the new situation and adjusting them
to the nation’s requirements was natural and
fateful.</p>
<p>To the few private individuals who had the
advantage of experience and were gifted with
political vision the crisis presented itself under
a different aspect. Some of them had foreseen
and foretold the war, basing their forecast
on the obvious policy of the German
Government and on the overt strivings of
the German nation. They had depicted that
nation as intellectual and enterprising, abundantly
equipped with all the requisites for an
exhausting contest, fired with enthusiasm for
a single idea—the subjugation of the world—and
devoid of ethical scruple. And in the
clarion’s blast which suddenly resounded on
the pacific air they recognized the trump of
doom for Teuton Kultur or European civilization,
and proclaimed the utter inadequacy of
ordinary methods to put down this titanic
rebellion against the human race. That has
been the gist of every opinion and suggestion
on the subject put forward by the writer of
these lines since the outbreak of the war.</p>
<p>But even without these repeated warnings
it should have been clear that a carefully calculating
people like the Germans, in whom the
gift of organizing is inborn and solicitude for
detail is a passion, would not embark on a
preventive war without having first established
a just proportion between their own equipment<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9">[9]</a></span>
for the struggle and the magnitude of the
issues dependent on its outcome. It was,
further, reasonable to assume that this was
no mere onset of army against army and
navy against navy according to the old rules
of the game, but a mobilization by the two
military empires of all their resources—military,
naval, financial, economic, industrial,
scientific and journalistic—to be utilized to
the fullest for the destruction of the Entente
group. It was also easy to discern that,
whichever side was worsted, the Europe which
had witnessed the beginning of the conflict
would be transfigured at its close, and that
Germany would, therefore, not allow her
freedom of action in conducting the war to
be cramped by sentimental respect for the
checks and restraints of a political system that
was already dead. Lastly, it might readily
be inferred that the huge resources hoarded
up by the enemy during forty years of preparation
would be centupled in value by the
favourable conditions which rendered them
capable of being co-ordinated and directed by
a single will to the attainment of a single end.
All these previsions, warranted then by unmistakable
tokens, have since been justified
by historic events, and it is to be hoped that
the practical conclusions to which they point
may sink into the minds of the allied nations
as well as of their Governments, now that
nearly two years have gone by since they
were first expressed.</p>
<p>The earliest impression which German mobilization
left upon the Allies was that of the
preventive character of this war. For it could
have had no other mainspring than a resolve to
paralyse the arm of the Entente, which, if<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10">[10]</a></span>
allowed to wax stronger, might smite in lieu of
being smitten. For the moment, however,
Germany was neither attacked nor menaced.
Far from that, her rivals were vying with each
other in their strivings to maintain peace. Her
condition was prosperous, her industries thriving,
her colonial possessions had recently been
greatly increased, her influence on the affairs of
the world was unquestioned, her citizens were
materially well-to-do, her workmen were highly
paid, her capitalists, seconding her statesmen
and diplomatists, had, with gold extracted
from France, Britain and Belgium, woven a
vast net in the fine meshes of which most of
the nations of Europe, Asia and America were
being insensibly trammelled. Already her
bankers handled the finances, regulated the
industries and influenced the politics of those
tributary peoples. And by these tactics a
relationship was established between Germany
and most states of the globe which cut deep
into the destinies of these and is become an
abiding factor of the present contest. For
that reason, and also because of the paramount
influence of the economic factor on the
results of the struggle, they are well worth
studying.</p>
<p>To her superior breadth of outlook, marvellous
organizing powers, the hearty co-operation
between rulers and people, and the
ease with which, unhampered by parliamentary
opposition, her Government was enabled to
place a single aim at the head and front of
its national policy, Germany is perhaps more
deeply indebted for her successes during the
first phases of the campaign than to the strategy
of Hindenburg or the furious onslaughts of
Mackensen. German diplomacy has been ridiculed<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">[11]</a></span>
for its glaring blunders, and German
statesmanship discredited for its cynical contempt
of others’ rights and its own moral obligations.
And gauged by our ethical standards
the blame incurred was richly deserved. But
we are apt to forget that German diplomacy
has two distinct aspects—the professional
and the economic—and that where the one
failed the other triumphed. And if success
be nine-tenths of justification, as the Prussian
doctrine teaches, the statesmen who preside
over the destinies of the Teutonic peoples have
little to fear in the way of strictures from
their domestic critics. For they left nothing
to chance that could be ensured by effort.
Trade, commerce, finances, journalism, science,
religion, the advantages to be had by royal
marriages, by the elevation of German princes
to the thrones of the lesser states, had all been
calculated with as much care and precision
as the choice of sites in foreign countries for
the erection of concrete emplacements for
their monster guns. No detail seemed too
trivial for the bestowal of conscientious labour,
if it promised a possible return. When in
doubt whether it was worth while to make an
effort for some object of no immediate interest
to the Fatherland the German invariably decided
that the thing should be done. “You
never can tell,” he argued, “when or how it
may prove useful.” For years one firm of
motor-car makers turned out vehicles with
holes, the object of which no one could guess
until the needs of the war revealed them as
receptacles for light machine-guns.</p>
<p>Nearly two years of an unparalleled struggle
between certain isolated forces of the Allies
and all the combined resources of the Teutons<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">[12]</a></span>
ought to banish the notion that the results
achieved are the fruits only of Germany’s
military and naval efficiency. In truth, the
adequacy of her military and naval forces constitutes
but an integral part of a much vaster
system. It has hitherto been the fashion
among British and French writers to dwell
exclusively on the comprehensiveness of the
measures adopted by the Germans to fashion
their land and sea defences into destructive
implements of enormous striking power and
scientific precision. But the German conception
of the enterprise was immeasurably more
grandiose. It included every means of offence
and defence actually available or yet to be
devised, and testifies to a grasp of the nature
of the problem which, so far as one can judge,
has not even yet been attained outside the
Fatherland. As the present situation and its
coming developments present themselves as
practical corollaries of causes which the leaders
of Germany rendered operative, it may not
be amiss to describe these briefly.</p>
<p>The objective being the subjugation of
Europe to Teutonic sway, the execution of
the plan was attempted by two different sets
of measures, each of which supplemented the
other: military and naval efficiency on the
one hand and pacific interpenetration on
the other. The former has been often and
adequately described; the latter has not yet
attracted the degree of attention it merits.
For one thing, it was unostentatious and
invariably tinged with the colour of legitimate
trade and industry. Practically every country
in Europe, and many lands beyond the seas,
were covered with networks of economic relations
which, without being always emanations<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">[13]</a></span>
of the governmental brain, were never devoid
of a definite political purpose. While Great
Britain, and in a lesser degree France, distracted
by parliamentary strife or intent on
domestic reforms, left trade and commerce
to private initiative and the law of supply
and demand, the German Government watched
over all big commercial transactions, interwove
them with political interests, and regarded
every mark invested in a foreign country
not merely as capital bringing in interest in
the ordinary way, but also as political seed
bearing fruit to be ingathered when <i>Der
Tag</i> should dawn. Thus France and Britain
advanced loans to various countries—to
Greece, for instance—at lower rates of interest
than the credit of those states warranted,
but they bargained for no political gain in
return. Germany, on the contrary, insisted on
every such transaction being paid in political
or economic advantages as well as pecuniary
returns. And by these means she tied the
hands of most European nations with bonds
twisted of strands which they themselves were
foolish enough to supply. Italy, Russia,
Turkey, Roumania, Bulgaria, Greece, Belgium
and the Scandinavian States are all instructive
instances of this plan. Bankers and
their staffs, directors of works and factories,
agents of shipping companies, commercial
travellers, German colonies in various foreign
cities, military instructors to foreign armies,
schools and schoolmasters abroad, heads of
commercial houses in the different capitals,
were all so many agencies toiling ceaselessly
for the same purpose. The effect of their
manœuvres was to extract from all those
countries the wealth needed for their subjugation.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">[14]</a></span>
One of the most astounding instances
of the success of these hardy manipulations is
afforded by the Banca Commerciale of Italy,
which was a thoroughly German concern,
holding in its hands most of the financial
establishments, trades and industries of Italy.
This all-powerful institution possessed in 1914
a capital of £6,240,000 of which 63 per cent.
was subscribed by Italian shareholders, 20 per
cent. by Swiss, 14 per cent. by French, and
only 2½ per cent. by Germans and Austrians
combined! And the astounding exertions put
forward by the Germans during the first
twelvemonth of the war are largely the product
of the economic energies which this line
of action enabled them to store up during the
years of peace and preparation.</p>
<p>The execution of those grandiose schemes
was facilitated by the easy access which Germany
had to the principal markets of the globe.
One of the main objects of her diplomacy had
been to break down the tariff barriers which
would have reserved to the great trading
empires the main fruits of their own labour and
enterprise. By the Treaty of Frankfort the
French had been compelled to confer on Germany
the most-favoured-nation clause, thus
entitling her to enjoy all the tariff reductions
which the Republic might accord to those
countries with which it was on the most amicable
terms. British free trade opened wide
the portals of the world’s greatest empire to a
deluge of Teuton wares and to a kind of competition
which contrasted with fair play in a
degree similar to that which now obtains between
German methods of warfare and our
own. Russia, at first insensible to suasion and
rebellious to threats, endeavoured to bar the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[15]</a></span>
way to the economic flood on her western frontiers,
but during the stress of the Japanese
war she chose the lesser of two evils and
yielded. The concessions then made by my
friend, the late Count Witte, to the German
Chancellor, drained the Tsardom of enormous
sums of money and rendered it a tributary to
the Teuton. But it did much more. It supplied
Germany with a satisfactory type of
commercial treaty which she easily imposed
upon other nations. Germany’s road through
Italy was traced by the mistaken policy of the
French Government which, by a systematic
endeavour to depreciate Italian consols and
other securities, drove Crispi to Berlin, where
his suit for help was heard, the Banca Commerciale
conceived, and commercial arrangements
concluded which opened the door to
the influx of German wares, men and political
ideals.</p>
<p>A few years sufficed for the fruits of this
generous hospitality to reveal themselves. The
influx of wealth and the increased population
helped to render the German army a match for
the combined land forces of her rivals, a formidable
navy was created, which ranked immediately
after that of Great Britain, and a
large part of Europe was so closely associated
with, and dependent on, Germany that an extension
of the Zollverein was talked of in the
Fatherland, and a league of European brotherhood
advocated by the day-dreamers of France
and Britain. The French, however, never
ceased to chafe at the commercial chain forged
by the Treaty of Frankfort, but were powerless
to break it, while the British lavished tributes
of praise and admiration on Germany’s enterprise,
and construed it as a pledge of peace.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[16]</a></span>
Russia, alive to the danger, at last summoned
up courage to remove it, and had already decided
to refuse to extend the term of the
ruinous commercial treaty, even though the
alternative were war. That was the danger
which stimulated the final efforts of the
Kaiser’s Government.</p>
<p>Thus the entire political history of Entente
diplomacy during this war may be summarized
as a series of attempts on the part of the
Allies to undo some of the effects of the masterstrokes
executed by Germany during the years
of abundance which she owed to the favoured-nation
clause, British free trade and kindred
economic concessions. Interpenetration is the
term by which the process has been known ever
since Count Witte essayed it in Manchuria and
China.</p>
<p>The German procedure was simple, yet effective
withal. Funds were borrowed mainly in
France, Britain, Belgium, where investors are
often timid and bankers are unenterprising.
And then operations were begun. The first
aim pursued and attained was to acquire control
of the foreign trade of the country experimented
on. With this object in view banks
of credit were established which lavished on
German traders every help, information and
encouragement. Men of Teuton nationality
settled in the land as heads of firms, as clerks
without salary, private secretaries, foremen,
correspondents, and rapidly contrived to get
command of the main arteries of the economic
organism. German manufactures soon flooded
the country, because those who undertook to
import them could count on extensive credit
from the institutions founded with the money
of the very nations whose trade they were<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[17]</a></span>
engaged in killing. In this way the competition,
not only of all Entente peoples but also
of the natives of the country experimented
on, was systematically choked. And the customers
of these banks, natives as well as
Teutons, became apostles of German influence.</p>
<p>Insensibly the great industrial concerns of
the place passed into the possession of German
banks, behind which stood the German
empire. A nucleus of influential business
people, having been thus equipped for action,
incessantly propagated the German political
faith. German schools were established and
subsidized by the <i>Deutscher Schulverein</i>, clubs
opened, musical societies formed, and newspapers
supported or founded, to consolidate
the achievements of the financiers. On political
circles, especially in constitutional lands, the
influence of this Teutonic phalanx was profound
and lasting.</p>
<p>In all these commercial and industrial enterprises
undertaken abroad for economic gain
and political influence, the German State, its
organs and the individual firms, went hand in
hand, supplementing each other’s endeavours.
The maxim they adopted was that of their
military commanders: to advance separately
but to attack in combination. Not only the
Consul, but the Ambassador, the Minister,
the Scholar, the Statesman, nay the Kaiser<a name="FNanchor_1_1" id="FNanchor_1_1"></a><a href="#Footnote_1_1" class="fnanchor">[1]</a>
himself, were the inspirers, the partners, the
backers of the German merchant. Marschall
von Bieberstein once told me in Constantinople
that his functions were those of a super-commercial
traveller rather than ambassadorial.
And he discharged them with efficiency. Laws
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[18]</a></span>and railway tariffs at home, diplomatic facilities
and valuable information abroad smoothed
the way of the Teuton trader. Berlin rightly
gauged the worth of this pacific interpenetration
at a time when Britons were laughing it to
scorn as a ludicrous freak of grandmotherly
government. To-day its results stand out in
relief as barriers to the progress of the Allies
in the conduct of the war.</p>
<p>Of this ingenious way of enslaving foreign
nations unknown to themselves, Italy’s experience
offers us an instructive illustration. The
headquarters of the German commercial army
in that realm were the offices of the Banca Commerciale
in Milan. This institution was founded
under the auspices of the Berlin Foreign Office,
with the co-operation of Herr Schwabach,
head of the bank of Bleichröder. Employing
the absurdly small capital of two hundred
thousand pounds, not all of which was German,
it worked its way at the cost of the Italian
people into the vitals of the nation, and finally
succeeded in obtaining the supreme direction
of their foreign trade, national industries and
finances, and in usurping a degree of political
influence so durable that even the war is
supposed to have only numbed it for a time.</p>
<p>Between the years 1895 and 1915 the capital
of this institution had augmented to the sum
of £6,240,000, of which Germany and Austria
together held but 2½ per cent., while controlling
all the operations of the Bank itself
and of the trades and industries linked with it.</p>
<p>The Germans, as a Frenchman wittily remarked,
are born with the mania of annexation.
It runs in their blood. And it is not
merely territory, or political influence, or the
world’s markets that they seek to appropriate.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[19]</a></span>
Their appetite extends to everything in the
present and future, nay, even in the past
which they deem worth having. It is thus
that they claim as their own most of Italy’s
great men, such as Dante, Giotto, Leonardo da
Vinci, Botticelli, Galileo, and it is now asserted
by a number of Teuton writers that Christ
Himself came of a Teutonic stock.</p>
<p>German organisms, as well as German statesmen,
display the same mania of annexation,
and the Banks in especial give it free scope.
German banks differ from French, British and
Italian in the nature, extent and audacity of
their operations. It was not always thus.
Down to the war of 1870 their methods were
old-fashioned, cautious and slow. From the
year 1872 onward, however, they struck out
a new and bold course of their own from which
British and French experts boded speedy
disaster. Private enterprises were turned into
joint stock companies, the capital of prosperous
undertakings was increased and gigantic
operations were inaugurated. Between the
years 1885 and 1889 the industrial values
issued each year reached an average of 1,770
million francs; between 1890 and 1895 the
average rose to 1,880 millions, and from 1896
to 1900 it was computed at 2,384 millions.<a name="FNanchor_2_2" id="FNanchor_2_2"></a><a href="#Footnote_2_2" class="fnanchor">[2]</a></p>
<p>Of all German financial institutions the
most influential and prosperous is the Deutsche
Bank. It has been aptly termed an
empire within the empire. Its capital, 250
million francs, exceeds that of the Reichsbank
by thirty millions. It is the first of the six
great German banks, of which four are known
as the “D” group, because the first letter of
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[20]</a></span>their respective names is D: Deutsche Bank,
Dresdner Bank, Disconto-Gesellschaft and
Darmstädter Bank. The other two are the
Schaffhausenscher Bankverein and the Berliner
Handelsgesellschaft. The total capital of these
six concerns amounts to 1,100 million francs.<a name="FNanchor_3_3" id="FNanchor_3_3"></a><a href="#Footnote_3_3" class="fnanchor">[3]</a></p>
<p>None of these houses is hampered by those
rules, traditions or scruples which limit the
activity of British joint stock banks. They
are free to launch into speculations which, to
the sober judgment of our own financiers,
must seem wild and precarious, but to which
success has affixed the hall-mark of approval.
Each of the six banks is a centre of German
home industries and also of the foreign transformations
of these. To mention an industry
is almost always to connote some one of the
six. Before the war broke out one had but
to gaze steadily at the beautiful facade of this
or that Russian bank to discern the Lamia-like
monster from the banks of the Spree.
The famous firm of Krupps, for instance, had
its affairs closely interwoven with those of
the Berliner Disconto Gesellschaft, and was
more than once rescued from bankruptcy by its
timely assistance. Similar help was afforded
to the celebrated firm of Bauer which is known
throughout the world for its synthetical
medicines. There were critical moments in
its existence when it was confronted with
ruin. The Bank extricated the firm from
its difficulties, and the present dividend of
33 per cent. has justified its enterprise.</p>
<p>In this way the latter-day German banks
upset all financial traditions, opened large
credits to industries, smoothed the way for
the spread of German commerce, killed foreign
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[21]</a></span>competition and seconded the national policy
of their Government. As an instance of the
push and audacity of these modernized institutions,
a master stroke of the Bank of Behrens
and Sons of Hamburg may be mentioned: it
bought up the entire coffee crop of Guatemala
one year to the amazement of its rivals and
netted a very large profit by the transaction.</p>
<p>Now as commerce is international and industry
depends for its greatest successes upon
exportation, it was inevitable that the up-to-date
German banks should seek fields of
activity abroad and aim at playing a commanding
part in the world’s commerce. And
they tried and succeeded. For they alone
instinctively divined the new spirit of the
age, which may be termed co-operative and
agglutinative. It was in virtue of this new
idea that groups of States were leagued together
by Germany in view of her projected
war, and it is the same principle that impels
her, before the conflict has yet been decided,
to weld to herself as many tributary peoples as
she may to assist her in the economic struggle
which will be ushered in by peace. Germans
first semiconsciously felt and now deliberately
hold that in all departments of modern life,
social, economic and political, our conception
of quantities must undergo a radical change.
The scale must be greatly enlarged. The unit
of former times must give place to a group of
units, to syndicates and trusts in commerce
and industry, to trade unions in the labour
world, to Customs-federations in international
life. That this shifting of quantities is a
correlate of the progress achieved in technical
science and in means of communication, and
also of the vastness of armies and navies and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[22]</a></span>
of the aims of the world’s foremost peoples,
is since then become a truism, realized not
only by the Germans but by all their allies.</p>
<p>For individual enterprise, as well as for
national isolation, there is no room in the
modern world. Isolation spells weakness and
helplessness there. The lesser neutral States
must of necessity become the clients of the
Great Powers and pay a high price for the
protection afforded them. Hence the maintenance
of small nations on their present basis,
with enormous colonies to exploit but without
efficient means of defending them, forms no
part of Germany’s future programme. And
the altruistic professions of the Entente which
claims to be fighting for the rights of little
States, whose idyllic existence it would fain
perpetuate, is scoffed at by the Teutons as
chimerical or hypocritical. When this war is
over, whatever its upshot, Central Europe with
or without the non-German elements will have
become a single unit, against whose combined
industrial, commercial and military strivings no
one European Power can successfully compete.
And the difficulties which geographical situation
has raised against effective co-operation
among the Allies in war time will make themselves
felt with increased force during the
economic struggle which will then begin.</p>
<p>No mere tariff arrangement, but only a
genuine league between all the west European
Powers and the British Empire, supplemented
by a customs union between them and the
other Allies of the Entente, will then avail
to ward off the new danger and establish some
rough approach to the equilibrium which the
present conflict has overthrown. The future
destinies of Europe, as far as one may conjecture<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[23]</a></span>
from the data available to-day, will
depend largely on the insight of the Entente
nations and their readiness to subordinate
national aims and interests to those of the
larger unit which will be the inevitable product
of the new order of things.</p>
<p>The ideal type of the industrial bank having
been thus wrought out, the Germans, whom a
thoroughly commercial education had qualified
for the work, carried on vast operations with
a degree of boldness which was matched only
by the thoroughness of their precautions.
They advanced money with a readiness and
an open-handedness which the West European
financier set down as sheer folly, but which
was the outcome of close study and careful
deliberation. They began by acquainting
themselves with the solvency of their clients,
with the nature of the transactions which these
were carrying on, with their business methods
and individual abilities, and to the results of
this preliminary examination they adjusted
the extent of their financial assistance. They
had secret inquiry offices to keep them constantly
informed of the condition of the
various firms and individuals, and when in
doubt they demanded an insight into the
books of the company which was seldom
denied them. The Spanish Inquisition was
but a clumsy agency in comparison with the
perfect system evolved by these German banks,
which could at any given moment sum up the
prospects as well as the actual situation of
each of their customers. It was this comprehensive
survey which warranted some of the
large advances they made to seemingly insolvent
firms which afterwards grew to be the
most prosperous in the Fatherland.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[24]</a></span></p>
<p>The methods thus practised at home were
adhered to in all those foreign countries which
the German financier, manufacturer or trader
selected for his field of operations. A bank
would be opened in the foreign capital with
money advanced mainly by one of the six
great financial institutions. It would be called
by some high-sounding name, suggestive of
the country experimented upon, and little
by little the German capital would be diminished
to a minimum and local capital substituted,
but the supreme control kept zealously
in the hands of the Teuton directors. Industries
would then be financed and finally
bought up. Others would also be financed
but deliberately ruined. Competition would
in this way be effectively killed, and little by
little the life-juices of the country would be
canalized to suit the requirements of German
trade, industry and politics.</p>
<p>If an industry in the invaded country was
judged capable of becoming subsidiary to some
German industry, the Bank would maintain it
for the purpose of amalgamating the two later
on, or else having the foreign concern absorbed
by the Teutonic. This was a labour of patriotism
and profit. But if the business was
recognized as a formidable rival to some
German enterprise, it was doomed. The procedure
in this case was simple. The Bank
advanced money readily, tied the firm financially,
rendering it wholly tributary; and then
when the hour of destiny struck, the credit
was suddenly withdrawn and the curtain rung
up in the Bankruptcy Court. When this consummation
became public, the unsuspecting
foreigner would ask with naïve astonishment:
“How can it be bankrupt? I understood that<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[25]</a></span>
Germans were financing it.” They were, and
it was precisely for that reason, and because it
was on the way to prosperity as a rival to some
German firm, that it was suffocated.<a name="FNanchor_4_4" id="FNanchor_4_4"></a><a href="#Footnote_4_4" class="fnanchor">[4]</a></p>
<p>This ingenious system proved exceptionally
effective in Brazil. It has been said that that
republic is become a dependency of Germany.
What cannot be gainsaid is that about one-third
of Brazil’s national debt<a name="FNanchor_5_5" id="FNanchor_5_5"></a><a href="#Footnote_5_5" class="fnanchor">[5]</a> is owing to
German bankers, and the whole financial and industrial
movement of the country is swayed by
the Society of Colonization which is German,
by the German Society for Mutual Protection,
by the German-Brazilian Society and by the
three Navigation Companies whose steamers
ply between Brazil and the Fatherland.<a name="FNanchor_6_6" id="FNanchor_6_6"></a><a href="#Footnote_6_6" class="fnanchor">[6]</a> It
is because of the far-reaching power and influence
which has accrued to Germany from
this successful invasion that Professor Schmoller
of the Berlin University could write: “It
behoves us to desire at any and every cost
that, by the next century, a German land of
twenty or thirty million inhabitants shall
arise in Southern Brazil. It is immaterial
whether it remains part of Brazil or constitutes
an independent State or enters into close
relations with the German Empire. But without
a connection guaranteed by battleships,
without the possibility of Germany’s armed
intervention in Brazil, its future would be
jeopardized.”</p>
<p>It is the Monroe doctrine that is commonly
credited with thwarting these designs on South
America. But as a matter of plain fact, it is
to the British Navy and to nothing else that
the credit is due. Were it not for the known
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[26]</a></span>resolve of the British nation to co-operate in
case of need with the American people in their
exertions to uphold that doctrine against Germany,
the Berlin Cabinet would long ago have
formally established a firm footing in Southern
Brazil and the United States Government would
have been powerless to prevent it.<a name="FNanchor_7_7" id="FNanchor_7_7"></a><a href="#Footnote_7_7" class="fnanchor">[7]</a></p>
<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_1_1" id="Footnote_1_1"></a><a href="#FNanchor_1_1"><span class="label">[1]</span></a> The Kaiser is one of the largest shareholders in the
great mercury mines of Italy.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_2_2" id="Footnote_2_2"></a><a href="#FNanchor_2_2"><span class="label">[2]</span></a> Cf. <i>L’Invasione tedesca in Italia</i>. Ezio M. Gray.
Firenze.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_3_3" id="Footnote_3_3"></a><a href="#FNanchor_3_3"><span class="label">[3]</span></a> <i>Op. cit.</i>, p. 113.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_4_4" id="Footnote_4_4"></a><a href="#FNanchor_4_4"><span class="label">[4]</span></a> Cf. <i>L’Invasione tedesca in Italia</i>, pp. 118, 119.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_5_5" id="Footnote_5_5"></a><a href="#FNanchor_5_5"><span class="label">[5]</span></a> 1050 million francs.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_6_6" id="Footnote_6_6"></a><a href="#FNanchor_6_6"><span class="label">[6]</span></a> <i>Op. cit.</i>, p. 120.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_7_7" id="Footnote_7_7"></a><a href="#FNanchor_7_7"><span class="label">[7]</span></a> An instructive article on the subject by Mr. Moreton
Frewen appeared in the <i>Nineteenth Century</i> of February,
1916.</p></div>
</div>
<h2><a name="CHAPTER_III" id="CHAPTER_III"></a>CHAPTER III<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[27]</a></span></h2>
<h3>GERMANY AND ITALIAN FINANCE</h3>
<p><span class="smcap">It</span> was in congruity with those principles
and methods that the Banca Commerciale,
which had its headquarters in Milan, set itself
to discharge the complex functions of a financial,
industrial, commercial and political agency
of German interpenetration in Italy.</p>
<p>To German customers and those Italians
who imported German goods, the Banca Commerciale
allowed long credits and easy means
of payment. To all who were in need of implements,
machinery, or materials for a new
enterprise, the bank “recommended” German
houses, and those who were wise construed the
“recommendation” as an ultimatum. For if
it was ignored, their names were inscribed on
the black books of the bank, and by means
of an efficacious system of secret dossiers,
handled by a confidential information bureau,<a name="FNanchor_8_8" id="FNanchor_8_8"></a><a href="#Footnote_8_8" class="fnanchor">[8]</a>
they found themselves thrust into a “credit
vacuum,” boycotted by finance and condemned
to bankruptcy. All banks shunned them.
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[28]</a></span>Their bonds became mere scraps of paper.
Every enterprise to which they set their hands
was blighted, and nothing remained for them
but to abandon their avocations or surrender
at discretion.</p>
<p>But besides this executive of destruction
there was another and still more important
board, whose work was wholly constructive.
It was commonly known as the “service of
information.” Its functions were to collect at
first hand all useful data about Italian commerce
and industry, to draw up tabulated
reports for the use of Germans at home
engaged in trade and industry. These lists
indicated current prices, the qualities of the
goods in demand, the favourite ways of packing
and consigning these, samples of manufactures,
statistics of production, the addresses of
all firms dealing with Italians—in a word, every
kind of data calculated to enable German trade
and industry to compete successfully with
their rivals. The manner in which this body
of information was drawn up, sifted, classified,
and made accessible, deserves unstinted admiration.
To say that commercial espionage
was practised largely in the working of this
comprehensive system is but another way of
stating that it was German.</p>
<p>The Banca Commerciale, which was the
head and centre of this organization, was, as
a matter of course, called Italian. For every
similar institution, commercial, journalistic or
other, which has for its object the realization
of the Teutonic plan of internationalization,
invariably wears the mask of the nationality
of the country in which it operates. And in
this case the mask was supplied by Italians,
on whom the bank bestowed all the highest<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">[29]</a></span>
<i>honorary</i> posts, while reserving the influential
ones for Germans and Austrians. Thus the
moving spirits of this vast organization were
Herrn Joel, Weil and Toeplitz, men of uncommon
business capacity, who devoted all their
time and energies to the attainment of the
end in view. And their zeal, industry and ingenuity
were rewarded by substantial results,
which have left an abiding mark on Italian
politics and entered for a great deal into the
attitude of the nation towards the two groups
of belligerents. In a relatively short span of
time foreign competition in Italian markets was
checked, German products ousted those of their
rivals, and at last the very sources of Italy’s
economic life were in the hands of the Teuton,
whose continued goodwill became almost a
vital necessity to the struggling nation.</p>
<p>Already in the year 1912 Germany stood
first among Italy’s customers, whether we consider
the list of her exports or that of imports.
Italy bought from that empire goods valued
at 626,300,000 francs, and sold it produce worth
328,200,000 francs; whereas Great Britain,
who supplies Italy with the bulk of her coal,
exported only 577,100,000 francs worth, while
her imports were valued at 264,400,000 francs.
For France the figures were 289,600,000 and
222,600,000 francs respectively.</p>
<p>The method by which Italian industries were
assailed, shaken, and then purchased and controlled
by this redoubtable organization, bore,
as we saw, all the marks of German commercial
ethics. Sharp practice which recognizes as its
only limitation the strong arm of the penal
law, is a fair description of the plan of campaign.
Against this insidious process none of the
native enterprises had the strength to offer<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">[30]</a></span>
effective resistance. One by one they were
drawn into the vast net woven by the three
German Fates—Joel, Weil and Toeplitz. The
various iron, mechanical and shipbuilding
works, which represented the germs from which
native industries were to grow, were sucked
into the Teuton maelstrom. The larger and
the smaller steamship navigation companies
likewise fell under the direction of the Banca
Commerciale, which permitted some of them
to exist and even to thrive up to a certain
point, beyond which their usefulness to the
general plan would have turned to harm. In
this way Italy’s entire mercantile marine became
one of the numerous levers in the hands
of the interpenetrating German. And the importance
of this lever for political purposes
can neither be gainsaid nor easily overstated.</p>
<p>In every little town and village which sends a
quota of emigrants to the transatlantic liners,
agents of the various steamship companies
are always about and active. Being intelligent
and enterprising, their influence on local
politics is irresistible, and it was uniformly
employed in those interests which it was the
object of the Banca Commerciale to further.
“This institution,” writes an Italian expert,
who has studied the subject with unusual care,
“being the mistress of the dominant economic
organisms of the nation, makes use of them to
carry out a germanophile policy. It employs
them for the purpose of exercising a directive
action in all elections, commercial, provincial
and general. Every servant of a steamship
navigation company, every purveyor of emigrants
is at the same time and by the very force
of things an electoral agent. The position of
arbitress and mistress of the steamship companies<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">[31]</a></span>
carries with it possession of the keys
of the national wealth, and is consequently a
formidable weapon of aggressive competition
against all industries, Italian and foreign, which
are not affiliated to those of Germany. The
Banca Commerciale, having obtained that supremacy,
forced the Italian companies to lead
a languishing existence in straitened circumstances,
whereas they might easily have grown
rich and flourishing. It permits our steamship
companies to subsist and even to earn somewhat,
but only just enough to suffice for the
declaration of a modest dividend. That is why
Italian navigation companies levy such excessive
rates of freight, why their service is not
organized in accordance with rational and latter
day standards, why they take no thought of
winning foreign markets or of national expansion.<a name="FNanchor_9_9" id="FNanchor_9_9"></a><a href="#Footnote_9_9" class="fnanchor">[9]</a>
They have no means of consigning
merchandise at the domicile, so that the consignees
are put to enormous expense for collection
and delivery. And to make matters
still worse, Italian navigation companies are
bound with those of Germany by special secret
conventions, which oblige them to abandon to
their rivals certain kinds of merchandise of the
Near and the Far East.”</p>
<p>If we examine the peculiarly Teuton ways
of trade competition in their everyday guise,
and without the glamour of political ideals
to distract our attention, we are confronted
with phenomena of a repulsive character. For
the German’s keen practical sense, his sustained
concentration of effort on the furtherance
of material interests, and his scorn of
ethical restraints render him a formidable
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">[32]</a></span>competitor in pacific pursuits and a dangerous
enemy in war. His moral sense is not so much
dulled by experience as warped by education.
It may be likened to a clock which has not
stopped but shows the wrong hour. He has
been taught that there are times and circumstances
when religious and ethical standards
may or must be set aside, and he arrogates to
himself the right of determining them. Without
examining into stories of preternatural
meanness and perfidy which have come into
vogue since the outbreak of the war, it is fair
to say that dirty tricks, destructive of all
social intercourse, formed part of the German
commercial procedure in France, Britain and
Russia, the only proviso being that they were not
penalized by the criminal law of the country.</p>
<p>An amusing but nowise edifying instance
turns upon Paris fashions. That Berlin, like
Vienna, should seek to vie with Paris in setting
the fashion of feminine finery to the world is
conceivable and legitimate. But that Germans
should compete with Paris in Paris fashions
connotes a psychological frame of mind which
is better understood by the inmates of a prison
than by a mercantile community. American
ladies visiting the French capital to order their
gowns are astonished to note that no fashions
really new have been shown to them in the great
Paris houses. They had just seen them all in
the German capital. And the Paris models
destined to be placed on the market next season
turn out to be identical with those which the
fair visitors had already inspected in Berlin
and could have purchased there at a much
lower price. How this could be is explained
simply. A German merchant in continuous
relations with the staffs of the Paris firms<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">[33]</a></span>
clandestinely obtains from some of the members
for a high price the models which are still
being kept secret, has them copied in large
numbers in Berlin and sold at a cheap price.
True, the German workmanship lacks the
dainty finish of the Paris article, but the
difference is such as appeals only to the eye
of a connoisseur.</p>
<p>In Italy similar phenomena were observed
frequently. A firm in Florence celebrated
for special types of wooden utensils which
were never successfully imitated elsewhere
was ruined by commercial espionage. One
day the proprietor engaged the services of
two foreign workmen who laboured hard and
steadily for some time and then departed, to
his great regret. Six months later Germany
dumped on the Italian markets the very same
articles in vast quantities, and at a price so
low that the Italian firm could not hope to
compete with them. At first, indeed, the
Florence house made a valiant stand against
the invasion, but had finally to give up the
fight as hopeless. Later on the proprietor
learned that the two honest-looking workmen
were first-class German engineers, whose only
objects in entering his service were to acquaint
themselves with his methods, copy his models
and then strangle his trade. And these objects
they achieved to their satisfaction.<a name="FNanchor_10_10" id="FNanchor_10_10"></a><a href="#Footnote_10_10" class="fnanchor">[10]</a></p>
<p>Thus, in order to strangle concerns that
compete with them successfully, the average
German merchant sticks at nothing. His
maxim is, that in trade as in all forms of the
struggle for existence, necessity knows no law.
And he is himself the judge of necessity. The
history of German industry in Italy is full of
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">[34]</a></span>instructive examples of this disdain of moral
checks, but one will suffice as a type. It
turns upon the struggle which the Teuton invaders
carried on against the Italian iron
industry, which for a while held its own
against all fair competition. In their own
country, the German manufacturers sold
girders at £6 10<i>s.</i> the ton. The profits made
at this price enabled them to offer the same
articles in Switzerland for £6, in Great Britain
for £5 3<i>s.</i> and in Italy for £3 15<i>s.</i> Now, as
the cost of production in Germany fluctuated
between £4 5<i>s.</i> and £4 15<i>s.</i> per ton, it is evident
that the dead loss incurred by the German
manufacturers on Italian sales varied between
10<i>s.</i> and £1 per ton. But this sacrifice was
offered up cheerfully because its object was
the destruction of the growing iron industry of
Northern Italy and the clearing of the ground
for a German monopoly.<a name="FNanchor_11_11" id="FNanchor_11_11"></a><a href="#Footnote_11_11" class="fnanchor">[11]</a> The spirit that
animates the Teuton producer, in his capacity
as rival, was clearly embodied by one of the
principal manufacturers of aniline dyes in
Frankfort, who remarked to an Italian business
man: “I am ready to sell at a dead loss for
ten years running rather than lose the Italian
market, and if it were necessary I would give
up for the purpose all the profits I have made
during the past ten years.”<a name="FNanchor_12_12" id="FNanchor_12_12"></a><a href="#Footnote_12_12" class="fnanchor">[12]</a> To contend with
any hope of success against men of this stamp,
one should be imbued with qualities resembling
their own. And of such a commercial equipment
the business community of Great Britain
have as yet shown no tokens.</p>
<p>In Italy the Banca Commerciale was wont
to send to every firm, whether it had or had
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">[35]</a></span>not dealings with it, a tabulated list of questions
to be answered in writing. The ostensible
object was to obtain trustworthy materials
to serve for the Annual Review of the economic
movement in the country published every
year by the Bank. In reality the ends achieved
were far more important, as we may infer from
the use to which all such information in France
was put. There the well-known agency of
Schimmelpfeng, which was in receipt of a
subvention from the German Chamber of
Commerce, was a centre of secret information
respecting the solvency, the prospects, the
debts and assets of every firm in France, and
its tabulated information about French commerce
and industry, together with all the
knowledge that had been secretly gleaned,
was duly sent to Berlin.</p>
<p>Russians complain somewhat tardily of the
prevalence of the same system among themselves.
“Every day,” writes the <i>Novoye
Vremya</i>, “fresh details are leaking out respecting
a certain German firm, ideal in its resourcefulness,
which succeeded in spreading a vast
net over all Russia. It has been satisfactorily
established that Germans occupied many responsible
posts in the organization, and that
these<a name="FNanchor_13_13" id="FNanchor_13_13"></a><a href="#Footnote_13_13" class="fnanchor">[13]</a> officials were subjects of the German
Empire. At the head of the entire business
in Russia down to a recent date was also a
German subject.” The kind of information
gathered by the agents of the company, “for
business purposes,” is clear from a circular
issued by the firm just a fortnight before the
outbreak of the war.</p>
<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36">[36]</a></span></p>
<h4>THE FIRM OF XYZ</h4>
<p class="right"><span style="padding-right: 5.5em">“Tula,</span><br />
“5/18 July, 1914.</p>
<p class="right">“<i>District Card for the Collectors of the Circuit.</i></p>
<p class="right">“<span style="padding-right: 1em"><i>Form N 246.</i></span></p>
<p>“We have forwarded you to-day a number of
cards of the printed form N 246, which you are
requested to have filled in at once and placed
at the head of form 490 of the corresponding
district. We draw your attention herewith
to the necessity of enumerating on the first
table of form N 246 all the villages and other
places of the circuit of each district collector,
whether or no they contain debtors of ours,
and of stating in the second table the number
of inhabitants. The registration is to be done
by the official charged with that part of the
work: each circuit is to be entered separately
and the villages and places it contains to be
given in alphabetical order. These lists are
to be verified every six months and fresh
information set out respecting the growing
number of our debtors. We request you to take
this work in hand at once and without delay.</p>
<p class="right">“<span class="smcap">The Control Department, Tula.</span>”</p>
<p>When this circular was published in Moscow
the general director of the firm wrote to certain
provincial newspapers pointing out that the
company is American, not German. “It is
curious,” a Russian journal remarks, “that an
American firm should need a map containing
all the villages and hamlets of the districts,
with the number of their inhabitants, irrespective
of the presence there of the company’s
debtors.”<a name="FNanchor_14_14" id="FNanchor_14_14"></a><a href="#Footnote_14_14" class="fnanchor">[14]</a></p>
<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_8_8" id="Footnote_8_8"></a><a href="#FNanchor_8_8"><span class="label">[8]</span></a> This secret information bureau is everywhere a
potent engine of attack in German hands. It renders
deliberate libellers and defamers immune against the
action of the law. The victims feel the effects but
cannot point to the cause. The <i>fiches</i>, as the certificates
are called, are couched in conventional terms and bear
no signature. In the case of persons whom the bank
desires to ruin, these documents are sentences of commercial
death.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_9_9" id="Footnote_9_9"></a><a href="#FNanchor_9_9"><span class="label">[9]</span></a> Cf. Preziosi, <i>La Germania a la Conquista dell’ Italia</i>,
p. 57 fol.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_10_10" id="Footnote_10_10"></a><a href="#FNanchor_10_10"><span class="label">[10]</span></a> <i>L’Invasione tedesca</i>, p. 147.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_11_11" id="Footnote_11_11"></a><a href="#FNanchor_11_11"><span class="label">[11]</span></a> <i>L’Invasione tedesca in Italia</i>, p. 149.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_12_12" id="Footnote_12_12"></a><a href="#FNanchor_12_12"><span class="label">[12]</span></a> <i>Op. cit.</i>, p. 150.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_13_13" id="Footnote_13_13"></a><a href="#FNanchor_13_13"><span class="label">[13]</span></a> It is an American Company for the sale of certain
machines. The Russian organ mentions all the names.
For my purpose this is unnecessary. The curious may
find them in the <i>Novoye Vremya</i> of 5/18 August, 1915.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_14_14" id="Footnote_14_14"></a><a href="#FNanchor_14_14"><span class="label">[14]</span></a> <i>Novoye Vremya</i>, 5/18 July, 1916.</p></div>
</div>
<h2><a name="CHAPTER_IV" id="CHAPTER_IV"></a>CHAPTER IV<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">[37]</a></span></h2>
<h3>THE ANNEXATION MANIA</h3>
<p><span class="smcap">Another</span> instructive example of the Annexation
mania, as it displays itself in German
commercial undertakings, comes to us from
Russia.</p>
<p>It is only one of many, a typical instance
of a recognized method. The Franco-Russian
joint-stock company Provodnik is known
throughout Europe. It manufactures tyres
and other rubber wares. The capital, which
amounted to only 700,000 roubles at the date
of its foundation, in the year 1888, had increased
to 22,000,000 by the time when
war was declared. It is closely connected
with another company named the Buffalo,
which has its headquarters in Riga and was
promoted by the President of the Provodnik,
M. Wittenberg, together with several Austrian
capitalists. M. Wittenberg is President
of both companies, and the Provodnik has
assisted the Buffalo on various occasions, even
during the war, notwithstanding the fact that
the shareholders of the Buffalo are mostly
German subjects. On January 2, 1914, another
company was created, this time in Berlin,
and called the “German Provodnik.” Now,
according to the instructions laying down the
rights of the Board (Par. 24), wares may not be
delivered on credit to any firm or institution
for the value of more than 50,000 roubles, and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38">[38]</a></span>
not even to this amount unless the solvency of
the recipient is beyond question.</p>
<p>In spite of this clearly marked limitation
the Board of the Franco-Russian Provodnik,
which exerted itself with unwonted zest to
supply the German Provodnik with motor-tyres
shortly before the war, opened a credit
of 498,000 roubles in favour of this firm. The
manager of the warehouses of the Riga products
in New York is a German subject named
Lindner. The managers in Zurich and Copenhagen
are also German subjects.<a name="FNanchor_15_15" id="FNanchor_15_15"></a><a href="#Footnote_15_15" class="fnanchor">[15]</a></p>
<p>It is not to be wondered at that countries
like Italy and Russia, poor in capital and
industry, fell an easy prey to the ruthless
German invader, who, with the help of British,
French, and even Italian and Russian savings,
suffocated the nascent industries of the respective
nations, killed foreign competition,
earned large profits, obtained control of the
country’s resources and an intimate knowledge
of the political secrets of their respective
Governments. “Many Germans,” wrote an
Italian Review,<a name="FNanchor_16_16" id="FNanchor_16_16"></a><a href="#Footnote_16_16" class="fnanchor">[16]</a> “serving in Italian establishments
are in possession of lists of the fortresses,
measurements, distances, positions of the roads
and footpaths, they have found the points of
triangulation and acquired all requisite data
and information about them. And to-morrow,
should war break out, they will accompany and
guide the German or Austrian invaders.”</p>
<p>How keen they are to make themselves conversant
with matters of political moment in the
guise of honest workmen is becoming fairly
well known to day, although it may be taken
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">[39]</a></span>for granted that if peace were concluded to-morrow
these same commercial spies would
find hospitality among some of the easy-going
merchants of Great Britain, who still refuse
to believe in the obvious danger or to act upon
their belief. In November 1912 the Italian
Minister of the Marine called for tenders for
the supply of silver dinner-plate for the warships.
At the critical moment, when the
decision was about to be taken, the German
firm of Hermann, which has its headquarters
in Vienna, reduced its offer first by 18 per cent.,
then by 20, and finally by 20·13 per cent. in
order to get the order. For the order carried
with it, for the representative of the firm,
Herr Forster, <i>the permanent right of access</i> to all
naval arsenals of Italy.<a name="FNanchor_17_17" id="FNanchor_17_17"></a><a href="#Footnote_17_17" class="fnanchor">[17]</a></p>
<p>The <i>naïveté</i> of Italy in matters of this
delicate nature stands out in jarring contrast
to the habitual caution of that diplomatic
nation, and has not yet been satisfactorily explained
from the psychological point of view.
One is puzzled to understand how, months
after the present war had begun, the press
of Genoa could announce that the supply of
electric motors for the Italian marine and of
ventilators for Italy’s fortified places on her
eastern frontier had been adjudicated to two
German firms, on the ground that their tenders
were the lowest.<a name="FNanchor_18_18" id="FNanchor_18_18"></a><a href="#Footnote_18_18" class="fnanchor">[18]</a></p>
<p>One of the largest automobile and motor
works in the German Empire is the Benz and
Rheinische Automobil und Motoren Fabrik
Actien Gesellschaft of Mannheim. It supplies
the Kaiser with his cars and has branches
everywhere. In Italy, too, it exists and
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40">[40]</a></span>flourishes. But there the great German firm
is modestly disguised under the name of the
Societá Italiana Benz. And it is so modest
that in spite of its gorgeous warehouse in the
Via Floria (Rome), of its luxurious head-office
in the Via Finanze, of its well-equipped workshop
for repairing and fitting and its little
army of agents actively pushing the business
all over Italy, its capital, all told, amounts
only to 30,000 lire, or £1,000! The firm is
managed by a German engineer whose kith
and kin are fighting in the Kaiser’s army.
And this German engineer, Herr Matt, has
free access to the Italian War Minister, even
now,<a name="FNanchor_19_19" id="FNanchor_19_19"></a><a href="#Footnote_19_19" class="fnanchor">[19]</a> when it is question of manufacturing
projectiles; and he has continuous relations
with the Italian Airmen’s Brigade.</p>
<p>Electricity in Italy, together with all its
auxiliary trades and industries, was, like every
other lucrative enterprise, in the hands of
Germans and German Swiss. The names of
the various company directors had the usual
familiar Teuton sound. When the European
conflict broke out it seemed for a moment as
if all these German concerns must come to a
sudden and dire end. But just as the German
engineer Herr Matt, whose relatives are officers
in the Kaiser’s army, has free access to the
Italian War Minister and carries on his business
in Italy as usual, so the electrical concerns
had merely to change one or two adjectives in
their trading names and were forthwith shielded
from harm. A case in point which is valuable
because typical occurred recently. The Italian
Electro-technical Association published a list
of the manufacturers of electric machines and
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">[41]</a></span>requisites in Italy, and by way of introduction
set down the following patriotic remarks:
“This list is addressed to those who at the
present moment feel it to be their duty to
uphold and encourage the production and
development of materials for electricity. Importation
from abroad, which we favoured when
Italian industry was still in an embryonic stage,
<i>degenerated especially in consequence of the action
of the Germans</i>, into a veritable conquest of
the markets; and no weapon, licit or illicit, was
spurned to destroy our sources of production,
and suffocate our nascent initiative.”</p>
<p>These are pathetic words. They are calculated
to appeal with force to the Italian who
loves his country. But when one looks more
closely into the list of Italian producers one is
disappointed to find the same familiar names as
before:<a name="FNanchor_20_20" id="FNanchor_20_20"></a><a href="#Footnote_20_20" class="fnanchor">[20]</a> Allgemeine Electricitäts Gesellschaft,
Thomson Houston, the Mannesmann Tubes
Co., the Italian Brown Boveri Co., etc. The
nationalist Italian press organ which first
directed public attention to these German
subtleties asks pertinently: “Were not and
are not the real producers named in this list
the same who were the prime movers in the
deplorable foreign conquest of the Italian
market?”<a name="FNanchor_21_21" id="FNanchor_21_21"></a><a href="#Footnote_21_21" class="fnanchor">[21]</a></p>
<p>The Banca Commerciale, which was admittedly
an all-powerful German institution,
and has the control, direct or indirect, of most
of the industries, the silk manufacture, metallurgical
and mechanical works of the country
and of thirty-four electrical companies in Italy:
which possess a capital of 434,000,000 francs
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42">[42]</a></span>and produce energy equal to 940,000 h.p.:
found itself in an unpleasant predicament as
soon as the King of Italy declared war against
Austria-Hungary. But Teuton resourcefulness
solved the problem with ease and seeming
thoroughness by inducing certain German
officials on the board to resign and appointing
as Italian director a gentleman known for his
philo-Germanism. But the three creators of
the bank were left: Herrn Joel, Toeplitz and
Weil, and although it was affirmed solemnly
that Joel was no longer the director but
M. Fenoglio, it has been publicly proved that
after the resignation of the former, the latter,
before sending a <i>consignment of gold to Berlin</i>,<a name="FNanchor_22_22" id="FNanchor_22_22"></a><a href="#Footnote_22_22" class="fnanchor">[22]</a>
had to ask for and actually received the
authorization of Herr Joel.<a name="FNanchor_23_23" id="FNanchor_23_23"></a><a href="#Footnote_23_23" class="fnanchor">[23]</a></p>
<p>The following brief summary of the companies
and enterprises in which the Banca
Commerciale is interested may enable the
British reader to form an idea of its decisive
influence on the economic and political life
of the Italian nation: they include eighteen
of the largest companies of textile industries;
sixteen of the most important companies of
chemical, electrical and kindred industries;
six of the chief companies of alimentation;
twenty-six transport companies; twenty-seven
of the principal companies of mechanical
industries and naval construction; six building
companies; five of the chief mining companies;
twenty-eight of the largest electrical companies;
and twenty-two miscellaneous.<a name="FNanchor_24_24" id="FNanchor_24_24"></a><a href="#Footnote_24_24" class="fnanchor">[24]</a></p>
<p>Thus every artery and vein of the economic
organism of Italy is swathed and pressed and
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">[43]</a></span>choked by this German isolator, which nobody dares
to pull away. For if we turn from the
economic to the political aspect of this curious
phenomenon, we shall find that the companies
enumerated give work to scores of thousands
of operators and employees, through whose
willing instrumentality they become vast electoral
agencies. “It is obvious,” we are authoritatively
assured, “that the influence of
such companies in administrative and political
elections is put forth in congruity with the
interests at stake, a circumstance which explains
how it comes that many Italian politicians
and representatives are, directly or otherwise,
chained to the chariot of the Banca
Commerciale and indirectly to that of Germany’s
policy.”<a name="FNanchor_25_25" id="FNanchor_25_25"></a><a href="#Footnote_25_25" class="fnanchor">[25]</a> In Italy the deputies are, with
few exceptions, the humble servants of their
constituents, and are powerless to shake themselves
free from local influences. “It is easy
to infer from this what efforts have to be made
and what compromises must be acquiesced in by
those deputies whose election depends on such
institutions which, aware that money is more
than ever the nerve of political contests, subscribe
to the election expenses, and assure in this way
the respectful gratitude of the parliamentary
recipients of their benefactions. And all this is
executed with order and discipline. Examples
could be quoted and names mentioned.”<a name="FNanchor_26_26" id="FNanchor_26_26"></a><a href="#Footnote_26_26" class="fnanchor">[26]</a></p>
<p>The unsuspected ways in which this remarkable
organization destroys, constructs and draws
its sustenance from its victims are a revelation.
Imagine a few British bankers possessed of two
hundred thousand pounds and conceiving the
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_44" id="Page_44">[44]</a></span>plan of wresting the economic markets of Italy
from Britain’s rivals, building up an all-powerful
organization with Italian money, throttling
Italian industries and commerce with the help
of Italian agents paid for the purpose out of
the hard-earned savings of the Italian people,
and then yoking the national policy to the
interests of Great Britain. One would laugh
to scorn such a mad scheme, and set down its
authors as wild visionaries. Yet that was the
programme of the little band of audacious
Germans who conceived the design of teutonizing
Italy. And they had almost realized it
when the war broke out. Even the halfpence
scraped together by poor emigrants and half-starved
Sicilian working-men were diverted from
the savings banks into banks of German origin,
two of which held four hundred million francs
of the nation’s economies a few months ago.</p>
<p>It was not to be expected that the domain
of foreign politics should long escape the notice
or be spared the experiments of this all-absorbing
organization. What excites our wonder
are the superiority of its method and the completeness
of its success. To the thinking of
Germany’s leaders international politics and
foreign trade are correlates. In the Near
East, where so many of Italy’s interests are
now concentrated, the Societa Commerciale
d’Oriente of Constantinople, being one of the
agencies of the Banca Commerciale, was also
one of the canals through which this influence
passed. Under the Italian flag and with the
co-operation of Italian diplomacy, that “little
business” of Germany was conscientiously
transacted which consisted in the adaptation
and employment of Italian expansion as an
instrument for Teutonic interpenetration.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_45" id="Page_45">[45]</a></span>
Whithersoever we turn our gaze we discern,
lurking under the comely vesture of Italy,
the clumsy form of the Teuton. It is
amusing to reflect that the recent railway
concessions in Asia Minor, for which Italian
statesmen laboured so hard and so long,
went in reality to the Banca Commerciale,
which is but a roundabout way of saying
to Germany. And in order to win their
suit and have those advantages conferred on
“Italy,” King Victor’s Government agreed to
renounce their claims for the reimbursement
of the expenses incurred during the administration
of the occupied Turkish islands. This
sacrifice meant tens of millions of francs, kept
from the pockets of Italian taxpayers and handed
over to the German bankers, who spent them in
promoting anti-Italian projects. The Bank of
Albania was also conceived originally as an organ
of German propaganda, and was pushed forward
by the same set of agents who induced the
Italian Government to employ them as its
own.</p>
<p>In those ways the seemingly modest little
bank scheme which Friedrich Weil with Crispi’s
help initiated in 1890, grew until it acquired
the influence of a State within the State. And
then it began to discharge functions unique
in the history of the banking world. Its
employees became diplomatists and statesmen
at a moment’s notice, ended wars, and drafted
treaties. The Banca Commerciale put a stop
to the campaign against Turkey which was a
thorn in the side of Teutonism and settled the
terms of peace in accordance with its own
judgment. It was not an ambassador or a
minister who opened the pourparlers in Stamboul
and continued them at Ouchy, but an<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_46" id="Page_46">[46]</a></span>
agent of the Banca Commerciale. It was
that same agent who immediately afterwards,
in concert with colleagues of his bank, negotiated
the treaty, reporting by telegraph to
the headquarters of the bank in Milan every
important conversation he had with the
Turkish delegates.<a name="FNanchor_27_27" id="FNanchor_27_27"></a><a href="#Footnote_27_27" class="fnanchor">[27]</a> At a later date important
conversations between the British Foreign
Office and the Consulta were entered into in
the name and for the alleged interests of Italy,
but the principal part in the drawing up of the
terms of the settlement arrived at was taken
by Signor Nogara of the Societa Commerciale
d’Oriente,—the company which the concessions
demanded were destined to benefit. In fine,
the parasite had thus become almost equal in
power to the body on which it battened.</p>
<p>A well-known politician and member of the
Italian Legislature, Di Cesaró, narrated the
following curious incident in a public speech
delivered on March 17, 1915: “An Italian
Admiral, having had the audacity to request
the immediate delivery of an order for arms
manufactured by the works which are under the
control of the Banca Commerciale, was relieved
of his functions within twenty-four hours, and
his place was taken by another Admiral, who
by chance happened to be the brother of one
of the negotiators of the Italo-Turkish Peace
of Ouchy.” And as we saw, the negotiators
of that peace were officials of the Banca
Commerciale. An authority on the subject<a name="FNanchor_28_28" id="FNanchor_28_28"></a><a href="#Footnote_28_28" class="fnanchor">[28]</a>
wrote: “For many years the Banca Commerciale
has contrived, directly or indirectly,
according to circumstances, to take a hand
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47">[47]</a></span>in the formation of various ministries.... As
a matter of fact, on its governing board there
are seven senators, many deputies, and a
numerous host of political notabilities. It has
its tentacles everywhere, high up and low
down, in Italy and abroad, in peace time and
in war time, when our native land is elated
with good fortune and when it is cast down
with bad. Its hand lies heavy upon everything
and everybody. It is the arbitress in
the choice of good and evil and is under no
obligation to render an account of its doings
to any one.... In war time we are certain
to feel greatly hampered by the meshes of
such a firmly woven net.”<a name="FNanchor_29_29" id="FNanchor_29_29"></a><a href="#Footnote_29_29" class="fnanchor">[29]</a> This anticipation
has since come true.</p>
<p>Like the vampire that soothes its victim
while drawing its life-blood, the parasitic
German organism cast a spell over influential
Italians of the community and imparted to
them a feeling that things were going well with
themselves and their country. Money passed
from hand to hand. Labour found remunerative
employment. Towns in decay were galvanized
into new life. And all Italy was grateful.
Milan, the “moral capital” of the kingdom,
where a couple of decades before the name
of Germany was execrated, became itself very
largely Teutonic and was dominated by a rich
and flourishing German colony. Venice, Genoa,
Rome, Florence, Naples, Palermo and Torino,
leavened in the same plentiful degree with
pushing subjects of the Kaiser, turned towards
Berlin as the sunflower towards the orb of day.</p>
<p>Against Austria, Italians might write and
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_48" id="Page_48">[48]</a></span>talk to their hearts’ content, but towards
Germany feelings of respect verging on awe
and of gratitude bordering on genuine friendship
were cherished by every institution and
leading individual in the kingdom. And when
the hour struck to wrench Italy from that
monster vampire, the task was so arduous
and fraught with such danger that no Cabinet
without the insistent encouragement of the
whole nation would have attempted it. The
policy of every Foreign Secretary was and still
is dominated by this unnatural relationship to
the Teuton, and it came at last to be acknowledged
as a political dogma that Germany must
in no case be confounded with Austria. Indeed,
it is fair to assert that the governing
circles of both countries held and hold that
nothing should be allowed to mar these
friendly feelings, not even the circumstance
that Germany as Austria’s ally is bound to
stand by her during the war. Hence when
the friction between Italy and Austria was
growing dangerous, Germany was ready with
two expedients for keeping her friendly intercourse
with the former country intact. She
first assumed the rôle of umpire between them,
endeavouring to beat down the demands of
the one while spurring on the other to a
higher degree of liberality, and when her
well-laid and skilfully executed plan unexpectedly
failed, in consequence of the interposition
of a <i>deus ex machina</i>, she produced
a draft treaty, complete in all details, which
was to rob war between Italy and herself, if
circumstances should render it unavoidable,
of all its frightfulness and savagery. The
two nations virtually said to one another:
“Whatever else we may do, we shall steer<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49">[49]</a></span>
clear of mutual hostilities to the best of our
ability. But as the action and reaction of
alliances may thwart our efforts and force
us into war against each other, we hereby
undertake that that war shall be but a
simulacrum of the struggle that we are at
present waging against all our other adversaries.
We shall respect each other’s property
religiously, for we shall both stand in need of
each other when the exhausting struggle is
ended and the wounds it inflicted have to be
dressed and healed. We Germans have invested
thousands of millions of francs in Italy,
the one foreign country for which we feel
genuine affection. You Italians have thriven
on our commercial and industrial enterprise.
Spare our property now and you shall not
rue your self-containment. After the war
the Entente people will shun us as lepers, and
our only hope of finding outlets for our commerce
is through the neutral States. Now,
of all the European Great Powers, Italy is
the only one qualified to render us great
services of this nature. And she will be glad
of a partner whose help is free from the alloy
of jealousy or hostility. For our interests do
not clash, whereas those of Italy and the
Entente Powers never can run parallel. In
the Adriatic she will find the Slavs pitted
against her, in Asia Minor the Russians,
French, British, Greeks, and in the Eastern
Mediterranean the three last-named States.
But at no point does Germany cross her path.
Our common hope in the future is based on
our experience of the past. It is knowledge
rather than trust. We Germans succeeded
in laying the foundations of your economic
strength. And now that Austria’s rivalry<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_50" id="Page_50">[50]</a></span>
has ceased, we will contribute to your political
growth. With the help of our organizing
talent you will become the France of the
future. Your population is already well-nigh
equal to that of the Republic. In ten years
it will be more numerous, and will still go on
increasing. Tunis has been built up by
Italian toil. Nature has assigned the Mediterranean
to Italy as her natural domain. The
overlordship of the Midland Sea is yours by
right, and in co-partnership with us you shall
assert and enforce this right. Mind your
steps, therefore, in performing the difficult
egg dance which the European War may
impose on us both. You are not, cannot be,
friends of France, closely though you are
related by blood. Neither can the French
become our friends. Therefore you and we
are natural allies, as your far-sighted politicians
like Crispi perceived. Even Sonnino
sees that and acknowledges it. The one
political idea of his life was to solder Italy
firmly to Germany. And that is still the
desire of your aristocracy. Fight with Austria,
if you must, but Italy and Germany
must not become armed enemies.”</p>
<p>Nearly two milliards of francs of German
money are invested in commercial and industrial
enterprises and immovable property in
Italy, besides the value of ships detained at
Italian ports, some of which have cargoes
valued at several million francs. The Kaiser
is himself the largest shareholder in the
Italian mercury mines of Monte Amiata, his
Foreign Secretary, von Jagow, is another.
And they are resolved not to relinquish their
hold. That Prince von Buelow should move
every lever to save this precious pledge was<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_51" id="Page_51">[51]</a></span>
natural, and that Italian statesmen with their
germanophile leanings should readily fall in
with his scheme is not to be wondered at.
The Kaiser’s ambassador proposed that in
the case of war each contracting party should
respect the property of the other. This
formula sounds decorous. Its meaning is
profound. A treaty embodying these stipulations
was agreed to and secretly signed by
Prince von Buelow and Baron Sidney
Sonnino, whose admiration for Germany embodied
itself in all the more important acts
of his political career. This transaction,
which the Italian Government wisely refrained
from publishing, was announced by
the Germans for reasons of their own. The
impression produced by this display of eclectic
affinities so pronounced that even the world’s
most ruthless war could not impair them was
considerable. And it would have been
heightened if the alleged and credible fact had
also been divulged that the diplomatic instrument
was ratified when Italy had already decided
upon war with Austria-Hungary. Between
Italy and Germany stands a bridge which both
peoples are resolved to keep intact at all costs.
Against the facts it is useless to argue.</p>
<p>The struggle between Germany and Italy,
therefore, should it ever break out, would
differ not merely in degree, but also, one
may take it, in kind, from the lawless and
ruthless savagery which characterizes the
warfare of the Teutons against the Entente
Powers. A civilizing mute would deaden the
resonance of bestial passion; and even private
property—in especial that of Germany—would
be safe from confiscation and wanton
destruction, and when peace is restored the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_52" id="Page_52">[52]</a></span>
rich mercury mines of Italy will again belong
to the Kaiser and his advisers. Last summer<a name="FNanchor_30_30" id="FNanchor_30_30"></a><a href="#Footnote_30_30" class="fnanchor">[30]</a>
a series of private meetings was held for three
days running in Switzerland, at which Germans
of high standing took part, for the
purpose of dealing with German capital in
Italy and safeguarding it during the war. At
one of the sittings it was computed that about
two milliards of francs belonging to German
subjects are buried in Italian undertakings or
in house or landed property.</p>
<p>In November 1915 the Italian Government
publicly applied one of the provisions of the
secret treaty in favour of Germany. At that
moment it was deemed necessary to commandeer
German ships in Italian ports for
the service of the navy and the mercantile
marine. Had it been a question of Austrian
vessels they would have been seized and
utilized without any such precautions. In
virtue of §4 of the Treaty the Italian authorities
undertook to pay a monthly sum to the
German owners for the use of their steamers.
That clause lays it down that the two contracting
states shall respect the enactment
made by the concluding section of Article VI
of the Hague Convention concerning the
treatment of enemy merchant vessels.</p>
<p>This treaty, then, is no mere scrap of
paper. It is a strong bridge spanning the
chasm between Italo-German friendship in
the past and Italo-German friendship after
the war. To take due note of this and of
like symptoms of the coming readjustment
of political and economic forces is one of the
primary duties of Entente statesmanship which
one piously hopes are being efficiently discharged.</p>
<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_15_15" id="Footnote_15_15"></a><a href="#FNanchor_15_15"><span class="label">[15]</span></a> Their names are Johann Assman and Rudolf Meyer.
Cf. <i>Novoye Vremya</i>, 11/24 August, 1915.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_16_16" id="Footnote_16_16"></a><a href="#FNanchor_16_16"><span class="label">[16]</span></a> <i>Rassegna Contemporanea.</i></p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_17_17" id="Footnote_17_17"></a><a href="#FNanchor_17_17"><span class="label">[17]</span></a> <i>L’Invasione tedesca in Italia</i>, p. 171.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_18_18" id="Footnote_18_18"></a><a href="#FNanchor_18_18"><span class="label">[18]</span></a> <i>Op. cit.</i>, p. 171.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_19_19" id="Footnote_19_19"></a><a href="#FNanchor_19_19"><span class="label">[19]</span></a> Cf. <i>L’Idea Nazionale</i>. The words “even now” refer to
November 22, 1915, and may be equally true to-day.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_20_20" id="Footnote_20_20"></a><a href="#FNanchor_20_20"><span class="label">[20]</span></a> Felix Deutsch, Karl Zander, Otto Joel, Karl von
Siemens, Walter Boveri, Karl Kapp, etc.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_21_21" id="Footnote_21_21"></a><a href="#FNanchor_21_21"><span class="label">[21]</span></a> <i>L’Idea Nazionale</i>, September 8, 1915.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_22_22" id="Footnote_22_22"></a><a href="#FNanchor_22_22"><span class="label">[22]</span></a> On May 21, 1915.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_23_23" id="Footnote_23_23"></a><a href="#FNanchor_23_23"><span class="label">[23]</span></a> <i>L’Idea Nazionale</i>, November 8, 1915.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_24_24" id="Footnote_24_24"></a><a href="#FNanchor_24_24"><span class="label">[24]</span></a> <i>Giornale d’Italia</i>, November 17, 1915.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_25_25" id="Footnote_25_25"></a><a href="#FNanchor_25_25"><span class="label">[25]</span></a> Cf. Preziosi, <i>La Germania a la Conquista dell’ Italia</i>,
p. 66.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_26_26" id="Footnote_26_26"></a><a href="#FNanchor_26_26"><span class="label">[26]</span></a> <i>Ibid.</i>, p. 67.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_27_27" id="Footnote_27_27"></a><a href="#FNanchor_27_27"><span class="label">[27]</span></a> Signor Preziosi gives the names of those agents as
MM. Volpi, Bertolini and Nogara (<i>op. cit.</i>, p. 71).</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_28_28" id="Footnote_28_28"></a><a href="#FNanchor_28_28"><span class="label">[28]</span></a> Professor Bondi, ex-Questor of Milan.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_29_29" id="Footnote_29_29"></a><a href="#FNanchor_29_29"><span class="label">[29]</span></a> Rivelazioni postume alle Memorie di un questore,
1913. Cf. Preziosi, <i>La Germania a la Conquista dell’
Italia</i>, p. 75 ff.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_30_30" id="Footnote_30_30"></a><a href="#FNanchor_30_30"><span class="label">[30]</span></a> 1915.</p></div>
</div>
<h2><a name="CHAPTER_V" id="CHAPTER_V"></a>CHAPTER V<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_53" id="Page_53">[53]</a></span></h2>
<h3>GERMANY AND RUSSIA</h3>
<p><span class="smcap">Turning</span> to our other ally, Russia, we find
that she underwent a course of treatment
similar to that which well-nigh prussianized
Italy. In the Tsardom the task was especially
easy owing largely to the advantages offered to
Teutonic immigrants from the days of yore,
to the German-speaking inhabitants of the
Baltic provinces, to the proselytizing German
schools which flourish in Petrograd, Moscow,
Odessa, Kieff, Saratoff, Simbirsk, Tiflis, Warsaw
and other centres, to German colonies
scattered over Russia and to religious sects.
During the Manchurian campaign the Commercial
Treaty drafted in Berlin, and at first
denounced by Count Witte as ruinous to
his country, was agreed to and signed.<a name="FNanchor_31_31" id="FNanchor_31_31"></a><a href="#Footnote_31_31" class="fnanchor">[31]</a> It
was Hobson’s choice. After that the empire,
which had already been a favourite and
fruitful field for Germany’s experiments, became
one of the most copious sources of
her national prosperity. Commercial push
and political espionage were so thoroughly
fused that no line of demarcation remained
visible.</p>
<p>Russia’s losses were proportionate and at
the time were computed at 35,000,000 marks a
year. In the Tsardom the imposition of this
tribute was resented. By the Teutons their
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_54" id="Page_54">[54]</a></span>economic victory was followed by political
influence. Their agents and spies abounded
everywhere. Time passed, and as relations
between the two empires grew tenser, the
danger defined itself in sharper outline to
the eyes of Russian statesmen, who resolved,
however, to postpone remedial measures until
the day should come for the discussion of
the renewal of the Commercial Treaty. The
knowledge that Russia would refuse either to
prolong that one-sided arrangement or to make
another like it, and that the consequences of
this refusal would be disastrous to Germany’s
economic and financial position, stimulated
German statesmen to bring matters to a head
before Russia could back her recalcitrance
with a reorganized army, and was one of
the contributory causes of the European
struggle.</p>
<p>Since then the war has flashed a brilliant
light on the dark places of German intrigue,
and some of the sights revealed are hardly
credible. Whithersoever one turns one is confronted
with the same striking phenomenon;
the preponderant influence wielded in almost
every walk of life, private and public, by
institutions and individuals who in some
open or clandestine way are under German
tutelage. In the sphere of economics this is
particularly noticeable. Three-fourths of
Russia’s foreign trade was in German hands.
Dealings between Russians and foreigners
were transacted chiefly through Germany.
Imports and exports passed principally through
German offices, established throughout the
length and breadth of the Tsardom, and commercial
dealings were conducted by merchants
in Berlin, Hamburg, Königsberg, Leipzig, and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_55" id="Page_55">[55]</a></span>
other centres of the Fatherland. Merchandise
was carried in and out of the country by
German railway lines, or to German ports in
German bottoms. Even American cotton and
Australian wool and tallow were disposed of
in Russia by German middlemen who had
them conveyed in German steamers. On the
other hand, Russian corn, sugar, spirits, were
taken to Europe by German transport firms.
Intending Russian emigrants were sought out
by agents of German steamship companies,
sent to German ports and accommodated on
German steamers. In brief, whenever the
Tsar’s subjects had anything to sell to the
foreigner or to buy from him, their first step
was to go in search of a German, through
whom the sale or purchase might be effected.</p>
<p>In domestic economics the same phenomenon
was everywhere noticeable. To a Russian’s
success in almost any commercial or industrial
venture, the co-operation of the German was
an indispensable condition. Individual enterprise
might sow and governmental legislation
might water, but it was German goodwill
that vouchsafed the fruit. Wherever Russian
industry showed its head, Germans flocked
thither to take the concern in hand, regulate
its growth, and co-ordinate its effects with
those of other industries which were under the
patronage of German banks. It was in vain
that Witte and his fellow workers threw up
barriers that seemed impassable to German
enterprise. They were turned with ease and
rapidity. Thus in order to protect the textile
industries of Moscow, prohibitive tariffs were
levied on textile fabrics of German origin.
But the irrepressible Teuton crossed the frontier,
established his factories in Poland, founded<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_56" id="Page_56">[56]</a></span>
the German-Jewish town of Lodz, and snapped
his fingers at the Government of the Tsar.
And forthwith Lodz assumed all the characteristics
of a German city. German schools
flourished there, German agents abounded,
German became the recognized language, and
permission was at one time given to German
reserves there, to undergo their periodic term
of military drill for the Kaiser’s army!</p>
<p>Of the three Entente Powers challenged by
Germany in 1914, Russia was therefore by far
the worst equipped for the unwonted effort
which the European War demanded of each.
For her liberty of action, and, in some cases,
even her liberty of choice, was hampered by
the financial, economic, and political network
which Germany had slowly and almost imperceptibly
woven over the entire population.
In the fine meshes of this net several organs
of national life were caught, immobilized and
connected with the Fatherland. And it was
not until they strove to move and discharge
their functions on behalf of the Russian nation
that they became fully conscious of their
plight. German intrigue and subterranean
scheming, under the mask of sympathy—now
for the autocracy, now for socialism—had
effected far-reaching changes in the Empire,
which few even among observant politicians
appear to have realized. These innovations
were embodied in the thraldom of Russian
banks to German financial institutions; in
the splendid organization which kept old
German colonies that were scattered over the
Empire in touch with each other, and co-ordinated
their action; in the eloquent Russian
advocates and influential dignitaries who contributed
to the furtherance of German ideas<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_57" id="Page_57">[57]</a></span>
and interests and swayed the policy of the
State; and in the dependence of the great
Russian Empire on its enemy for munitions,
and almost every other technical necessary
of war.</p>
<p>From the days of the great Peter this
Teuton influence had been creeping imperceptibly
over the Slav race like some cancerous
soul-growth. It infused a subtle poison in
the State organism, the most appalling effects
of which are only now assuming visible shape.
Two palace revolutions were brought about
by a national reaction against the predominance
of this foreign influence, which was resented
by the people not merely because it was alien,
but largely also because of its unscrupulous
and ruthless character. Some of the most
atrocious cruelties which students of Russian
history associate with court and political life
in the Tsardom, during the best part of two
centuries, had their sources in the sheer
malignity of Teuton Ministers who spoke and
acted in the name of the autocrat of the
moment. It is characteristic that the Minister
Münnich, in the school for officers which he
founded in Petersburg, had Russian history
eliminated from the programme as superfluous,
German history being allowed to remain; and
that out of 255 students, only eighteen studied
the Russian language, whereas 237 applied
themselves to German. The first Sovereign
to rebel against this Teuton supremacy in his
Empire was the late Alexander III., who made
no secret of his profound dislike for German
ways. But as the Russian proverb has it,
“one man in the field, is not a soldier.”
Hercules, to cleanse the Augean stables, had
need of the water of a river, and the anti-German<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_58" id="Page_58">[58]</a></span>
Tsar could not hope to make headway
without the co-operation of his army of
officials, who themselves were permeated with
the Teutonic spirit. And as passive resistance
was their attitude, his purging scheme was
abortive. As a matter of cool calculation,
the only hope of freeing Russia from the
meshes of the German net was a war between
the two peoples. And all radical legislation
had therefore to be postponed.</p>
<p>In the meanwhile the Germans, having
organized and primed their agents, have been
teutonizing Russia cunningly and effectively.
With the precious assistance of their own kith
and kin settled in the Baltic provinces and
elsewhere, they employed the never-failing
expedient of taking an active and, when
possible, a leading part in domestic Russian
politics, and invariably on both sides. At
the Court they have always been well represented,
and in the ranks of the inarticulate
and Parliamentary Opposition they have also
been playing a noteworthy part. In factories
and other industrial and commercial institutions
they arranged strikes, called indignation
meetings and hatched conspiracies at critical
junctures when it was to Germany’s interest
that Russia’s attention should be riveted
upon home affairs. No Parliamentary Bill
could be privately drafted, no railway scheme
could be secretly discussed, no Ministerial
measure could be canvassed; nay, seldom
could a confidential report be drawn up to the
Emperor himself without the knowledge of
the Berlin authorities and the occasional intervention
of their agents in Petrograd. It is
interesting to note that in 1914 a secret
memorandum of a highly confidential character,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_59" id="Page_59">[59]</a></span>
from a statesman to the Tsar, found its way
to Berlin soon after it had been presented to
the monarch and had a certain influence on
the decisions which led to the war.</p>
<p>The work of economic interpenetration
carried on under the ægis of such powerful
patrons and resourceful coadjutors was greatly
facilitated by the German colonies scattered
over Russia for generations. Many of these
foreigners had been invited by Catherine II.,
receiving large grants of land and various
privileges which enabled them to flourish at
the expense of the native population, on which
they looked down with open contempt.</p>
<p>At that time the extent of free land was
considerable in Bessarabia, Volhynia, and the
provinces of Kherson, Ekaterinoslav, Saratoff
and Samara, where down to the year 1915
entire cantons were inhabited by Germans.
In the Novouzensky canton, for example, they
constituted 40 per cent. of the population,
in that of Berdyansk 17 per cent. and in the
Akkerman canton 14 per cent. The inducements
which had been held out to them to
settle in these fertile districts were irresistible.
Each colonist received fifty dessiatines of
land,<a name="FNanchor_32_32" id="FNanchor_32_32"></a><a href="#Footnote_32_32" class="fnanchor">[32]</a> extensive pastures for cattle, grants
for the journey and the cost of stocking
his farm, absolute immunity from all taxes,
rates and military service, and complete local
autonomy apart from that of the Russian
community.</p>
<p>The Germans whom these boons attracted
were of two categories: sectarians (Menonites),
who eschewed military service on religious
grounds; and ne’er-do-wells, who objected
to the restraints of law and justice in the
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_60" id="Page_60">[60]</a></span>Fatherland; besides a considerable percentage
of tramps. Most of the men of the second
category fared as badly in their adopted
country as they had in their native land.
They gave themselves up to intemperance and
kindred vices, and their descendants still lead
a hand-to-mouth existence in the Tsardom
which their privileges alone could not better.
The sectarians, on the other hand, formed a
compact co-operative body, and by dint of
persevering industry and shrewdness, made
the most of their favoured position and prospered.
With their common savings they
purchased such vast tracts of land from the
neighbouring gentry that in time the Russian
population was constrained to emigrate to
Siberia and other distant parts of the Empire.
And when the present conflict was unchained
they were in possession of an area of fertile
land bigger than Pomerania, which is one of
the largest provinces of Prussia. In the Volga
country alone they owned 879,420 dessiatines,
or, say, 1,884,471 acres! In the south of
Russia there are 519 German settlements, and
the area they occupy is estimated at more
than 31,252 square versts.<a name="FNanchor_33_33" id="FNanchor_33_33"></a><a href="#Footnote_33_33" class="fnanchor">[33]</a> And the land
of the country gentry in the neighbouring
districts was fast passing into their hands.<a name="FNanchor_34_34" id="FNanchor_34_34"></a><a href="#Footnote_34_34" class="fnanchor">[34]</a>
They have their own local government, their
banks which help them to acquire Russian
land, their insurance companies and their
schools. In short, they were a compact little
State within the Tsardom.</p>
<p>The sectarians still hold aloof from the
native population. Indeed, almost the only
relations in which they stand to Russians are
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_61" id="Page_61">[61]</a></span>those of masters and agricultural labourers.
They hire Russian peasants to till their land
and they compel them to work hard for small
wages. Many of these colonies have the appearance
of little German towns. They have
added industrial pursuits to agricultural, possess
flour mills, timber mills, and plough their
farms with German implements. They are
aggressively German in sentiment, language,
character and Kultur.</p>
<p>That in brief is the history of one type of
German colonization in the Tsardom. There
is another at which it may not be amiss to
cast a glance. It is of recent date and consists
of German elements already resident in the
Tsardom. It is a monument of Teuton
audacity and Slav forbearance. One might
ransack the history of European nations without
finding another such instance of downright
effrontery and disloyalty on the part of a
privileged section of the community, and of
easy-going toleration on the part of the State.
The German elements of the provinces of
Kurland and Livland, subjects of the Tsar
though they are, resolved after the abortive
revolution of 1906 to raise a living wall against
the rising tide of Russian influence. And as
is the wont of the Teuton throughout the world,
they employed Russia’s men and Russia’s
money to achieve their anti-Russian object.
This object was to attract some twenty
thousand Germans to the province, provide
them with farms on easy terms, and look to
time, the industry of the men, the fecundity
of the women and the teachings of the schools
to create a new German State in that part
of the Russian Empire. It was part of the
functions of these colonists, we are frankly<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_62" id="Page_62">[62]</a></span>
told by their historiographer,<a name="FNanchor_35_35" id="FNanchor_35_35"></a><a href="#Footnote_35_35" class="fnanchor">[35]</a> “to serve, even
as armed defenders” against the Russians!
In no other country on the globe is such a
scheme conceivable.</p>
<p>The undertaking was organized and carried
out by two brothers, Brödrich by name, in
one of whom the Tsar’s Government placed
implicit confidence and evinced it by appointing
him to be chief of the police in the canton of
Goldingen. In this post of trust the German
leader was able to further the anti-Russian
cause materially. And he utilized his opportunities
to the utmost for the purpose during
the five years of his tenure of office. He
himself travelled in search of suitable German
colonists and had numerous agents on the
look-out for such. He finally got about 13,000
to settle in Kurland and 7000 in Livland.
The Kurlandische Kreditverein advanced the
necessary capital as mortgagee of the land,
and within five or six years many of the
colonists had already paid off their debts,
sold their farms to other Germans and bought
untilled land in the neighbourhood for themselves.
The school was responsible for the
required standard of German patriotism. The
success of the experiment exceeded the highest
expectations, and to-day the man of confidence
of the Tsar’s Government, Karl Robert
Brödrich, is become chief of the local administration
under Wilhelm II., and deservedly
enjoys the confidence of the Kaiser’s Ministers.</p>
<p>This type of German invasion in Russia,
especially in recent years, was carried out
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_63" id="Page_63">[63]</a></span>with a supreme disdain of the laws of the
Empire which is equally characteristic of
those who display and those who tolerate it.
In virtue of a law inscribed in the Statute
Book on 14/26 March 1887, foreigners are not
permitted to purchase or own land outside
the cities in the provinces of Kurland and Livland,
whereas in Esthland there is no such
prohibition. Yet in Esthland only 6396 dessiatines
belong to Germans, whereas in the
two provinces whence they are absolutely
excluded Germans possess 36,852 dessiatines
and 6396 dessiatines respectively! In the
territory of the Don Cossacks no foreigner
may possess land under any circumstance,
yet the Germans own there 3700 dessiatines.
Again, in the provinces of Podolia and Volhynia,
where, for State reasons, the ownership of
land is allowed only to Russians, Germans purchased
and own 63,831 dessiatines in the latter
province and 12,475 in the former. Altogether
the amount of Russian territory which passed
into the hands of the Teutons is enormous.
In July 1915, when the inventory was not yet
completed, the area inscribed had reached the
total of 2,450,000 dessiatines or about 5,250,000
acres.<a name="FNanchor_36_36" id="FNanchor_36_36"></a><a href="#Footnote_36_36" class="fnanchor">[36]</a> “This figure—” we are assured—“is still
far from complete, inasmuch as a large number
of data from various provinces have not been included
in it, and there are no entries at all for the
three provinces of the kingdom of Poland where
military operations are going on and where
unhappily the presence of German colonists has
been utilized by the German General Staff.”<a name="FNanchor_37_37" id="FNanchor_37_37"></a><a href="#Footnote_37_37" class="fnanchor">[37]</a></p>
<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_64" id="Page_64">[64]</a></span></p><p>In Poland there were well over 500,000
German colonists, besides a large number of
new-comers, whose unwritten “privileges”
included, as we saw, occasional permission
to their young men liable to serve a few weeks
annually in the ranks of the German army
to discharge that duty under German officers
in Russian Poland! In the Ukraine and the
most fertile districts of the Volga basin hundreds
of thousands of Germans lived, throve,
and upheld the traditions as well as the
language of the Fatherland, under the eyes
of tolerant local authorities.</p>
<p>Hard by old Novgorod, the once famous
Russian republic and cradle of the Russian
State, a number of German colonists settled
some 150 years ago. The population of two
of these settlements numbers several thousand
souls, descendants of the original settlers, in
the fourth and fifth generation. They had
had time enough, one would think, during
that century-and-a-half to assimilate Russian
ways and to acquire a thorough knowledge of
the Russian tongue. Well, these colonists do
not speak the language of the country in
which they and their forbears have been
living for over 150 years! They still consider
themselves German, and if you ask them who
their sovereign is they answer unhesitatingly—Kaiser
Wilhelm! During Russia’s recent
military reverses, which threatened for a time
to culminate in the capture of Riga, and
possibly of Petrograd as well, these parasites
in the body politic of Russia displayed their
joy in various unseemly ways, which aroused
the indignation of their Slav neighbours. In
one of their schools the Russian visiting
authorities were received with demonstrations<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_65" id="Page_65">[65]</a></span>
of hostility. It is usual for the portrait of the
Russian Tsar to be set up in every school in
the Empire. In one of these educational establishments
it was discovered in the lavatory
with the eyes gouged out.</p>
<p>Long before this war Berlin had become alive
to the importance of these colonies as factors
in the work of pacific interpenetration and
political propaganda. Wandering teachers
from the Fatherland were accordingly sent
among them to link them up with their brethren
at home, and fan the embers of patriotism
which long residence in the Tsardom had not
quenched. Little by little, the political fruits
of these apostolic labours began to show
themselves: the colonists, whose main preoccupation
had been to occupy the most
fertile soil in the district, began to take over
the approaches to Russia’s strategic plans,
and to display an absorbing interest in Russian
politics. Several Zemstvos fell into their
hands, and were practically controlled by
them, and they contrived to gain considerable
influence in the elections to the Duma.</p>
<p>The chance of a useful part for these German
colonies to perform having thus unexpectedly
arisen on the horizon, they seized it with
promptitude and utilized it with the thoroughness
that characterizes their race. The numbers
prosperity, and influence of the colonies grew
rapidly. Land that had belonged to the
Russian peasantry was taken over by the
foreign parasites, and while the Tsar’s Minister,
were toiling and moiling to transport hundreds
of thousands of Russian husbandmen and their
families in search of land beyond the Ural
Mountains to the virgin forests of Eastern
Siberia, there in the very heart of European<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_66" id="Page_66">[66]</a></span>
Russia were hundreds of thousands of intruders,
who, with the help of their German Colonial
banks, were acquiring additional tracts of land
from which their native owners had been ousted.</p>
<p>I pointed out this anomaly over and over
again, and long before the war I described it
in review articles. The well-known German
Professor, Hans Delbrück, replied shortly
afterwards, in the <i>Contemporary Review</i>,<a name="FNanchor_38_38" id="FNanchor_38_38"></a><a href="#Footnote_38_38" class="fnanchor">[38]</a>
denying point-blank the truth of my
statements, which were drawn from official
sources, and confirmed by the evidence
of my senses. For I had visited several
of the colonies in question. Besides these
German settlements, there had also been
a number of German industrial and commercial
establishments in the Empire which,
at first nowise harmful, were afterwards taken
in hand by emissaries from Berlin, linked up
together, affiliated to one or other of the great
financial houses of Germany, and transformed
into redoubtable instruments of Teuton domination.
Capital was subscribed, syndicates
were formed, railway-building and electro-technical
industries were organized, Russia’s
railways policy modified, and metallurgical
works were monopolized by the Germans.
Here again financial institutions discharged
the functions of motive power. At the beginning,
about thirty million roubles were subscribed
for the creation of banks, and by dint
of push, importunity, secret influence and
intrigue, these institutions received on deposit
the savings of the Russian peasant, merchant,
landowner, and official, which finally mounted
up to several hundreds of millions. With
this money they were enabled to control the
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_67" id="Page_67">[67]</a></span>markets and constrain Russian institutions
and individuals to bow to their will.</p>
<p>Contracts in Russia were appropriately
drafted in the German language, being directed
to the promotion of German interests. Incipient
and even long-established Russian firms
were either killed by unfair competition or
compelled to enter the syndicates and forego
their national character. Inventions and new
appliances were tested, plagiarized, and employed
in the service of the Fatherland. And
while preparing for the war which was to set
Germany above the nations—<i>Deutschland über
Alles</i>—these syndicates followed the policy
dictated from Berlin, sowed discord between
Russian firms and various State departments,
organized strikes and paid the strikers in
competing establishments, and thus deprived
the Russian State of industrial organs on
which it would necessarily have to rely in
war-time. To give but one example of this
cleverly devised attack, the cotton industry of
the Tsardom was in the hands of the Germans
when war was declared. Another of the most
important groups of Russian industries is
that of naphtha. When this precious liquid
is dear, many of the lesser works have to close;
when it is cheap, even small industrial enterprises
are able to go on working. By way
of obtaining complete control of this vital
element of Russia’s industrial life, the Deutsche
Bank went to work to form a syndicate, had
a number of private wells bought up, united
them in one, acquired numerous shares in
Russian oil companies, and had the manager
of another German bank—the well-known
Disconto Gesellschaft—made a member of
the Board of the Russian Nobel Company.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_68" id="Page_68">[68]</a></span></p>
<p>One of the results of this ingenious deal was
a sharp rise in the prices of all the products
and some of the by-products of naphtha.
The increase continued at an alarming rate,
filling the pockets of the German shareholders,
whose syndicates received the oil at cost
price for their own consumption, while Russian
firms were forced to acquire it at the market
value or to shut down their works. Amongst
the worst sufferers from these anti-Russian
tactics were the steam-navigation companies
of the Volga, which had jealously warded off
all attempts to germanize them.</p>
<p>In conditions as restrictive as these, it is
well-nigh impossible for Russian industry to
hold its own, much less prosper and grow.
And only the most vigorous and best-organized
enterprises in the Empire, like that of the
Morozoffs in Moscow, managed to pursue their
way unscathed. In Russian Poland, where
textile industries flourished, and the total
annual production was valued at 294,000,000
roubles, over one-third of these industries belonged
to the Germans, whose yearly output
amounted to more than one-half of the grand
total, <i>i.e.</i>, to 150,000,000 roubles.<a name="FNanchor_39_39" id="FNanchor_39_39"></a><a href="#Footnote_39_39" class="fnanchor">[39]</a> In all
these industrial and commercial campaigns
the German prime movers had carried out
their operations more or less openly. But
where interests affecting the defences of the
Empire were concerned, caution was the first
condition of success, and, as usual, the Teutons
proved supple and adaptable. By way of
levying an attack against the shipbuilding
industry, they pushed shaky Russian concerns
into the foreground, while studiously
keeping themselves out of view. Thus in
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_69" id="Page_69">[69]</a></span>one case new Russian banks were founded,
and old ones in a state of decay were revived
by means of German capital and encouraged
to form a syndicate with the Nikolayeffsky
shipbuilding works and certain foreign banks.
An official inquiry, presided over by Senator
Neidhardt, lately revealed the significant fact
that each firm of this syndicate had bound
itself to demand identical prices for the construction
of Russian ships, and under no
circumstances to abate an iota of the demand.
And it was further agreed that these prices
<i>should be so calculated as to yield to the members
of the syndicate one hundred per cent. profit</i>.</p>
<p>This allegation is not a mere inference, nor
a rumour. It is an established fact. Neither
is the proof circumstantial; it consists of the
original agreement in writing signed by the
authorized representatives of the institutions
concerned. The data were laid before the
members of the Russian Duma by A. N.
Khvostoff.<a name="FNanchor_40_40" id="FNanchor_40_40"></a><a href="#Footnote_40_40" class="fnanchor">[40]</a> Thus the Russian peasant is
taxed for the creation of a fleet, and the Duma
votes an initial credit of, say, 500,000,000
roubles for the purpose. And if the shipbuilding
companies and their financial bankers
were honest the aim could be achieved. But
in the circumstances what it comes to is that
the nation must pay 500,000,000 more, in
order to get what it wants. And this tax of
a hundred per cent. is levied by German parasites
on the Russian people. One might
scrutinize the history of corruption in every
country of Europe without finding anything
to beat this Teutonic device, which at the same
time gratified the cupidity of the money-makers
and dealt a stunning blow at the
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_70" id="Page_70">[70]</a></span>Russian State. Half of the shares of the
celebrated Putiloff munitions factory are said
to have belonged to the Austrian Skoda
Works.</p>
<p>At the outset of the present war, when
Russia’s needs were growing greater and more
pressing, the works controlled by Germans
and Germany’s agents diminished their output
steadily. In lieu of turning out, say, 30,000
poods of iron they would produce only 5,000,
and offer instead of the remainder verbal
explanations to the effect that lack of fuel or
damage to the machinery had caused the
diminution. Again, one of these ubiquitous
banks buys a large amount of corn or sugar,
but instead of having it conveyed to the
districts suffering from a dearth of that commodity,
deposits it in a safe place and waits.
In the meantime prices go up until they reach
the prohibition level. Then the bank sells its
stores in small quantities. The people suffer,
murmur, and blame the Government. Nor is
it only the average man who thus complains.
In the Duma the authorities have been severely
blamed for leaving the population to the mercy
of those money-grubbers whom German capital
and Russian tribute are making rich. “Averse
to go to the root of the matter,” one Deputy
complained, “the Government punishes a
woman who, on the market sells a herring
five copecks dearer than the current price,
yet at the same time it permits the Governors
to promulgate their own arbitrary laws
regulating imports and exports from their
own provinces. In this way Russia is split
up into sixty different regions, each one of
which pursues its own policy unchecked.”</p>
<p>The importance of the rôle played by the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_71" id="Page_71">[71]</a></span>
banks financed by German capital in Russia
can hardly be overstated. They advance money
on the crops and take railway and steamship
invoices as guarantees—they are centres of
information respecting everybody who resides
and everything that goes on in the district
and the province. I write with personal
knowledge of their working, for I watched
it at close quarters in the Volga district and
the Caucasus with the assistance of an experienced
bank manager. Their political
influence can be far-reaching, and the services
which they are enabled to render to the
Fatherland are appreciable. And they rendered
them willingly. As extenders of
Germany’s economic power in the Empire
they merited uncommonly well of their own
kindred. Thus of Russia’s total imports
in the year 1910, which were valued at
953,000,000 roubles, Germany alone contributed
goods computed at 440,000,000. These
consisted mainly of raw cotton, machinery,
prepared skins, chemical products, and wool.</p>
<p>How steadily our rivals kept ousting the
British out of Russian markets by those
means may be gathered from the following
comparative tables. The percentage of Russia’s
requirements supplied by the two competing
nations varied, during the fifteen years between
1898 and 1913, as follows—</p>
<table summary="stats">
<tr><td style="text-align: center"><i>Year.</i></td><td style="text-align: center"><i>Germany supplied.</i></td><td style="text-align: center"><i>Britain supplied.</i></td></tr>
<tr><td>1898-1902</td><td style="padding-right: 2em; padding-left: 4em">34·6 per cent.</td><td>18·6 per cent.</td></tr>
<tr><td>1903-1907</td><td style="padding-right: 2em; padding-left: 4em">37·2<span style="padding-left: 1.7em">"</span></td><td>14·8<span style="padding-left: 1.7em">"</span></td></tr>
<tr><td>1908-1910</td><td style="padding-right: 2em; padding-left: 4em">41·6<span style="padding-left: 1.7em">"</span></td><td>13·4<span style="padding-left: 1.7em">"</span></td></tr>
<tr><td>1911</td><td style="padding-right: 2em; padding-left: 4em">45·4<span style="padding-left: 1.7em">"</span></td><td>12·2<span style="padding-left: 1.7em">"</span></td></tr>
<tr><td>1912</td><td style="padding-right: 2em; padding-left: 4em">47·5<span style="padding-left: 1.7em">"</span></td><td>12·6<span style="padding-left: 1.7em">"</span></td></tr>
<tr><td>1913</td><td style="padding-right: 2em; padding-left: 4em">49·6<span style="padding-left: 1.7em">"</span></td><td>13·3<span style="padding-left: 1.7em">"</span></td></tr>
</table>
<p>In the year 1901 Germany supplied 31 per<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_72" id="Page_72">[72]</a></span>
cent. of the total value of Russia’s imports;
in 1905 her contribution was 42 per cent.;
and the increase went steadily forward, reaching
over 50 per cent. in the year 1913. If we
add to this the net profits of German industrial
and commercial undertakings in the Russian
Empire, we may form a notion of the appropriateness
of the comparison which likened
the Tsardom to a vast German colony. The
entire economic system of the country was
rapidly approaching the colonial type. And
to these economic results one should add the
political.</p>
<p>It is fair to assume that at the outset the
main motive of this industrial invasion was
the quest of commercial profit. Subconsciously
political objects may have been vaguely present
to the minds of these pioneers, as indeed they
have ever been to the various categories of
German emigrants in every land, European
and other. But in the first instance the
creation of German industries in Russia was
part of a deliberate plan to elude the heavy
tariffs on manufactured goods. It has been
aptly described by an Italian publicist<a name="FNanchor_41_41" id="FNanchor_41_41"></a><a href="#Footnote_41_41" class="fnanchor">[41]</a> as
legal contraband, and it supplies us with a
striking example of German enterprise and
tenacity. It attained its object fully. About
three-fourths of the textile and metallurgical
production in the Tsardom, the entire chemical
industry, the breweries, 85 per cent. of the
electrical works and 70 per cent. of gas
production were German. And of the capital
invested in private railways no less than
628,000,000 roubles belongs to Germans. Even
Russian municipalities were wont to apply to
Germany for their loans, and of the first issues
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_73" id="Page_73">[73]</a></span>of thirty-five Russian municipal loans no less
than twenty-two were raised in the Fatherland.</p>
<p>The necessity of waging war against this
potent enemy within the gates intensified
Russia’s initial difficulties to an extent that
can hardly be realized abroad, and was a
constant source of unexpected and disconcerting
obstacles. Some time before the opening
of the war, a feeling of restiveness, an impulse
to throw off the German yoke, had been
gradually displaying itself in the Press, in
commercial circles, and in the Duma. These
aspirations and strivings were focussed in the
firm resolve of the Russian Government, under
M. Kokofftseff, to refuse to renew the Treaty
of Commerce which was enabling Germany
to flood the Empire with her manufactures
and to extort a ruinous tribute from the
Russian nation. Two years more and the
negotiations on this burning topic would have
been inaugurated, and there is little doubt
in my mind—there was none in the mind of
the late Count Witte—that the upshot of these
conversations would have been a Russo-German
war. For there was no other less
drastic way of freeing the people from the
domination of German technical industries
and capital, and the consequent absorption
of native enterprise.</p>
<p>When diplomatic relations were broken off,
and war was finally declared, Germany was
already the unavowed protectress of Russia.
And when people point, as they frequently
do, to the war as the greatest blunder ever
committed by the Wilhelmstrasse since the
Fatherland became one and indivisible, I feel
unable to see with them eye to eye. Seemingly
it was indeed an egregious mistake, but<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_74" id="Page_74">[74]</a></span>
so obvious were the probable consequences
which made it appear so that even a German
of the Jingo type would have gladly avoided
it had there not been another and less
obvious side to the problem. We are not to
forget that in Berlin it was perfectly well
known that Russia was determined to withdraw
from her Teutonic neighbour the series
of one-sided privileges accorded to her by
the then existing Treaty of Commerce, and
that this determination would have been persisted
in, even at the risk of war. And for
war the year 1914 appeared to be far more
auspicious to the German than any subsequent
date.</p>
<p>Handicapped by these foreign parasites who
were systematically deadening the force of
its arm, the Russian nation stood its ground
and Germany drew the sword.</p>
<p>Improvisation—the worst possible form of
energy in a war crisis—was now the only
resource left to the Tsar’s Ministers. And the
financial problems had first of all to be faced.
In this, as in other spheres, the country was
bound by and to Germany, so that the task
may fairly be characterized as one of the most
arduous that was ever tackled by the Finance
Minister of any country—even if we include
the resourceful Calonne. And M. Bark, who
had recently come into office, was new not
only to the work, but also to the politics of
finance in general. Happily, his predecessor,
who, whatever his critics may advance to
the contrary, was one of the most careful
stewards the Empire has ever possessed, had
accumulated in the Imperial Bank a gold
reserve of over 1,603,000,000 roubles, besides
a deposit abroad of 140,720,000 roubles. Incidentally<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_75" id="Page_75">[75]</a></span>
it may be noted that no other bank
in the world has ever disposed of such a vast
gold reserve.</p>
<p>Although one of the richest countries in
Europe, Russia’s wealth is still under the earth,
and therefore merely potential. Her burden
of debt was heavy. For at the outbreak of
the war the disturbing effects of the Manchurian
campaign and its domestic sequel, which had
cost the country 3,016,000,000 roubles, had
not yet been wholly shaken off. And, unlike
her enemy, Russia had no special war fund
to draw upon. As the national industries
were unable to furnish the necessary supplies
to the army, large orders had to be placed
abroad and paid for in gold. At the same
moment Russia’s export trade practically
ceased, and together with it the one means
of appreciably easing the strain. The issue
of paper money in various forms was increased,
loans were raised, private capital was withdrawn
from the country, various less abundant
sources of public revenue vanished, and the
favourable balance of trade dropped from
442,000,000 roubles to 85,500,000. Germany,
on the other hand, possessed her war fund,
in addition to which she had levied a property
tax of a milliard marks a year before the
outbreak of hostilities; she further drew in
enormous sums in gold from circulation, and
generally mobilized her finances systematically.</p>
<p>But Russia was compelled to improvise,
to make bricks without straw. Her war on
a front of two thousand versts long had to be
waged with whatever materials happened to
be available. Japan—who, I have little doubt,
will be found at the close of the great struggle
to have benefited largely by her pains—exerted<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_76" id="Page_76">[76]</a></span>
herself to provide munitions for her new friend
and ally. The United States, Great Britain and
France also contributed their quota. For many
of these orders placed abroad gold had to be
exported, and as Russia has no other natural
way of importing gold but by selling corn,
which there were no means of transporting,
a sensible depreciation of the rouble resulted.
Great Britain and France have also had to
make heavy purchases abroad for their military
needs, but these two countries can still export
wares extensively and keep the payments
in gold within certain limits. Even Italy
receives a noteworthy part of her annual
revenue in the shape of emigrants’ remittances
from abroad. But once Russia’s gates were
closed and her corn had to remain in the
granaries, elevators, or at railway stations,
the shortage in her revenue became absolute.
During the first three months of the year 1915
the value of Russian exports over the Finnish
frontier and the Caucasian coast of the Black
Sea was only 23,000,000 roubles, showing a
falling off of about 93 per cent., as compared
with the worth of the produce exported during
the corresponding three months of the preceding
year.</p>
<p>It is a curious fact that part of this reduced
trade continued to be carried on with Germany
for months after the war had begun. A
Russian publicist has remarked that at the
opening of the campaign the voice of the
nation was heard saying: “Corn we have
in plenty, and vegetables and salt. It is we
who feed Europe. Germany will therefore
starve without our corn. Our armies may
retreat, but our corn will go with them; and
the more the Germans advance into Russia,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_77" id="Page_77">[77]</a></span>
the further they are away from their bread.”
And in this the average Russian saw a pledge
of victory. But before six months had lapsed,
the everyday man grew indignant. For he
learned that his corn was being conveyed
through Finland and Sweden into Germany,
and in such vast quantities as had never
before been heard of. Here is a street scene
illustrative of this traffic and the feelings
it aroused. A long string of carts laden with
flour blocks in one of the Petrograd streets
leading to a bridge over the Neva; a General
walking with his wife stops one of the drivers
and asks: “Wherever are you taking the
flour to?” “Where do you suppose? Sure
we’re taking it to the Germans. We have
to feed the creatures. They are a bit faint.”
“There you see!” exclaimed the General
to his wife; “didn’t I tell you? And every
morning without fail the same long line of
carts blocks the streets while our corn is being
taken to the Germans!”<a name="FNanchor_42_42" id="FNanchor_42_42"></a><a href="#Footnote_42_42" class="fnanchor">[42]</a> It is to be feared
that this commerce has not yet wholly ceased.
For the Russians, like ourselves, are considerate
of the Germans.</p>
<p>That that story of trading with the enemy
is no idle anecdote is evident from the circumstance,
based on official Russian statistics,
that during ten months from August to May,
while the war was being waged relentlessly
between the two empires, Russia bought from
Germany no less than 36,000,000 roubles’
worth of manufactures. How much the Central
Empires purchased from Russia, I am
unable to say. That commerce is one of the
almost inevitable consequences of improvisation
and one of the most sinister. Some
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_78" id="Page_78">[78]</a></span>months after the outbreak of the war the
Imperial Government levied a duty of a hundred
per cent. on all commodities coming
from Germany, Austria-Hungary, and Turkey.
That was assumed to be a prohibitive tariff.
But it failed to keep out imports from the
Fatherland. In the one month of April 1915,
Germany sent 3,000,000 roubles’ worth of
manufactured goods into Russia, and in May
2,500,000 roubles’ worth. And the Allied
Press was then descanting on the stagnation
in German trade and the starvation
of the German people. The explanation of
this anomaly lies in the unforeseen and
enormous scarcity and rise of prices in the
home markets. Some metal wares—for instance,
various kinds of instruments and of wire
appliances, etc.—are not to be had in Russia
for love or money, consequently a hundred per
cent. duty is but a heavy tax paid by the
consumer, not an effective prohibition.<a name="FNanchor_43_43" id="FNanchor_43_43"></a><a href="#Footnote_43_43" class="fnanchor">[43]</a> Since
then, I am assured, the Government has
adopted stringent measures which some people
believe to have put an end to that form of
trading with the enemy.</p>
<p>It is hard for foreigners to realize the plight
to which Russia has been reduced by the closing
of her gates. As the Nile waters were the
source of Egypt’s prosperity, so the abundant
Russian harvests constitute the life-giving
ichor which flows in the veins of the Russian
nation. Without superfluous corn for exportation,
the State would be unable to meet
its obligations, maintain its solvency, or provide
the motive power of progress. The
exportation of agricultural produce was the
fountain head not only of Russia’s material
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_79" id="Page_79">[79]</a></span>well-being, but of her moral and cultural
evolution: everything, in a word, was dependent
upon plentiful harvests and extensive
sales of cereals abroad. And, suddenly, the
gates were closed, the corn was stored, and the
nation left without its revenue. Nobody but
a Russian, or one who has lived long in the
country, can realize fully all that this tremendous
blow connotes. Parenthetically, it may
be remarked that it adds a motive, and one
of the most potent, to those which inspire
the heroic sacrifices of the people, quickening
the flame of devotion to their Allied cause.
Russia is now literally fighting for her own
liberty, for escape from the iron circle that
shuts her off from the sea, and isolates her
from the western world in which it is her
ambition and her mission to play a helpful
part.</p>
<p>One needs no further explanation why the
Russian Government put pressure upon M.
Delcassé and Sir Edward Grey to open the
Dardanelles route for the Russian corn.
Neither is it to be wondered at that while the
Allied Forces in Gallipoli were still grappling
with the Turks, the Tsar’s Ministers should
have thrust into the foreground the question
of Constantinople and the Straits, and insisted
upon an immediate pragmatic settlement.
True, that was not statesmanship; it was
anything but political wisdom; but at any
rate it was human on the part of all concerned.
If this Titanic struggle, in which Russia is
perhaps the greatest sufferer, is to bring her
any palpable and enduring advantage, this,
it was urged, can take but one form—freedom
from the preposterous restraints that bar her
way to the sea, and through the sea to the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_80" id="Page_80">[80]</a></span>
outside world. This and other pleas were
powerful; but for this very reason and for
the purpose of realizing her natural striving
I personally would have temporarily negatived
the Russian proposal and left nothing undone
to ensure its withdrawal. For if I were
asked to point to the efficient cause of the
Allies’ present lamentable plight in the Near
East, I should single out this premature
arrangement and its necessary consequences.
For Roumania and Bulgaria were at the
moment as bitterly opposed to Russia’s overlordship
in the Dardanelles and her possession
of Constantinople as were France and Great
Britain in the days of yore. And they
embodied their opposition in acts.</p>
<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_31_31" id="Footnote_31_31"></a><a href="#FNanchor_31_31"><span class="label">[31]</span></a> In June 1904.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_32_32" id="Footnote_32_32"></a><a href="#FNanchor_32_32"><span class="label">[32]</span></a> About 107 acres.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_33_33" id="Footnote_33_33"></a><a href="#FNanchor_33_33"><span class="label">[33]</span></a> One square verst is equal to 0·44 square mile.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_34_34" id="Footnote_34_34"></a><a href="#FNanchor_34_34"><span class="label">[34]</span></a> Cf. <i>Novoye Vremya</i>, October 5, 1914.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_35_35" id="Footnote_35_35"></a><a href="#FNanchor_35_35"><span class="label">[35]</span></a> His name is Dr. Fritz Wertheimer. His writings are
to be found in various periodicals. The essay from which
these data are taken was published in the <i>Frankfurter
Zeitung</i>, January 8, 1916.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_36_36" id="Footnote_36_36"></a><a href="#FNanchor_36_36"><span class="label">[36]</span></a> <i>Novoye Vremya</i>, July 2, 1915.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_37_37" id="Footnote_37_37"></a><a href="#FNanchor_37_37"><span class="label">[37]</span></a> By a law sanctioned by the Tsar, in February 1915,
the German Colonists of Southern and Western Russia
were obliged to sell their land to Russian subjects, and
they received ten months’ grace for the purpose.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_38_38" id="Footnote_38_38"></a><a href="#FNanchor_38_38"><span class="label">[38]</span></a> Cf. <i>Contemporary Review</i>, February 1911.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_39_39" id="Footnote_39_39"></a><a href="#FNanchor_39_39"><span class="label">[39]</span></a> Cf. Duma debates of August 1914.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_40_40" id="Footnote_40_40"></a><a href="#FNanchor_40_40"><span class="label">[40]</span></a> Cf. <i>Novoye Vremya</i>, August 17, 1915.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_41_41" id="Footnote_41_41"></a><a href="#FNanchor_41_41"><span class="label">[41]</span></a> Virginio Gayda.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_42_42" id="Footnote_42_42"></a><a href="#FNanchor_42_42"><span class="label">[42]</span></a> Cf. <i>Novoye Vremya</i>, February 24, 1915.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_43_43" id="Footnote_43_43"></a><a href="#FNanchor_43_43"><span class="label">[43]</span></a> Cf. <i>Utro Rossiyi</i>, August 28, 1915.</p></div>
</div>
<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VI" id="CHAPTER_VI"></a>CHAPTER VI<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_81" id="Page_81">[81]</a></span></h2>
<h3>THE STATESMANSHIP OF THE ENTENTE</h3>
<p><span class="smcap">One</span> of the most amazing phenomena of
Entente statesmanship during the present
European struggle, is the offhand readiness
with which the Governments of France and
Great Britain, yielding to abstract reasoning
founded upon gratuitous assumptions, not only
reversed the policy of centuries but committed
themselves to a wholly new departure which
was certain to raise up enemies to the Entente,
to render its task immeasurably more arduous,
and to lessen its means of achieving success.
However well Russia deserved of her allies,
however unquestionable her claim to the city
of Constantine, no less suitable a moment
could have been selected to press that claim
than the spring of 1915. The only evidence
we possess that the British statesmen primarily
responsible for this capital blunder were conscious
of the fateful character of this commitment,
is the extreme care they took to have
their responsibility shared by the members
of the Opposition, which at that time was not
represented in the Cabinet. But even with
this indication before us, we cannot believe
that even now this premature solution of a
secular problem on lines suggested by transient
episodes of a military campaign, has struck
the responsible statesmen in proportion to its
specific weight, the depth of its importance,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_82" id="Page_82">[82]</a></span>
and the nature of its consequences. To take
but one of these, we find that towards the end
of the second year of the campaign, Turkey
is one of the two key-positions of the international
situation. To conclude a separate
peace with that Power is become a pressing,
and would also be a feasible, task were it not
that this earmarking of Constantinople for
Russia constitutes an impassable barrier. No
Turkish Cabinet would or could conclude a
separate peace and strike up friendship with
the nations that are making ready to deprive the
Caliph of his capital. It would be a mistake,
however, to assume that this premature allotment
of Constantinople to Russia is the only
obstacle to the conclusion of a separate peace
with Turkey. There are also hindrances of a
military nature which would have to be displaced
before any decisive move in this direction
could be expected of the young Turks.</p>
<p>But it cannot be gainsaid that the most
formidable obstacle is that. Neither can it be
questioned that that premature arrangement
will, if the Allies emerge victorious from the
ordeal, thrust into the foreground of practical
politics a whole group of problems the most
delicate and dangerous that were ever yet
tackled by the inadequately equipped diplomacy
of the Allied Governments. It is then
that the Entente Powers will fully realize the
deluge to which they made such haste to
open the sluice-gates in the spring of 1915.
And the only way practicable out of this blind
alley would be the spontaneous abandonment
by the Russian Government of the right it possesses,
which however the Allies will certainly
never call in question. Whether the Tsar’s
Government believes such a sacrifice necessary,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_83" id="Page_83">[83]</a></span>
and whether, if they did, they could summon
up the courage requisite to make it, are
questions which Russia’s loyal allies have
neither the right nor the wish to raise. We
will carry out our obligations in the letter and
the spirit. If the Russian people, in the person
of their responsible organ, should renounce for
the moment the claims which we have formally
recognized and undertaken to enforce, this
decision will have been come to spontaneously
and without pressure or advice from their allies.</p>
<p>The extent to which the Teuton had his
own way among the easy-going Russian people
is hardly to be realized. It would be certainly
inexplicable in an empire governed on national
lines and conscious of its mission. For unlimited
pliancy was the quality which German
importunity evoked on the part of the highest
authorities. One of many examples is worth
recording. Among all industrial enterprises
the Russian Government is most sensitive
about that of high explosives. The manufacture
of these they had always rigorously
reserved for their own people, on obvious
grounds. Well, the moment the Germans
resolved to break down this barrier, they
found the means to do it despite the objection
raised by the Russian Press that it would be
dangerous to confide the production of high
explosives to foreigners and superlatively dangerous
to confide it to prospective enemies.
The prospective enemy carried the point, and
the manufacture of high explosives was handed
over to a German company, which built works
for the purpose near the Russian capital, and
had its headquarters and board of directors in
Berlin!<a name="FNanchor_44_44" id="FNanchor_44_44"></a><a href="#Footnote_44_44" class="fnanchor">[44]</a></p>
<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_84" id="Page_84">[84]</a></span></p>
<p>As in Italy, so in the Tsardom, one of the
principal levers of Teuton interpenetration
was the regulation of the national trade and
industry. That is to say, these were allowed
to subsist and thrive up to, but not beyond,
the point at which they were useful as adjuncts
of German enterprise. And the regulators
were principally two: the Treaty of Commerce
extorted from the Tsar’s Government during
the embarrassments caused by the Manchurian
campaign, and the German banks, which in
the empire paraded as Russian, just as in
Italy they were decked as Italian. Many of
those financial institutions were but branches
of German houses, and their methods were
identical with those of the Banca Commerciale:
long credits and easy modes of
repayment offered to all those who agreed
to deal with German firms, while discredit,
ostracism, and ruin threatened the recalcitrant.
And as Italian money and Italian institutions
were employed as instruments of German interpenetration
in foreign countries,<a name="FNanchor_45_45" id="FNanchor_45_45"></a><a href="#Footnote_45_45" class="fnanchor">[45]</a> so Russian
funds and banks were used as helps to German
interpenetration in Belgium and other lands.</p>
<p>A noteworthy instance of the ingenuity
with which this intricate mechanism was
worked came to light shortly before the outbreak
of the war. In Brussels there was a
branch of the Petrograd International Bank
which purported to be a purely Russian concern.
But once the Kaiser had sent his ultimatum
to the Tsar’s Government, the Russian
mask was doffed by the Brussels agency,
which forthwith appeared in its true colours
as a potent instrument of germanization in
Belgium. There was found to be almost
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_85" id="Page_85">[85]</a></span>nothing Russian about the bank but the name.
The staff, the language spoken, the methods
of business, the political sympathies, the aims
of the operations were all German. Out of the
forty-three permanent members of the staff,
thirty were German subjects, six Austrians,
two German-Swiss, two Belgians, one was a
Dutchman, one Turk, and there was a solitary
Russian. The moment Count Berchtold presented
his ultimatum to Serbia this “Russian”
bank refused to change any Russian
banknotes on any terms and let it be understood
that they were valueless. A panic on
the Belgian market was the immediate consequence.
Russian travellers had to deposit
their jewellery in pawn and pay exorbitant
rates of interest on loans. The bank itself
practised a kind of usury, and advanced only
sixty per cent. of the face value of notes issued
by the Imperial Bank of Russia. When the
Belgian Government, after the declaration of
war, began to tackle German espionage, this
“Russian” bank was found to be one of the
strongholds of the military spies. Certain of
the employees were permanent agents of the
German Military Attaché, and were at the same
time inscribed as members of the staff of the
Deutsche Bank of Berlin.</p>
<p>All those well-thought-out and successfully
executed schemes may bear in upon the
British people some notion of what is meant
by German organization and co-ordination,
and may also help them to gauge the chances
of success, military, diplomatic and economic,
on which the Allies, with their easy-going
ways, their hope of somehow “blundering
through,” and their lack of combination and
of plan—can rely when pitted against a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_86" id="Page_86">[86]</a></span>
mighty organism, disposing of the most redoubtable
forces ever created by human science
and skill, directed by a single mind, and
served with ascetic self-abnegation and religious
ardour by over a hundred million
people. The courage and faith of the Allies
in gazing for years upon this portentous engine
of destruction without making suitable provision
for the day when it would be turned
against themselves, will fill future generations
with amazement.</p>
<p>No bare enumeration of details can convey
an adequate idea of the vastness, compactness
and potency of the German organization which
kept the Russian Colossus partially paralysed
at home, while the Kaiser’s armies were dealing
it stunning blows on the battlefield. It is a
revelation which will be followed by a new
birth of the whole political world. The German
colonists, the wandering German commercial
travellers who acted as political spies, the
various banks, joint-stock companies, religious
sects, journals, reviews, schools, clubs, Lutheran
pastors, and other Teuton agents, were but
so many wheels and springs of the mighty
machine which was set in motion and kept
working by the political leaders in Berlin.
For all these firms and enterprises and individuals
from the Fatherland scattered over
the length and breadth of the Tsardom were
welded together in one vast organism by far-seeing
politicians who canalized every important
current of the nation’s life and imparted
to it the direction which German interests
required. No enterprise was too vast, no
detail too trivial, for the attention of these
moulders of Germany’s destinies.</p>
<p>All those activities, commercial, financial,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_87" id="Page_87">[87]</a></span>
industrial, journalistic, religious, political, the
German mind combined into a single idea, the
co-ordinate parts of which were studied and
regulated, not by party chiefs, but by qualified
experts, who, although specialists, subjected
them to organic treatment. In this respect
the German may be likened to a massive sombre
figure who, surrounded by a crowd of sprightly
shadowy nobodies, discoursing with easy
frivolity on grave subjects, is engrossed with
the task of destroying a great part of the frame-work
of the world in order to rebuild it after
his own plan. Unfortunately the extraordinary
enlargement of interest which marks the latter-day
political conceptions, and inspires the
fateful action of Germany’s acknowledged
leaders, breeds in the allied peoples not so much
a stern resolve to tame that revolutionary
nation at all costs, as a sentimental longing for
the return of the idyllic past, and an illusive
hope that by dint of mild Christian charity it
may yet be brought back.</p>
<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_44_44" id="Footnote_44_44"></a><a href="#FNanchor_44_44"><span class="label">[44]</span></a> <i>Novoye Vremya</i>, June 24, 1915.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_45_45" id="Footnote_45_45"></a><a href="#FNanchor_45_45"><span class="label">[45]</span></a> For example, the Banca Franco-Italiana in Brazil.</p></div>
</div>
<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VII" id="CHAPTER_VII"></a>CHAPTER VII<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_88" id="Page_88">[88]</a></span></h2>
<h3>TEUTON POLITICS</h3>
<p><span class="smcap">It</span> is this Teutonic power of looking far
ahead, this profundity of vision, this mingled
comprehensiveness and concentration, and the
marked success with which these qualities have
hitherto been exercised to the lasting detriment
of the Entente nations which looked on and
naïvely applauded, that fill the thoughtful
student with misgivings about the future.
True, it may not be too late for effective counter
measures. But two conditions are manifestly
essential to the successful application of
any remedy: first, that its necessity should be
felt and realized; and, second, that the scrupulosity
which at present hesitates to apply drastic
measures should yield to higher considerations
than those of individual delicacy of sentiment
and over-refined humanitarianism. When an
individual abuses laws and restraints which
bind his fellow-men, in order to inflict a deadly
injury on them, it is meet that they should
free themselves from those checks in their
dealings with him. For example, it may be
theoretically wrong, after the conclusion of
the present struggle, for our people to bear such
a grudge against the individual German as
would exclude him from communion and
intercourse with the nations of the Entente.
And this principle would seem to apply with
greater force to those Germans who might be<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_89" id="Page_89">[89]</a></span>
willing to abandon their nationality and
identify their aims, interests and strivings with
those of the nation in which they would fain
become incorporated. But when we reflect
that almost every German, whatever his calling,
how profound soever his debt of gratitude
to a foreign people, considers himself first and
always a member of his own country, works
for its interests to the detriment of all others,
and does not scruple to violate moral laws and
social traditions in order to betray his new
friends, we may well ask in virtue of what
precept we should abstain from ostracizing him
from the British Empire. His second nationality
is so often a mere mask to enable him to
perpetrate black treason, and it is so openly
thus regarded by his own Government, which
upholds and solemnly sanctions the principle,
that it would be inexplicable folly on the part
of the British nation to aid and abet its
enemies by admitting them to the freedom of
the community without taking effective precautions
against treason.</p>
<p>And yet there is a large body of men in this
country, as in France and Italy, who condemn
the demand for these precautions as un-Christian
and impolitic. Such laxness is the
soil in which thrives the upas tree whose shade
has so long darkened the organs of our empire
and now threatens to blight the whole organism.</p>
<p>An all-important feature in the controversy
which has arisen over the naturalization of
German subjects is the utterly amoral view of
it which underlies the attitude of the Kaiser’s
Government. According to these authorities,
whose utterances and acts are decisive and
final, a German, unlike every other subject,
may swear allegiance to two states, of which<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_90" id="Page_90">[90]</a></span>
one is his Fatherland, without being bound
by his oath to the other. Various reasons,
including material interests, may, it is argued,
make it desirable that he should acquire citizenship
in a foreign land; and the Kaiser’s Government,
for the good of the empire, recognizes
this necessity and facilitates the process by a
law. This law, which was enacted in July
1913, authorizes the born German subject,
having first made known his intention and
motive, to swear allegiance to a foreign state
without forfeiting, or intending to forfeit, the
rights or escaping from the duties which flow
from his German citizenship. Now this is
a privilege which not even the Pope has ever
claimed the faculty of according.</p>
<p>From the point of view of international
law this double naturalization is inadmissible.
Every individual in the community of nations
is the subject of a certain state, and only of
one, and whenever the interests of that state
run counter to those of any other, he is bound
legally as well as morally to promote the
former to the best of his ability and means.
The Teuton doctrine and practice are that
Germans may insinuate themselves into a
country, and in the guise of loyal citizens
become conversant with its secrets, and then
use them to its hurt. In the light of this law,
which was a custom long before it became a
statute, the number of Germans naturalized
in various countries grew amazingly during
the past fifteen years. In France, for example,
where there were only 38,000 foreigners naturalized
in the year 1896 and 65,000 in 1901, the
figure reached 90,000 in 1906 and 120,000 five
years later. And of these, four-fifths were
Germans and Austrians. Many Germans first<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_91" id="Page_91">[91]</a></span>
became Swiss or British subjects in order the
more easily to acquire the rights of Frenchmen.
One in particular, named Wilhelm Hellpern,
first became a Belgian, then as Willy Hellpern
a British subject, and finally, with a view to
obtaining a place on the Board of the Société
Française de l’Industrie Chimique, applied for
and received naturalization in France. This
“Willy” Hellpern was a representative of the
Central Gesellschaft für chemische Industrie.<a name="FNanchor_46_46" id="FNanchor_46_46"></a><a href="#Footnote_46_46" class="fnanchor">[46]</a></p>
<p>When war was declared in 1914 hundreds of
Germans applied for papers of naturalization in
Switzerland, and obtained them from various
little Swiss communes which were in sore want
of funds. Spies eager to place their machinations
under the protection of Swiss citizenship
found smooth ways to the desired goal. In the
single canton of Zurich demands for naturalization
rose from 260 during the nine months
ending in October 1913,<a name="FNanchor_47_47" id="FNanchor_47_47"></a><a href="#Footnote_47_47" class="fnanchor">[47]</a> to 732 in the corresponding
nine months of 1915. Several cases
of fraud were discovered during this rapid
process of transforming foreign into Swiss
citizens: one of the most salient being that of
Friedrich Wilhelm Frank, a German who had
taken out his naturalization papers in England
and then decided to shake off his acquired
British citizenship for that of the Helvetian
Republic. As Frank had not been resident
in Switzerland during the two years required
by the law of that country he applied and
paid for a false certificate of residence, and in
this way achieved his object. But the trick
was finally discovered and the naturalization
cancelled.</p>
<p>We may protest as vigorously as we will
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_92" id="Page_92">[92]</a></span>against this infamous troth-mongering which
is destructive of international relations, and
indirectly of social intercourse, but no responsible
government can afford to ignore the
necessity of guarding against its consequences.
For it is no ephemeral manifestation of temperament,
nor the passing whim of a political
party or a class. The law of double citizenship,
coupled with a plenary indulgence for treason
and perjury in the cause of the Fatherland, is
but the solemn consecration of a principle
which was long practised and is warmly
approved by the entire German people. The
Berlin Government publicly invoked it during
the latter half of the year 1915, under circumstances
which remove doubts on this score.
On one and the same day in August that year
all German official and non-official journals
published a notice, which ran as follows: “It
is alleged that in neutral countries, and particularly
in the United States of America, men
of German <i>extraction</i>” (the word <i>citizenship</i> is
not used, but <i>extraction</i>), “are employed as
workmen, engineers or in other capacities in
the production of war munitions for our
enemies. All those who thus reinforce the
military strength of our foes, thereby make
the prosecution of the war more difficult for
Germany, and not only burden themselves
with a heavy load of moral turpitude, but also
expose themselves—and many of them are
seemingly unaware of this—to the operation
of the German laws which punish high
treason.”</p>
<p>In other words, subjects of, say the American
Republic, who were born there of German
parents or grandparents and never acknowledged
any other government nor possessed<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_93" id="Page_93">[93]</a></span>
the citizenship of any other country, become
guilty of high treason if they dare to avail
themselves of the plenitude of the rights
which that citizenship confers. They may not
work for firms which supply the Allies because
their fathers, or it may be only their grandfathers,
happened to be Germans. The moral
duties of German subjects still lie heavy on
them, and they must execute the Kaiser’s will
to-day on pain of being dealt with as traitors
to the Fatherland.</p>
<p>Monstrous principles and revolting procedure
of this kind are calculated to kindle a blaze of
indignation in people who realize their effects
and set value on the boons of civilization or
Christianity. They are among the many new
ideas which Kultur has contributed to the
stock of weapons destructive of modern society.
One might term them the asphyxiating gases
of German international politics. In keeping
with these teachings and practices were the
theft of foreign passports by the German
Government which handed them over to spies,
as in the case of Lody, who was executed in
London in the early part of the war. Thus the
binding force of moral and of human law is
dissolved whenever it clashes with German
national, military, or commercial interests.
This dogma lies at the roots of Kultur.</p>
<p>By the time war was declared, Germany had
stretched forth her tentacles into various lands
and was draining the life-juices of many peoples.
Her footing in Italy, Russia, Belgium and
France was firm. Observant students of international
politics fancied they could determine
the approximate date when, if the then rate
of progress were maintained, Germany’s overlordship
over Europe would be definitely<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_94" id="Page_94">[94]</a></span>
established and all armed conflicts on the
Continent become thenceforth meaningless.
They were all the more puzzled at what they
set down as the egregious folly of jeopardizing
the precious fruits of forty years’ well-sustained
labours by precipitating a tremendous conflict
of doubtful issue. But besides the sudden
temptation to utilize a conjuncture of exceptionally
favourable promise, the leaders of the
Teutonic nations felt moved to appeal to arms
by certain slow, but steady, currents which
threatened to change the situation to Germany’s
detriment in the space of another few
years.</p>
<p>With the remoter causes of the Kaiser’s
fatal resolve, we are not now concerned. It
may suffice to know that they were numerous
and that the trend of their operation had been
for a few months unmistakable. Time, which
was working wonders for the Teuton in one
direction, was raising up redoubtable enemies
against him in another. For one thing Russia
was becoming transfigured. The dry bones of
the nation which the Germans often declared
was good only as ethnic manure had had life
and a soul breathed into them by the great
agrarian reform of which the credit belongs to
Witte and Stolypin. The latter statesman in
a series of conversations had in 1906 opened
his mind to me on the subject, and frankly
avowed that the Government, having gone
astray in its estimate of the Russian peasants
who turned out to be revolutionary and
anarchistic, was resolved to render them conservative
by giving them land and an interest
in the maintenance of law and order. That,
he informed me, was the aim and origin of the
agrarian law, and I expounded the theory, its<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_95" id="Page_95">[95]</a></span>
working and its anticipated consequences, in
a series of articles published at the time.<a name="FNanchor_48_48" id="FNanchor_48_48"></a><a href="#Footnote_48_48" class="fnanchor">[48]</a></p>
<p>Down to the year 1861 the Russian serfs
had been mostly bound to the soil. They were
emancipated by Alexander II., who ordered
each landowner to make over to the serfs as
much of his landed property as was being
actually cultivated by these. Wherever this
amount seemed too extensive for the support
of a family it was whittled down and the
residue left with the landlord. Each of the
various lots thus expropriated was given not
to an individual, nor to a family, but to the
village community. Each field was cut into
as many strips as there were farms, and each
farm had the use of one. Every year the
peasants had to pay a certain sum to the
landlord until the land was wholly redeemed,
and liability for these payments, like the
possession of the land, was common. Hence
the drunkards and the lazy paid little or
nothing. It was the community which decided
when the sowing and when the reaping should
take place. The results of this system were
baneful. And little by little the more enterprising
peasants who had no motive to improve
the value of the land which they were allowed
for a time to cultivate, migrated to the towns
and joined the growing army of working men.</p>
<p>How long this state of things would have
continued, if these immediate consequences had
formed the only objection to it, is uncertain.
But the Revolution of 1905-6 rendered it
wholly untenable. The peasantry, on whom
the Tsar and the Government counted for
support, readily followed the lead of every
anarchist and revolutionary who dangled the
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_96" id="Page_96">[96]</a></span>promise of free land before their eyes, and
gutted or burned the manors of the landlords.
With no conception of the sacredness, nor,
indeed, of the nature of property, they seized
what they could by force, and were gravely
disappointed when it was re-taken from them
by law. Stolypin’s scheme, as he himself propounded
it to me, was to enable the peasant
to acquire the land he tilled, and not merely the
scattered strips, but a compact farm capable
of supporting himself and his family. And
the system of collective liability for payments
to the State was abolished, together with
that of collective land-ownership.</p>
<p>This was in truth a genial reform, and the
business-like way in which it was carried out
did credit to the late Minister and the people.
Even now it is far from completed, but already
there are about six million peasant farms cut
out and allotted. In European Russia approximately
as many more remain to be apportioned.
The effects of this innovation were rapid and
encouraging. The value of the land rose
enormously in consequence of the intenser
culture and the increased yield. Under the
old arrangement Russia’s harvest of cereals
was barely enough to feed the population
inadequately, to supply seed and to enable a
limited amount of produce to be exported.
And as this limited amount was in practice
often exceeded, the food supply of the peasantry
was cut down in proportion. At present all
this has changed for the better and changed to
a greater extent than the outside world realizes.
One of the consequences of this betterment,
coupled with the decrease of drunkenness, is
the greater purchasing power of the peasant
and the growth of his requirements. So beneficial<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_97" id="Page_97">[97]</a></span>
and evident were the effects of this
reform, that some patriotic Russians gladly
saw their Government go to the very extreme
of pliancy towards Germany rather than run
the risk of a war and the danger of a break in
this remarkable career of national regeneration.
The process was noted and gauged by the Germans,
who awakened to the fact that, in a few
years more, the legend of Ilya Murometz would
be exemplified in latter-day Russia, and a
Colossus arise among the nations, which would
hinder the tide of Teutondom from inundating
Europe for all time.</p>
<p>Other considerations of a more pressing
character weighed with the statesmen of the
Wilhelmstrasse, whose survey of the international
situation was, at any rate, comprehensive.
Renascent Russia, for example, was,
as we saw, resolved to withdraw from the German
Empire the one-sided advantages accorded
by the Commercial Treaty. And as this question
would in any case become acute within two
years, that date was one of the time-limits of
the European war, and I ventured to designate
it as such to two of the most prominent statesmen
of the Entente in the month of March
1914. They both went so far as to say that
my anticipation was extremely probable.<a name="FNanchor_49_49" id="FNanchor_49_49"></a><a href="#Footnote_49_49" class="fnanchor">[49]</a></p>
<p>However this may be, Germany, who works
out her destinies by preventive wars, and
therefore never leaves the initiative to her
enemies or rivals, precipitated a conflict which
would, she believed, break out in any case
within a couple of years, and for which no more
auspicious moment could be chosen than the
end of July 1914, after the Kiel Canal had
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_98" id="Page_98">[98]</a></span>been made navigable for her largest battleships
and the harvest ingathered.</p>
<p>The year and month of the historic event
had been fixed by her leaders a considerable
time in advance, as we now know from incontrovertible
evidence. So, too, had the
choice of method, which was in harmony with
the usual formula, that Germany is never
the apparent aggressor, and that it is her
enemies who must be made to appear the
partisans of preventive war.</p>
<p>The principle was thus laid down by Bismarck
when he altered King Wilhelm’s historic
telegram from Ems: “Success essentially
depends upon the impression which the genesis
of the war makes on ourselves and others. It
is important that we should be the party
attacked.”<a name="FNanchor_50_50" id="FNanchor_50_50"></a><a href="#Footnote_50_50" class="fnanchor">[50]</a></p>
<p>Finally, the very day was determined—and
almost on the very eve it was changed to the
following day.</p>
<p>In connection with the date and the method
I have a curious tale to unfold which has never
yet been recounted in western Europe. The
incident in some respects bears an unmistakable
resemblance to the story of Bismarck’s
forgery of the Ems telegram and is well
worth relating<a name="FNanchor_51_51" id="FNanchor_51_51"></a><a href="#Footnote_51_51" class="fnanchor">[51]</a> and remembering. The main
features are as follows.</p>
<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_46_46" id="Footnote_46_46"></a><a href="#FNanchor_46_46"><span class="label">[46]</span></a> Cf. <i>Hors du Joug allemand</i>, par Léon Daudet.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_47_47" id="Footnote_47_47"></a><a href="#FNanchor_47_47"><span class="label">[47]</span></a> The number for the entire year was 350.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_48_48" id="Footnote_48_48"></a><a href="#FNanchor_48_48"><span class="label">[48]</span></a> In the <i>Daily Telegraph</i>.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_49_49" id="Footnote_49_49"></a><a href="#FNanchor_49_49"><span class="label">[49]</span></a> Count Witte went farther and fixed the end of 1915
as the date.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_50_50" id="Footnote_50_50"></a><a href="#FNanchor_50_50"><span class="label">[50]</span></a> <i>Bismarck: His Reflections and Reminiscences.</i></p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_51_51" id="Footnote_51_51"></a><a href="#FNanchor_51_51"><span class="label">[51]</span></a> My authority for the story is the principal observer,
who was also an actor in a part of this subsidiary little
drama: A. I. Markoff, who at that time represented the
semi-official Russian Telegraph Agency, as its head
correspondent in Berlin. He himself told me the story
in Stockholm and authorized me to make it known.</p></div>
</div>
<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VIII" id="CHAPTER_VIII"></a>CHAPTER VIII<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_99" id="Page_99">[99]</a></span></h2>
<h3>A MACHIAVELLIAN TRICK BY WHICH
RUSSIA’S HAND WAS FORCED</h3>
<p><span class="smcap">The</span> world is now aware, although it can
hardly be said to realize, how closely journalism
approaches to being a recognized organ of the
Imperial German Government. One of the
most influential of the Berlin journals during
the past ten years has been the <i>Lokal-Anzeiger</i>.
This paper was founded by Herr Scherl, one
of those clever enterprising business men who
have been so numerous, active and successful
in the Fatherland during the past quarter of
a century. His journal was a purely business
concern, carried on congruously with the law
of supply and demand and keeping pace with
the shifting requirements of the public and
the strongest currents in the Government. It
had long enjoyed the reputation of being a
semi-official organ, and it was Herr Scherl’s
ambition that it should be formally promoted
to that rank. In February 1914 he sold the
paper to a group of four persons, two of whom
were Herr Schorlmeyer and Count T. Winckler,
and all four were members of the political party
which looked for light and leading to the Crown
Prince and his military environment. Thus
the <i>Lokal-Anzeiger</i> became the organ of the
progressive military party, which was exerting
itself to the utmost to force the pace of the
Government towards the one consummation<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_100" id="Page_100">[100]</a></span>
from which the realization of Germany’s dream
of world-power was confidently expected.
Among the privileges accorded to the <i>Lokal-Anzeiger</i>
from the date of its purchase for the
behoof of the Crown Prince onward, was that
of publishing official military news before all
other papers, and not later even than the
<i>Militär-Wochenblatt</i>. Consequently, it thus
became the most trustworthy source of military
news in the Empire. This fact is worth bearing
in mind, for the sake of the light which it
diffuses on what follows.</p>
<p>War being foreseen and arranged for, much
careful thought was bestowed on the staging
of the last act of the diplomatic drama in
such a way as to create abroad an impression
favourable to Germany. The scheme finally
hit upon was simple. Russia was to be confronted
with a dilemma which would force her
into an attitude that would stir misgivings
even in her friends and drive a wedge between
her and her ally or else would involve her complete
withdrawal from the Balkans. The
latter alternative would have contented Germany
for the moment, who would then have
dispensed with a breach of the peace. For it
would have enabled the two Central Empires
to weld together the Balkan States and Turkey
in a powerful federation under their joint
protectorate, and would not only have simplified
Germany’s remaining task, but have
supplied her with adequate means of accomplishing
it against Russia and France
combined. Great Britain’s neutrality was
postulated as a matter of course.</p>
<p>Congruously with this plan, Russia was from
the very outset declared to be the Power on
which alone depended the outcome of the crisis.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_101" id="Page_101">[101]</a></span>
Upon her decision hung peace and war. On
July 24, telegraphing from Vienna, I announced
this on the highest authority,<a name="FNanchor_52_52" id="FNanchor_52_52"></a><a href="#Footnote_52_52" class="fnanchor">[52]</a> with
a degree of force and clearness which left no
room for doubt as to the aims, intentions and
preliminary accords of the two Central Empires.
I stated that if in the course of the Austro-Serbian
quarrel Russia were to mobilize,
Germany would at once answer by general
mobilization and war. For there will, then,
I added, be no demobilization but an armed
conflict. Before making that grave announcement,
I had had convincing assurances and
proofs that I was setting forth an absolute and
irrevocable decision arrived at by the Central
Empires on grounds wholly alien to the interests
and issues which were then engaging the Austrian
and Serbian Governments, and that a bellicose
mood had gained a firm hold on the minds of
the statesmen of Berlin and Vienna. Had that
deliberate statement been subjected to adequate
instead of the ordinary partial tests, the
full significance of the crisis would have been
realized by the Governments of the Entente.</p>
<p>In the course of the negotiations which were
then hastily improvised, Germany, who strove
hard to gain credit for the rôle of disinterested
peacemaker, gradually revealed herself as the
chief protagonist, whereas Austria was little
more than a pawn in the game. Disguising
her eagerness to provoke one of the two desired
solutions, Russia’s abandonment of Serbia or
her declaration of war, Germany succeeded in
misleading the Governments of France and
Britain as to her real intentions.</p>
<p>While M. Poincaré was in the Russian
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_102" id="Page_102">[102]</a></span>capital proposing toasts and drawing roseate
forecasts of the future, the German Ambassador
in Paris, von Schön, was constantly in attendance
at the Quai d’Orsay, endeavouring to
impress on the minds of the Acting Minister
and the permanent officials there, the sincerity
of the Kaiser’s eagerness for peace and the
growing danger of Russia’s aggressiveness.
“You and we,” he kept saying, “are the only
Continental Governments which are aware of
the magnitude of the issues and the imminence
of the danger. You and we perceive the utter
folly, the sheer criminality, of plunging Europe
in the horrors of a sanguinary war for the sake
of a petty state governed by regicides and
assassins. What interests have you or we to
risk the welfare of our respective nations for
the behoof of the Serbian military party whose
dreams of greatness border on mania? No, it
behoves us both to do all that lies in us to calm
Russia’s passion and induce her to listen to
the promptings of reason and self-interest.
You, with the powerful influence which your
friendship and alliance impart to your counsels,
and we by dint of example, ought to succeed in
averting this awful peril.” In this tone, Herr
von Schön delivered his daily exhortations and
found some willing listeners. His specious
pleading made a deep and favourable impression,
and would perhaps have led to representations
by the French Government calculated
to wound the susceptibilities and perhaps
estrange the sympathies of France’s ally at the
most critical hour of the alliance, had it not
been for the presence at the Foreign Office of
a man whose eye was sure and whose measurement
of forces, political and personal, was
accurate. That man was M. Berthelot. Gauging<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_103" id="Page_103">[103]</a></span>
aright this insidious appeal to the centrifugal
forces of the political mind, he turned
a deaf ear to von Schön’s suasive efforts and
kept the ship of state on its course, without
swerving. In this way what seemed to the
Berlin politicians the line of least resistance
was adequately reinforced and a formidable,
because crafty, attack repulsed.</p>
<p>But besides attack, the Germans had also a
problem of defence to engage their attention.
And, curiously enough, it appears to have been
particularly knotty in Austria. At that
moment Count Berchtold was Minister of
Foreign Affairs in name, but Count Tisza, the
Hungarian Premier, was the man who thought,
planned and acted for the Habsburg Monarchy.
He it was who had drawn up the ultimatum
to Serbia and made all requisite arrangements
for co-operation with Germany. He was
backed by the Chief of the General Staff,
Konrad von Hoetzendorff, whose eagerness to
provide an opportunity for displaying the
martial qualities of the army was proverbial.
But there were others in high places there who
had no wish to see the Dual Monarchy drawn
into a European war, and who would gladly
have come to an agreement with Russia on
the basis of such a compromise as Serbia’s reply
to the ultimatum promised to afford. Whether,
as seems very probable, this current bade fair
to gain the upper hand, it is still too soon to
determine with finality. There are certainly
many indications that this was one of the
dangers apprehended in Berlin. Russia’s
moderation was another. And the interplay
of the two might, had Germany held aloof,
have led to a compromise. For this reason
Germany did not stand aloof.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_104" id="Page_104">[104]</a></span></p>
<p>The date fixed for the German mobilization
was July 31. The evidence for this is to be
found in the date printed on the official order
which was posted up in the streets of Berlin,
but was crossed out and replaced by the words
“1st of August,” in writing, as there was no
time to reprint the text. It had been expected
in Berlin that Russia would have taken a
decision by July 30, either mobilizing or
knuckling down. Neither course, however,
had been adopted. Thereupon Germany became
nervous and went to work in the following
way.</p>
<p>On Thursday, July 30, at 2.25 p.m. a number
of newspaper boys appeared in the streets of
Berlin adjoining the Unter den Linden and
called out lustily: “<i>Lokal-Anzeiger</i> Supplement.
Grave News. Mobilization ordered
throughout the Empire.” Windows were
thrown wide open and stentorian voices called
for the Supplement. The boys were surrounded
by eager groups, who bought up the
stock of papers and then eagerly discussed the
event that was about to change and probably
to end the lives of many of the readers. It does
not appear that the Supplement was sold anywhere
outside that circumscribed district.
Now in that part of the town was situated
Wolff’s Press Bureau, where the official representatives
of Havas and the Russian Telegraphic
Agency sat and worked.</p>
<p>The correspondent of the latter agency,
having read the announcement of the <i>Lokal-Anzeiger</i>,
which was definitive and admitted
of no doubt, at once telephoned the news to
his Ambassador, M. Zverbeieff. During the
conversation that ensued the correspondent
was requested by the officials of the telephone<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_105" id="Page_105">[105]</a></span>
to speak in German, not in Russian. This was
an unusual procedure. The Ambassador could
hardly credit the tidings, so utterly were they
at variance with the information which he
possessed. He requested the correspondent
to repeat the contents of the announcement,
and then inquired: “Can I, in your opinion,
telegraph it to the Foreign Office?” The
answer being an emphatic affirmative, the
Ambassador despatched a message in cypher
to this effect to the Russian Minister of Foreign
Affairs. For there could be no doubt about the
accuracy of information thus deliberately given
to the public by the journal which possessed
a monopoly of military news and was the organ
of the Crown Prince. The Russian correspondent
also forwarded a telegram to the
Telegraphic Agency in Petrograd communicating
the fateful tidings.</p>
<p>Within half an hour the German Ministry
of Foreign Affairs telephoned to Wolff’s Bureau
to the effect that the report about the mobilization
order was not in harmony with fact, and
it also summoned the <i>Lokal-Anzeiger</i> to issue
a contradiction of the news on its own account.
This was duly done, and so rapidly that the
second Supplement was issued at about 3 p.m.
The explanation given by the newspaper staff
was that they were expecting an order for
general mobilization and had prepared a special
Supplement announcing it. This Supplement
was unfortunately left where the vendors saw
it, and thinking that it was meant for circulation
seized on all the copies they could find,
rushed into the streets and sold them. On
many grounds, however, this account is unsatisfactory.
Copies of a newspaper supplement
containing such momentous news are not<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_106" id="Page_106">[106]</a></span>
usually left where they can be found, removed
and sold by mere street vendors. Moreover,
the date, July 30, was printed on the supplement,
so that it was evidently meant to be
issued, as a matter of fact it was circulated only
in a very limited number of copies and in the
streets around Wolff’s Bureau, where it was
certain to produce the desired effect.</p>
<p>Half an hour later the correspondent of the
Russian Agency received a request to call at
the General Telegraph Office at once. On his
arrival he was asked to withdraw his two
telegrams which the Censor refused to transmit.
To his plea that so far as he knew there was
no censorship in Germany he received the reply
that it had just been instituted and now declined
to pass his telegrams. “In that case,”
he said, “my consent is of no importance,
seeing that the matter is already decided.”
Finally, he asked to have his messages returned
to him, but they would consent only to his
reading, not to his retaining, them.</p>
<p>The Russian Ambassador also despatched
an urgent <i>message en clair</i> to his Government
embodying the contradiction communicated
by the Wilhelmstrasse.</p>
<p>Now, the significant circumstance is that
the Ambassador’s first telegram stating that
general mobilization had been officially ordered
throughout the German Empire was forwarded
with speed and accuracy and reached the
Russian Foreign Minister without delay. And
this news was communicated to the Tsar, who
by way of counter-measure issued the order
to mobilize the forces of the Russian Empire.
But the Ambassador’s second telegram was
held back several hours and did not reach its
destination until the mischief was irremediable.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_107" id="Page_107">[107]</a></span>
That curious incident is of a piece with the
Bismarck’s Ems telegram.</p>
<p>It is by such devices that the German Government
is wont to launch into war. The
mentality whence they spring cannot be discarded
in a year or a generation, nor will any
Peace Treaty, however ingeniously worded,
prevent recourse being had to them in the
future. For this, among other reasons, more
trustworthy guarantees than scraps of paper
must be sought and found.</p>
<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_52_52" id="Footnote_52_52"></a><a href="#FNanchor_52_52"><span class="label">[52]</span></a> On 24th July I received this official information. It
was published on Monday, 27th.</p></div>
</div>
<h2><a name="CHAPTER_IX" id="CHAPTER_IX"></a>CHAPTER IX<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_108" id="Page_108">[108]</a></span></h2>
<h3>GERMAN PROPAGANDA IN SCANDINAVIA</h3>
<p><span class="smcap">The</span> same breadth of vision and efficacy of
treatment were similarly rewarded in the
Scandinavian countries, where German propaganda,
ever resourceful and many-sided, was
facilitated by kinship of race, language, folklore
and literature. Of the three kingdoms
Sweden, the strongest, was also the most impressible
owing to the further bond of fellowship
supplied by a common object of distrust—the
Russian empire. Suspicion and dislike
of the Tsardom had been long and successfully
inculcated by the German Press, from which
Sweden received her supply of daily news, and
also, as is usual in such cases, by prominent
natives who, in obedience to motives to which
history is indifferent, employed their influence
to spread suspicion. Sven Hedin rendered
invaluable services in this way to the Kaiser
and the Fatherland, throwing the glamour of
his name over a movement of which the ultimate
tendency was national suicide. Under
the auspices of a prussophile minority of
Swedish politicians, a few of whom were
supposed to favour the establishment of an
absolute monarchy like that of Prussia, a
clever campaign against the Tsardom was
inaugurated. Falsehoods were concocted,
imaginary dangers conjured up and described
as real, and sinister Russian designs against<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_109" id="Page_109">[109]</a></span>
the independence of Sweden and Norway were
invoked as motives for energetic action. In
vain the Tsar’s Government protested its
friendship for Sweden and disproved the poisonous
calumnies circulated by the Germans.</p>
<p>In the discovery and arrest of a number
of Russian military spies, who were as active
in Sweden as in other lands, and whose relations
with the Tsar’s Military Attaché in
Stockholm were said to be proven, these
agitators found the few solid facts that served
them as the groundwork of their fabric of
suspicion and calumny.</p>
<p>The results of this propaganda answered
the expectations of its German and Swedish
organizers. Despite the quieting assurances
given by the ex-Premier, the late Karl Staaff
and M. Branting, Sweden’s two foremost statesmen,
the present population was thoroughly
alarmed. They spontaneously taxed themselves
for new warships, insisted that a non-recurring
war-tax identical with that of
Germany should be imposed by the State,
and many called for the immediate adhesion
of Sweden to the Triple Alliance.</p>
<p>One of the fixed points of Russia’s policy,
the Swedish agitators told their fellow-countrymen,
is the acquisition of an ice-free
port which can be utilized in winter. The
Baltic ports do not answer this requirement,
not only because they freeze in the cold
season, but also, and especially, because the
narrow Sound can be easily blocked by a
hostile Power and Russia’s ships bottled up
in the Baltic. Hence the persevering efforts
she made at first to get possession of the
Dardanelles and obtain free access to the
Mediterranean in war-time. More than once<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_110" id="Page_110">[110]</a></span>
she was on the very point of achieving success
there, but lack of enterprise on the part of
her statesmen or a sudden adverse change in
the political conjuncture foiled this scheme,
the realization of which was put off indefinitely.
The Persian Gulf was the next
object of her designs, but there, too, she
encountered a diplomatic defeat. The third
goal lay in the Far East, where a new Russian
empire governed by a Viceroy and possessed
of a promising capital, was founded with
every prospect of good fortune. But here,
again, defective statesmanship was followed
by failure, and the campaign against Japan
closed the Far Eastern chapter for a long
while. Whither, it was asked, can Russia
turn now? Recent events, M. Sven Hedin
assured his countrymen, have already answered
the query. Northwards. The great
Slav Empire covets an ice-free harbour in
Norway, and until this war broke out was
busily engaged in compassing its end. At
any future moment it may again start off
on this enterprise. It is the duty of patriotic
Swedes to thwart this nefarious project.</p>
<p>A Norwegian port, it is freely admitted,
would not fulfil all Russia’s requirements.
It would, for instance, leave much to be desired
from an economic point of view. The
resources of the hinterland would be too
scanty. The cost of transport would be too
heavy. But strategically it would answer
the purpose admirably. Now this conquest
would not be achieved without invading and
annexing a portion of North Sweden as well.
For it would be impossible to keep and utilize
such an acquisition without a hinterland containing
factories, workshops, wharves, docks,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_111" id="Page_111">[111]</a></span>
stores and a fairly numerous population which,
in turn, would require corn, cattle, timber,
etc. Is it credible, asked M. Sven Hedin,
that the southern boundary of this back-land
could be drawn further northwards than to
the north of Ångermanland, Jämtland and
Drontheim? At bottom, then, it is the annexation
of a vast slice of Sweden proper that
Russia has in view. Perhaps the first route of
the Russian army would lie on the eastern bank
of the rivers Torne-älf and Muonio-älf and
lead to the Lyngen Fjord. How long would
it stop there? Step by step it would move
along the coast southwards to Drontheim.
Then Norrland would be surrounded on three
sides by Russians. “Later on they would
tighten the noose and strangle our country.
Are we to remain inactive during the course
of events?... The Swede in general is aware
of the existence of this danger and <i>knows</i> that
it may come upon him at any moment as a
reality.”</p>
<p>In verity, no normal individual, acquainted
with the political condition of Europe, can
be said to know that the peril of a Russian
invasion of Sweden exists or existed of late
years. As a matter of fact, he knows that
the contradictory proposition is true.</p>
<p>The symptoms of Russia’s alleged designs
on Norway and Sweden are as fantastic as
the sweeping statements by which they are
heralded. One of them was the order issued
by the Russian Government to build a railway
bridge over the Neva in Petrograd in
order to link the Finnish railway with all
the other stations which are situated on the
opposite bank of that river, as though the
Russian capital should be the only one in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_112" id="Page_112">[112]</a></span>
Europe without a girdle railway and Finland
the sole section of the empire cut off from
all the rest! Another of these “infallible
tokens” of Russia’s machinations were the
measures adopted to render the Finnish railways,
and, in particular, the Oesterbotten
line, capable of transporting Russian military
trains, by enlarging the stations, strengthening
the bridges and rails, and other kindred expedients.
Further, a number of new lines
were considered necessary from a strategic
point of view, one connecting Petersburg
with Wasa via Hiitola, Nyslott and Iyväskylä.
Barracks were built or ordered in
Fredrikshamn, Kouvala, Lahtis and other
Finnish towns, or railway centres. All these
precautions, however, are not only explicable
without the theory that Sweden and Norway
are to be invaded, but they ought to have
been adopted long ago, say unprejudiced
military authorities, in the interests of Russia’s
home defence. Yet M. Sven Hedin concluded
his argument with the words: “When it has
been further established that the transport
of Russian troops to Finland has greatly increased—and
it is affirmed that there are
already about 85,000 soldiers there—and when
we also bear in mind that for many years past
Sweden and likewise Norway have been visited
by so-called knife-grinders<a name="FNanchor_53_53" id="FNanchor_53_53"></a><a href="#Footnote_53_53" class="fnanchor">[53]</a> from Russia, <i>no
doubt can remain. Russia is making ready for
an onslaught on the Northern kingdoms.</i>”</p>
<p>But long before Sven Hedin and his friends
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_113" id="Page_113">[113]</a></span>had begun their campaign, the ground had been
prepared from Berlin, the work of interpenetration
had made great headway, and Germany
was regarded by Sweden as an elder sister. For
the economic invasion preceded the political.
Statistics of foreign trade reveal the Teuton
as the exporter to that country of over forty
per cent. of the entire quantity of merchandise
entering from abroad.<a name="FNanchor_54_54" id="FNanchor_54_54"></a><a href="#Footnote_54_54" class="fnanchor">[54]</a></p>
<p>Switzerland, whose position as a neutral
oasis encircled by belligerents is fraught with
difficulty, has long been treated as hardly
more than an adjunct of the German empire,
and many of the best Swiss writers, far from
resenting this affront, welcome it as a compliment.
Just as Americans occasionally write
about “<i>the</i> King” when alluding to the
British Sovereign, so the Swiss often fall into
the way of describing the operations of “our
army,” “our cause,” when alluding to the
Kaiser’s troops and German designs.</p>
<p>Several times during the progress of the
war the conduct of Swiss organizations and
individuals towards the two groups of belligerents
aroused grounded misgivings in the
minds of the French, British and Italians
who asked only for the observance of strict
neutrality. One remarkable instance of the
pro-German leanings complained of was the
absolute and persistent refusal of the Swiss
to submit to reasonable restrictions respecting
the sale to Germany and Austria of goods
exported to Switzerland by the allied countries.
This refusal was all the more significant that
it came after the secret acquiescence in the
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_114" id="Page_114">[114]</a></span>more stringent limitations which had been
imposed on them by the Germans. Thus two
wholly different sets of weights and measures
would appear to have been employed by the
spokesmen of the little Republic in their
dealings with the two groups of warring
Powers. And it was always Germany who
obtained preferential treatment.</p>
<p>This bias springs from causes which are
stable and deep-rooted. The bulk of the
Swiss people are frankly pro-German in their
sympathies and their military chiefs side with
the Teuton on most of those questions of
principle which form the line of cleavage
between him and the allied peoples. That
the end justifies the means, is one of those
axioms which the authorities of the Swiss
Republic appear to have endorsed without
hesitation. In the month of March 1916
two Swiss Colonels, Egli and de Wattenwyl,
were tried on two charges which, if proved,
would, it was somewhat hastily assumed,
bring down severe retribution on their heads.
It was alleged that they had communicated
to the German military authorities important
telegraphic messages intercepted on their way
from the Allies. But the evidence adduced
was deemed insufficient to bear out this indictment.
The other charge was that they
had regularly handed on the confidential
bulletin of the Swiss General Staff to the
military <i>attachés</i> of the Central Empires in
Berne and only to them. And the count was
proven to the satisfaction of the tribunal.
Now this act admittedly constituted a breach
of neutrality. Yet the Chief of the Swiss
General Staff, Colonel Sprecher, defended the
accused men on the singular ground that their<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_115" id="Page_115">[115]</a></span>
action—that is to say, a grave breach of
neutrality to the detriment of the allied
nations—was excusable because of the end in
view, which was to gain in exchange useful
information for the Intelligence Department
of the War Office. This plea is based on the
German military principle that the means are
hallowed by the end.</p>
<p>It is some satisfaction, however, to note that
in the Romande cantons of the Republic a
series of protests have been made against the
spirit of Prussian military amorality which,
as the pleadings and the acquittal of the
two officers showed, permeates the military
circles of that little State whose very existence
depends on its neutrality.</p>
<p>Kultur is widely diffused throughout the
German-speaking cantons of Switzerland. The
German Universities of the Republic are regarded
and treated as Universities of the
Fatherland and their professors interchanged.
And when we further reflect that Germany
exports to Switzerland goods to the value of
680,870,000 francs as against 347,985,000 exported
by France, who stands second on the
list, that German Universities and those of
German Switzerland elect their professors indiscriminately
from among candidates of both
countries, and that German is spoken in
Switzerland by more than 2,500,000 inhabitants
as against 796,244 who use French—one cannot
affect surprise at much that called for comment
before the war and provoked mild deprecation
throughout its first phase.</p>
<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_53_53" id="Footnote_53_53"></a><a href="#FNanchor_53_53"><span class="label">[53]</span></a> Several Russian “knife-grinders” are alleged to
have been discovered in various parts of Sweden, moving
from place to place, with maps of various districts and
a good deal of money in their pockets. The Swedes
declare that they are Russian spies.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_54_54" id="Footnote_54_54"></a><a href="#FNanchor_54_54"><span class="label">[54]</span></a> The value of wares she sold to Sweden in 1911 is
computed at 275,423,000 krons as against 170,999,000
krons’ worth purchased from Great Britain.</p></div>
</div>
<h2><a name="CHAPTER_X" id="CHAPTER_X"></a>CHAPTER X<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_116" id="Page_116">[116]</a></span></h2>
<h3>GERMANY AND THE BALKANS</h3>
<p><span class="smcap">For</span> two decades the Balkan States and
Turkey had been objects of Germany’s especial
solicitude. And with reason. For the part
allotted to them in the plan for teutonizing
Europe was of the utmost moment. The high
road from Berlin to the Near East passed
through Budapest and the Balkans. And
Austria, as the pioneer of German Kultur
there, kept her gaze fixed and her efforts
concentrated on Salonica. Bulgaria’s goodwill
had been acquired through Ferdinand of
Coburg, himself an Austro-Hungarian officer,
and was maintained by Austria’s energetic
championship of Bulgaria’s claims against
Serbia. Counts Aehrenthal and Berchtold
destined Bulgaria and Roumania to coalesce
and form the nucleus of a permanent Balkan
confederation to be patronized and protected
by the Habsburgs.</p>
<p>But circumstance thwarted the design.
And after the Balkan League had done its
work and Turkey’s grasp on Europe had
relaxed, Bulgaria, in the person of Ferdinand,
was brought to undo what without her lead
could not then have been achieved, to fall foul
of her allies and smash the coalition.</p>
<p>This incitement was unwelcome to many of
Bulgaria’s trusty leaders, who, much though
they might grudge Serbia’s successes and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_117" id="Page_117">[117]</a></span>
rapid growth, were of opinion that Bulgaria
would be ill-advised to break her connection
with the Slav cause. But the leaders unexpectedly
found that they were being led, and
led away from the natural friends of Bulgaria
by the German prince who had caused the
death of Bulgaria’s greatest statesman and
made no secret of his contempt for the Bulgarian
people generally. Ferdinand, assuming
autocratic power, rendered this inestimable
service to the Teutons and fastened the Bulgarian
State to the Central Empires.</p>
<p>At some time before the outbreak of the
war Ferdinand had struck up a compact with
the Central Empires which bound Bulgaria
to follow their lead. This he did at his own
risk and on his own responsibility. I had
grounds for believing in the existence of some
such covenant a considerable time before the
storm burst, but I had no tangible proof of
it. In July 1914, however, I knew it for
certain, but without having ascertained the
particulars. When and by whom it had been
signed, and what were the main stipulations
agreed upon, still remained in the domain of
speculation. I discovered, however, that Bulgaria’s
hands were tied; that her mourning
for lost Macedonia would not last long; that
the aims she pursued were the policy of the
outlet on four seas, and the territorial separation
of Greece and Serbia; that her rôle in
the Peninsula was to be predominant; that
she had been chosen to supplant Serbia as the
leading Balkan State, and would pay tribute
to the Central Empires in the shape of docility
to and ready co-operation with them; and
that Roumania would, if she continued to
find favour in the eyes of the statesmen of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_118" id="Page_118">[118]</a></span>
Vienna and Berlin, be associated with Bulgaria,
but without attaining her rank or
acquiring her power.</p>
<p>It has since been positively asserted by
M. Filipescu, an ex-Cabinet Minister of
Roumania, that “towards the mid-August
1914, when the treaty was concluded which
bound Bulgaria to Germany, the Roumanian
Minister in Berlin, M. Beldiman, had cognizance
of this treaty and apprised the
Roumanian Government of the fact.”<a name="FNanchor_55_55" id="FNanchor_55_55"></a><a href="#Footnote_55_55" class="fnanchor">[55]</a>
M. Take Jonescu, the illustrious Roumanian
statesman, has assigned a different date to
the conclusion of the agreement, but confirmed
the fact of its existence in the course
of a conversation which has also been made
public.[2] He stated that the King of Bulgaria,
“who is swayed more by personal rancour
than by the interests of his people, imposed
his policy on them. He allied himself with
the Germans as long ago as Spring 1914. The
treaty was taken from Sofia to Berlin by an
official of the Deutsche Bank.”<a name="FNanchor_56_56" id="FNanchor_56_56"></a><a href="#Footnote_56_56" class="fnanchor">[56]</a></p>
<p>Whatever doubts may prevail respecting
the exact date, the main fact is established—Ferdinand
bound Bulgaria to the Central
Empires.</p>
<p>Personal interest as well as State reasons
determined him to place himself under
Austro-German protection. It was at Austria’s
instigation that he had spurned the
advice of his official advisers, treacherously
attacked his allies and brought down defeat
upon his armies and discredit upon himself.
But the Habsburg Government had undertaken
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_119" id="Page_119">[119]</a></span>to see him through the ordeal to which
he was then subjected by his own people.
The Treaty of Bucharest, which deprived
Bulgaria of Kavalla and Salonica, left the
wound to fester and Austro-Bulgarian friendship
to harden into a definite alliance. None
the less Bulgaria’s friendship with the Central
Empires was not openly manifested until the
financial transaction was concluded between
them which made Bulgaria the creditor of
Austria-Hungary shortly before the outbreak
of the war.</p>
<p>Economically, Bulgaria, like her neighbours,
had long been a tributary of the Central
Empires. German and Austrian interests
were cunningly intertwined with Bulgarian
in almost every branch of national life. The
banks, financial houses, export firms, are all
under Austrian or German control. In the
army, too, despite its Russian training and
traditions, there was a party of officers whose
admiration for the war-lord ran away with
their discretion. And the celebrated loan of
half a milliard francs, which Austrian financiers
undertook to advance to Bulgaria—on outrageously
oppressive conditions—set the crown
to the work of many years. This transaction
was not intended by either party to be purely
financial. Its political bearings were evidenced
by the circumstances in which it was negotiated
and the terms on which it was concluded.
But the economic concessions insisted upon by
Austria and conceded by Bulgaria constituted
of themselves a convincing proof of the design
to reduce the latter country to the position
of one of the dependents of the Central
Empires.</p>
<p>Of all the recognized agencies for penetrating<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_120" id="Page_120">[120]</a></span>
international opinion, swaying international
sentiment, and influencing international
action, one of the most abiding and decisive
is that of royal courts. Yet its value was not
merely underrated by Britain, France and
Russia, but was completely ignored. And
Germany, whose diplomacy, in spite of its
clumsiness and brutality, was far-sighted and
assiduous in watching for and utilizing every
opportunity of smoothing the way for the
execution of the grandiose plan, purveyed
almost every court and throne in Europe with
kings, queens and princesses of its own. And
those who were neither Germans by birth nor
connected with Germans by marriage were
influenced by education, by military training,
or at least by a system of atmosphering which,
with certain striking examples before one, could
be reduced to a few clear rules.</p>
<p>Roumania at the opening of the war was
governed by a Hohenzollern prince who had
linked the destinies of his country with those
of Austria-Hungary as far back as the year
1880, and, having renewed the secret convention
in 1913, which for him was no mere scrap
of paper, convoked a crown council in August
1914 and proposed that Roumania should
redeem his pledge and take the field against
the enemies of the Central Empires. But
King Carol’s military ardour was not merely
damped but choked by a recalcitrant cabinet.</p>
<p>That monarch’s influence as a pioneer of
Teuton Kultur in Roumania can hardly be
exaggerated. An upright ruler, who discharged
his duties conscientiously, the King reckoned
among these the dissipation of native gloom
by means of German light. And during his
long reign he succeeded in spreading a network<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_121" id="Page_121">[121]</a></span>
of German economic interests throughout
his realm which, while raising the material
level of the nation, has reduced it to the
position of a German tributary. It would be
unjust to make this a subject of reproach to
the monarch who acted up to his lights, but
it would be a mistake to belittle the vast
services thus rendered by a single individual
to the Teuton race, or to overlook the degree
of responsibility that attaches to the nations
now banded together, and in especial to Russia,
for the sequence of untoward phenomena
which, now that they are not only seen, but
felt, and felt painfully, we naïvely deplore.</p>
<p>King Carol’s successor is also a Hohenzollern
prince whose attachment to his Prussian
fatherland is noted, whose relations with his
kinsman, the Kaiser, are cordial, but whose
devotion to his subjects is paramount. More
than once since the opening of the campaign
Roumania was believed to be on the point
of exchanging neutrality for belligerency, but,
on grounds which it would be unfruitful to
discuss, she abandoned the intention, if she
ever harboured it. As matters now are, the
Allies are congratulating themselves on the
circumstance that she is still neutral.</p>
<p>The Queen of Sweden is a daughter of the
most imperialistic of German princes, the late
Grand Duke of Baden and a cousin of the
Kaiser, to whom she is attached by bonds of
sympathy and admiration. And her consort
the King, fascinated by the methods, the
strivings, the achievements of the Hohenzollerns,
has made more than one attempt to
imitate them, but, owing partly to the opposition
of the late Herr Staaff, and largely to
his own mental and moral equipment, which<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_122" id="Page_122">[122]</a></span>
point in a different direction, he felt obliged
to desist.</p>
<p>The accomplished Queen of the Belgians
and the Tsaritsa of Russia are also both German
princesses, but they form exceptions to
the rule that whichever of any two spouses is
German exercises an overmastering influence
on the other. The Prince Consort of Holland,
the Duke of Mecklenburg, is a German of the
Germans, but through constitutional channels
he can wield no political influence, and the
attitude of the Dutch Government towards
the Allies has been clear enough to need no
elaborate exegesis.</p>
<p>The King of Bulgaria is an ex-officer of the
Austro-Hungarian army, whose pro-German
work and its far-resonant results will probably
never be wholly forgotten by his own German
people. For, as we saw, it has rendered them
services that cannot be repaid. Not, indeed,
that he had any coherent plan in his mind’s
eye, or was guided by any deep-seated moral
principles. Politics were for him the art of
the possible enlarged by the negation of the
ethical. Ferdinand may, therefore, be described
as an opportunist, who in current
politics contented himself with following his
nose. Of treaties and conventions he had
signed a goodly number and broken some.
Thus with Russia he had a secret agreement of
a military nature, and also with Russia’s rival,
Austria-Hungary. With Serbia he had one
set of stipulations, with Turkey another, but,
shifty customer that he is, he had set himself
above them all and was ever ready to follow the
lead of personal interest. What the historian
will accentuate is the deftness with which German
diplomacy, for all its alleged clumsiness,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_123" id="Page_123">[123]</a></span>
contrived to use his defects and his qualities
alike for the furtherance of its own designs.</p>
<p>Love of country, like religious faith, is a
respectable mainspring of action. But Ferdinand
has been credited with neither.
Whithersoever he moves one looks in vain
for the guiding light of large ideas. Deeper
than conscious volition lies the stored-up
instinct of barren pettifogging egotism to
which a fine moral atmosphere is deadly.
Insincerity is second nature to him. He
once boasted in my presence that he was a
born actor, and it is fair to say that he played
his rôles—repellent for the most part—as
behoves a mummer. The astonishing thing
is that he should have got influential politicians
to take him seriously. While assuring
the French deputy, M. Joseph Reinach, of his
attachment to France and signing himself the
European, he was writing to Professor Walter
of Budapest offering “all the sympathies of
the Bulgarian nation” to Hungary.<a name="FNanchor_57_57" id="FNanchor_57_57"></a><a href="#Footnote_57_57" class="fnanchor">[57]</a> I have
read ecstatic communications of his penned
in hours of exaltation, when visions of Constantine’s
city, the mosque of Aya Sofia
towering aloft, warmed his fancy and the
sheen of Byzantine brocades and the quaint
paraphernalia of bygone days inspired his
apocalyptic words. His language in those
telegrams and letters was highfaluting and
bombastic. And I read other communications
of his—mostly abject appeals for help—devoid
of dignity and manliness, when the gloom of
dissipated illusions was made unbearable by
fear of dethronement and death. And the
figure cut by the Tsarlet, who addressed those
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_124" id="Page_124">[124]</a></span>humble prayers—mostly to influential ladies—was
despicable.</p>
<p>Ferdinand was swayed by ingrained hatred
of Russia which was almost as potent as his
contempt for the Bulgars. And he never
made a secret of either. For the Turkish
pasha who was responsible for the Bulgarian
atrocities, which aroused Gladstone’s indignation,
Ferdinand’s professed admiration took
the form of a subscription.<a name="FNanchor_58_58" id="FNanchor_58_58"></a><a href="#Footnote_58_58" class="fnanchor">[58]</a> But high above
all motives that turned upon his feelings
towards others were those that centred
entirely in himself.</p>
<p>And he had cogent personal motives for
cultivating cordial relations with the country
of his birth. From the Austrian Government
he expected to be saved from the necessity of
abdicating and expiating his unwisdom. It
was his inordinate ambition and vanity which
had brought the Bulgarian nation to the very
brink of ruin. He it was who had insisted on
breaking off negotiations with Turkey during
the London Conference and recommencing
hostilities. In vain the Chief of the General
Staff, Fitcheff,<a name="FNanchor_59_59" id="FNanchor_59_59"></a><a href="#Footnote_59_59" class="fnanchor">[59]</a> besought him to conclude
peace. The importunate military adviser was
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_125" id="Page_125">[125]</a></span>suddenly relieved of his duties and the second
phase of the Balkan war begun. It was
Ferdinand, too, who thwarted Russia’s peace-making
efforts, refused to send delegates to
the tribunal of arbitration in Petrograd, and
ordered the treacherous attack on the Serbs
and the Greeks which culminated in Bulgaria’s
forfeiting some of the principal fruits of her
heroic military exertions.</p>
<p>For this series of baleful blunders—to the
Bulgars they were nothing more—Ferdinand
was known to be alone responsible. He had
assumed the sole responsibility, and he had
hoped to gather in the lion’s share of the
spoils. And as soon as responsibility seemed
likely to involve punishment, his Ministers
withdrew and exposed his person to the
nation. When, after the end of the second
Balkan war, General Savoff repaired to Constantinople
to better the relations between
Bulgaria and Turkey, he invited a number of
French and British journalists who happened
to be just then in the capital, and he addressed
them as follows: “It has come to my ears that
in Sofia I am accused of being the person who
issued the order to our army to attack our
Allies and that I am to be tried for it. They
will never dare to prosecute me. For I have
here—” and he thumped his side pocket as
he spoke—“the order issued by the real author
of the war and in his own handwriting. He
commanded me orally to do this, but I replied
that I must have a written order from the
Government. Thereupon he shouted: ‘I am
the supreme chief of the army and am about
to give you the order in writing,’ indited the
behest and handed it to me. That is why he
cannot prosecute me. I will show him up.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_126" id="Page_126">[126]</a></span>
Already now I tell you, so that all may hear,
<i>C’est un coquin, un misérable!</i>”<a name="FNanchor_60_60" id="FNanchor_60_60"></a><a href="#Footnote_60_60" class="fnanchor">[60]</a></p>
<p>That was General Savoff’s summing-up of
his august sovereign. And his forecast proved
correct. Ferdinand did not attempt to lay
the blame on him, still less to have an indictment
filed against him. On the contrary, he
kissed Savoff on his return to Sofia and later
on made him his adjutant-general. Ferdinand’s
responsibility being established, his abdication
was clamoured for by public opinion.
His own estimate of his plight was impregnated
with despair. He despatched the abject
telegrams mentioned above to his influential
friends. It was then that he received a
letter signed by the three chiefs of the
Liberal groups of the old Stambulovist Party—Radoslavoff,
Ghennadieff and Tontcheff—and
written, it has been alleged, after consultation
between all four parties, exhorting
him to reverse the national policy and link
Bulgaria’s fate with that of Austria. The
Coburg prince publicly welcomed them, dismissed
the Daneff Cabinet, handed the reins
of power to the three self-constituted saviours
of the dynasty and country, and the Treaty of
Bucharest was signed in an offhand manner.
The keynote of the policy of the new Cabinet
was hatred of Russia, who was held up to
public opprobrium by the press of Sofia as
the mischief-maker who had betrayed Bulgaria;
and as the nation thirsted for a culprit on whom
to vent its rage, the legend obtained a certain
vogue. At the same time emphatic assurances
were given by Count Berchtold that Austria
would upset the Treaty of Bucharest, break
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_127" id="Page_127">[127]</a></span>down the Serbian and Greek barriers that stood
between Bulgaria and her natural boundaries,
and establish Ferdinand and his dynasty more
firmly on the throne. This prospect heartened
the King and stimulated his fellow-workers.</p>
<p>But perhaps the most decisive factor in
Bulgaria’s attitude towards the Central Powers
has been that of Russia towards Bulgaria.
The Tsardom cherishes tender feelings towards
the political entity which it called into being.
Bulgaria is the creature of the great Slav
people which shed its blood and spent its
treasure in giving it life and viability, and has
ever since felt bound to watch over its destinies,
forgive its foolish freaks, and contribute to its
political and material well-being. Congruously
with this frame of mind, Russia has not the
heart to deal with Bulgaria as she would deal
under similar provocation with Roumania or
Greece. Like the baby cripple, or the profligate
son, this wayward little nation ever
remains the spoiled child. Hence, do what
harm she may to Russia, she is not merely
immune from the natural consequences of her
unfriendly acts, but certain to reap fruits
ripened by the sacrifices of those whose policy
she strove to baulk. Conscious of this immense
privilege, she takes the fullest advantage
of it. Under such conditions no stable coalition
of the Balkan States was possible.</p>
<p>The remarkable ascendancy thus won by
Germany over Bulgaria is but one of the
salient results of her foresight, organization
and single-mindedness which the Allies are
now beginning to appreciate. Their ideal policy
in the Balkans was to have none. Great
Britain in particular was proud of her complete
disinterestedness.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_128" id="Page_128">[128]</a></span></p>
<p>Between the Teutons and the Greeks there
were no such close ties as those that linked
Bulgaria to the Central Empires. The Hellenic
kingdom is a democracy marked by a constant
tendency to anarchy. Down to the beginning
of the reign of the present monarch its ruler
was never more than the merest figure-head,
nor its people anything but an amalgam of
individuals deficient in the social sense and
devoid of political cohesiveness. The late
King George, for instance, remained, to the
end of his life, an amused spectator of the
childish game of politics carried on by his
Ministers; and so insecure did he consider
his tenure of the kingship, that his frequent
threat to “take his hat” and quit the country
for good had become one of the commonplaces
of Greek politics. Only a few years ago his
reign appeared to be drawing to an ignominious
end. His functions were usurped by a military
league and his sons removed from the army.
Anarchy was spreading, at that time I expressed
the opinion that the only person
capable of saving Greece—if Greece could yet
be saved—was the Cretan insurgent, M. Venizelos.
This suggestion appealed to the Chief
of the Military League and was adopted.
Venizelos was invited to Athens with the
results known to all the world. At first
reluctantly tolerated, he was subsequently
highly appreciated by King George and was
afterwards handicapped by King Constantine,
whose impolitic instructions during the Bucharest
Conference resulted in sowing seeds of
discord between Greece and Bulgaria.</p>
<p>To small countries and petty personal ambitions,
a war among the Great Powers brings
halcyon days of flattery, bribery and seductive<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_129" id="Page_129">[129]</a></span>
prospects in an imaginary future. In Greece
all these and other attractions were dangled
before the eyes of men of power and influence.
The Sovereign, whose admiration for the Kaiser
verges on idolatry, soon extended this platonic
sentiment to the Kaiser’s army. And when
fortune seemed definitively to espouse the
cause of the Central Empires, his admiration
was reinforced by fear and the pro-German
leanings, which were at first merely platonic,
bade fair to harden into active co-operation.
It was not until then that the Entente Powers,
discerning the fateful character of their errors
and the trend of events, resolved after much
hesitation and discussion to put forth an
effort to retrieve the situation. Of his philo-German
tendencies King Constantine gave
several public proofs long before the war, and
on the psychological soil from which they
sprang, German diplomacy raised its typical
structure of intrigue and adulation. As the
irresistible captain who had shattered the
armies of Turkey and Bulgaria, winning undying
fame for himself and his country, the
King was encouraged to believe that on him
devolved the mission of uniting all Hellenes
under his sceptre, building up a larger Greece,
consolidating the monarchy within, and ruling
as well as reigning. And so well laid was this
plan that when the European armies took the
field and the Entente Powers counted Greece,
then apparently governed by Venizelos, among
its cordial friends, the Teutons, sure of their
ground, but still working assiduously for their
object, put their trust in the Kaiser’s royal
henchman and their own permanent display of
force, and were not disappointed.</p>
<p>Long before the war-cloud burst, the history<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_130" id="Page_130">[130]</a></span>
makers of Berlin recognized the fact that the
key to the Dardanelles lay in Sofia, and not
only to the Dardanelles, but also the key to
the Near East. The statesmen of Austria and
Germany discerned that the Bulgars under
their guidance could be got to do for Turkey
what Japan hoped, and still hopes, to effect
for China. It is a work of complete transformation,
a sort of political transubstantiation
whereby the Bulgars would infuse ichor
into the limp veins of the Ottoman organism
and recreate a strong political entity which
would be an instrument in the hands of the
Central Empires. The Bulgar knows the Turk,
to whom he is more akin by race habits and
temperament than to any of the Slav peoples,
understands his psychic state, his mode of feeling
and thinking, and is therefore qualified to serve
as link between the Oriental and the Western.
It was in view of this eventuality that the
slow, plodding work of grafting Kultur on
the Bulgar people was undertaken. Two
German schools, one in Sofia and the other in
Philippopolis, were the centres whence it was
radiated to the ends of the land. In Bulgaria
there are many preparatory grammar
schools in which tuition for both sexes is free.
All scholars who have passed through one of
the German schools are admitted without any
examination into the Grammar School, or
Gymnasium, a privilege which works as a
powerful attraction. Since Turkey retroceded
Karagatch<a name="FNanchor_61_61" id="FNanchor_61_61"></a><a href="#Footnote_61_61" class="fnanchor">[61]</a> to Bulgaria there are three such
centres of Teutonic propaganda in Bulgaria,
and I am informed that a fourth will shortly
be established in Rustschuk.</p>
<p>The record of the economic invasion of
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_131" id="Page_131">[131]</a></span>Roumania by the Teuton,<a name="FNanchor_62_62" id="FNanchor_62_62"></a><a href="#Footnote_62_62" class="fnanchor">[62]</a> supplemented as
it was by various complex auxiliary movements
of a political character, supplies us
with a fresh variation of the trite text that
Germany conceived her plan on a vast scale
and executed it by co-operation between the
State and the individuals, leaving nothing to
chance which could be settled by forethought.
The ruler of the country was a Hohenzollern,
and as he wielded absolute power in matters
connected with foreign policy, he had a free
hand and kept it efficaciously employed. For
over thirty years King Carol transacted the
international business of the realm—economic
as well as political—with assiduity, conscientiousness
and a fair meed of success. He encouraged
industry and commerce, and welcomed
German and Austrian capital and enterprise.
The upshot of his exertions was that in
the fullness of time his kingdom, like those
of Italy, Bulgaria and Turkey, became to
most intents a nascent Teutonic colony. In
Roumania, as in Bulgaria, the commercial
methods and business ways are German. The
heads of banking establishments and great
industries are either Teutons or friends of
Teutons. Nearly every big enterprise, commercial
and industrial, was launched and kept
afloat by capital from the Fatherland. The
Discount Bank in Berlin has a vast cellar filled
with Roumanian bonds, shares and other
securities. So close are the ties that connect
the little state with the great empire that even
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_132" id="Page_132">[132]</a></span>the Roumanian railways have a special convention
with those of Prussia. Here, then, as
everywhere else, we are in presence of intelligence
wedded to politico-economic enterprise.
Individual German firms and the Government
worked hand in hand; diplomacy, trade and
commerce moved steadily towards the same
goal, and attained it.</p>
<p>Owing to Roumania’s grievances against
Russia—whose seizure of Bessarabia nearly
forty years ago left a wound which festered for
years and has only recently been cicatrized—King
Carol concluded a military convention
with the Austro-Hungarian empire, the stipulations
of which have never been authoritatively
disclosed. There is reason to believe
that one clause obliged the Roumanian Government
to come to the support of the Habsburg
Monarchy with all its military resources in
case that empire should be wantonly attacked
by another Power. Whether this instrument,
which was never laid before the Roumanian
legislature for ratification, is deemed to have
been vitiated by the lack of this indispensable
sanction, or is assumed to have terminated
with the decease of the king who concluded
it, is a matter of no real moment. The
relevant circumstance is the unwillingness of
Austria-Hungary to invoke the terms of the
convention and the resolve of the Bucharest
Cabinet to ignore them.</p>
<p>Thus Roumania, like all other neutral states,
was well within the sphere of attraction of the
Central Empires long before the present conflict
was unchained. And the clever tactics
by which siege was laid to the sympathies of
a nation which at bottom has hardly any
traits in common with the besieger, would<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_133" id="Page_133">[133]</a></span>
have entailed a complete revision and remodelling
of the polity of Russia, France and Britain,
had these Powers had any coherent programme
or distant aims. But their motto was: Sufficient
unto the day is the evil thereof.</p>
<p>True, none of those States ever designed a
political revolution of the Old Continent, such
as Napoleon had imagined or Germany is now
striving to realize. But neither did they read
aright nor even give serious thought to the
symptoms of the great conspiracy which was
being hatched by others for that purpose.
Busied with their party squabbles and social
reforms, they took it for granted that international
tranquillity which was a condition of
the stability of all internal affairs was assured.
Such occasional misunderstandings as might
crop up among the Powers could, they imagined,
always be smoothed over by manifestations of
goodwill and timely concessions. Fitfulness and
hesitancy marked every attempt made by Germany’s
rivals to push their trade or extend their
political relations beyond their own borders.</p>
<p>This lack of enterprise was especially accentuated
in their dealings with Turkey. No
Powers had done so much to uphold Ottoman
sway in Europe as France and Britain, and for
a long while their exertions found their natural
outcome in a degree of influence at the Sublime
Porte which was unparalleled in Turkish
history. But once Germany inaugurated her
economico-political campaign in the Near East,
the principle of neighbourliness was invoked in
favour of allowing her to possess herself of a
share of the good things going, whereupon
Great Britain, and in a lesser degree France,
curbed their natural impulse and left most of
the field to the pushing new-comer. For years<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_134" id="Page_134">[134]</a></span>
the writer of these lines pointed out the danger
of this self-abnegation, but his insistent appeals
for a more active line of conduct were met
by the statement that Near Eastern affairs
had long ceased to tempt the enterprise or
affect the international policy of Great Britain.
As though Great Britain were not a member
of the European community or her geographical
insularity implied political isolation; or as if
her policy of equilibrium were capable of being
achieved without the employment of adequate
means! When I raised my voice against our
participation in the Baghdad railway scheme
and bared to the light the political designs
underlying it, Cabinet Ministers assured the
country that its scope was exclusively economic
and cultural and had no connection with
politics! This naïve belief and the <i>laissez-faire</i>
attitude which it engendered enabled the
Teutons to reduce Turkey to economic and
political thraldom and to earmark Asia Minor,
thenceforward hedged in with the Baghdad and
Anatolian railways, as a future German colony.</p>
<p>The closeness and constancy of the relations
between economics and politics which easily
took root in German consciousness, had for
another of its corollaries the dispatch of General
Liman von Sanders and his band of officers to
reorganize the Ottoman army. This measure
struck some observers as the beginning of the
end of European peace. It was thus that the
Russian Premier, Kokofftseff, and his colleague,
Sazonoff, construed it, and that was the interpretation
which I also put upon it. But none
of the other interested Governments expressed
similar misgivings, nor, so far as one can judge,
entertained any. Yet when war was finally
declared, Germany’s plan of campaign allotted an<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_135" id="Page_135">[135]</a></span>
important rôle to Turkey not in a possible emergency,
but at a date to be determined by the
completion of her military and naval equipment.</p>
<p>In this ingenious and comprehensive way,
operating at a multitude of points, but never
dissociating economics from politics, never
abandoning the work of commercial expansion
to the unaided resources of individuals, the
Teutonic empires contrived to spread a huge
net in whose meshes almost every civilized
nation was to some extent entangled. And the
subsequent political conduct of many of these
was determined in advance by the plight to
which they had been thus reduced. Russia was
reasonably believed to be incapable of taking
the field; Italy was accounted wholly unfitted
to bear the weight of the financial burden
which a conflict with Germany would lay upon
her shoulders; Roumania, it was calculated,
would decline to exchange material gains for
political returns purchased at a heavy cost;
Bulgaria could not afford to estrange Austria’s
sympathies and need never fear that she
might forfeit those of Russia; Sweden, saturated
with German Kultur, was one of the
foreposts of Teutonism in the north of Europe
and might in time be induced to imitate
Bulgaria and play for the hegemony of the
Scandinavian States with the Kaiser’s help;
Switzerland was virtually German in everything
but political organization; Holland
would believe in Prussianism and tremble;
Belgium was economically a pawn in German
hands and Antwerp a German port; and
in the United States millions of hyphenated
Germans would plead the Teuton cause and
do the rough work of advancing it by means
of their political organization and influence.</p>
<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_55_55" id="Footnote_55_55"></a><a href="#FNanchor_55_55"><span class="label">[55]</span></a> See <i>Le Temps</i>, October 31, 1915.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_56_56" id="Footnote_56_56"></a><a href="#FNanchor_56_56"><span class="label">[56]</span></a> Mr. M. Civinini of the <i>Corriere della Sera</i>. See
<i>Corriere della Sera</i>, October 11, 1915.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_57_57" id="Footnote_57_57"></a><a href="#FNanchor_57_57"><span class="label">[57]</span></a> In September 1914. See <i>Morning Post</i>, September 4,
1914.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_58_58" id="Footnote_58_58"></a><a href="#FNanchor_58_58"><span class="label">[58]</span></a> The Batak massacre of Bulgarians by order of Abdul
Kerim Pasha had called forth Gladstone’s pamphlet:
<i>Bulgarian Atrocities</i>, and aroused the horror of civilized
men. But the Hungarian aristocracy sympathized with
the mass murderer, and presented him with a golden
hilted sabre. The list of subscribers for this mark of
aversion to the Bulgarian people can still be viewed in
the Museum at Budapest. The third name on that list—Princess
Clementine—is followed immediately by that of
her son Prince Ferdinand of Coburg, who gave one hundred
florins as a token of his admiration for the exterminator
of his future subjects! It need hardly be added
that he was not yet Prince of Bulgaria.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_59_59" id="Footnote_59_59"></a><a href="#FNanchor_59_59"><span class="label">[59]</span></a> General Fitcheff has since become Minister of War.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_60_60" id="Footnote_60_60"></a><a href="#FNanchor_60_60"><span class="label">[60]</span></a> This narrative was published by M. Wesselitsky in
the <i>Novoye Vremya</i>, November 6, 1915.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_61_61" id="Footnote_61_61"></a><a href="#FNanchor_61_61"><span class="label">[61]</span></a> One of the suburbs of Adrianople ceded in July 1915.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_62_62" id="Footnote_62_62"></a><a href="#FNanchor_62_62"><span class="label">[62]</span></a> Roumania’s annual imports from Austria-Hungary,
according to the latest available statistics, were valued
at 136,906,000 francs; from Germany at 183,713,000;
and from Great Britain at only 85,470,000 francs. France
exported thither goods valued at no more than 35,273,000
francs.</p></div>
</div>
<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XI" id="CHAPTER_XI"></a>CHAPTER XI<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_136" id="Page_136">[136]</a></span></h2>
<h3>THE RIVAL POLICIES</h3>
<p><span class="smcap">In</span> face of this Teutonic control of the
world’s trade, politics and news supply, the
Great Powers whose outlook, political and
economic, was most nearly affected, exhibited
a degree of supineness which can only be
adequately explained by such assumptions as
one would gladly eliminate. Anyhow the
lessons conveyed by eloquent facts fell upon
deaf ears. Yet it was manifest, in view of
Germany’s ingenious combination of economics
and politics, and the irresistible co-operation
of the State and individuals in applying it,
that the slipshod methods of Britain and
France could no longer be persisted in without
grave danger to these states. To deal with
trade and industry as though they were matters
that concerned only the particular business
firms engaged in them was no longer an economical
error, it was also a political blunder.
To Government meddling in trade and industry
the British people have ever been averse. And
their dislike is intelligible although no longer
warranted. A glance at Germany’s economic
campaign and its results ought to have borne
out the thesis that individual self-reliance and
push are unavailing to cope with a potent
organism equipped scientifically, provided with
large capital and backed by the resources of
diplomacy. New epochs call for fresh methods,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_137" id="Page_137">[137]</a></span>
and the era of commercial and industrial
individualism was closed years ago by the
German people. Co-ordination of effort, the
combination of politics with economics, and
unity of direction were among Germany’s
methods in the contest, and she adopted them
in the grounded belief that commerce and
industry lie at the nethermost roots of the
vast political movements of the new era.</p>
<p>This is a century of co-operation, of joint
efforts for common interests, of union in
trade, industry, labour, politics and war. To
stand aloof is to be isolated, and isolation
means helplessness against danger. Germany
was the first Power to grasp these facts, to
understand the new phase of life and to adapt
herself to it. For this work of readjustment
her people were specially endowed by Nature,
and in their equipment for the task they saw
a mark of election set upon them by their
“old God.” For the correlate of co-operation
is talent for organization, and with this
the Teutons are plentifully gifted. They feel
impelled as it were by instinct to push forward
much further on the road already
traversed by all nations from isolation to
individualism through gregariousness. They
opened the new era of amalgamation by co-ordinating,
on a vast scale, individual achievements,
resources and labour, and directing
them to a common end. The allied peoples
were meanwhile content to muddle through
in the old way. This difference explains much
that seems puzzling in the outcome of the
struggle.</p>
<p>It has been affirmed somewhat off-handedly
that the Latin and British peoples, incapable
of united and organized effort, have halted at<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_138" id="Page_138">[138]</a></span>
the individualist stage. They are supposed
to lack the bump of organization. According
to this theory among the Germans, who had
passed through all the intermediate phases
and carried individualism to sinister extremes
in the past, a reaction set in which called forth
the latent powers of organization which they
possess. And these have been wielded with
brilliant results ever since the unity of the
German Empire was first established. Applying
the new principle to politics, the statesmen
of Berlin grasped the fact that all future
conflicts in Europe would be waged by coalitions.
Neither Austria-Hungary alone nor the
German Empire alone could undertake a world
war. That was the genesis of the scheme of
welding the two central empires in one politico-military
entity and then attracting as many
other States as possible into their orbit. And
the enterprise was conducted so ingeniously
that when war was declared, Roumania, Bulgaria
and Turkey were tied to the Triple
Alliance. And henceforward, whatever the
outcome of the war may be, the permanent
fusion of Germany and Austria is a foregone
conclusion.</p>
<p>By the means described a state of things,
actual and potential, was established which
rendered Germany’s military attack on Europe
much less hazardous and doubtful a venture
than was at first supposed. For there was
not a country on the globe which she or her
ally had not subjected to the process of interpenetration,
nor was there one which had
remained wholly irresponsive. Even Brazil,
Chili, Peru, China, Morocco, Persia, Abyssinia,
had all experienced its effects. And
when at last the harvest-time was come and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_139" id="Page_139">[139]</a></span>
its fruits were to be ingathered Germany felt
that she could count to varying extents on
the active sympathy and support of governments,
parliaments and nations; on the Turks,
the Swiss, the Swedes, the Bulgarians, the
Roumanians; on the autocratic ruler of the
Greeks and on millions of American-Germans.
Every independent religious centre was permeated
with an atmosphere composed in
Germany. The Caliph and the Sheikh-ul-Islam
of the Moslems, the evangelical preachers
of the Russian Baltic provinces, Brahmins in
India, subjects of the Negus of Abyssinia, the
Jews of western Russia and Poland, as well
as those of the Netherlands, the Catholics of
Switzerland, Holland and Italy, nay, the
Vatican itself, raised their voices in the chorus
of the millions who sang hosannah to the
Highest.<a name="FNanchor_63_63" id="FNanchor_63_63"></a><a href="#Footnote_63_63" class="fnanchor">[63]</a></p>
<p>Dismay was the feeling aroused among the
Allies by the quick dramatic moves which
precipitated the war. The trump of doom
seemed to have sounded at a moment when
mankind was on the point of discovering the
secret of immortality. The utter unpreparedness
of the Allies was the dominant note of
the new situation, and its manifestations were
countless and disastrous. There was no adequate
British expeditionary army to send on
foreign service, and there existed no machinery
by which such a force could quickly be got
together and trained. Voluntary enlistment
was a slowly moving mechanism, and even if
it could be made to work more rapidly, there
was no way of employing the new soldiers,
for whom there were neither barracks nor
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_140" id="Page_140">[140]</a></span>uniforms nor rifles in sufficiency. And if all
these requirements could have been improvised,
there were no generals accustomed to
handle armies of millions. And even if all
those wants had been supplied to hand
there was no Government enterprising enough
to put them to the best advantage of the
nation. Moreover, colonial expeditions were
the most extensive military operations which
the country had carried on within the memory
of the present generation, and it was beyond
the power of the authorities not only to
organize the imperial defences on an adequate
scale but even to realize the necessity of
attempting the feat. In a word, the prospect
could hardly have been more dismal.</p>
<p>In France it was a degree less cheerless, but
still decidedly bleak. Mobilization there went
forward, it is claimed, more smoothly than
had been anticipated, but not rapidly enough
to enable adequate forces to be dispatched
in time against the German military flood.
The organization of the railway system was
most inefficient. And had it not been for
heroic Belgium, who, confronted with the
alternatives of ruin with honour and safety
with ignominy, unhesitatingly chose the better
part, the inrush of the Teutons would, it is
asserted by military experts, have swept away
every obstacle that lay between them and the
French capital, which was their first objective.
Belgium’s magnificent resistance thus saved
Paris, gave breathing space to the French,
and enabled the Allies to swing their sword
before smiting.</p>
<p>Russia, too, did better than had been augured
of her, but not nearly as well as if her resources
had been organized by competent experts,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_141" id="Page_141">[141]</a></span>
alive to the dangers that threatened the
empire. On the eve of the war a process of
fermentation among the working men of her
two capitals was coming to a head, and a
revolt, if not a revolution, was being industriously
organized. The movement had certainly
been fostered, and probably originated,
by wealthy German employers in Petrograd,
Moscow and other industrial centres. They
had hoped to frustrate the mobilization order,
retard Russia’s entry into the field, and possibly
bring about civil strife. And they were within
an ace of succeeding. On the very eve of
hostilities reports reached Berlin and Vienna
that the revolution was already beginning.
But the declaration of war against Germany
purified the air, absorbed the redundant energies
of the people, and fused all classes and
parties into a whole-hearted, single-minded
nation, giving Russia a degree of union which
she had not enjoyed since Napoleon’s invasion.
But, separated from her allies, she
went her own way without much reference to
theirs. Her plans had been drafted by her
military leaders, and might be modified by
local conditions or subsequent vicissitudes,
but were neither co-ordinated nor even synchronized
with those of France and Britain.
Thus the first and most important lesson had
still to be mastered.</p>
<p>Liège and Namur having fallen, the danger
to Paris struck terror to the hearts of the
French, and the public mind was being
gradually prepared by the Press to receive the
depressing tidings of its capture with dignified
calm. The occupation of the capital, it
was argued, would not essentially weaken
the military strength of the Republic. For the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_142" id="Page_142">[142]</a></span>
army would still be intact, and that was the
essential point. Here, for the first time, one
notes the almost invincible force of the antiquated
opinions to which the Allies still
tenaciously clung about warfare as modified
by Germany. No misgivings were harboured
that the enemy might threaten to burn the
capital city if the army refused to capitulate,
or that he was capable of carrying out such a
threat. War in its old guise, hedged round
with traditions of chivalry, with humanitarian
restrictions, with international laws, was how
the French and their allies conceived it. And
it was in that spirit that they made their
forecasts and regulated their own behaviour
towards the enemy.</p>
<p>The rise of Generals Joffre, Castelnau and
Foch and the retreat of the German invaders
raised the Allies from the depths of despair
to a degree of confidence bordering on presumption.
After the departure of the Belgian
Government to Antwerp,<a name="FNanchor_64_64" id="FNanchor_64_64"></a><a href="#Footnote_64_64" class="fnanchor">[64]</a> the occupation of
Brussels,<a name="FNanchor_65_65" id="FNanchor_65_65"></a><a href="#Footnote_65_65" class="fnanchor">[65]</a> the defeat of the Austrian army by
the Serbs and the rout of three German army
corps by the Russians,<a name="FNanchor_66_66" id="FNanchor_66_66"></a><a href="#Footnote_66_66" class="fnanchor">[66]</a> the Western Allies
conceived high hopes of the military prowess
of the Slavs, and looked to them for the decisive
action which would speedily bring the
Teutons to their knees. And for a time
Russia’s continued progress seemed to justify
these hopes. Her troops entered Insterburg<a name="FNanchor_67_67" id="FNanchor_67_67"></a><a href="#Footnote_67_67" class="fnanchor">[67]</a>
and pushed on to Königsberg, which they
invested and threatened,<a name="FNanchor_68_68" id="FNanchor_68_68"></a><a href="#Footnote_68_68" class="fnanchor">[68]</a> and in the south
they scored a series of remarkable successes
in Galicia. But in the west of Europe the
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_143" id="Page_143">[143]</a></span>Allies could at most but retard without
arresting the advance of the Germans, whose
aim was to defeat the French and then concentrate
all their efforts on the invasion of the
Tsardom. Despite assurances of an optimistic
tenor there appeared to be no serious hope
of defending Paris, nor were effective local
measures adopted for the purpose; and on
September 3 the French Government, against
the insistent advice of three experienced
Cabinet Ministers, suddenly moved to Bordeaux,
and earned for itself the nickname of
<i>tournedos à la bordelaise</i>. On the same historic
day the Tsar’s troops triumphantly entered
Lemberg, restored to that city its ancient
name of Lvoff, and proceeded to introduce
the Russian system of administration there
with all its traditional characteristics. But
in lieu of conferring full powers on the
Governor of the conquered province, a man
of broad views and conciliatory methods,
the Government dispatched a narrow-minded
official, devoid of natural ability, of administrative
training, and of the sobering consciousness
of his own defects, and listened to his
recommendations. For Russia, like France
and Britain, still contemplated the situation
and its potentialities through the distorting
medium of the old order of things. Their
orientation had undergone no change.</p>
<p>One of the immediate consequences of
Russian rule in Galicia was to confirm the
Vatican in its belief that Austria offered
Catholicism far more trustworthy guarantees
for its unhindered growth than could ever be
expected from the Tsardom.</p>
<p>The famous battle of the Marne<a name="FNanchor_69_69" id="FNanchor_69_69"></a><a href="#Footnote_69_69" class="fnanchor">[69]</a> infused
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_144" id="Page_144">[144]</a></span>new energies into the Allies, whose Press
organs forthwith took to discussing the terms
on which peace might be vouchsafed to the
Teutons, and in these stipulations a spirit of
magnanimity was displayed towards the enemy
which at any rate served to show how little
his temper was understood and how enormously
his resources were underrated. Soon,
however, the mist of ignorance began to lift,
and saner notions of the stern interplay of
the tidal forces at work were borne in upon
the leaders of the allied peoples. One of
the first discoveries to be made was the enormous
consumption of ammunition required by
latter-day warfare and the ease with which
the Germans were able to meet this increased
demand. That this enormous advantage was
the result of scientific organization was patent
to all. Nor could it be ignored that an essential
element of that organization was the militarization
of all workmen whose services were
needed by the State. But from the lesson
thus inculcated to its application in practice
there was an abyss. And as yet that abyss
has not been bridged. The most formidable
obstacle in the way is offered by the shackles
of party politics, which still hamper the leaders
of the Entente Powers, and in particular of
Great Britain. Industrial compulsion has not
yet been moved into the field of practical
politics.</p>
<p>One of Germany’s calculations was that,
however superior to her own resources those
of her adversaries might be, they were not
likely to be mobilized, concentrated and
brought to bear upon the front. Consequently
they would not tell upon the result. Military
discipline had not impregnated any of the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_145" id="Page_145">[145]</a></span>
allied nations, whose ideas of personal liberty
and dignity would oppose an insurmountable
obstacle to that severe discipline which was
essential to military success. Great Britain,
they believed, would cling to her ingrained
notions of the indefeasible right of the British
workman to strike and of the British citizen
to hold back from military service. And the
telegrams announcing that in the United
Kingdom the cries of “business as usual,”
“sport as usual,” “strikes as usual,” “voluntary
enlistment as usual,” indicated the survival
of the antiquated spirit of individualism
into a new order of things which peremptorily
called for co-operation and iron discipline,
were received in Berlin and Vienna with
undisguised joy. The persistence of this spirit
has been the curse of the Allies ever since.</p>
<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_63_63" id="Footnote_63_63"></a><a href="#FNanchor_63_63"><span class="label">[63]</span></a> The Highest of All is the official designation of the
Kaiser: der Allerhöchste.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_64_64" id="Footnote_64_64"></a><a href="#FNanchor_64_64"><span class="label">[64]</span></a> August 17, 1914.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_65_65" id="Footnote_65_65"></a><a href="#FNanchor_65_65"><span class="label">[65]</span></a> August 20, 1914.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_66_66" id="Footnote_66_66"></a><a href="#FNanchor_66_66"><span class="label">[66]</span></a> August 22, 1914.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_67_67" id="Footnote_67_67"></a><a href="#FNanchor_67_67"><span class="label">[67]</span></a> August 23, 1914.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_68_68" id="Footnote_68_68"></a><a href="#FNanchor_68_68"><span class="label">[68]</span></a> August 29, 1914.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_69_69" id="Footnote_69_69"></a><a href="#FNanchor_69_69"><span class="label">[69]</span></a> September 12, 1914.</p></div>
</div>
<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XII" id="CHAPTER_XII"></a>CHAPTER XII<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_146" id="Page_146">[146]</a></span></h2>
<h3>PROBLEMS OF LEADERSHIP</h3>
<p><span class="smcap">It</span> is worth noting in this connection how
heavily the lack of genial leaders at this critical
conjuncture in European history told upon
the allied peoples and affected their chances
of success. The statesmen in power were
mostly straightforward, conscientious servants
of their respective Governments, whose ideal
had been the prevention of hostilities, and
whose exertions in war time were directed to
the restoration of peace on a stable basis.
By none of them was the stir, the spirit, the
governing instincts of the new era or the
actual crisis perceived. They all failed of
audacity. Hence they were solicitous to leave
as far as possible intact all the rights, privileges
and institutions of the past which would
be serviceable in the re-established peace
régime of the future. In Great Britain the
voluntary system of recruiting the army and
navy was to be respected, the right of workmen
to strike was recognized, and the maintenance
of party government was looked upon
as a matter of course. The writer of these pages
made several ineffectual attempts to propagate
the view that a War Cabinet presided over by
a real chief was a corollary of the situation,
military and industrial compulsion for all was
indispensable, that a discriminating tariff on
our imports and a restriction of certain exports<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_147" id="Page_147">[147]</a></span>
would materially contribute to our progress, and
that a special department for the manufacture
of munitions ought to be organized without
delay.<a name="FNanchor_70_70" id="FNanchor_70_70"></a><a href="#Footnote_70_70" class="fnanchor">[70]</a> One measure indicative, people said,
of undisputed wisdom which was resorted to
was the appointment of Lord Kitchener as
Secretary for War.<a name="FNanchor_71_71" id="FNanchor_71_71"></a><a href="#Footnote_71_71" class="fnanchor">[71]</a> If this step deserved the
fervent approval it met with, its efficacy was
considerably impaired by imposing on the new
Secretary the task of purveying munitions and
other supplies, in addition to the multifarious
duties of his office. And with this solitary
exception everything was allowed to go on
“as usual,” with consequences which every
one has since had an opportunity of meditating.
Internal whole-hearted co-operation
between the Government and all the social
layers of the population was neither known
nor systematically attempted, and still less
were the respective forces of the Allies co-ordinated
and hurled against the enemy. The
struggle was confined to the army and the
navy, and these instruments of national defence
were inadequately provided with the
first necessaries for action.</p>
<p>Each of the Allies was isolated, cooped
within its own narrow circle of ideas, buoyed
up by its own hopes, bent on the attainment
of its own special aims. The first step towards
amalgamation was negative in character, but
superlatively politic. It took the form of a
covenant by which it was stipulated that none
of the Allies should conclude a separate peace
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_148" id="Page_148">[148]</a></span>with the enemy. But beyond that nothing
was done, nor was anything more considered
necessary.</p>
<p>In Britain the consciousness that the country
was at war spread very slowly, while the conviction
that this was a life-and-death struggle
which would seriously affect the lives and
rights and habits of every individual made no
headway. Only a few grasped the fact that
a tremendous upheaval was going forward
which marked the rise of a new era and a
complete break with the old. By the bulk
of the population it was treated as a game
calling for no extraordinary efforts, no special
methods, no new departures. It was construed
as a hateful parenthesis in a cheerful
history of human progress, and the object of
the nation was to have it swiftly and decently
closed. Hence the machinery of the old system
was not discarded. Voluntary enlistment was
belauded and agitation against joining the
army magnanimously tolerated. Attacks on
the Government were permitted. The manufacture
of munitions was confided to private
firms and to the whims of dissatisfied workmen,
and co-operation among the various
sections of the population was left to private
initiative.</p>
<p>Most of us are prone to consider this war
as a fortuitous event, which might, indeed,
have been staved off, but which, having disturbed
for a time the easy movement of our
insular life, will die away and leave us free to
continue our progress on the same lines as
before. But this faith is hardly more than
the confluence of hopes and strivings, habits,
traditions, and aspirations untempered by
accurate knowledge of the facts. And the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_149" id="Page_149">[149]</a></span>
facts, were we cognizant of them, would show
us that the agencies which brought about
this tremendous shock of peoples without blasting
our hopes or exploding our pet theories,
will not spend their force in this generation
or the next, and that already the entire fabric—social,
political, and economical—of our
national life is undergoing disruption.</p>
<p>The shifting of landmarks, political and
social, is going steadily if stealthily forward;
and the nation waking up one day will note
with amazement the vast distance it has imperceptibly
traversed. If only we could realize
at present how rapidly and irrevocably we are
drifting away from our old-world moorings,
we should feel in a more congenial mood for
adjusting ourselves to the new and unpopular
requirements of the era now dawning. Already
we are becoming a militarist and a protective
State, but we do not yet know it. We have
broken with the traditions of our own peculiar
and insular form of civilization, of which
poets like Tennyson were the high priests,
yet we hesitate to bid them farewell. We
still base our forecasts of the future political
life on the past and calculate the outcome of
the next elections, the fate of Disestablishment
and Home Rule, the relative positions of the
chief Parliamentary parties on the old bases,
and draw up our plans accordingly. In short,
we still bear about with us the fragrant atmosphere
of our previous existence which will
never be renewed. And it is owing to the
effects of that disturbing medium that our
observations have been so defective and our
mistakes so sinister. We still fail to perceive
that decay has overtaken the organs of our
Party Government and the groundwork of our<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_150" id="Page_150">[150]</a></span>
State fabric is rotten. Yet everything about
and around us is in flux. We are in the midst
of a new environment.</p>
<p>When this war is over we shall search in
vain for what was peculiarly British in our
cherished civilization. Of that civilization
which reached its acme during the reign of
the late King Edward, we have seen the last,
little though most of us realize its passing.
It was an age of sturdy good sense, healthy
animalism, and dignity withal, and not devoid
of a strong flavour of humanity and home-reared
virtue. But in every branch of politics
and some departments of science it was an age
of amateurism. Respect for right, for liberty,
for law and tradition, for relative truth and
gradual progress, was widely diffused. Well-controlled
energy, responsiveness to calls on
one’s fellow-feeling, and the everyday honesty
that tapers into policy were among its familiar
features. But if one were asked to sum it all
up in a single word it would be hard to utter
one more comprehensive or characteristic than
the essentially English term, comfort. Comfort
was the apex of the pyramid which is now
crumbling away. And it is that Laodicean
civilization, and not the fierce spirit of the new
time, which is incarnate in the present official
leaders of the British nation.</p>
<p>The French, too, approached the general
problem from their own particular standpoint.
Provided with a serviceable military organization,
the same unconsciousness of the need of
mobilizing all the other national resources
pierced through their policy. Parties and
factions subsisted as before, and half-way
men who would have been satisfied with
driving the enemy out of France and Belgium<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_151" id="Page_151">[151]</a></span>
lifted up their voices against those who insisted
on prosecuting the war until Prussianism
was worsted. The French Socialists met
in London<a name="FNanchor_72_72" id="FNanchor_72_72"></a><a href="#Footnote_72_72" class="fnanchor">[72]</a> and passed resolutions in which
the usual claptrap of the war of classes, the
boons of pacifism and the wickedness of the
Tsardom occupied a prominent place. And
the Congress was honoured by the presence
of two Cabinet Ministers, MM. Guesde and
Sembat.</p>
<p>Russia, true to her old self, carried the
narrow spirit of the bureaucracy into the
fiercest struggle recorded by history, seemingly
satisfied that the clash of armies and
navies would leave antiquated theories and
moulding traditions intact. When the revolutionist
Burtzeff published his patriotic letter to
the French papers approving Russia’s energetic
defence of civilization, he was applauded by
all Europe. “Even we,” he wrote, “adherents
of the parties of the Extreme Left and
hitherto ardent anti-militarists and pacifists,
even we believe in the necessity of <i>this</i> war.
The German peril, the curse which has hung
over the world for so many decades, will be
crushed.” Yet when he returned to his
country resolved to support the Tsar’s Government
and lend a hand in the good work, he
was sent to Siberia, in commemoration of the
old order of things.</p>
<p>Germany alone took her stand on the new
plane and accommodated herself to the new
conditions. Thoroughness was her watchword
because victory was her aim, its alternative
being coma or death. With her gaze fixed on
the end, she rejected nothing that could serve
as means.</p>
<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_152" id="Page_152">[152]</a></span></p>
<p>In congruity with these divergent views
and sentiments was the reading of the war’s
vicissitudes in the various belligerent countries.
The allied Press was over-hopeful,
right being certain to triumph over might
wedded to wrong. Publicists pitied the
Teutons in anticipation of the fate that was
fast overtaking them. Pæans of victory resounded,
allaying the apprehensions and numbing
the energies of the leagued nations. The
German, it was asseverated, had shot his bolt
and was at bay. Russia had laid siege to
Cracow, and would shortly occupy that city
as she had occupied Lemberg. The Tsar’s
troops might then be expected to push on to
Berlin, and to reach it in a few months. And,
painfully aware of the certainty of this consummation,
Austria was dejected and Hungary
secretly making ready to secede from the
Habsburg Monarchy. To this soothing gossip
even serious statesmen lent a willing ear. The
writer of these remarks was several times
asked by leading personages of the allied
Governments whether internal upheavals were
not impending in Germany and Austria, and
his assurance that no such diversion could be
looked for then or in the near future was
traversed on the ground that all trustworthy
accounts from Berlin, Vienna and Budapest
pointed to a process of fermentation which
would shortly interpose an impassable barrier
to the further military advance of the Central
empires. But he continued to express himself
in the same strain of warning, which subsequent
events have unhappily justified.</p>
<p>In October 1914, for instance, he wrote—</p>
<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_153" id="Page_153">[153]</a></span></p><div class="blockquot"><p>“Germany has already shot her bolt, people
tell us. Already? The people who for forty
years have been preparing to establish their
rule from Ostend to the Persian Gulf have
expended their energies after three months of
warfare? And the concrete foundations built
at such pains and expense in the German
factory that dominates Edinburgh? Was the
Teuton simple-minded enough to fancy that
he would be in a position to utilize this and
the other emplacements for his giant guns
within three months after the outbreak of
hostilities? Let us be fair to our enemy and
just to ourselves. The German has not shot
his bolt. If time is on our side, it will also
remain on his up to a point which we have
not yet reached. Those who urge that the
German must make haste imply that his resources
are gradually drying up, and that
neither his food supplies, nor his chemicals,
nor his metals can be imported so long as we
hold command of the seas. His armies will
therefore die of inanition, or their operations
will be thwarted for lack of munitions. This
would indeed be joyful tidings were it true.
If false, it is a mischievous delusion.</p>
<p>“We are told that the German time-table
has been upset. Unquestionably it has. But
is the time-table identical with the programme
for which it was drawn up? If it is, then the
march on Paris has been definitely abandoned.
Now is this conclusion borne out by what we
behold? What, then, is the meaning of the
plan to capture Belfort and Calais? What is
the object of the vast reinforcements now on
their way from the east to Von Kluck’s army?
Personally, I have not a doubt that Paris is
the objective, or that the Germans are still
striving to carry out their programme in its<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_154" id="Page_154">[154]</a></span>
entirety, which is the extension of their empire
over Europe and Asia Minor. The immediate
object of the Allies is to foil this design, and
only after we have accomplished that can we
think of assuming the offensive and crushing
Prussian militarism. We have not compassed
that end; the battlefields are still in the Allies’
countries, and the initiative rests with the
enemy. Now to whatever causes we may
attribute this undesirable state of things—and
it certainly cannot be ascribed to lack of
energy on the part of the British Government
or our military authorities—it is right that
those who are acting for the nation should
ask themselves whether those causes are still
operative. If they are—and on this score
there is hardly room for doubt—it behoves
the Allies, and the British people in particular,
to rise to a just sense of the <i>unparalleled sacrifices</i>
they must be prepared to make during
the ordeal which they are about to undergo.”</p></div>
<p>The German way of looking at the relative
strength and positions of the belligerents as
modified by the vicissitudes of the campaign
was realistic and statesmanlike. Starting from
the principle that a people of about a hundred
millions, animated by a lively faith in its own
vitality and mental equipment, can neither
be destroyed nor permanently crippled, they
argued that the worst that Fate could have
in store for them would be a draw. But before
that end could be achieved the Teutonic
armies must have been pulverized and Germany
and Austria occupied by the allied
troops. And of this there were no signs.
“We never fancied,” they said, “that what
happened in 1870 would be repeated in 1914.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_155" id="Page_155">[155]</a></span>
How could we make such a stupid mistake?
Then we had only France against us. To-day
we encounter the combined forces of Russia,
France, Belgium and England. This difference
had to have its counterpart in the campaign.
Thus we have not yet captured Paris.
But then to-day we are wrestling with the
greatest empires in the world, and we hold
them in our grip. We are fighting not for a
few milliard francs and a disaffected province,
but for priceless spoils and European hegemony.
Moreover, Belgium, which we possess
and mean to keep, is a greater prize than the
temporary occupation of Paris. Besides, postponement
is not abandonment. Whether we
take the French capital one month or another
is but a detail.</p>
<p>“And, over and above all this, we have
reached the sea and are within a few miles of
England’s shores. Furthermore, Russia’s army,
which we lured into East Prussia until it
fancied it was about to invest Königsberg,
has been driven back beyond Wirballen far
into Tsardom, with appalling losses of men
and material. Her other forces, which several
weeks ago boasted that they were about to
capture Cracow, will soon be driven out of
Przemysl and Lemberg. Libau will fall into
our hands. Riga is sure to be ours, and Warsaw
itself will finally admit our victorious
troops. Does this look like defeat at the hands
of our enemies? And German soil is still as
immune from invasion as though it were girded
by the sea.”</p>
<p>In all our forecasts one important element of
calculation was invariably left out of account:
the consequences of our blunders, past, present
and future. And these have added enormously<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_156" id="Page_156">[156]</a></span>
to our difficulties and dangers. Not the least
made was the mistake in allowing the two
German warships <i>Goeben</i> and <i>Breslau</i> to enter
the Dardanelles. To have pursued them into
Ottoman waters would, it was pleaded in
justification, have constituted a violation of
Turkish neutrality. Undoubtedly it would,
but the infringement would not have been
more serious than many flagrant breaches of
neutrality which the Sublime Porte had committed
a short time before and was known to
be about to perpetrate again.<a name="FNanchor_73_73" id="FNanchor_73_73"></a><a href="#Footnote_73_73" class="fnanchor">[73]</a> But a scrupulous
regard for the rights of neutrals has been,
and still is, the groundstone of the Allies’
policy, irrespective of its effects on the outcome
of the war. The rules of the game, it
is contended, must be observed by us, however
much they may be disregarded by the
enemy. This considerateness and scrupulosity
may be chivalrous, but they form an irksome
drag on a nation at war with Teutons. The two
ships were at once transferred by Germany to
the Turks.<a name="FNanchor_74_74" id="FNanchor_74_74"></a><a href="#Footnote_74_74" class="fnanchor">[74]</a> Some two months later, deeming
their war preparations completed, the latter
suddenly bombarded the open Russian town of
Theodosia in the Black Sea, and sank several
small craft, thus realizing Germany’s hopes
and justifying her politico-economic policy.
It was now too late to lament the chivalrous
attitude which had permitted the <i>Goeben</i> and
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_157" id="Page_157">[157]</a></span>the <i>Breslau</i> to steam into the Dardanelles, or
to regret the indifference we had persistently
displayed to Near Eastern affairs for well-nigh
twenty years. The best that could be done at
that late hour was to face the consequences
of those errors with dignity and to strive to
repair them with alacrity. But all the efforts
made were partial and successive. There was
no attempt at co-ordination.</p>
<p>Turkey’s defection was a serious blow to the
allied cause, not only in view of the positive,
but also of the negative, advantages it was
calculated to confer upon Germany. The
Ottoman army, consisting of first-class raw
materials, had had its latent qualities unfolded
and matured by German organization, discipline
and training. Its supplies were replenished.
Ammunition factories were established. Barracks
were built and fortifications equipped in
congruity with latter-day needs. Three million
pounds of German bar gold reached Constantinople,
and were deposited in the branch offices
of the Deutsche Bank there for the requirements
of the army. In all this the Kaiser’s
Government ran no risks. The return was
guaranteed by the politico-economic measures
which had been continuously applied during
the years of our “disinterestedness.”</p>
<p>Enver had meanwhile risen to the zenith of
his career. He was now War Minister and had
surrounded himself with officers who would
follow him whithersoever he might lead them.
A low-sized, wiry man, seemingly of no account,
Enver is pale of complexion, shuffling in gait.
His eyes are piercing, and his gaze furtive.
A soul-monger who should buy him at his
specific value and sell him at his own estimate
would earn untold millions. For, to use a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_158" id="Page_158">[158]</a></span>
picturesque Russian phrase, the ocean is only
up to his knees. He is physically dauntless
and buoyant. In the war against Italy he
had fought well and organized the Arab and
other native troops under conditions of great
difficulty, winning laurels which have not yet
withered. A Pole by extraction, Enver Pasha
is a Prussian by training and sympathies,
and a Turk by language and religion and by
his marriage with a daughter of the Sultan.
Political sense he has none. His one ideal
was to earn the appreciation of the Prussian
military authorities, to whom he looks up as
a fervid disciple to peerless masters. German
military praise melts his manhood and turns
his brain. He possesses a dictatorial temper
with none of the essential qualities of a dictator,
and in the field he is distinguished, I
am told, by splendid valour without an inkling
of scientific strategy.</p>
<p>It was that Polish Turk and his German
masters who formally made war upon Russia,
France and Britain.<a name="FNanchor_75_75" id="FNanchor_75_75"></a><a href="#Footnote_75_75" class="fnanchor">[75]</a> And the Turkish nation
had no opportunity to sanction or veto their
resolve. Nay, even the majority of the
Cabinet, including the Grand Vizier, had had
no say on the issue, were not even informed
of what was being done until overt acts of
hostility had actually clinched the matter.
Indeed, there was a majority of Cabinet
Ministers in favour of neutrality, but it was
ignored. In this way Turkey threw in her
lot with the Teutons,<a name="FNanchor_76_76" id="FNanchor_76_76"></a><a href="#Footnote_76_76" class="fnanchor">[76]</a> to the astonishment
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_159" id="Page_159">[159]</a></span>of the Allies, who had hoped that a policy of
forbearance and meekness would elicit a
friendly response and frustrate the effect of
the master strokes by which Germany, during
a long series of years, had consolidated her
ascendancy over Turkey and obtained the
command of the Ottoman army. The childish
notion that a sudden exhibition of pacific
intentions and goodwill is enough to foil the
carefully laid schemes of a clever enemy which
have been maturing for decades, is the refrain
that runs through the history of our foreign
policy for the last thirty or forty years. And
not only through the history of our foreign
policy. Faith in the sacramental efficacy of
an improvisation is a trait common to all the
Allies, but in the British nation it is the faith
that is expected to move mountains.</p>
<p>The negative aspect of Turkey’s belligerency
proved to be quite as irksome as the positive.
For it involved the closing of the Dardanelles
to Russia’s corn export and the disappearance
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_160" id="Page_160">[160]</a></span>of the principal route for communications
between the Tsardom and its Western allies.
Archangel is blocked in winter and inadequately
connected by rail with the two capitals in
summer. This additional embarrassment and
its financial sequel compelled the attention of
the Allies to the need of some kind of co-operation—just
to satisfy actual needs. For
neither then nor at any subsequent period was
there any pretence of laying open the whole
ground and building a complete structure
upon that. A temporary expedient is all
that was contemplated, and nothing more lasting
was evoked. None the less, the Conference
of the three Finance Ministers in Paris<a name="FNanchor_77_77" id="FNanchor_77_77"></a><a href="#Footnote_77_77" class="fnanchor">[77]</a>
marked a step in advance, and was subsequently
followed up by a closer and more continuous
contact.</p>
<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_70_70" id="Footnote_70_70"></a><a href="#FNanchor_70_70"><span class="label">[70]</span></a> Cf. <i>Contemporary Review</i>, November 1914. I was
requested to suppress an article on the subject of “Coalition
Government” and another on the subject of “Tariff
Reform during and after the War.”</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_71_71" id="Footnote_71_71"></a><a href="#FNanchor_71_71"><span class="label">[71]</span></a> August 5, 1914.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_72_72" id="Footnote_72_72"></a><a href="#FNanchor_72_72"><span class="label">[72]</span></a> February 1915.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_73_73" id="Footnote_73_73"></a><a href="#FNanchor_73_73"><span class="label">[73]</span></a> Turkey had already violated her neutrality to our
detriment many times. For instance, on September 25
she had erected military works against us on the Sinai
frontier; as far back as August 25 Turkish officers had
seized Egyptian camels laden with foodstuffs. Moslem
fidahis in Ottoman service endeavoured to incite the
Egyptian Mohammedans against the British Government
during the first half of October.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_74_74" id="Footnote_74_74"></a><a href="#FNanchor_74_74"><span class="label">[74]</span></a> August 13, 1914.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_75_75" id="Footnote_75_75"></a><a href="#FNanchor_75_75"><span class="label">[75]</span></a> November 3, 1914.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_76_76" id="Footnote_76_76"></a><a href="#FNanchor_76_76"><span class="label">[76]</span></a> On October 25, 1908, after having studied the origins
of the Turkish Revolution and the antecedents of its
authors, and while all Europe was still warmly congratulating
the Young Turks on their bloodless victory
and moderation, I dispatched the following telegraphic
message to the <i>Daily Telegraph</i>—
</p>
<div class="blockquot">
<p>“Most unwillingly do I give utterance to facts and
impressions calculated to introduce a jarring note
into the harmonious optimism of Western peoples,
who confidently augur great things of the young
Ottoman nation, and discern no difficulties likely to
become formidable dangers to the new-born State.
But a knowledge of all the essential data is indispensable
to correct the diagnosis without which the
malady cannot be successfully treated. Emancipation,
then, has produced a beneficent enthusiasm for
the political ideals of Europe in minds hitherto impermeable
to Western notions, but has neither transformed
the national character nor supplied the revolutionary
movement with the requisite constructive
forces. <i>Neither can it break the fateful continuity
of Turkish history nor avert the defects of the destructive
causes that have been operative here for generations.</i>”</p></div>
</div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_77_77" id="Footnote_77_77"></a><a href="#FNanchor_77_77"><span class="label">[77]</span></a> February 6, 1915, and the following three days.</p></div>
</div>
<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XIII" id="CHAPTER_XIII"></a>CHAPTER XIII<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_161" id="Page_161">[161]</a></span></h2>
<h3>PROBLEMS OF FINANCE</h3>
<p><span class="smcap">Finances</span> are the nerve of warfare, and in
a contest which can be decided only by the
exhaustion of one of the belligerents they are,
so to say, the central nerve system. The
Germans being astute financiers, and aware
that the war to which their policy was leading
would soon break out, had made due preparations,
with a surprising grasp of detail. Nothing
was forgotten and nothing neglected. And
success rewarded their efforts. The result was
that they mobilized their finances long before
they had begun to mobilize their troops.</p>
<p>France, on the contrary, persuaded that
peace would not be disturbed, took no thought
of the morrow. Yet her budgetary estimates
showed an ugly deficit. This gap, however,
would have been filled up in the ordinary
course of things by a big loan which was about
to be floated. But M. Caillaux, probably the
most clever financier in France, who, if he
applied his knowledge and resourcefulness to
the furtherance of his country’s interests, could
achieve great things, used them—and together
with them his parliamentary influence—to
upset the Cabinet and thwart the loan scheme.
Then, taking over the portfolio of the Finance
Minister in the new Cabinet, he arranged for
borrowing a small instead of a large amount,
thereby exposing his country to risks more<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_162" id="Page_162">[162]</a></span>
serious than the public realized. For it was a
heavy disadvantage on the eve of the most
exhausting struggle ever entered upon by the
French people, whose strongest position was
weakened as no enemy could have weakened it.</p>
<p>Russia was in a different, but nowise better,
position when suddenly called upon to meet
the onerous demands of the world-contest.
She, too, having pinned her faith to the
maintenance of peace, had made no preparations
for war, financial or military. Moreover,
a considerable sum of her money was at the
time deposited in various foreign countries,
and especially in France, for the service of her
loans and the payment of State orders placed
with various firms. This money, on the outbreak
of hostilities, was automatically immobilized
by the moratorium, although the
delicate question whether a moratorium can
be legally applied to sums thus deposited by
a foreign Government has not yet been decided
with finality. As a matter of fact,
Russia’s deposits remained where they were,
and could not be utilized. The consequences
of this embargo were irksome, and for a time
threatened to become dangerous. Little by
little, however, these restrictions were removed,
partly by the French Government and
partly by the spontaneous efforts of the banks.</p>
<p>France, too, suffered in a like way from the
paralysing effect of the moratorium. For the
French had no less than half a milliard francs
lent out at interest for short terms in Russia.
This sum could, as it chanced, have been refunded
at once without inconvenience, seeing
that it was liquid in the banks of Petrograd,
Moscow, Warsaw, and other cities of the Tsardom.
But as the money was in Russian roubles,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_163" id="Page_163">[163]</a></span>
and all international exchange had ceased, it too
was incapable of being converted into francs.
Thus the two allies, although really flush of
money, were undergoing some of the hardships
of impecuniosity, and to extricate them
from this tangle was a task that called for the
exercise of uncommon ingenuity. This happily
was forthcoming.</p>
<p>But that was only one aspect of a larger
and more momentous business which the
financiers of the Entente Powers had to set
themselves to tackle. Another of its bearings
was the effect of the war upon the rate of
exchange of the rouble, which is of moment
to all the Allies. Indeed, so long as the conflict
lasts the smooth working of the financial
machines of the three States is of as much
moment to each and all as is the winning of
battles and the raising of fresh armies. In
this struggle and at least until the curtain has
fallen upon the final scene, the maintenance
of financial credit and the purveyance of ready
cash, together with all the subsidiary issues to
which these operations may give rise, should
be discussed and settled in common.</p>
<p>During the present world combat, which
has not its like in history, whether we consider
the issues at stake, the number of troops
engaged, or the destructive forces let loose,
the ordinary narrow conceptions of mutual
assistance, financial and other, with their
jealous care of flaccid interests, cannot be
persisted in. The basic principle on which
it behoves the allied Powers to sustain each
other’s vitality can only be the community of
resources within the limits traced by national
needs. For our cause is one and indivisible,
and a success of one of the Allies is a success<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_164" id="Page_164">[164]</a></span>
of all. Hence, although we move from different
starting-points and by unconnected roads,
we are one community in motive, tendencies
and sacrifices. The sense of Fate, whose
deepening shadow now lies across the civilized
nations of the Old Continent, has evoked the
sympathies of the partner peoples for each
other, and temporarily obliterated many of the
points of artificial distinction which owed their
existence to national egotism.</p>
<p>Russia’s resources, then, were immobilized
at the outset of the war. The minister who
had spent thirty-five years in the financial
department of State had resigned shortly
before. His successor, a man of considerable
capacity and good intentions, was bereft of
the help of the best permanent officials of
the Ministry, who had followed the outgoing
minister into retirement. And no minister
ever needed help more sorely than M. Bark.
For the sudden cessation of all international
exchange and the consequent immobilization
of Russia’s financial reserve, made it temporarily
impossible for her to satisfy demands
which could easily have been met under
circumstances less disconcerting. Here her
British ally came to the rescue. In the first
place, the British Government gave its guarantee
to the Bank of England for the acceptances
which this bank had discounted. These were
of two kinds: all acceptances whatever discounted
before hostilities had broken out, and
all commercial acceptances discounted since
the declaration of war. The measure which
brought this welcome assistance was general in
its form, but it included Russian bills accepted
in London. And this discount by the Bank of
England will continue until one year after the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_165" id="Page_165">[165]</a></span>
close of the campaign. In plain English, that
means that the greater part of Russia’s cash
payments in London will be put off until then.</p>
<p>In Russia’s dealings with France a like
trouble made itself felt, but the same remedy
was not applied. The Government there did
not offer a State guarantee for acceptances
by the Banque de France. The reasons for
this difference of method are immaterial. The
main point is that some other expedient had to
be devised whereby Russia could discharge her
short-term debts to her French creditors. In
the Tsardom money was available for the
purpose, but it was in roubles, which would
first have to be exchanged into francs, and,
as there was no rate of exchange, this operation
could be effected, if at all, only at a
considerable and unnecessary loss.</p>
<p>After several weeks’ negotiations, and a
thorough study of the question, an agreement
was struck up between the Imperial Russian
Bank and the Banque de France, by which
the latter institution placed at the disposal of
the former the requisite sum in francs which
was specially earmarked for the payment of
Russia’s private debts in Paris.</p>
<p>The fall in the rouble was partly caused by
the diminution of Russian exports, in consequence
of the closing of the Baltic, the Mediterranean,
and the land routes <i>via</i> Germany and
Austria. The whole harvest of 1914 lay
garnered up in the Tsar’s dominions, where
prices fell to a low level, while the rouble lost
one-fourth of its value. Russia’s interest on
her foreign debt was thus increased by twenty-five
per cent. The Western allies, on the other
hand, were paying huge sums for corn to
neutrals. As in the long run all Entente<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_166" id="Page_166">[166]</a></span>
Powers will have to bear their share of eventual
losses, it behoved them to prevent or moderate
them. And this they accomplished to a limited
extent. It might have been well to go further
into the matter and consider the advisability
of entering into closer partnership than was
established by their concerted efforts in Paris.
An economic league with privileges for importation
and exportation accorded to all its
members—and only to these—not merely during
the war but for a series of years after the conclusion
of peace, might perhaps have tended
to solve that and kindred problems. But the
Allied Governments were constitutionally averse
to taking long views or adopting comprehensive
measures.</p>
<p>But the reopening of the Dardanelles and
the liberation of Russia’s corn supplies called
for immediate attention and a concrete plan of
campaign. The idea of rigging out a naval and
military expedition had been mooted in London
before the Financial Conference in Paris, but
on grounds which do not yet constitute
materials for public history it was dropped.
At the Conference the scheme was again taken
up, and the previous objections to its execution
having been successfully met it was
unanimously accepted. It is worth observing
that the original plan, so far as the present
writer was cognizant of it, was coherent, adequate
and feasible, and involved co-ordination
on the part of all three Allies. It did not contemplate
a purely naval expedition to the
Dardanelles, but provided for a mixed force
of land and sea troops, of which the number
was considerable and under the conditions
then prevalent might also have been ample for
the purpose. Although the Allies had thus<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_167" id="Page_167">[167]</a></span>
made what they believed to be adequate provision
for the success of their project, they
took measures to render assurance doubly
sure. They entered into pourparlers with
Greece, from whose co-operation they anticipated
advantages which would tell with decisive
force not only on the outcome of the
expedition but also on the upshot of the war.</p>
<p>Venizelos was approached and sounded on
the subject. His authority in his country,
like that of Bismarck on the eve of his fall,
was held to be supreme. For he had saved
Greece from anarchy and the dynasty from
banishment; he had reorganized the army,
strengthened the navy, established good government
at home, extended the boundaries of the
realm and laid the foundations of a regenerate
State which might in time reunite under the
royal sceptre most of the scattered elements of
Hellenism. His personal relations with King
Constantine were, however, understood to be
wanting in cordiality, but the monarch was
credited with sufficient acumen to perceive
where the interests of his dynasty and country
lay, and with common sense enough to allow
them to be safeguarded and furthered. It was
on these unsifted assumptions that the Governments
of the allied Powers went to work.</p>
<p>One redoubtable obstacle to be dislodged
before any headway could be made was
Bulgaria’s opposition. In order to displace
it, it would be necessary to acquiesce in her
demands for territory possessed by her neighbours.
And in view of the intimate relations,
political and economical, which the military
empires had established with Bulgaria and
their firm hold over Ferdinand, even this
retrocession might prove inadequate for the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_168" id="Page_168">[168]</a></span>
purpose. According to a binding arrangement
between Serbia and Greece, no territorial
concession running counter to the settlement
of the Bucharest Treaty might be accorded to
Bulgaria by either of the two contracting
States, without the consent of the other.
And now Venizelos was asked to signify his
assent to the abandonment by Serbia of a
part of the Macedonian province recently
annexed. This point gained, he was further
solicited to cede Kavalla and some 2000
square kilometres of territory incorporated
with Greece, to Bulgaria, in return for the
future possession of 140,000 square kilometres
in western Asia Minor. It was stipulated
by him and hastily taken for granted by
the Governments of the Allied States that
these concessions, together with those which
Serbia and Roumania were expected to make,
would move Bulgaria to follow Russia’s lead
and enter the arena by the side of the Allies.
But before Venizelos’s readiness to compromise
could be utilized as a practical element of
the negotiations, the Bulgarian Cabinet had
applied for and received an advance of 150
million francs from the two Central empires
on conditions which, in the judgment of the
Greek Premier, rendered further dealings with
that State nugatory.</p>
<p>At the same time King Constantine, yielding
to German importunity and to personal
emotions, adopted a series of measures of
which the effect would have been to discredit
in the eyes of the nation Venizelos’s patriotism
as a minister and his veracity as an individual.
The upshot of these machinations was the
voluntary retirement of the Premier from
public life, the dissolution of the Greek Parliament,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_169" id="Page_169">[169]</a></span>
the accession to power of a Germanophile
Cabinet, and the frustration of that part
of the Allies’ plan which had for its object the
immediate co-operation of Greece and the subsequent
enlistment of the neighbouring Balkan
States. As yet, however, Greece was not wholly
lost to the Entente. Another opportunity presented
itself which, had it been seized by the
Governments of Great Britain and France,
might yet have altered the course of Balkan
history. But the acceptable offer in which it
was embodied by the Hellenic Government
elicited no response whatever in London or
Paris. This was the last hope. Thenceforward
the Allies were constrained to rely upon
their own unaided exertions.</p>
<p>How they approached the problem thus
modified, and to what degree and in consequence
of what technical occurrences the
achievement fell short of reasonable expectations,
are matters which do not come within
the scope of this summary narrative of historic
events. It may suffice to contrast the belief,
which in March 1915 was widespread—that the
Dardanelles would be forced and Constantinople
captured in the space of four or five
weeks—with the circumstance that since then
the British troops alone had nearly a hundred
thousand casualties and that in the month of
January 1916 it became evident that nothing
could be gained by further prolonging this painful
effort, and the enterprise was abandoned.</p>
<p>In spite of Turkey’s hostility, the tone of
the Allied Press lost little of its buoyancy.
Japan, who had declared war on Germany
in August,<a name="FNanchor_78_78" id="FNanchor_78_78"></a><a href="#Footnote_78_78" class="fnanchor">[78]</a> had since captured Kiao Chau<a name="FNanchor_79_79" id="FNanchor_79_79"></a><a href="#Footnote_79_79" class="fnanchor">[79]</a>]
and that achievement coupled with the results
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_170" id="Page_170">[170]</a></span>of four months’ warfare in Europe were held
to be promising. For Germany’s original
plan of campaign had been foiled, her army
driven back from Paris, and Austria had been
defeated in Galicia. If on the debit side
of the balance nearly all Belgium and nine
departments of France had fallen into the
enemy’s hands, it was some solace to learn
that the military authorities of the Allies had
reckoned with all that from the outset. Every
reverse sustained by their arms turned out to
have been foreseen and discounted by their
sagacious leaders. Then, again, it was argued
that time was on our side, enabling us to
develop our resources, which are much vaster
than those of the enemy. To this way of
looking at the situation the writer of these
lines opposed another. “There is,” he wrote,
“a small section of the nation, men conversant
with the aims, modes of thought, and
military, financial, and economic resources of
the enemy, whose gloomy forecasts in the
past have been unhappily fulfilled in the
present, and who would gladly see more conclusive
evidence than has yet been offered that
everything which can be done at a given
moment to turn the scale more decisively in
our favour is being expeditiously undertaken
by the responsible authorities.</p>
<p>“They are afraid that the gravity of the
issues for which we are fighting, the telling
initial advantages secured by the wily enemy,
the formidable nature of the difficulties in the
way of decisive victory, and the tremendous
sacrifices which we shall all be called upon to
make before we come in sight of the goal,
have not yet filtered down into the consciousness
of any considerable section of the people.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_171" id="Page_171">[171]</a></span>”
Many months later<a name="FNanchor_80_80" id="FNanchor_80_80"></a><a href="#Footnote_80_80" class="fnanchor">[80]</a> Mr. Lloyd George re-echoed
that judgment when dealing with the
Welsh miners’ strike.</p>
<p>But optimism continued to prevail among the
allied peoples, who through the Press proclaimed
their conviction that ultimate and complete success
was a foregone conclusion. At the same
time, however, an eager desire to hasten this consummation
found vent among a considerable section
of politicians, more particularly in France.
And one of the means by which they hoped to
attain their goal was by inviting Japan to co-operate
with the Allies in Europe. As “invitation”
was the term employed, the peculiar
manner in which the idea was conceived hardly
needs definition. To the Japanese themselves
the inference was patent and distasteful. Theretofore
it had been a dogma that France, Britain
and Russia, being quite capable of crushing
Germany and Austria, neither attempted nor
wished to draw any neutral or Asiatic nation into
the sanguinary maelstrom of war. And even now
it was held to be undignified to swerve from that
doctrine. Help therefore, it was contended,
was not indispensable to victory, it was merely
desirable from the humanitarian standpoint
of putting an early end to the campaign and
sparing the lives of millions.</p>
<p>French statesmen of the calibre of MM.
Pichon and Clémenceau pushed into the foreground
of international politics this question
of Japan’s military intervention in Europe.
An organized Press campaign was carried on in
several of the most prominent daily papers
and reviews of Paris.<a name="FNanchor_81_81" id="FNanchor_81_81"></a><a href="#Footnote_81_81" class="fnanchor">[81]</a> Striking arguments
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_172" id="Page_172">[172]</a></span>were put forward in support of the thesis that
Japan’s co-operation in Europe is desirable,
and the inference which many readers were
encouraged to draw was that if the aim had
not yet been attained, failure should be ascribed
to the statesmanship of the Allies, which was
deficient in sagacity, or to their diplomacy,
which was wanting in resourcefulness. M.
Pichon, in a masterly article in the <i>Revue</i>,
wrote: “I am one of those who hold that
(Japan) could bring to us here on the European
continent an incomparable force, and I remain
convinced that the Japanese Government would
like nothing better than to respond to the
appeal of the Triple Entente Powers if these
requested its collaboration for future combats.”<a name="FNanchor_82_82" id="FNanchor_82_82"></a><a href="#Footnote_82_82" class="fnanchor">[82]</a></p>
<p>The idea was that Japanese troops should
come to southern Europe, combine with the
Serbs and create a new front there. This
diversion, it was contended, would transform
the slow and costly siege war and give the
Allies access to Germany. And these decisive
results could be achieved by an expedition of
less than half a million Japanese warriors.</p>
<p>When it was asked what motives could be
held out to Nippon potent enough to determine
her to embark on such an enterprise,
the reply was that she had a positive interest
to undertake the task. For by contributing
to the defeat of Germany in Europe she would
free herself from Teutonic machinations in the
Far East. The Allies would, of course, have
to promise her territorial compensation commensurate
with her sacrifices. And after the
conclusion of peace Japan would extract from
Germany not only a sum big enough to cover
all the expenses of the expedition, but also a
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_173" id="Page_173">[173]</a></span>heavy war indemnity. Over and above this,
France and Britain would enable her to float
on easy terms a loan of some three hundred
millions sterling, as a moderate return for the
three or four months curtailment of the war
which costs the Allies nearly a hundred and
twenty millions a month. Lastly, Japan’s
horn would be vastly exalted and her prestige
increased by her participation in the most
tremendous conflict recorded in history.</p>
<p>Considered on its merits the enterprise impressed
one more by its arduousness than by
the tangible advantages it offered to either
of the interested parties. The technical difficulties
were many and well-nigh insurmountable:
the lack of transports, the distance
at which the Mikado’s troops in Europe would
be from their base of supplies, and the length
of time that must elapse before they could
replenish their stores of ammunition, whether
these were drawn from Tokyo or manufactured
in Europe. And half a million fighting
men, however well trained, would represent
but a drop in the ocean when flung against
the millions to whom they would be opposed.</p>
<p>Still more decisive was the question of
motive. Why should the Japanese sacrifice
their brave soldiers? For the sake of territory
which they do not yet covet, or of prestige
which they enjoy in a superlative degree
already? Although chivalrous and highly impressible
to everything that can appeal to a
high-minded people, they are also practical
and far-sighted and are not to be lured by a
will-o’-the-wisp. They had already assisted
the Allies in the Far East and performed their
part admirably.</p>
<p>The Japanese army is made up of patriots<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_174" id="Page_174">[174]</a></span>
whose lives belong to their country. To their
spirit of self-sacrifice there are no bounds.
And that this splendid organism should be implicitly
set down as a band of mercenaries
capable of being bought and sold is more than
its leaders can brook. The idea that mere
money or money’s worth could purchase
Japanese blood is resented by our Far Eastern
Ally. Between Europe and Asia Japan is the
connecting link. Her people are endowed
with some of the highest qualities of the
European and the Asiatic. Their civilization
is ancient and refined, and they understand
and appreciate that of Europe. The chivalry
of the Samurai is recognized universally.
Their respect for their plighted word is
scrupulous. And their tact and moderation
have been demonstrated time and again
during their relations first with Russia and
then with the United States. Japan’s immediate
task lies in the Far East, and to that
region she is minded to confine her activity,
as was shown by the pressure which she soon
afterwards put upon China. None the less,
it is symptomatic of feelings which are still
inarticulate and of currents which flow beneath
the surface, that more than once of late the
Russian Press has called for a defensive and
offensive alliance between the Tsardom and
Japan.<a name="FNanchor_83_83" id="FNanchor_83_83"></a><a href="#Footnote_83_83" class="fnanchor">[83]</a> That it will come and exert a noteworthy
influence on the politics of the world,
is the firm conviction of the present writer,
who has had the good fortune to contribute
more than once to bring the two Powers
closer together.<a name="FNanchor_84_84" id="FNanchor_84_84"></a><a href="#Footnote_84_84" class="fnanchor">[84]</a></p>
<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_78_78" id="Footnote_78_78"></a><a href="#FNanchor_78_78"><span class="label">[78]</span></a> August 23, 1914.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_79_79" id="Footnote_79_79"></a><a href="#FNanchor_79_79"><span class="label">[79]</span></a> November 6, 1914.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_80_80" id="Footnote_80_80"></a><a href="#FNanchor_80_80"><span class="label">[80]</span></a> July 1915.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_81_81" id="Footnote_81_81"></a><a href="#FNanchor_81_81"><span class="label">[81]</span></a> In the <i>Petit Journal</i>, the <i>Homme Enchaîné</i>, <i>l’Illustration</i>,
the <i>Revue Hebdomadaire</i>, and the <i>Revue</i>.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_82_82" id="Footnote_82_82"></a><a href="#FNanchor_82_82"><span class="label">[82]</span></a> Fevrier, <i>Revue</i>, 1915, p. 195.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_83_83" id="Footnote_83_83"></a><a href="#FNanchor_83_83"><span class="label">[83]</span></a> Cf. <i>Novoye Vremya</i>, June 26, 1915.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_84_84" id="Footnote_84_84"></a><a href="#FNanchor_84_84"><span class="label">[84]</span></a> See Hayashi’s <i>Secret Memoirs</i>.</p></div>
</div>
<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XIV" id="CHAPTER_XIV"></a>CHAPTER XIV<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_175" id="Page_175">[175]</a></span></h2>
<h3>READJUSTMENTS</h3>
<p><span class="smcap">Deprived</span> of the help for which they had
looked to Japan, the publicists and politicians
of the allied countries now centred their hopes
on the neutrals and on Kitchener’s great army,
which was to appear on the scene in spring,
put an end to the warfare of the trenches, and
free Belgium from the Teuton yoke. The impending
belligerency of certain of the neutrals
would, it was reasonably believed, turn the
scales in favour of Britain, France and Russia.
Indeed, Bulgaria alone, owing to her commanding
geographical position, might have
achieved the feat more than once during the
campaign. With the death of King Carol of
Roumania<a name="FNanchor_85_85" id="FNanchor_85_85"></a><a href="#Footnote_85_85" class="fnanchor">[85]</a> the probability of this consummation
seemed to verge on certitude. It
aroused high hopes among the Allies.</p>
<p>The propitious moment seemed to have
come for the union of all Roumanians under
the sceptre of the new king. Over three
million members of that race under Hungarian
sway had long been waging a losing contest
for their nationality, language and religion.
And they entertained no hope of better prospects
in the future. For in view of her military
inferiority Roumania, with her little army
of half a million men, could not indulge in
energetic protests against the treatment meted
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_176" id="Page_176">[176]</a></span>out to her kindred by Hungary. She had no
choice but to resign herself to the inevitable.
Diplomatically, too, she was bound to Austria
by a secret convention, concluded by the
Hohenzollern prince who had presided over her
destinies for a generation. Economically she
was, as we saw, tied hand and foot to Germany.
Moreover, it was a matter of common knowledge
that King Carol would never tolerate
any radical change in the political orientation
of the kingdom. To the writer of these lines
he said so in plain words shortly before he died,
and he also charged him with a message of
the same tenor to the Austro-Hungarian
Minister of Foreign Affairs. But, loyal and
conscientious, as was his wont, King Carol
added that if circumstances should ever necessitate
a radical change in Roumania’s attitude,
a younger ruler might usher it in, for whom
he would not hesitate to make room.</p>
<p>This eventuality arose in September<a name="FNanchor_86_86" id="FNanchor_86_86"></a><a href="#Footnote_86_86" class="fnanchor">[86]</a> when
the Russians defeated the Austrians, occupied
Lemberg, threatened Cracow, took up strong
positions on the Carpathians, and bade fair
to overrun Hungary. Fate, it seemed, had
at last overtaken the Habsburg Monarchy,
which, contrary to general expectation, had not
succumbed to internal strife on the outbreak
of the war. And it now lay with Roumania
and her neighbours to play the part of Fate’s
executors. As a matter of fact, Roumania
suddenly found a sonorous voice in which
to utter her grievances against the Teutons.
Senators, deputies, ex-ministers executed a
<i>chassez croisez</i> movement through France, Italy
and Britain, delivering diatribes against Austria-Hungary,
arousing sympathy for Roumania,
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_177" id="Page_177">[177]</a></span>and proclaiming their country’s resolve to
strike a blow for justice, liberty and civilization.
The names of Senator Istrati, M. Diamandy,
and Dr. Constantinescu were associated with
feasts of patriotic sentiment and flow of soul.
Military delegates in Paris made extensive
purchases of various necessaries for the
commissariat and sanitary departments of
the War Ministry, and the date on which the
gallant Roumanian nation would unsheathe
its sword in the cause of humanity was unofficially
announced.</p>
<p>At that moment the country was governed,
as it still is, by a Premier who might appropriately
be termed its Dictator, so little influence
on his policy and methods is wielded by his
colleagues in the Cabinet. John Bratiano is
the sole trustee of the nation at the most
critical period of its history. The son of an
eminent and deservedly respected statesman,
this politician entered public life encircled by
the halo of his father’s prestige. Gifted with
considerable powers, he owes more to birth
than to hard work and self-discipline. Entering
early upon his valuable political heritage
he found all paths smoothed, all doors open
to him. The leadership of the most influential
parliamentary party fell to him at an age
when other politicians are painfully struggling
with the preliminary difficulties in the way of
success, and John Bratiano became the ruler
of Roumania without an effort. Descended
from an illustrious stock, he is penetrated
with an overmastering sense of his own personal
responsibility, from which the principal relief
to be obtained lies in the indefinite prolongation
of his liberty of choice. Finality in
matters of momentous decision appears painful<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_178" id="Page_178">[178]</a></span>
to him, and the standard of success which
would fairly be applied to the policy of the
ordinary statesman seems too lax for the man
whose shoulders are pressed down with the
weight of the kingdom as it is and the kingdom
yet to come. Hence his anxiety to drive a
brilliant bargain with the Allies and to leave
no hold for hostile criticism at home. Like
most patriots placed in responsible positions,
he is bent on furthering what he considers
the interests of his country in his own way,
and honestly convinced that the right way is
his own, he has hitherto declined to share
responsibility with the Opposition—which disapproves
his Fabian policy—even though it
numbers among its members a real statesman
of the calibre and repute of Take Jonescu.</p>
<p>At first M. Bratiano swam with the stream.
He assured foreign diplomatists, eminent
Italians and others, that Roumania had decided
to throw in her lot with the Allies. And
his declarations were re-echoed by his colleagues.
These statements were duly transmitted to the
various Cabinets interested, and the entry of
Roumania into the struggle was reckoned with
by all the Allied Powers. On the strength of
these good intentions one of the Allies was
asked to advance a certain sum of money for
military preparations, and the request was
complied with. Italy was approached and
treated as a trusty confidant, and a tacit arrangement
was come to with her by which
each of the two Latin States was expected to
communicate with the other as soon as it
should decide to take the field. In fine, it was
understood that Roumania would join in at
the same time as Italy.</p>
<p>Cognizant of those intentions and preparations<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_179" id="Page_179">[179]</a></span>
the Allies rejoiced exceedingly. The
prospect that opened out before them appeared
cheerful. Kitchener’s great army was to take
the offensive in spring, Roumania’s co-operation
was due some months or weeks previously,
and the forcing of the Dardanelles might be
counted upon as a corollary, to say nothing
of the adherence of Greece and Bulgaria to
the allied cause. But Germany and Austria
lost nothing of their self-confidence. Clumsy
though their professional diplomacy might
be, their economico-diplomatic campaign had
left little to be desired. Its fruits were ripe.
They had firmly knitted the material interests
of the little Latin State with their own, and
could rely on the backing of nearly every
supporter of Bratiano’s Cabinet in the country.
But leaving nothing to chance, they now put
forth the most ingenious, persistent and costly
efforts to maintain the ground they had won.
Influential newspapers were bought or subsidized,
new ones were founded, public servants
were corrupted, calumnies were launched
against the Allies and their supporters, and a
nucleus of military men ranged themselves
among the opponents of intervention.</p>
<p>M. Bratiano suddenly turned wary and
circumspect. His talk was now of the necessity
of time for preparations, of the divergence
of views between his Cabinet and that of the
Tsar, and of the inadequacy of the motives
held out to his country for belligerency.
Thereupon negotiations began between Russia
and Roumania, which dragged on endlessly.
What the Roumanian Premier said to the
Russian Minister was practically this: “The
choice between belligerency and neutrality
must be determined by the balance of territorial<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_180" id="Page_180">[180]</a></span>
advantages offered by each. And the terms
must be adequate and guaranteed.” The conditions
which, according to him, answered to
this description consisted of the cession of
all Transylvania, part of the Banat of Temesvar,
the Roumanian districts of Bukovina,
and of the province of Crishana and Marmaros.</p>
<p>About Transylvania there was no dissentient
voice: it was admitted that it ought by right
to form part of the Roumanian kingdom. The
dispute between Bucharest and Petrograd
hinged on a zone of the Banat and a strip of
Bukovina. The Tsar’s Government admitted
that Bukovina might be annexed by Roumania
as far as the river Seret, but not farther
north; whereas the Roumanian Premier insisted
on obtaining the promise of a zone the
northern boundary of which would be formed
by the river Pruth, and would therefore include
the important city of Czernowitz, which
is the capital of the province. The divergence
of opinion arising out of this demand for the
district of Pancsova in the Banat of Temesvar
raised a formidable obstacle to an understanding,
for the claim runs counter to the principle
of nationality somewhat pedantically laid down
by the Allied Powers. Parenthetically, it is
worth remembering that hard-and-fast principles
which lead insensibly to dogmatism
cannot be too sedulously avoided by a Government.
Politics must assuredly have its ideals,
but compromise is the method by which alone
it can approach them. The Allies have already
been constrained by tyrannous circumstance
to entertain important exceptions to their
principle of nationality which was invoked
against Italy’s claim to Dalmatia, and in their
own best interests they might have compromised<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_181" id="Page_181">[181]</a></span>
on the subject of Bulgaria’s claims
to Macedonia, and of Roumania’s pretensions
to annex certain of the disputed territories
inhabited by Serbs and Ruthenians.</p>
<p>In truth, Roumania’s attitude, of which at
various times conflicting accounts have been
given, appears to be what one might reasonably
expect, considering the sympathies of the
nation, the interests of the State, and the
requirements of the conjuncture. Looking at
it from the view-point of the outsider, it would
perhaps have been to her interest to join the
Allies when the Russians, driving the Magyars
and the Austrians before them, could have
played the part of right wing to her armies. It
was generally believed later on that she would
unsheathe the sword at the same time as Italy.
Informal announcements to that effect are
known to have been made to certain official
representatives of that country. And her
failure to stand by these spontaneous declarations
was the cause of profound disappointment
to the Entente and of a considerable
loss of credit to herself. These facts and conclusions
appeal with irresistible force to the
uninitiated, and in especial to those among
them who are citizens of the belligerent States.</p>
<p>But there is another aspect of the matter
which, whatever effect its disclosure may have
on the general verdict, is at any rate well worth
considering. According to this version, which
is based on what actually passed between
Bucharest and the capitals of the Entente
Powers, the central idea of Roumania’s strivings
was to achieve national unity together
with defensible military frontiers as far as
appeared feasible, and to obtain in advance
implicit assurances that the Entente Powers,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_182" id="Page_182">[182]</a></span>
if victorious, would allow her claims without
demur or delay. The territories occupied by
the Roumanians of Transylvania, the Bukovina,
and the Banat were to be united under
the sceptre of the King, including the strip
which is contiguous to Belgrade. To this the
Slavs demurred because Belgrade could then
no longer remain the Serbian capital. But
of these demands M. Bratiano would make
no abatement, nor in the promise of the
Entente to fulfil them would he admit of
any ambiguity. Roumania’s experience in
1877, under M. Bratiano’s father, when, after
having helped Russia to defeat the Turks, she
was deprived of Bessarabia and obliged to
content herself with the Dobrudja, was the
main motive for this striving after definite
conditions, while her readiness to look upon
that loss of Bessarabia as final moved her to
demand every rood of Austro-Hungarian territory
which was inhabited by her kinsmen or
had belonged to them in bygone days. These
motives were inconsistent with the mooting
of the Bessarabian question, and the statement
so often made in the Press that Roumania
demanded, and still demands, that lost
province from Russia are absolutely groundless.
The subject was never once broached.</p>
<p>It has been argued that although these
claims to recompense may have been reasonable
enough in themselves, to have made
them conditions of Roumania’s participation
in the war on the side of the Allies smacked
more of the pettifogger than of the statesman.
In a tremendous struggle like the present for
lofty ideals this bargaining for territorial advantages
showed, it was urged, the country
and the Government in a sinister light. To<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_183" id="Page_183">[183]</a></span>
this criticism the friends of M. Bratiano reply
that most of the belligerents set the example,
with far less reason than Roumania could
plead. Italy, for instance, had made her
military co-operation conditional on the promise
of a large part of Dalmatia, as well as
the <i>terra irredenta</i>, and Russia insisted upon
having her claim to Constantinople allowed.
Why, it is asked, should Roumania be blamed
for acting similarly and on more solid grounds?</p>
<p>During the first phase of the conversations
which were carried on between Roumania
and the Entente there would appear to have
been no serious hitch. They culminated in
a loan of £5,000,000 advanced in January
1915. In the following month they ceased
and were not resumed until April, when
M. Bratiano was informed that it would
facilitate matters if he would discuss terms
with the Tsar’s Government. By means of
an exchange of notes an arrangement had
been come to by which Roumania was to have
“the country inhabited by the Roumanians
of Austria-Hungary” in return for her neutrality
and on the express condition that she
should occupy them <i>par les armes</i> before the
close of the war. I announced this agreement
in the summer of 1915 and, commenting on the
controversy to which it gave rise, pointed out
that it amounted only to a promise made by
Russia and an option given to Roumania, which
the latter state was at liberty to take up or
forgo as it might think fit. It bound her to
nothing. Consequently, to accuse her of having
broken faith with Italy or the Entente is
to betray a complete lack of acquaintance with
the facts.</p>
<p>It was only when Roumania’s military participation<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_184" id="Page_184">[184]</a></span>
was solicited that difficulties began
to make themselves felt. And they proved
insurmountable. So long as the Russian armies
were victorious Roumania’s demands were
rejected. When the Tsar’s troops, for lack of
ammunition, were obliged to retreat, concessions
were made very gradually, slight concessions
at first, which became larger as the
withdrawal proceeded, until finally—the Russian
troops being driven out—everything was
conceded, when it was too late. For with the
departure of the Russian armies Roumania
was so exposed to attack from various sides,
and so isolated from her protectors, that her
military experts deemed intervention to be
dangerous for herself and useless to the Allies.</p>
<p>In Italy, it has been said with truth, the
conviction prevailed that Roumania would
descend into the arena as soon as the Salandra
Cabinet had declared war against Austria, and
a good deal of disappointment was caused by
M. Bratiano’s failure to come up to this expectation.
But the expectation was gratuitous
and the disappointment imaginary. In an
article written at the time I pointed out that
one of the mistakes made by the Entente
Powers consisted in the circuitous and clumsy
way in which they negotiated with Roumania.
The spokesman and guardian of Italy during
the decisive conversations with the Entente was
the Foreign Minister, Baron Sonnino, the silent
member of the Cabinet. Now, this turned out
to be a very unfortunate kind of guardianship,
which his ward subsequently repudiated with
reason. For one effect of his taciturnity—the
Roumanians ascribed it to his policy—was to
keep Roumania in the dark about matters of
vital moment to her of which she ought to have<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_185" id="Page_185">[185]</a></span>
had cognizance. Another was to treat with
the Entente Governments as though Roumania
had sold her will and private judgment to the
Salandra Cabinet. This, however, is a curious
story of war diplomacy which had best be left
to the historian to recount. One day it will
throw a new light upon matters of great
interest which are misunderstood at present.
Roumania’s co-operation then, as now, would
have been of much greater help to the Allies
than certain other results which were secured
by sacrificing it. And sacrificed it was quite
wantonly. We are wont to sneer at Germany’s
diplomacy as ridiculously clumsy, and to
plume ourselves on our own as tactful and
dignified. Well, if one were charged with
the defence of this thesis, the last source to
which one would turn for evidence in support
of it is our diplomatic negotiations with
M. Bratiano’s Cabinet.</p>
<p>In the light of this <i>exposé</i> the severe judgments
that have been passed on the policy of
the Roumanian Cabinet may have to be revised.</p>
<p>The crux of the situation was the attitude
of Bulgaria. Bulgaria, a petty country with a
population inferior to that of London, impregnated
with Teutonism and ruled by an Austro-Hungarian
officer who loathes the Slavs, had
throughout this sanguinary clash of peoples
rendered invaluable services to the Teutons
and indirectly inflicted incalculable losses on
the civilized nations of the globe. This
tremendous power for evil springs from her
unique strategic position in Eastern Europe.
At any moment during the conflict her active
assistance would have won Constantinople and
Turkey for the Allies, and if proffered during
one of several particularly favourable conjunctures<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_186" id="Page_186">[186]</a></span>
might have speedily ended the war.
But so tight was Germany’s grip on her that
she not only withheld her own aid, but actually
threatened to fall foul of any of the Balkan
States that should tender theirs. It is, therefore,
no exaggeration to affirm that the duration
of this war and some of the most doleful events
chronicled during the first year of its prosecution,
are due to the insidious behaviour of
Ferdinand of Coburg and his Bulgarian coadjutors.
One may add that this behaviour
constitutes a brilliant and lasting testimony
to the foresight and resourcefulness of German
diplomacy. It is one of the products of
German organization as distinguished from
French and British individualism.</p>
<p>While Bulgaria was thus holding the menace
of her army over Roumania’s head, and M.
Bratiano stood irresolute between belligerency
and neutrality, the German and Austrian
armies were effectively co-operating with German
and Austrian diplomatists. They compelled
the Russians to withdraw from Eastern
Prussia,<a name="FNanchor_87_87" id="FNanchor_87_87"></a><a href="#Footnote_87_87" class="fnanchor">[87]</a> and from a part of Galicia<a name="FNanchor_88_88" id="FNanchor_88_88"></a><a href="#Footnote_88_88" class="fnanchor">[88]</a>] later on
from Lodz, from the Masurian Lakes and
Bukovina.<a name="FNanchor_89_89" id="FNanchor_89_89"></a><a href="#Footnote_89_89" class="fnanchor">[89]</a> Gradually Roumania saw herself
bereft of what would have been her right wing
and cover, and her military men, the most
influential of whom had been against intervention
from the first, now declared the
moment inauspicious on strategical grounds.
Thereupon the oratorical representatives of
the Roumanian people consoled themselves
with the formula that Roumanian blood would
be shed only for Roumanian interests, and that
when a fresh turn of Fortune’s wheel should
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_187" id="Page_187">[187]</a></span>bring the Russian troops back to Bukovina and
Galicia, the gallant Roumanians would strike a
blow for their country and civilization.</p>
<p>It would be unfruitful to enter into a detailed
examination of the efforts of the Allies to
detach the neutrals, and in especial the Balkan
States, from the Military Empires with which
their interests had been elaborately bound
up. But in passing, one may fairly question
the wisdom of their general plan, which
established facts—still fragmentary in character—enable
us to reconstruct. The resuscitation
of the Balkan League and the mobilization of
its forces against Turkey was an enterprise
from which the greatest statesmen of the
nineteenth century, were they living, would
have recoiled. For it presupposes an ascetic
frame of mind among the little States, which
in truth hate each other more intensely than
they ever hated the Turks. The first condition
of success, were success conceivable,
would have been the abrogation of the Treaty
of Bucharest and the redistribution of the
territories, which its authors had divided with
so little regard for abstract justice and the
stability of peace. And to this procedure,
which Bulgaria ostentatiously demanded, Serbia
entered a firm demurrer in which she was joined
by Greece. For Serbs and Bulgars have always
been hypnotized by Macedonia. Their gaze
is fixed on that land as by some magic fascination,
which interest and reason are powerless
to break. They think of the future development,
nay of the very existence of their
respective nations, as indissolubly intertwined
with it. To lose Macedonia, therefore, is to
forfeit the life-secret of nation. Hence Bulgaria
obstinately refused to abate one jot of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_188" id="Page_188">[188]</a></span>
her demands, while Serbia was firmly resolved
to reject them. It mattered nothing that the
fate of all Europe and of these two States was
dependent on compromise. The little nations
took no account of the interests at stake.
Each, like Sir Boyle Roche, was ready to
sacrifice the whole for a part, and felt proud
of its wisdom and will-power.</p>
<p>Under these circumstances the scheme of a
resuscitated Balkan League should have been
accounted a political chimera, whereas politics
is the art of the possible. What might perhaps
have been envisaged with utility was the
selection of the less mischievous and more
helpful of the unwelcome alternatives with
which the allied diplomacy was confronted.
If, for instance, it could have been conclusively
shown that Bulgaria’s help was indispensable,
adequate and purchasable, the plain course
would have been to pay handsomely for that.
However high the price, it would have been
more than compensated by the positive and
negative gains. If, on the other hand, Bulgaria
were recalcitrant and inexorable, the
Tsardom which protected her might to some
good purpose have become equally so, and
displayed firmness and severity. It has been
said that Russia cannot find it in her heart
either to coerce Serbia or to punish Bulgaria.
If this be a correct presentation of her temper—and
in the past it corresponded to the reality—then
the Allies are up against an insurmountable
obstacle which must be looked
upon as one of the instruments of Fate.</p>
<p>Our Press is never tired of repeating that the
neutrals have a right to think only of their
own interest and to frame their policy in
strict accordance with that, whether it draws<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_189" id="Page_189">[189]</a></span>
them towards the Allies or the Teuton camp.
To this principle exception may be taken. If
it be true that the European community, its
civilization and all that that connotes are in
grave danger, then every member of that
community is liable to be called on for help,
and is bound to tender it. In such a crisis
it is a case of every one being against us who
is not actively with us. Otherwise the contention
that this is no ordinary war but a
criminal revolt against civilization, is a mere
piece of claptrap and is properly treated as
such by the neutrals. But there is another
important side of the matter which has not
yet been seriously considered. If the neutrals
are warranted in ignoring the common
interest and restricting themselves to the
furtherance of their own, it is surely meet
that the Allies, too, should enjoy the full
benefits of this principle and frame their
entire policy—economic, financial, political and
military—with a view to promoting their common
weal, and with no more tender regard
for that of the non-belligerent States than is
conducive to the success of their cause and
in strict accordance with international law.
The application of this doctrine would find its
natural expression in the creation of an economic
league of the Allied States with privileges
restricted to its members. It may not be
irrelevant to state that during one phase of
the war combined action of the kind alluded
to would have given the Allies the active help
of one or two neutral countries. Nay, if the
exportation of British coal alone had been
restricted to the belligerents, the hesitation of
those countries between neutrality and belligerency
would have been overcome in a month.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_190" id="Page_190">[190]</a></span></p>
<p>Italy and Bulgaria, being the two nations
whose attitude would in the judgment of
German statesmen have the furthest reaching
consequences on the war, were also the object
of their unwearied attentions. And every
motive which could appeal to the interest or
sway the sentiment of those peoples was set
before them in the light most conducive to
the aims of the tempter. Those painstaking
efforts were duly rewarded. Bulgaria, before
abandoning her neutrality, had contributed
more effectively even than Turkey to retard
the Allies’ progress and to facilitate that of
their adversaries.</p>
<p>For Italy’s restiveness Germany was prepared,
but it was reasonably hoped that with
a mixture of firmness, forbearance and generosity
that nation would be prevailed upon to
maintain a neutrality which the various agents
at work in the peninsula could render permanently
benevolent. And from the fateful
August 3, 1914, down to the following May,
the course of events attested the accuracy of
this forecast. At first all Italy was opposed
to belligerency. Deliberate reason, irrational
prejudice, religious sentiment, political calculation,
economic interests and military considerations
all tended to confirm the population
in its resolve to keep out of the sanguinary
struggle. The Vatican, its organs and agents,
brought all their resources to bear upon devout
Catholics, whose name is legion and whose
immediate aim was the maintenance of peace
with the Central empires. The commercial
and industrial community was tied to Germany
by threads as fine, numerous and binding as
those that rendered Gulliver helpless in the
hands of the Lilliputians. The common people,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_191" id="Page_191">[191]</a></span>
heavily taxed and poorly paid, yearned for
peace and an opportunity to better their
material lot. The Parliament was at the beck
and call of a dictator who was moved by party
interests to co-operate with the Teutons, while
the Senate, which favoured neutrality on independent
grounds, had made it a rule to
second every resolution of the Chamber. In a
word, although Italy might wax querulous and
importunate, her complaints and her demands
would, it was assumed, play a part only in the
scheme of diplomatic tactics, but would never
harden into pretexts for war.</p>
<p>For it was a matter of common knowledge
that departure from the attitude of neutrality,
whatever its ultimate effects—and these would
certainly be fateful—must first lead to a long
train of privations, hardships and economic
shocks, which would subject the limited staying
powers of the nation—accustomed to peace,
and only now beginning to thrive—to a searching,
painful and dangerous test. From a
Government impressed by this perspective, and
conscious of its responsibility, careful deliberation,
rather than high-pitched views, were
reasonably expected.</p>
<p>And the attitude of the Cabinet since August
1914 had been marked by the utmost caution
and self-containment. Contemplated from a
distance by certain of the Allies whose attention
was absorbed by the political aspect of the
matter, this method of cool calculation seemed
to smack of hollow make-believe. Why, it was
asked, should Italy hold back or weigh the
certain losses against the probable gains, seeing
that she would have as allies the two most
puissant States of Europe, and the enormous
advantage of sea power on her side?</p>
<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_85_85" id="Footnote_85_85"></a><a href="#FNanchor_85_85"><span class="label">[85]</span></a> October 10, 1914.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_86_86" id="Footnote_86_86"></a><a href="#FNanchor_86_86"><span class="label">[86]</span></a> September 8, 1914.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_87_87" id="Footnote_87_87"></a><a href="#FNanchor_87_87"><span class="label">[87]</span></a> October 13, 1914.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_88_88" id="Footnote_88_88"></a><a href="#FNanchor_88_88"><span class="label">[88]</span></a> December 6, 1914.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_89_89" id="Footnote_89_89"></a><a href="#FNanchor_89_89"><span class="label">[89]</span></a> February 15, 1915.</p></div>
</div>
<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XV" id="CHAPTER_XV"></a>CHAPTER XV<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_192" id="Page_192">[192]</a></span></h2>
<h3>THE POSITION OF ITALY</h3>
<p><span class="smcap">But</span> intervention in the war was not one of
those ordinary enterprises on which Italy
might reasonably embark, after having carefully
counted up the cost in men and money
and allowed a reasonable margin for unforeseen
demands on both. In this venture the liabilities
were unlimited, whereas the resources of
the nation were bounded, the limits being much
narrower than in the case of any other Great
Power. And this was a truly hampering circumstance.
Serious though it was, however,
it would hardly avail to deter a nation from
accepting the risks and offering up the sacrifices
requisite, if the motive were at once
adequate, peremptory and pressing.</p>
<p>But Italy, unlike the Allies, had had no
strong provocation to draw the sword. Grievances
she undoubtedly possessed in plenty.
She had been badly dealt with by her allies,
but forbearance was her rule of living. For
nearly a generation she had been a partner of
the two militarist States, yet she shrank from
severing her connection with them, even when
they deliberately broke their part of the compact.
This breach of covenant not only dispensed
her from taking arms on their side,
but would also, owing to the consequences it
involved, have sufficed to warrant her adhesion
to the Entente Powers. But for conclusive<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_193" id="Page_193">[193]</a></span>
reasons—lack of preparedness among
others—she condoned all affronts and drew the
line at neutrality.</p>
<p>The country was absolutely unequipped for
the contest. The Lybian campaign had disorganized
Italy’s national defences and depleted
her treasury. Arms, ammunition, uniforms,
primary necessaries—in a word, the means of
equipping an army—were lacking. The expenditure
of £80,000,000 sterling during the conflict
with Turkey rendered the strictest economy
imperative, and so intent was the Cabinet on
observing it that the first candidate for the post
of War Minister declined the honour, because
of the disproportion between the sum offered
to him for reorganization and the pressing needs
of the national defences.</p>
<p>The outbreak of the present conflict, therefore,
took Italy unawares and found her in a
condition of military unpreparedness which,
if her participation in the war had been a
necessity, might have had mischievous consequences
for the nation. Availing herself of
this condition of affairs and of the pacific temper
of the Italian people, Germany reinforced
those motives by the prospect of Corsica, Nice,
Savoy, Tunis and Morocco in return for active
co-operation. But the active co-operation of
Italy with Austria and Germany was wholly
excluded. The people would have vetoed it
as suicidal. The utmost that could be attempted
was the preservation of her neutrality,
and that this object would be attained seemed
a foregone conclusion.</p>
<p>And it is fair to state that this belief was well
grounded. When war was declared and Italy
was summoned to march with her allies against
France, Britain and Russia, she repudiated her<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_194" id="Page_194">[194]</a></span>
obligation on the ground that the clause in
their treaty provided for common action in
defence only, not for co-operation in a war of
aggression, such as was then about to be
waged. And that plea could not be rebutted.
This preliminary dissonance to which the
Central empires resigned themselves was followed
by disputes which turned upon the interpretation
of the compensation clause of the
Treaty, upon Italy’s territorial demands and
Austria’s demurrers. Thus from first to last
the issues raised were of a diplomatic order,
and if German statesmen had received carte
blanche to settle them, it is not improbable
that a compromise would have been effected
which would have left the Italian Government
no choice but to persevere in its neutrality.</p>
<p>And German statesmen strove hard to wrest
the matter from their ally and take it into
their own hands, but were only partially successful.
Both they and the Austrians selected
their most supple and wily diplomatists to
conduct the difficult negotiations. Prince
Bülow was appointed German Ambassador to
King Victor’s Government, Baron Macchio
supplanted Merey in Rome, but the most
sensational change effected was the substitution
of Baron Burian for Count Berchtold
in the Austrian Ministry of Foreign Affairs.<a name="FNanchor_90_90" id="FNanchor_90_90"></a><a href="#Footnote_90_90" class="fnanchor">[90]</a>
This latter event was construed by the European
public as the foretoken of a new and
far-resonant departure in Austria’s treatment
of international relations. In reality it was
hardly more than the withdrawal from public
business of a tired statesman <i>malgré lui</i> who
had persistently sought to be relieved of his
charge ever since his first appointment. Count
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_195" id="Page_195">[195]</a></span>Berchtold’s name is inseparably associated with
events of the first magnitude for his country
and for Europe, but on the creation or moulding
of which he had little appreciable part.
It is hardly too much to say that if, during
the period while he held office, the Ministry
of Foreign Affairs had been without a head,
the mechanism would have worked with no
serious hitch, and with pretty much the same
results which we now behold. For he was
but the intermediary between the mechanism
and the real minister, who invariably appeared
as a <i>deus ex machina</i> in all the great
crises of recent years, and who was none other
than the Emperor Francis Joseph himself.</p>
<p>Count Berchtold was a continuator. He
endeavoured under adverse circumstances to
carry out the feasible schemes of his predecessor,
but the obstacles in his way proved
insurmountable. He is a straightforward,
truthful man, and in the best sense of the word
a gentleman. The greatest achievement to
which he can point during his tenure of power
is the disruption of the Balkan League. Having
had an opportunity of seeing the working of
the scheme at close quarters, I may say that it
was ingenious. Pacific by temperament and
conviction, he co-operated successfully with
the Emperor to ward off a European conflict
more than once. But from the day when Count
Tisza won over Franz Josef to the ideas of
Kaiser Wilhelm, Count Berchtold’s occupation
was gone.</p>
<p>His successor, Baron Burian, entered upon
his office with an established reputation and a
political programme. But so immersed were
the Allies in the absurd illusions which ascribed
disorganization to Germany and discord to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_196" id="Page_196">[196]</a></span>
the two imperial Governments, that Burian’s
appointment was read by many as an omen
that Austria-Hungary was already scheming
for a separate peace. Events soon showed that
the disorganization was not in Germany nor
the discord on the side of the Central Empires.</p>
<p>Meanwhile the Italian Minister of Foreign
Affairs, Di San Giuliano, had succumbed to a
painful illness, which, however, did not prevent
him from writing and reading dispatches down
to the very eve of his death.<a name="FNanchor_91_91" id="FNanchor_91_91"></a><a href="#Footnote_91_91" class="fnanchor">[91]</a> His successor
was Sydney Sonnino, perhaps the most upright,
rigid and taciturn man who has ever had
to receive foreign diplomatists and discourse
sweet nothings in their ears. Devoid of eloquence,
of personal magnetism and of most of
the arts deemed essential to the professional
diplomatist, he is a man of culture, eminent
talents, fervid zeal for the public welfare,
steady moral courage, and rare personal integrity.
Pitted against the supple and versatile
Bülow, his influence might be likened to
that of the austere philosopher gazing at the
incarnate Lamia.</p>
<p>Between these two statesmen conversations
began<a name="FNanchor_92_92" id="FNanchor_92_92"></a><a href="#Footnote_92_92" class="fnanchor">[92]</a> under favourable auspices. One of the
conditions to which each of them subscribed
was the maintenance of rigorous secrecy until
the end of their labours. And it was observed
religiously until Germany’s “necessity”
seemed to call for the violation of the
pledge, whereupon it was profitably violated.
Baron Sonnino told the German plenipotentiary
that “the majority of the population
was in favour of perpetuating neutrality, and
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_197" id="Page_197">[197]</a></span>gave its support to the Government for this
purpose, provided always that by means of
neutrality certain national aspirations could be
realized.”<a name="FNanchor_93_93" id="FNanchor_93_93"></a><a href="#Footnote_93_93" class="fnanchor">[93]</a> Bülow at once scored an important
point by taking sides with Italy against Austria
on the disputed question whether Clause VII
of the Triple Alliance entitled the former
country to demand compensation for the upsetting
of the Balkan equilibrium caused by
Austria’s war on Serbia. That view and its
practical corollaries set the machinery going.
The Austrian Government abandoned its <i>non
possumus</i>, and discussed the nature and extent
of the compensation alleged to be due. But
it never traversed the distances between words
and acts.</p>
<p>One of the many wily devices by which the
German Ambassador sought to inveigle the
Consulta into forgoing its right to resort to
war was employed within three weeks of the
beginning of negotiations. Bülow confidentially
informed Sonnino that Germany was
sending Count von Wedel to Vienna to persuade
the Cabinet there to cede the Trentino
to Italy, and asked him whether, if Austria
acquiesced, it would not be possible to announce
to the Chamber that the Italian Government
had already in hand enough to warrant it in
assuming that the main aspirations of the nation
would be realized.<a name="FNanchor_94_94" id="FNanchor_94_94"></a><a href="#Footnote_94_94" class="fnanchor">[94]</a> “Absolutely impossible,”
was Sonnino’s reply. But the Dictator Giolitti,
whom Prince Bülow took into partnership, was
more confident and pliable. This parliamentary
leader, whose will was law in his own country
and whose life-work consisted in eliminating
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_198" id="Page_198">[198]</a></span>ethical principles from politics, made known
his belief—nay, his positive knowledge—that
by diplomatic negotiations the nation could
obtain concessions which would dispense it
from embarking on the war. This pronouncement
had a widespread effect on public opinion,
confirming the prevalent belief that Austria
would satisfy Italy’s claims.</p>
<p>There was no means of verifying those
announcements, for the Rome Government
scrupulously observed its part of the compact,
and allowed no news of the progress of the
conversations to leak out. In fact, it went
much farther and deprived the Italian people
systematically of all information on the subject
of the crisis. Consequently the poisoners of
the wells of truth had a facile task.</p>
<p>It was no secret, however, that the cession
of the Trentino would not suffice to square
accounts. Italy’s land and sea frontiers were
strategically so exposed that it was sheer impossible
to provide adequately for their defence.
And this essential defect rendered the
nation semi-dependent on its neighbour and
adversary and powerless to pursue a policy of
its own. For half a century this dangerous
flaw in the national edifice and its pernicious
effects on Italy’s international relations had
been patiently borne with, but Baron Sonnino
considered that the time for repairing it and
strengthening the groundwork of peace had
come. And as he had not the faintest doubt
that technically as well as essentially he had
right on his side, he pressed the matter vigorously.
Austrian diplomacy, dense and dilatory
as ever, argued, protested, temporized. In
these tactics it was encouraged by the knowledge
that Italy was unequipped for war, and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_199" id="Page_199">[199]</a></span>
by the delusion that the remedial measures of
reorganization then going forward were only
make-believe. The Italian Government, on
the other hand, convinced that nothing worth
having could be secured by diplomacy until
diplomacy was backed by force, was labouring
might and main to raise the army and navy
to a position as worthy as possible of a Great
Power and commensurate with the momentous
issues at stake.</p>
<p>But the position of the Cabinet was seriously
weakened by the domestic and insidious enemy.
Giolitti’s pronouncement had provided the
Austrians with a trump card. For if the
Dictator accounted the proffered concession
as a settlement in full, it was obvious that the
Cabinet, which was composed of his own
nominees whom he could remove at will, would
not press successfully for more extensive compensation.
Giolitti was the champion and
spokesman of the nation, and his estimate of
its aspirations alone carried weight. And now
once more the Dictator, acting through his
parliamentary lieutenants, organized another
anti-governmental demonstration which humiliated
the Cabinet and impaired its authority as
a negotiator. Of this favourable diversion the
Austrians availed themselves to the full. But
gradually it dawned upon them that behind
the Italian Foreign Minister a reorganized
Italian army, well equipped and partially
mobilized, was being arrayed for the eventuality
of a failure of the negotiations. By way
of recognizing this fact the Ballplatz increased
its offer, but only very slightly, while it grew
more and more lavish of arguments. But the
“principal aspirations of the Italian people”
had not yet been taken into serious consideration<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_200" id="Page_200">[200]</a></span>
by Baron Burian. Down to April 21
this statesman had not braced himself up to
offer anything more than the Trentino, which
Prince Bülow had virtually promised in
January, and this despite the intimation given
by the Italian Foreign Secretary, that after the
long spell of word-weaving and hair-splitting
he must insist on a serious and immediate
effort being put forth to meet Italy’s demands.</p>
<p>Thus during five months of tedious negotiations
Austria had contrived to exchange views
and notes with the Consulta without offering
any more solid basis for an agreement than
the cession of a part of the Trentino. It is
fair to add that even this appeared a generous
gift to Franz Josef’s ministers, who failed to
see why the Habsburg Monarchy should offer
any compensation to an ally from whom help,
not claims, had been expected. To a possible
abandonment of territory on the Isonzo or
elsewhere the Vienna Cabinet made no allusion.
On April 8 Sonnino presented counter
proposals, which he unfolded in nine clauses.
They comprehended the cession of the Trentino,
including the frontiers established for
the kingdom of Italy by the Treaty of Paris
of 1810; a rectification of Italy’s eastern
boundaries, taking in the cities of Gradisca and
Gorizia; the transformation of Trieste and its
territory into an autonomous State, internationally
independent; the transfer to the
kingdom of Italy of the Curzolari group of
islands; all these territories to be delivered
up on the ratification of the Treaty. Further,
Italy’s full sovereignty over Valona was to
be recognized by Austria, who should forswear
all further designs on Albania and
concede a full pardon to all persons of those<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_201" id="Page_201">[201]</a></span>
lands undergoing punishment for political or
military offences. On her side Italy would
consent to pay 200,000,000 francs as her share
of the public debt and of other financial obligations
of the provinces in question, to remain
absolutely neutral during the present war, and
to renounce all further claims to compensation
arising out of Clause VII of the Treaty.<a name="FNanchor_95_95" id="FNanchor_95_95"></a><a href="#Footnote_95_95" class="fnanchor">[95]</a></p>
<p>Those terms were rejected by the Austrian
Foreign Minister on grounds which have no
longer any practical interest. Noteworthy is
his remark that even in peace time the immediate
consignment of such territory as Austria
might be willing to abandon would be impossible,
and during the prosecution of a tremendous
war it was inconceivable.<a name="FNanchor_96_96" id="FNanchor_96_96"></a><a href="#Footnote_96_96" class="fnanchor">[96]</a> From
this position he had never once swerved during
the five months’ conversations, and he was
backed by Germany, who on March 19 had
offered to guarantee the fulfilment of the
promise after the war. But a fortnight later
he suddenly changed his ground without really
yielding the point, by suggesting the creation of
a mixed commission which should make recommendations
about the ways and means of
transferring the strips of territory in question.
But as the labours of this commission were
not to be restricted in time, and as the amount
to be ceded fell far short of what was demanded,
Baron Sonnino negatived the suggestion.</p>
<p>Then and only then did the Italian Government
withdraw their proposals, denounce the
Triple Alliance, and proclaim Italy’s liberty of
action.<a name="FNanchor_97_97" id="FNanchor_97_97"></a><a href="#Footnote_97_97" class="fnanchor">[97]</a></p>
<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_202" id="Page_202">[202]</a></span></p><p>Of this sensational turn of affairs the European
public had no inkling. For the Italian Government
was bound to reticence by its plighted
word and the Germans and Austrians by their
interest, which was to foster the belief that the
conversations were proceeding successfully and
that Austria’s proposals were welcomed by
the Consulta. But Italy, thus absolved from
the ties that had so long linked her with
Germany and Austria, entered into a conditional
compact with the Powers of the
Entente. In Paris the secret quickly leaked
out and was at once communicated to Berlin,
whose organized espionage continued to
flourish in the French capital. Thereupon
Herr Jagow urged Bülow to bestir himself
without delay. But the Prince was hard set.
On the Italian Cabinet he had lost his hold.
It had already crossed the Rubicon and passed
over to the Entente. True, the Cabinet was
not Italy, was not even the Government of
Italy. It was hardly more than a group of
mere place-warmers for Giolitti and his partisans.
At any moment it could be upset and
the damage inflicted by Austria’s stupidity
made good. And to effect this was the task to
which the German Ambassador now addressed
himself.</p>
<p>He was admirably qualified to discharge it.
All Italy, with the exception of a small band
of nationalists and republicans, was his ally.
The Pope was <i>ex officio</i> an apostle of peace. A
large body of the clergy submissively followed
the Pope. The Vatican and its hangers-on were
sitting <i>en permanence</i> directing a movement
which had for its object the prevention of war.
The parliamentary majority was aggressively
neutralist. The economic interests of the nation<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_203" id="Page_203">[203]</a></span>
were ranged on the same side. Almost the
entire aristocracy was enlisted under the flag
of the German Ambassador, at whose hospitable
board the scions of the men whose names had
been honourably associated with the Risorgimento
met and deliberated. As yet, therefore,
nothing was lost to the Central Empires;
only a difficulty had been created which would
serve as a welcome foil to impart sharper relief
to Prince Bülow’s certain victory. The
man whose co-operation would win this victory
was the Dictator Giolitti, and him the Ambassador
summoned to Rome.</p>
<p>Now Giolitti was acquainted with everything
that had been done by the Cabinet,
including his country’s covenant with the
Allies, and he disapproved of it. He was
also initiated by Bülow into the scheme by
which that covenant was to be set aside and
Italy made to break her faith, and he signified
his approbation of it. Nay, this patriot went
further; he undertook to aid and abet Bülow
in his well-thought-out plot. It had been
resolved by the German Ambassador, as soon
as he learned that Italy had taken an irrevocable
decision and denounced the Treaty of
Alliance, that he would amend the proposals
which he himself, in Austria’s name, had put
forward as the utmost limit to which she was
prepared to go; and he was anxious, before
offering them officially, to ascertain whether
Italy’s Dictator would accept them and guarantee
their acceptance by his parliamentary
majority.</p>
<p>That was the object for which Giolliti’s
presence was needed in Rome. The amended
proposals were typewritten and distributed by
Erzberger, the leader of the German Catholic<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_204" id="Page_204">[204]</a></span>
parliamentary party, who was an over-zealous
agent of the Wilhelmstrasse and a <i>persona grata</i>
at the Vatican. He, a German, had gone to
Rome to bestir the neutralists and lead the
movement against the Italian Government.
His leaflets containing the belated concessions
were given to Giolitti and his lieutenants. I
received a copy myself, and sent it to the <i>Daily
Telegraph</i>. The concessions were actually published
in that journal and communicated to
the British public before King Victor’s Government,
to whom Prince Bülow was accredited,
had any cognizance of their existence. That
this procedure involved a gross breach of the
covenant between the Ambassador and Sonnino
stipulating the maintenance of absolute
secrecy was deemed an irrelevant consideration.</p>
<p>Seldom in modern times have such underhand
methods been resorted to by the Government
of a Great Power. Neither would it be
easy to find an example of a responsible statesman
behaving as Giolitti behaved and working
in collusion with the Government of a State
which at the time was virtually his country’s
enemy. This statesman, however, duly played
the part assigned to him in this intrigue
against his Government and country, and
the success of his scheme would have left
the Italian nation covered with infamy and
bereft of friends. For if he had been able
to conclude the compact with Austria as he
had undertaken to do, his country would have
been left to the mercy of his Austro-German
masters, who despise Italy, and probably, if
victorious, would have refused to redeem their
promises, while the Entente States would have
boycotted her as faithless and false-hearted.
As a dilemma for Italy the position in which<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_205" id="Page_205">[205]</a></span>
she was placed must have delighted the wily
Bülow. How it can have satisfied an Italian
statesman is a psychological riddle.</p>
<p>Meanwhile the German Ambassador presented
officially Austria’s final proposals, as
though the conversations on this subject had
not been broken off. Baron Sonnino refused
to discuss them. But the Dictator intended
that his word should be heard and his will
should be done. To the King and the Premier,
Giolitti announced that, despite all that had
been accomplished by the Government, he still
clung to the belief that Austria’s new concessions
offered a basis for further negotiations,
which, if cleverly conducted, would lead to
the acquisition of some other strips of territory,
and would certainly culminate in a satisfactory
settlement.</p>
<p>But, not satisfied with this confidential expression
of opinion, Giolitti let it be known to
the whole nation that he, the chief and spokesman
of the parliamentary majority, was convinced
of the feasibility of an accord with
Austria on the basis of her last offer, which
he deemed acceptable in principle; that he saw
no motives for plunging Italy into a hideous
war, which would involve the nation in disaster;
and that he would adjust his acts to these
convictions.</p>
<p>This deliberate pronouncement, coming from
the most prominent man in the country, had
a powerful effect upon his followers and also
upon the public at large. No nation desires
war for war’s sake, and the interpretation put
upon Giolitti’s words by the extreme neutralists
and, in particular, by the insincere organs
of the Vatican, was that he had seen enough
to convince him that the Cabinet had decided<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_206" id="Page_206">[206]</a></span>
to wage war against Germany and Austria
at all costs and irrespective of the nation’s
interests. Giolitti’s parliamentary friends demonstratively
called upon him at his private
residence, leaving their cards, and announcing
the conformity of their views to those of their
leader; and as their number, which was carefully
communicated to the Press, formed the
majority of the Chamber, the Cabinet felt
impelled to take the hint and act upon it.
This was the only course open to it. For, as
the ministers were obliged to meet Parliament
on May 20—the day fixed for its reopening—they
were sure to be out-voted on a division,
whereupon a crisis, not merely ministerial but
national and international, would be precipitated.
The consequences of such a conflict
might be disastrous. Rather than wait for
this eventuality the Cabinet tendered its resignation.
Thus Bülow had seemingly triumphed.
The Government was turned out by Giolitti,
who had accepted in advance the Austro-German
terms of a settlement, and Italy was
seemingly won over to the Teutons.</p>
<p>So far as one could judge, the fate of the
nation was now decided. Its course was
marked out for it, and was henceforward unalterable.
For, so far as one could see, by no
section of the constitutional machinery was
the strategy of Bülow and Giolitti to be
thwarted. In a parliamentary land the legislatures
are paramount, and here both Chamber
and Senate were arrayed against the Cabinet
for Giolitti and Germany.</p>
<p>The ferment consequent upon this turn of
affairs was tremendous. All Europe was astir
with excitement. The Press of Berlin and
Vienna was jubilant. Panegyrics of Giolitti<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_207" id="Page_207">[207]</a></span>
and of Bülow filled the columns of their daily
Press.</p>
<p>But a <i>deus ex machina</i> suddenly descended
upon the scene in the unwonted form of
an indignant nation. The Italian people,
which had at first been either indifferent or
actively in favour of cultivating neighbourly
relations with Germany, had of late been
following the course of the struggle with the
liveliest interest. Germany’s dealings with
Belgium had impressed them deeply. Her
methods of warfare had estranged their sympathies.
Her doctrine of the supremacy of
force and falsehood had given an adverse
poise to their ideas and leanings. Deep
into their hearts had sunk the tidings of
the destruction of the <i>Lusitania</i>, awakening
feelings of loathing and abomination for its
authors, to which free expression was now
being given everywhere. The spirit that actuated
this revolting enormity was brand-marked
as that of demoniacal fury loosed from moral
control and from the ties that bind nations and
individuals to all humanity.</p>
<p>The effect upon public sentiment and opinion
in Italy, where emotions are tensely strung,
and sympathy with suffering is more flexible
and diffusive than it is even among the other
Latin races, was instantaneous. One statesman,
who was a partisan of neutrality, remarked
to me that German “Kultur,” as revealed
during the present war, is dissociated from
every sense of duty, obligation, chivalry,
honour, and is become a potent poison which
the remainder of humanity must endeavour
by all efficacious methods to banish from the
international system.</p>
<p>“This,” he went on, “is no longer war; it<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_208" id="Page_208">[208]</a></span>
is organized slaughter, perpetrated by a race
suffering from dog-madness. I tremble at
the thought that our own civilized and
chivalrous people may at any moment be
confronted with this lava flood of savagery and
destructiveness. Now, if ever, the opportune
moment has come for all civilized nations to
join in protest, stiffened with a unanimous
threat, against the continuance of such crimes
against the human race. Europe ought surely
to have the line drawn at the poisoning of
wells, the persecution of prisoners, and the
massacre of women and children. If a proposal
to this effect were made, I myself would
second it with ardour.”<a name="FNanchor_98_98" id="FNanchor_98_98"></a><a href="#Footnote_98_98" class="fnanchor">[98]</a></p>
<p>These pent-up feelings now found vent in a
series of meetings and demonstrations against
Germany as well as Austria and their Italian
allies. Italy’s spiritual heritage from the old
Romans asserted itself in impressive forms
and unwonted ways, and the conscience of
the nation loudly affirmed its claim to be the
main directing force in a crisis where the
honour and the future of the country were at
stake. And within four days of this purgative
process a marked change was noticeable.
Giolitti’s partisans—hissed, jostled, mauled,
frightened out of their lives—lay low. Many
of them publicly recanted and proclaimed their
conversion to intervention. The chief of the
German Catholic party and friend of the
Vatican, Erzberger, was driven from his hotel
to the German Embassy as a foreign mischief-maker,
contrabandist and spy. Some of
the Press organs, subsidized or created by
the Teutons, were obliged to disappear. The
honest neutralist journals, yielding to the
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_209" id="Page_209">[209]</a></span>nation, veered round to the fallen Cabinet.
In a word, the political atmosphere, theretofore
foul and mephitic, became suddenly charged
with purer, healthier elements—Bülow’s plot
was thwarted and Giolitti’s rôle played out.
The Salandra-Sonnino Cabinet was borne back
to office on the crest of this national wave,
and Italy declared war against Austria. But
only against Austria. For the Cabinet, restored
to power, became a cautious steward,
and took to imitating him of the Gospel who
hid his talents instead of augmenting them.</p>
<p>This restriction of military operations to the
Habsburg Monarchy struck many observers as
singular. In truth the motives that inspired
the Government have never been authoritatively
divulged. That every Italian Cabinet
since Crispi’s days had made a marked distinction
between Germany and Austria was notorious.
That Di San Giuliano felt as strongly
attracted towards Berlin as he was repelled by
Vienna may be gathered from the official but
still unpublished dispatches that exist on the
subject. But that in a war not of two individual
nations, but of groups of States, one—and
only one—of these should be singled out
as the object of aggression aroused something
more than mere curiosity. And this feeling
was intensified when it became known that
on the eve of the diplomatic rupture Bülow,
ever on the alert for the interests of his country,
had induced the Italian Government to conclude
a convention with Germany for the protection
of private property in case of active
hostilities. For Germany possesses in Italy
property valued at several milliards of francs,
whereas Italy claims as her own almost nothing in
the German empire. Who can read the riddle?<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_210" id="Page_210">[210]</a></span></p>
<p>The adhesion of Italy to the Allies may be
noted as perhaps the most important political
event of the year, while the circumstances in
which it was decided on dispel all doubt that
the Italian people were actuated by lofty
motives and rose to the highest ideas involved
in the European conflict, and that the Cabinet’s
ideals were nowise identical with those of the
nation. It is alleged by certain personal
friends of Baron Sonnino, who had exceptionally
good opportunities for knowing what took
place—and I have grounds for acquiescing in
their view—that this statesman was for declaring
war against Germany as well as Austria,
but that Professor Salandra negatived this
logical and straightforward move.</p>
<p>That the Salandra Cabinet damaged the
cause of Italy by thus endeavouring to
blow hot and cold, is a fact which its warmest
supporters no longer call in question. They
now merely plead for extenuating circumstances
on the ground that the damage was
done unwittingly. “It would be unjust,”
the Nationalist Federzoni said in a speech
delivered before the Chamber on March 16,<a name="FNanchor_99_99" id="FNanchor_99_99"></a><a href="#Footnote_99_99" class="fnanchor">[99]</a>
“to accuse the Italian Government of disloyalty
or insincerity, but none the less the
treaty it concluded with Germany has proved
superlatively baleful to the country.” Like
the other allied peoples, the Italian nation
has been served by a Cabinet which defeated
many of the objects it was striving after.</p>
<p>Studying Italian politics since the war broke
out is like threading the Cretan Labyrinth in
a dense fog. The fog, curiously enough, which
now seldom lifts, would seem to form an integral
part of the politics. For one of the
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_211" id="Page_211">[211]</a></span>maxims of the present chief of the Consulta,
Baron Sonnino, is that secrecy is the soul of
efficacy. And as thoroughness marks his
action whenever it is quite free, the mystery
that enwraps the schemes and designs of King
Victor’s Government is become impenetrable.
One may form a faint notion of the stringency
with which this un-Italian occultism is observed
by the eminent Jewish statesman, from
the circumstance that during the crisis that
preceded the war, only one of his colleagues
was kept informed of the progress of the conversations
with Austria, and that was his
own chief, Professor Salandra. As for the
nation at large, it was so out of touch with
the Government, and so led astray concerning
the trend of events, that for months it confidently
anticipated an accord with the Central
Empires. Again, down to the day on which
Baron Sonnino read out his last declaration in
the Chamber (Dec. 1), officials of the Ministry
had rigorous instructions not to give any one
even a hint as to whether Italy would or
would not sign the London Convention, renouncing
the right to conclude a separate
peace.</p>
<p>For a long time previously Italy’s aloofness
had preoccupied the Entente, and to the
accord between the two there continued to
be something lacking. The Italian Government,
dissatisfied with the degree of help
received from Great Britain, was not slow
to indicate it in official conversations with
our Ambassador. Happily, the silence of our
Foreign Office and the secrecy of Baron
Sonnino concealed the rifts of the lute until
most of them were said to be repaired. In the
meantime Italy persisted in concentrating on<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_212" id="Page_212">[212]</a></span>
the Isonzo and the Carso all her efforts to help
the Allies against the Turks and the Bulgars.
The expeditions to the Dardanelles, Salonika
and Serbia evoked her moral sympathy, but
could not secure her military co-operation.
The generosity of the Entente, and of Britain
in particular, towards Greece was an additional
stumbling-block, and the offer of Cyprus to
King Constantine an abomination in her eyes.</p>
<p>That Italy’s impolitic aloofness could not
last, without impairing the worth of her sacrifices,
was obvious. And the extent to which
co-operation could be stipulated and the compensations
to which that would entitle her,
formed the subjects of long and delicate conversations
between the interested Governments.
For, naturally enough, Baron Sonnino,
whose domestic critics are many and ruthless,
was desirous of getting all he could in the
Eastern Mediterranean and Asia Minor, while
measuring out with patriotic closeness the
military and naval help to be given in return—Italy’s
position, economic, financial and strategic,
differing considerably from that of the
other Great Powers. It was not until the
end of November 1915 that these negotiations
were worked out to an issue; and on the 30th
King Victor’s Government signed the Convention
of London, undertaking not to conclude
a separate peace.</p>
<p>The gist of this supplementary accord, in
so far as it imposes fresh obligations upon
Italy, was communicated to the Chamber by
Baron Sonnino. It provided for the organization
of relief for the Serbian troops in Albania,
and for other auxiliary expeditions to places
on the Adriatic coast. But it leaves intact
the essential and standing limitations to Italy’s<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_213" id="Page_213">[213]</a></span>
military and naval co-operation which had to
be reckoned with theretofore. And these may
be summarized as follows: King Victor’s
Government, while examining every proposal
coming from the Allies on its political merits,
must be guided by the military and naval
experts of the nation whenever it is a question
of despatching troops or warships to take
part in a common enterprise. Italy’s first
care is to hinder an invasion of her territory.
The next object of her solicitude is to husband
her naval and other resources and cultivate
caution. Lastly, the extent of her contribution
to an expedition must be adjusted to
her resources, which are much more slender
than those of any other Great Power, and
are best known to her own rulers. And her
financial means are to be reinforced by contributions
from Great Britain.</p>
<p>Those, in brief, are some of the lines on which
the latest agreement has been concluded.</p>
<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_90_90" id="Footnote_90_90"></a><a href="#FNanchor_90_90"><span class="label">[90]</span></a> January 15, 1915.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_91_91" id="Footnote_91_91"></a><a href="#FNanchor_91_91"><span class="label">[91]</span></a> Di San Giuliano died on October 18, 1914. He was
working for a short time on the 17th.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_92_92" id="Footnote_92_92"></a><a href="#FNanchor_92_92"><span class="label">[92]</span></a> On December 20, 1914.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_93_93" id="Footnote_93_93"></a><a href="#FNanchor_93_93"><span class="label">[93]</span></a> Italian Green Book, Despatch N. 8.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_94_94" id="Footnote_94_94"></a><a href="#FNanchor_94_94"><span class="label">[94]</span></a> Italian Green Book, January 14, 1915, Despatch
N. 11.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_95_95" id="Footnote_95_95"></a><a href="#FNanchor_95_95"><span class="label">[95]</span></a> Italian Green Book, Dispatch N. 64.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_96_96" id="Footnote_96_96"></a><a href="#FNanchor_96_96"><span class="label">[96]</span></a> Italian Green Book, Dispatch N. 71, April 16, 1915.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_97_97" id="Footnote_97_97"></a><a href="#FNanchor_97_97"><span class="label">[97]</span></a> May 3, 1915. Cf. Italian Green Book, Dispatch
N. 76.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_98_98" id="Footnote_98_98"></a><a href="#FNanchor_98_98"><span class="label">[98]</span></a> Cf. <i>Daily Telegraph</i>, May 10, 1915.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_99_99" id="Footnote_99_99"></a><a href="#FNanchor_99_99"><span class="label">[99]</span></a> March 16, 1916.</p></div>
</div>
<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XVI" id="CHAPTER_XVI"></a>CHAPTER XVI<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_214" id="Page_214">[214]</a></span></h2>
<h3>ROUMANIA AND GREECE</h3>
<p><span class="smcap">That</span> Roumania would now take the field
was a proposition which, after the many and
emphatic assurances volunteered by her own
official chiefs, was accepted almost universally.
She had received considerable help from the
Allies towards her military preparations. Her
senators and deputies had fraternized with
Italians and Frenchmen and her diplomatists
had been in frequent and friendly communication
with those of France, Britain and Russia.
Even statesmen had allowed themselves to be
persuaded by words and gestures which it
now appears were meant only to be conditional
assurances or social lubricants. The
Serbian Premier, for instance, whose shrewdness
is proverbial, exclaimed to an Italian
journalist, in the second half of June: “Roumania
cannot but follow the example set her
by Italy. Indeed, you may telegraph to your
journal that Roumania’s entry into the arena
is a question of days and it may be only of
hours. Of this many foretokens have come
to our knowledge.”<a name="FNanchor_100_100" id="FNanchor_100_100"></a><a href="#Footnote_100_100" class="fnanchor">[100]</a> But the optimists who
had drawn practical conclusions from Roumanian
promises and friendships lost sight of
the difference between their own mentality
and that of the Balkan peoples. They also
failed to make due allowance for the influence
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_215" id="Page_215">[215]</a></span>of German interpenetration, the power of
German gold, and the deterrent effect of German
victories. And above all, they left out
of consideration the really decisive question
of military prospects as conditioned by strategical
position and supplies of munitions.</p>
<p>The party of intervention, however, was
still active and full of ardour. Its chief, Take
Jonescu, is not merely Roumania’s only statesman,
but has established a claim to rank as
one of the prominent public men of the present
generation. Unluckily he has long been out
of office, and his party is condemned to the
Cassandra rôle of uttering true prophecies
which find no credence among those who wield
the power of putting them to good account.
M. Bratiano’s appropriate attitude may be
described as statuesque. Occasionally his
Press organs commented upon the manifestations
of the interventionists in words barbed
with bitter sarcasm and utilitarian maxims.
“Roumania’s blood and money,” the <i>Independence
Roumaine</i> explained, “must be spent
only in the furtherance of Roumania’s interest.”
Her cause must be dissociated from
that of the belligerents. To this Take Jonescu
replied<a name="FNanchor_101_101" id="FNanchor_101_101"></a><a href="#Footnote_101_101" class="fnanchor">[101]</a> that it is precisely for the good of
Roumania that her interest should not be
separated from that of the Entente Powers in
the conflict. For on the issue of this conflict
depends the state-system of Europe and also
the future of Roumania. If the Germans are
triumphant, he added, force and falsehood will
triumph with them, the State will acquire
omnipotence, the individual sink into serfdom.
Neutrality during a war with such issues is,
therefore, the height of political unwisdom.</p>
<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_216" id="Page_216">[216]</a></span></p>
<p>Greece, after Venizelos’s retirement, returned
to the narrow creed and foolish pranks of her
unregenerate days, sinking deeper into anarchy.
More than once in her history she had been
saved from her enemies and once from her
friends, but from her own self there is no
saviour.</p>
<p>As soon as the Kaiser’s paladin, King
Constantine, had dismissed his pilot and taken
supreme command of the Ship of State, the
portals of the realm were thrown open to
German machinations. The weaver in chief
of these was Wilhelm’s confidential agent,
Baron Schenk. According to his own published
biography, this gentleman had in youth
been the friend of the two sisters of Princess
Battenberg, the Grand Duchess Serge and of
the Russian Tsaritza. He had served in the
German army, become the representative of
the firm of Krupps, and been received at the
German court. While Venizelos was in office,
Baron Schenk flourished in the shade, but as
soon as the Germanophile Gounaris took over
the reins of power, the secret agent went boldly
forward into the limelight and became the
public chief of a party, received openly his
helpmates and partisans, distributed rôles and
money and set frankly to work to “smash
Venizelos.”</p>
<p>King Constantine’s protracted and strange
malady hindered the Queen, who is the
Kaiser’s sister, from receiving visits. Even
the wives of ministers were denied access to
her Majesty. But the baron was an exception.
He called on her almost every day.
Cabinet Ministers consulted him. Journalists
received directions, articles and bribes from
him. And when the elections were coming<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_217" id="Page_217">[217]</a></span>
on every venal man of influence who could
damage Venizelos or help his antagonists was
bought with hard cash. In order to defeat
some Venizelist candidates whose return would
have been particularly distressing, the Baron
is said to have spent six hundred thousand
francs.<a name="FNanchor_102_102" id="FNanchor_102_102"></a><a href="#Footnote_102_102" class="fnanchor">[102]</a> And it is held that the results obtained
by these means were well worth the
money spent. For the parliamentary opposition
was strong and aggressive, and some of
its more active members had imbibed Hellenic
patriotism from the German Schenk. They
have since been toiling and moiling to disqualify
Venizelos permanently from office on
the ground that he is a republican, and that
the destinies of monarchy would not be safe in
his hands. By these means German organization,
which finds work and room for kings and
for poisoners, for theologians and assassins,
has transformed Greece into a Prussian satrapy
which avails itself of the freedom of the seas,
established by the Allies, to carry on contraband
to their detriment and give help and encouragement
to Austrians, Bulgars and Turks. And
the Turks were meanwhile extirpating the
Greeks of the coast of Asia Minor.</p>
<p>Bulgaria’s attitude underwent no momentous
change during the interval that elapsed between
the outbreak of the war and the close of the
first year. Symptoms of a new orientation
had, it is true, often been signalled and commented,
but Ferdinand of Coburg and his
lieutenants remained steadfastly faithful to the
policy of quiescence which had conferred more
substantial benefits on Germany and Austria
than could have been bestowed by the active
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_218" id="Page_218">[218]</a></span>co-operation of the whole Bulgarian army. This
tremendous effect could never have been obtained
if Bulgaria had entirely broken with
the Powers of the Entente. It seemed as
essential to its success that these should never
wholly give up the hope of winning her over,
as it was that her important movements should
be conducive to the interests of their enemies.
Hence every secret arrangement with Berlin
and Vienna was emphatically denied, and every
overt accord declared to be devoid of political
significance.</p>
<p>It was thus that Europe was directed to
construe the negotiations between the Sofia
Cabinet and the Austro-German financial syndicate
respecting the payment of an instalment
of the £20,000,000 loan contracted shortly
before the war. That Germany, whose financial
ventures are invariably combined with
political designs, would not part with her
money to Bulgaria at a moment when gold is
scarce, unless she were sure of an adequate
political return, could not be gainsaid. And
that the retention by Bulgaria of her freedom
of action would be incompatible with the
interests of Austria and Germany is also manifest.
However this may be, the twenty millions
sterling demanded by Sofia were accorded,
and the legend was launched that the transaction
was purely financial.</p>
<p>Towards the end of July<a name="FNanchor_103_103" id="FNanchor_103_103"></a><a href="#Footnote_103_103" class="fnanchor">[103]</a> King Ferdinand’s
ministers made another momentous move, the
consequences of which cut deep into the political
situation. A convention was signed in
Stamboul between the Turkish and Bulgarian
Governments by which the former ceded to
Bulgaria the Turkish section of the Dedeagatch
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_219" id="Page_219">[219]</a></span>railway—that is to say, the whole line that runs
on Turkish territory, together with the stations
of Dimotika, Kulela-Burgas, and Karagatch.
The new boundary ran thenceforward parallel
to the river Maritza, all the territory eastward
of that becoming Bulgarian.</p>
<p>And this concession, King Ferdinand’s
ministers would have Europe believe, was
devoid of political bearings. It was merely
a case of something being given for nothing.
And the Allies allowed themselves to be persuaded
that this was the real significance of
the deal. The German Press was more frank.
It announced that the relations between Bulgaria
and Turkey had entered upon a decisive
phase and that all fear of Bulgaria’s taking
part in the war on the side of the Allies had
been definitely dispelled.</p>
<p>The Bulgarian problem throughout all that
wearisome crisis, which ended by Ferdinand
throwing off the mask, was in reality simple,
and the known or verifiable facts ought to have
been sufficient to bring the judgment of the
Entente statesmen to conclusions which would
have enabled them to steer clear of the costly
blunders that characterized their policy. The
line of action followed from first to last by
Ferdinand was supremely inelastic: only its
manifestations, of which the object was to
deceive, were varied and conflicting. It was
bound up with Austria’s undertaking to restore
Macedonia to Bulgaria and to maintain
Ferdinand on the throne. This twofold
promise was the bait by which the king was
caught and kept in Austria’s toils, while the
Bulgarian people was moved by patriotism
to identify its cause with that of Ferdinand.
And the arrangement was to my knowledge<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_220" id="Page_220">[220]</a></span>
completed before the opening of the European
war. Evidence of its existence was forthcoming,
but the statesmen of the Entente, who
allowed preconceived notions to overrule the
testimony of their senses, declined to accept
it. Since then the Bulgarian Cabinet, in the
person of the Premier, has publicly admitted
the truth of my reiterated statement. In a
public speech, delivered in March 1916, “M.
Radoslavoff confessed that Bulgaria had entered
the war by reason of certain obligations
which she had assumed.”<a name="FNanchor_104_104" id="FNanchor_104_104"></a><a href="#Footnote_104_104" class="fnanchor">[104]</a></p>
<p>But there was another safe test which the
Entente Governments could have applied with
profit to the situation. Interest was obviously
the mainspring of the Bulgarian nation by
whomsoever it might chance to be represented.
It would be inconsistent with the
conception of international politics to assume
any other. Now that interest, it was obvious,
could be so fully and rapidly furthered by the
Central Empires, and in the judgment of the
Bulgars with such finality and at the cost of
so few sacrifices, that it was sheer impossible
for the Entente Governments to attempt to
compete with those. Bulgaria demanded immediate
possession of Central Macedonia and
the permanent weakening of the Serbian State.
And this the Central Empires promised to
effect within a few weeks from Bulgaria’s entry
into the war. Moreover, while asking that
she should take part in a struggle against that
group of belligerents which she deemed by far
the weaker, they undertook to give her the
full support of the two greatest military
Powers in the world.</p>
<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_221" id="Page_221">[221]</a></span></p>
<p>Consider the difference between that arrangement
and the attractions provided by the
Entente. Russia, France and Britain could
deal only in counters, not in hard cash like
their adversaries. The utmost they were able
to offer was an undertaking to use their good
offices with Serbia and Greece to obtain the
promise of a part of Bulgaria’s demands.
And the fulfilment of this promise would of
necessity be conditional on the victory of the
Allies. As for the weakening of Serbia, it
could not be entertained. On the contrary,
that State, according to the Entente scheme,
would be greatly enlarged, would, in fact,
become by far the greatest of the Balkan
nations. And for this shadowy lure, Bulgaria
was expected to meet in deadly encounter the
greatest military empires the world has ever
seen, and to meet them without the help of
any of the Great Powers of the Entente.</p>
<p>One has but to compare these two alternatives
in order to realize that, even if Ferdinand
had entered into no binding compact with
Austria and Germany, he would not hesitate
a moment between them. Personally and
politically he was held tight by the Teuton
tentacles.</p>
<p>The currency of the notion that with these
competing offers before him, a crafty statesman
like Ferdinand who felt over and above
that Russia’s vengeance was hanging over his
head, would take what he believed was the
losing side, shows a degree of <i>naïveté</i> which
cannot be qualified without epithets which it
had better be understood than expressed.</p>
<p>Looking back upon the results of the first
twenty months of the war and upon the
more obvious causes to which they may<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_222" id="Page_222">[222]</a></span>
fairly be ascribed, one is struck less forcibly
by the military and economic unpreparedness
of the Allies for the inevitable conflict than
by their inaccessibility to the ground ideas
on which Germany set her hopes of success.
The two groups of belligerents stood intellectually
on different planes. The Teuton’s
faith was implicit in the law of causality,
in the necessity of contemplating the vast
problem as a whole, of adjusting means
to ends, of co-operation at home and co-ordination
of means abroad. The methods
of the Allies were drawn from a limited range
of experience which was no longer applicable
to the new conditions, and their hopes rested
on a series of isolated exertions put forth temporarily
under stress of exceptional pressure.</p>
<p>They made noble sacrifices for the cause
of liberty and justice. Pacific by temperament
and conviction, they resignedly accepted
military discipline as a temporary expedient,
a purgatorial ordeal, and went about the
while with a sense of displacement, the longing
of exiles to get back. Spurred by stress of
circumstance, they achieved more than foresight
and insight had led them to design but
far less than their optimism had encouraged
them to anticipate. Step by step they were
driven by hard reality to widen their angle of
vision, to extend their schemes, and to concert
certain measures in common. The meeting
of the three Finance Ministers in Paris was
followed by the Councils of the allied generals,
by the combined expedition to the Dardanelles,
and by the nationalization of the manufacture
of munitions in each of the allied countries. And
all these innovations were moves in the right
direction. But they were made as temporary<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_223" id="Page_223">[223]</a></span>
expedients under pressure of outward events,
and it is still to the future that one looks for
tokens of statesmanlike intuition which from
a comprehensive survey of the problem in its
entirety will draw the materials wherewith to
weave a coherent scheme of general action and
permanent co-operation.</p>
<p>Events travelled fast in the month of July
1915, and their effect on the Allies was depressing.
In Russia the Austro-Germans were advancing
steadily against Riga and Warsaw,
where a battle which experts accounted the
most sanguinary and momentous in the war
was approaching a decision. A fatal bar being
placed by Russia’s reverses and other untoward
occurrences to the realization of the hopes
that had been raised by Kitchener’s army,
the French, headed by M. Pichon and backed
by the Russian Press, once more mooted the
vexed question of Japanese intervention. In
the Turkish dominions the Greeks were subjected
to relentless persecution, especially on
the coast of Asia Minor. The massacre of
Armenians on an unprecedented scale was
reported from Bitlis, Moosh, Diarbekir and
Zeitun. In the first-named region 9,000
bodies, mostly women and children, were, it is
alleged, cast into the river Tigris.<a name="FNanchor_105_105" id="FNanchor_105_105"></a><a href="#Footnote_105_105" class="fnanchor">[105]</a> The Swedish
Premier, by an enigmatic speech in which the
doctrine of neutrality at all costs was ostentatiously
repudiated, aroused suspicion of an intention
on the part of his Government to join the
Teutons in order to weaken the Slav neighbour,
and to this apprehension colour was imparted
by the tardy announcement that since the
outbreak of the war Sweden had increased her
army from 360,000 to 500,000 men. In the
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_224" id="Page_224">[224]</a></span>United States mysterious “accidents” and
mishaps occurred on board warships and in
munitions and arms manufactories, and strikes
were organized by Germans and Austrians on
a scale which attracted the serious attention
of the Washington Government.</p>
<p>But the last month of that fateful year was
further darkened by the most dangerous and
ominous event recorded in the United Kingdom
since the war began. Over 200,000 coal
miners of South Wales deliberately, obstinately
and criminally withheld their labour from
their own nation, whose existence at that
moment was dependent on its bestowal. The
coal pits of South Wales remained idle for
over a week. The miners crossed their arms
and turned deaf ears to the voice of reason
and interest calling on them not to sacrifice
the lives of their kith and kin who were fighting
for them. This act of black treason to the
country had been foreseen and foretold months
before, but out of consideration for the rights of
individuals was allowed to take place. The
Germans and Austrians were exultant, for
another couple of weeks’ strike would have given
them the victory. Already the collapse of our
defence was become a definite eventuality. The
tact and statesmanship of Mr. Lloyd George
exorcised the redoubtable spectre, but the spirit
which that piece of treason revealed filled the
most sanguine with dread and set those of little
faith asking themselves whether this lamentable
phenomenon was not one of certain ill-boding
symptoms which seemed to reveal the smoothly
moving current that bears doomed nations
onward to their fate.</p>
<p>Certainly nothing could put in a clearer
light than that strike has done the peremptory<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_225" id="Page_225">[225]</a></span>
necessity of national discipline, at any rate
in war-time. The State that is unable to
command the service of all its citizens when
beset by ruthless foreign enemies has lost its
lease of life and its right to live. It must be
recognized that patriotism is still an unknown
sentiment among millions of those who are
citizens of the United Kingdom and Ireland.
Patriotism has never been systematically inculcated
among us as in Germany, France and
Russia. Parochial or at most party interests
still mark the loftiest heights to which certain
sections of the population can soar above the
dead level of individual egotism. In Germany
and Austria strikes during war are unthinkable.
Every railway official, every tram-conductor,
every artisan there is a soldier subject to
military discipline and is expected to give
the fullest measure of his productive powers
to the nation. And it is fair to add that they
all regard this duty as a signal honour and a
source of pleasure. For to them patriotism
is a religion and their country a divinity.</p>
<p>The depth and fervour of this self-denying
spirit among them as contrasted with the
“healthy individual egotism” of the Allies
constitutes one of the most disquieting phenomena
of the struggle. Austria has been scoffed
at for her abject submissiveness to Germany.
But there is another way of looking at her
attitude. She has courageously effaced her individuality
more completely even than Turkey
for the sake of the common cause. And
she has lost nothing by the painful effort.
Her various peoples who were expected to be
tearing each other to pieces have given us a
splendid example of discipline and self-abnegation.
In the Skoda works at Pilsen, where<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_226" id="Page_226">[226]</a></span>
machine guns are made, fifteen thousand
workmen are cheerfully toiling and moiling
every day of the week, Sundays and holidays
not excepted. Since the war began Germany
has accomplished as great things at home as
on foreign battlefields. She built and launched
a Dreadnought of 25,600 tons, a line-of-battle
ship of 26,200 tons. And while the latter
vessel was on the stocks, the reports published
in the British press of the splendid results
obtained by the 15-inch guns of the <i>Queen
Elizabeth</i> moved the German Admiralty to
substitute these for the 12-inch guns already
adopted. Two swift cruisers, 12 small submarines
and 24 larger ones of 1200 tons displacement,
with a speed of 16 knots under
water, 20 on the surface and a radius of action
of 3000 miles—were among the results of a
single year’s activity.</p>
<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_100_100" id="Footnote_100_100"></a><a href="#FNanchor_100_100"><span class="label">[100]</span></a> <i>Giornale d’Italia</i>, June 19, 1915. <i>Corriere della Sera</i>,
June 20, 1915.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_101_101" id="Footnote_101_101"></a><a href="#FNanchor_101_101"><span class="label">[101]</span></a> <i>La Roumanie</i>, July 26, 1915.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_102_102" id="Footnote_102_102"></a><a href="#FNanchor_102_102"><span class="label">[102]</span></a> <i>Gazette de Lausanne</i>, July 6, 1915, and <i>Corriere della
Sera</i>, July 8, 1915.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_103_103" id="Footnote_103_103"></a><a href="#FNanchor_103_103"><span class="label">[103]</span></a> July 22, 1915.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_104_104" id="Footnote_104_104"></a><a href="#FNanchor_104_104"><span class="label">[104]</span></a> Cf. <i>Daily Telegraph</i>, March 14, 1916, in telegram
from Athens.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_105_105" id="Footnote_105_105"></a><a href="#FNanchor_105_105"><span class="label">[105]</span></a> <i>Novoye Vremya</i>, July 22, 1915.</p></div>
</div>
<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XVII" id="CHAPTER_XVII"></a>CHAPTER XVII<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_227" id="Page_227">[227]</a></span></h2>
<h3>GERMANY’S RESOURCEFULNESS</h3>
<p><span class="smcap">And</span> our enemies’ resourcefulness and power
of adaptation is of a piece with their capacity
for work. When war was declared and foreign
trade arrested, numerous German factories
underwent a quick transformation. Silk-works
began to turn out bandages and lint;
velvet works produced materials for tents;
umbrella makers took to manufacturing rain-proof
cloth; the output of sewing-machine
factories was changed to shrapnel; piano
manufacturers became makers of cartridges.
Paper producers supplied the War Office with
paper-made blankets. For copper, when the
supply began to grow short, nickelled iron
was quickly substituted. Sugar was employed
to obtain the spirit which had to take
the place of benzine. And the upshot of these
transformations is that the orders received
for military needs exceed those which would
in normal conditions of exportation have been
placed by foreign customers with German
industry. The goods traffic on German railways,
which had fallen to 41 per cent. during
the first month of the war, has since gone up
to 96 per cent. Those achievements are not
merely noteworthy in themselves, they are
ominously symptomatic.</p>
<p>A German professor, writing to a friend imprisoned
in France, commented in passing<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_228" id="Page_228">[228]</a></span>
upon these qualifications of his countrymen in
a letter which M. Joseph Reinach soon afterwards
gave to the public. One passage in that
document is worth quoting. The professor
holds that even if the worst comes to the worst,
Germany can always conclude a “white
peace” which will leave her the formidable
glory of having held the whole world in check,
will consolidate her prestige in Europe and
enable her, twenty years hence, when she has
made good her losses, to establish permanently
her dominion. “My confidence is based on
German patriotism, on German sense of discipline,
on German genius for organization.
But it is founded above all else on our enemies’
incapacity for organization. Ah, if our adversaries
could enhance the worth of their
resources by acquiring our gifts of initiative
and method, we should be lost! I am thrilled
by the picture of what we could accomplish
if we were in the places of the English and the
French and by the thought of the danger that
would confront us if they but knew how to
utilize the force of their allies as we have
availed ourselves of those of Austria and
Turkey.”</p>
<p>Those reflections find their fairest comment
in the events of the twenty months that
have passed since the opening of the campaign.</p>
<p>Our enemies’ reading of those events is
instructive. The Austrian Press hails them
as satisfactory. Even the Socialist organ<a name="FNanchor_106_106" id="FNanchor_106_106"></a><a href="#Footnote_106_106" class="fnanchor">[106]</a>
declares that, in the qualities that go to the
attainment of success, “Austria holds the first
place.” The Austrian General Staff wrote eight
months ago: “Our troops have now been
fighting for a twelvemonth.... A whole world
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_229" id="Page_229">[229]</a></span>of enemies rose up against the Central Empires,
and more than once our army had to bear the
brunt of their formidable onslaught. To-day,
they hold but small tracts of territory in western
Galicia and Alsatia, whereas Germany’s hand
is closed in a tight grasp on Belgium and
the richest provinces of France, and in the
north-east the allied forces of Austria and
Germany have penetrated well into Russian
Poland. The cannons’ muzzles are turned
against the most powerful fortresses of the
Tsar, and in the Dardanelles our third ally
keeps watch and ward imperturbably.”</p>
<p>The War Lord himself has recorded his
estimate of the results of the first year’s
campaign. “Germany,” he stated in a speech
delivered at Lemberg, “is an impregnable
fortress. In her forward march she is irresistible.
She will prove to the world that she
can overcome all her enemies and will dictate
to them the peace terms that please herself.”
And in a discourse pronounced at Beuthen
he recorded his view of the Allies’ outlook in
these words: “Our enemies are floundering
in confusion. Among themselves they are not
united. They are disorganized by the struggle,
disheartened by the knowledge that they are
powerless to conquer Germany. German
valour, German organization, German science
have emerged with honour from this ordeal,
the most terrible that a nation has ever undergone.
Germany is greater and mightier than
ever before.”</p>
<p>It behoves us to learn from our enemies,
and, abstraction made from the monstrosities
which are indelibly associated with the German
name, there is much which the Teutons can
still teach us. That the secret of success lies<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_230" id="Page_230">[230]</a></span>
in a comprehensive system of organization is
self-evident. But that organization must
utilize all the resources of the Allies and include
permanent arrangements, economic and other,
for a future which shall not be a continuation
of the past. Many of the advantages which
the old ordering of things assured us are gone
beyond recall. Conscription is become inevitable.
Free trade is an institution of the
past. The control of armies in the field by
delegates of a democratic parliament such as
is now demanded by the French Chamber is a
dangerous craving for the fleshpots of Egypt.
Whether Germany wins or loses, her rebellion
against European civilization will effect substantial
and durable changes in the methods
of that civilization from which even the
United States will not be exempted.</p>
<p>Thus between the old order of things and
the new yawns an abyss which has to be
crossed before we can worst our enemies even
in the military campaign which is but one
phase of the world-struggle. Our resources
for the purpose of bridging it are ample, but
our first difficulty is the circumstance that we
are chained to the old system and are still
unwilling to burst the bonds that hold us.
And until efficacious means of effecting this
are adopted the end must remain unattainable.
Victory will not descend on our camp like a
manna from on high. The Allied Armies do
not resemble the mulberry tree which, having
long lagged behind its rivals, suddenly bursts
into fruit as well as flower.</p>
<p>During the past twenty months the Allies in
general, and the British in particular, have
achieved feats of which they have reason to
be proud—feats which two years ago seemed<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_231" id="Page_231">[231]</a></span>
beyond the compass of human effort. But,
much as we have done, we have not reached,
nor indeed attempted to reach, the limits of
our capacities, and the story of these memorable
twenty months of struggle is dimmed by the
shadow of the vaster exploits from which we
have unaccountably shrunk.</p>
<p>The old-world social conceptions still prevalent
in Great Britain afford no standard by
which to gauge the significance of the crisis
through which Europe is passing, nor do they
provide efficacious means of satisfying the
pressing needs which it has created. Yet
the nation’s guides perceive nothing to change
in those conceptions; on the contrary, they
uphold them zealously. No event has occurred
in modern times of greater concern to Europe
than the unleashing of disruptive forces which
threaten when the war is over to break up the
politico-social fabric. Now, the mere prospect
of this tremendous upheaval and of its sequel
is, one would fancy, calculated to arouse the
spirited interest of all the nations affected.
Yet in Great Britain, whose very existence it
menaces, it was at first received with such
unmeaning comments as “business as usual.”
The alertness of the people’s sensations—always
inconsiderable—for volcanic outbursts
which have their centre abroad, has never
been quite so blunted as to-day.</p>
<p>Germany cultivates force not for its own
sake but because it happens to suit her particular
purpose. For this reason she preaches
the doctrines that right and might are identical,
that the end hallows the means, that military
and political necessity overrule treaties and
laws. For as violence and cunning may still
gain triumphs, under the conditions that once<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_232" id="Page_232">[232]</a></span>
rendered them the only weapons of man,
Germany’s first step is to bring about such
conditions and to spread faith in the teachings
of the new gospel. What the success of these
efforts would involve is evident. All the
ground slowly and painfully reclaimed from
the primitive state of nature, transmuted into
social order, and moralized by the altruistic
accord of progressive humanity, would be
submerged by the tidal wave of Teutonism.</p>
<p>The first clash of the two forces which took
place a generation ago was hardly noticed.
Germany stretched out her feelers tenderly,
and even when she was draining nation after
nation of its life juices, she took care to lull
the patient while sucking his blood. Accordingly
her attack provoked no counter-attack,
nay, there was no serious attempt at defence.
Those who directed the forces of the civilized
communities were unconscious of the counter-force
that was steadily undermining these—so
unconscious that in lieu of isolating and
paralysing it, the tendency of their endeavours
was to further and to strengthen it. For they
hastily assumed that it, too, was a great moral
force in an uncouth guise and should also be
tended and cultivated. Their duty, had they
hearkened to its promptings, would have been
to employ towards the criminal plotters against
Europe’s civilized communities coercion of the
same drastic description that once enabled
mankind to substitute for the barbarous usages
of savage tribes the habits of social relationship
and moral self-surrender to the weal of
all. Among the mainstays of Germany’s type
of society and the instruments by which it
was built up are heavy artillery, mighty armies,
the gallows, bribery and guile. With some of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_233" id="Page_233">[233]</a></span>
those arms she had opened the campaign of
conquest a quarter of a century ago, and of
that campaign the present war, unexampled
though it be, is but an acute and transient
episode. This would appear to be the only
true reading of contemporary events.</p>
<p>Few careful students of European politics
will now deny that the struggle between the
forces for which Teutonism stands and those
on which the social ordering of the rest of
Europe is based was inaugurated long ago,
that the ground was then cleared for the new
politico-social structure, or that the dissolution
of our “effete, drowsy States, saturated with
wealth and honeycombed with hypocrisies,”
was carefully planned and taken in hand with
scientific precision. It is equally clear, to
those who have eyes to see, that the present
clash of nations, despite its appalling effects
on civilization, is but an acuter phase of that
campaign, a series of incidents in a mighty
struggle which neither began in July 1914 nor
will end with the close of hostilities, but will
rage on for years to come in less sanguinary
but more decisive forms. For the future peace—whatever
its terms—which will silence the
cannon’s boom, will but transfer the war
theatre without ending the war. The methods
will be changed from military to economic.
But only the weapons will be different; the
military discipline, the callous indifference to
the dictates of human and divine law, the
utter absence of scruple will continue to characterize
the tactics of our enemy, who will
then have a wider scope for his activities than
the battlefield can offer. The German has no
match among the allied nations in the regions
of the new diplomacy, trade, industry, applied<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_234" id="Page_234">[234]</a></span>
science, insidious journalism and vast organization.
He is incomparably better equipped
than they, and owing to his amorality has
none of those obstacles to contend with which
so often confront them with scruples and check
their advance.</p>
<p>And during the progress of the present war
the Teutons are making ready for that economico-political
duel which will, they hope, give
them the decisive superiority for which they
had vainly hoped from the war. That hope, if
their experience of the past thirty years be a
fair indication, is by no means groundless.</p>
<p>Not to realize these facts to-day is to play
into the hands of our enemies, as we have been
steadfastly doing during the past thirty years.
The British and their allies are being overcome
less by German skill and cleverness than
by their own sluggishness, narrowness of outlook
and love of ease. As the German professor,
whose utterances I have already quoted,
tersely put it: “My confidence is founded
above all else on our enemies’ incapacity for
organization.” In truth, it is not inborn incapacity
to which we owe our unquestioned
inferiority, but to the atrophy of will-power
which is one of the consequences of years of
egotism, overweening confidence, self-indulgence
and the loss of an inspiring social faith.</p>
<p>Now, there is every reason to assume that
these master facts are not yet recognized by
our rulers, who seem perfectly contented that
the nation should go on living as before from
hand to mouth, with no far-reaching views for
the future. This insular narrow-mindedness
is natural. For the Ministers in power are
the same who obstinately refused to credit the
evidence of their senses, which went to prove<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_235" id="Page_235">[235]</a></span>
that Germany was bending all her energies
to the successful prosecution of a formidable
campaign against us and our presumptive
allies for a whole generation. The frank recognition
of this state of masked hostility would
have imposed on the Government the correlate
duty of taking up the challenge, readjusting
our public life to the altered conditions,
urging the nation to make heavy sacrifices and
dissatisfying radical constituencies, whose one
ideal is to devote themselves exclusively to
parochial policy and domestic legislation. And
the chiefs of the party in power lacked the
mental and moral strength to throw off their
deep-rooted apprehension of the consequences
to party prospects, of increased taxation and
other burdens of citizenship. They never
grasped the situation as a whole, but restricted
their survey to each fragmentary question as
it was thrust into the foreground of actualities
and eliminated every other.</p>
<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_106_106" id="Footnote_106_106"></a><a href="#FNanchor_106_106"><span class="label">[106]</span></a> <i>Arbeiter Zeitung.</i></p></div>
</div>
<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XVIII" id="CHAPTER_XVIII"></a>CHAPTER XVIII<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_236" id="Page_236">[236]</a></span></h2>
<h3>THE PERILS OF PARTY POLITICS</h3>
<p><span class="smcap">No</span> bold, broad, stable policy, therefore, was
ever conceived by those party politicians.
The vast organization which was destined
to destroy the old order of things in Europe,
and whose manifestations were an open book
to all observers who brought acuteness and
patience to the study, was not merely ignored
by them—its very existence was denied, and
those who refused to join the ranks of the
deniers were brand-marked as mischief-makers.
The nation’s responsible trustees, by way of
justifying this singular attitude, accepted implicitly
our enemy’s account of his unfriendly
acts and enterprises. Thus it was the chief
of His Majesty’s Government who, from his
place in the House of Commons, emphatically
asserted that it behoved the British nation to
welcome the Baghdad railway enterprise as
a precious cultural undertaking devoid of
political objects and, therefore, well worthy
of our support. In vain the writer of these
lines laid bare the real designs of the German
Government, and adduced cogent proofs that
the seemingly cultural scheme was but an
integral part of a vast campaign, of which
one object was the ousting of Britons from
the Near and Middle East and the substitution
of German overlordship there. They
shut their eyes and stopped their ears, and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_237" id="Page_237">[237]</a></span>
bade us rejoice that Britain is not as other
countries and can afford to welcome and even
further Germany’s “cultural” projects.</p>
<p>It was our party politicians who, when the
ground-swell of international anger and the
premonitory rumble of volcanic forces became
audible, diverted public attention from the
symptoms and solemnly assured their countrymen
that Germany had no intention of going
to war. To the author of these pages, who
was at the pains of unfolding in private his
information and conclusions on this subject
to one of those leaders, the answer given ran
thus: “Your intentions are patriotic and
your accuracy of observation is probably
scientific. But your conclusions are wholly
erroneous. You must admit that you are a
pessimist. Nor can you deny that we members
of the Cabinet dispose of fuller and more decisive
data for a judgment than you, with all
your opportunities, can muster. After all,
we do know something of the temper of the
German Government. And we have cogent
grounds for holding that neither the Kaiser
nor his Ministers want war. Bethmann Hollweg
is the most pacific chancellor Germany has
ever had. And the German people, bellicose
though you think them, are to the full as
peace-loving as our own. Their one desire
is to be allowed to vie with us in commercial
and industrial pursuits. So true is this, that
if we suppose the improbable, that the Kaiser’s
Government should feel disposed to bring about
a European war, that design would be thwarted
by the Reichstag backed by the bulk of the
population.”</p>
<p>Thus the men who presided over the destinies
of the British Empire either had no eye for<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_238" id="Page_238">[238]</a></span>
the triumphant progress of the German campaign
that had been going forward for years
unchecked, or, if they discerned any of its
episodes, saw them only through the softening
and distorting medium of deceptive assurances
and explanations emanating from Berlin. And
on the strength of these illusive phrases they
kept the country in a state of unpreparedness
for the military form of the struggle for which
our enemy was making ready, and if they had
had their way our navy—which was our anchor
of salvation—would also perhaps have been
shorn of its strength.</p>
<p>When at last the war broke out, it was our
party politicians, the men to whom we still
look up for light and guidance, who misinterpreted
its nature and underestimated the
urgent needs of the Empire. It was they
who conceived the campaign as though it
were one of our occasional colonial expeditions,
and would fain base the strength of our land
army abroad on the small number of troops
which the Government had conditionally undertaken
to provide. And throughout the first
sixteen months of the war, it was they who
went on doling out contingents with Troy
weights and measures like Mrs. Partington
beating back the tidal waves with a mop.
It was they, too, who were at extraordinary
pains and risked their prestige, to throw away
the splendid privileged position which, at the
outset of the struggle, we chanced to occupy in
South-Eastern Europe. Every blunder into
which petty municipal minds could fall when
confronted with a wild revolutionary welter,
marked the hesitant policy of the British
Government. This aimless chaos of soul was
the main cause of the woeful waste of our<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_239" id="Page_239">[239]</a></span>
political advantages and enormous resources
in the accomplishment of secondary ends
which generally led nowhere. It was thus
that they forfeited the active support of
Turkey, Bulgaria and Greece, foolishly stood
by applauding every step those nations took
towards the camp of our enemies, and then felt
constrained to turn to their own people whom
they had unwittingly misled and call upon it
for the sacrifice of the flower of its manhood.</p>
<p>It was they who sacrificed, through sheer administrative
incapacity, the decided superiority
over the Teutons which we enjoyed in the air
at the outset of the war. It is now admitted
that our mastery in that region was then complete.
All that the country demanded of
them was that they should hold it. But what
with divided control, restricted views, and the
policy of insufficient means—<i>petits paquets</i>—as
the French term it, they allowed our enemies
to outstrip us. And to-day in the air as on
land it is the Germans who have the initiative
and the Allies who are condemned to the
defensive. Yet experts had pointed out over
and over again what should be done and what
avoided. Their advice was obviously sound
and their criticism obviously irrefutable. But
the men in power fumbled and floundered on
until we had forfeited our mastery in the air
to our enemies. And ever since then the nation
has been paying the penalty. Yet it is to the
men responsible for these costly blunders that
the nation still looks for salvation!</p>
<p>It was the same men who conceived or
sanctioned the plan of an expedition to Mesopotamia.
Whether this was a wise or a foolish
project, when once decided upon it should
have been carried out with might and main.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_240" id="Page_240">[240]</a></span>
All the means requisite to success should have
been taken; all the resources possessed by the
Empire should have been drawn upon and
nothing needlessly left to chance. Above all
things else, the views of the man charged with
the execution of the plan should have been
elicited and carefully weighed. As a matter
of fact, General Townshend’s judgment was
decidedly adverse to the expedition under the
conditions in which it was planned. For the
forces assigned to him, amounting to far less
than a division, were absurdly inadequate, and
their inadequacy was easily demonstrable. He
ought to have had at least two divisions more.
But once again the game of divided control
and diluted responsibility was played, with consequences
which would in any other country
suffice to wreck the Government chargeable
with the blunder.</p>
<p>Yet it is to the men who committed that
and all the other blunders that the nation still
looks confidently for salvation!</p>
<p>If the British people finally obtain it under
those leaders they may fairly claim to have
abrogated the law of cause and effect.</p>
<p>These same men are still the mentors and
the spokesmen of a free nation which can
choose its leaders. It is they to whom the
people has entrusted the conduct of the most
critical phase of the whole campaign in which
the recurrence of similar errors may foredoom
the Empire to disruption. And it is, humanly
speaking, inconceivable that miscalculations
of that kind should be eliminated, in view of
the crucial fact that the Ministers at present
in power, if we may judge by their utterances
and their acts, entertain a fundamentally false
conception of the relations between the Teutons<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_241" id="Page_241">[241]</a></span>
and the allied nations. Among the elements
of that conception there would seem to be no
room for the historic past. The present stands
by itself with a history that goes no further
back than the month of July 1914, and will
convulsively come to an end with the truce
that ushers in the future treaty of peace. For
that diplomatic instrument will put an end
to the struggle and inaugurate an era of international
tranquillity. Such is the theory on
which their entire policy is based.</p>
<p>We must fight on now to a <i>finish</i>, but the
upshot is sure to be a finish. Their anticipations
of an unclouded dawn, when the present
night has worn itself into the streaky greyness
of morning, are certain to come to pass. The
ordeal which we are undergoing is tremendous,
but at any rate the nation and its allies will
emerge from it rejuvenated under the spell of
the present magicians, as the old ram emerged
lamb-like and frisky from Medea’s cauldron.
That, in brief, would seem to be the picture in
the mind’s eye of the British Government, and
to that conception all their plans are being
accommodated.</p>
<p>As a matter of ascertainable fact, neither we
nor our Allies have anything of the kind to
hope for. In the near future the present
campaign will have come to a close, but not
the struggle between ourselves and our Teuton
aggressors. For this war, far from ending the
tragic duel between the two types of community
life in Europe, is but one of its transient
episodes. The trial of strength began many
years ago and will not be decided for many
years to come, how satisfactory so ever the
terms of the future peace may be to ourselves
and our Allies. This is a fundamental truth<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_242" id="Page_242">[242]</a></span>
which has not yet penetrated the consciousness
of either rulers or people. And for that
reason the problem awaiting them is mis-stated,
belittled. According to the received
version it is to beat back German aggression
and render it impossible in the future. Now,
however successfully the first part of the task
may be discharged—and it is still very uphill
work—the second is a sheer impossibility, and to
lay our plans as though it were feasible and
soon to be realized, is to embark on the body
of a sleeping whale in the belief that it is an
island in the sea. And to negotiate peace
abroad and give an impulse to politics at
home, with that comforting prospect in mind,
is to lead the nation into a Serbonian bog
whence no escape is possible. The leaders of
Great Britain are so permeated with the
duties, the rights, the hopes and the strivings
of parliamentary parties, that they involuntarily
think in terms of home politics and have
no chord in their being responsive to the
emotions that sway the German soul and nerve
the German arm.</p>
<p>To the average mind it is clear that the
terms on which peace might be negotiated,
if the end of the war were also to be the end
of the struggle, might differ considerably from
those on which a statesman would properly
insist, were he convinced that the sheathing
of the sword marked but the opening of a new
phase of the duel. And it is this alternative
which it behoves us to lay at the foundation
of our peace treaty, if it should rest with the
Allies to impose their terms. The problem,
therefore, which a Government that governs
has to tackle, is twofold: the conclusion of
such a peace as will confer on the Entente<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_243" id="Page_243">[243]</a></span>
States, individually and collectively, all possible
advantages, not for contemplating such a
tranquil state of things as the ministerial conception
postulates, but for the prosecution of
the struggle with the greatest chances of
success, and for the reconstruction of the
social fabric at home with a view to harmonizing
it with the new requirements, and, in
particular, with the needs created by the
constant state of economic, financial, diplomatic
and journalistic warfare in which we
shall be engaged. The social ordering of
Great Britain must be not merely modified
but remodelled and rebuilt from the groundwork
to the coping-stone. One of the first
needs of the nation is the education, physical
and spiritual, of the new generation. Patriotic
sentiment must be engrafted on the receptive
soul of the child, and its range of sympathy
widened and deepened. The duty of self-abnegation
for the welfare of the community must
be inculcated, together with new conceptions
of personal dignity and worth. To the domestic
sentiment in those cramped and distorted forms
in which it still survives in Britain, where we
cling tenaciously to so many institutions devoid
of life and utility, a less commanding
part must be assigned in the future than
heretofore. Above all, it behoves us to encourage
the scientific spirit with its correlates,
patient thought and study, as opposed to the
arrogant amateurism which, without rudimentary
qualifications, claims to have a voice
in the solution of every problem under the
sun. It is largely to this dilettante temperament
of the nation and its rulers that we owe
the disasters we have sustained and the dangers
with which we are threatened.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_244" id="Page_244">[244]</a></span></p>
<p>Looking back, then, dispassionately upon the
movement, deliberately organized over thirty
years ago by the restless German mind and
pushed steadily forward ever since over diplomatic
barriers, financial hindrances, economic
obstacles and international laws, one is struck
less by the unparalleled magnitude of the
enterprise than by the blindness and sluggishness
of its destined victims. And it is largely
in these and kindred negative qualities that
we have to seek for the clue to the astonishing
sequence of successes scored by our
enemies in their military and naval, as well
as their politico-economic, campaigns. Moreover,
these same defects, deep-rooted and
widespread among the allied peoples, constitute
their main source of weakness during the
economic and decisive tug-of-war which will
be ushered in by the treaty of peace. For the
temperament, traditions and strivings of each
of these nations are so many obstacles to the
gathering of their scattered moral energies
and wasted spiritual forces in one fertilizing
stream. They are bent on joining incompatible
elements in a political synthesis. In
the name of national independence and by
way of a telling protest against the vassalage
which binds Austria to Germany, the Entente
nations spurn the notion of any common
accord which requires the practice of self-surrender
as a base, and are resolved under the
strain of circumstance to present such a loosely-joined
front to the enemy as will not involve
their foregoing one iota of their freedom or one
tittle of their national claims. How, in these
conditions, they expect ever to rise to that
height of moral fervour without which the
quasi-ascetic effort demanded of them is<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_245" id="Page_245">[245]</a></span>
inconceivable, has not yet been explained.
As usual, they count upon effects without
causes, upon an ingathering of the harvest
with no preceding seedtime. Now, interdependence
and compromise are the indispensable
conditions of that cohesion which
alone can engender the force required. A
condition approaching organic coherency must
be attained before a smooth working system
can be created among the Allies. But as each
of them is still rooted to the past, permeated
by its own interests and aspirations, and jealous
not only of the substance of its liberty but
also of the shadow, the distance yet to be
traversed before the goal can be reached is
enormous, and the road rugged and beset with
pitfalls.</p>
<p>A glance at the past and present may
enable us to gauge aright the nature of some
of the difficulties that have to be surmounted
in the future.</p>
<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XIX" id="CHAPTER_XIX"></a>CHAPTER XIX<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_246" id="Page_246">[246]</a></span></h2>
<h3>PAST AND PRESENT</h3>
<p><span class="smcap">Let</span> us begin with the present, in view of the
circumstance that the war has brought the
allied peoples into a much nearer approach
to union and has more fully systematized their
efforts than can ever be the case in peace time.
We find, then, two groups of belligerents pitted
against each other, whose resources in men,
money and economic supplies are strikingly
unequal. The Teutons are by far the weaker
side, and even in spite of their long preparations
ought to have been thoroughly beaten
long ago. So evident and encouraging was the
comparison that the Entente nations themselves
boldly grounded their calculations on it,
and anticipated a brief spell of warfare and a
decisive victory. And this forecast seemed
reasonable enough when the material elements
were weighed and contrasted. The Entente
communities occupy 68,031,000 square kilometres
of territory, which are inhabited by a
population of 770,060,000, or say 46 per cent.
of the entire land on the globe and 47 per cent.
of the entire human race. The Central Empires,
on the other hand, possess no more than
5,921,000 square kilometres with 150,199,000
inhabitants, which amounts to only 4 per
cent. of dry land on the globe and 9.1 per
cent. of mankind. Add to that the circumstance
that in the air our superiority over our<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_247" id="Page_247">[247]</a></span>
enemies was undisputed, and that the odds in
favour of our enlisting the active support of
the Balkan States were overwhelming. The
chances in favour of the Allies, therefore, were
and are enormous. That being so, why, it
may well be asked, has the course of the
military, naval and air campaign so uniformly
favoured the weaker side? It is no answer
to point out that Germany and Austria had
been organizing the war for over thirty years,
or had contrived to mobilize all their resources
when the first shot was fired. That
explanation would account for their progress
during the first few months, but not
for the victories they scored down to the
beginning of April 1916. It was loudly proclaimed
by British journalists that the Berlin
General Staff had based its plan on the assumption
that the struggle would be decided in a
few months and certainly by the end of 1914.
And the inference was drawn that as this time-table
was upset, Germany was so bewildered
that she could hardly draw up another plan
and adjust her forces to that. She had shot
her bolt, we were assured, had missed the
target, and it was beyond her power to put
forth another effort. But events refuted these
false prophets, without, however, greatly impairing
their credit with the multitude. They
still continue to describe Germany’s dire straits
and foretell her speedy collapse. And they
are listened to with eagerness and trust.</p>
<p>In truth the root of the matter lies deeper.
One of the most telling factors, in every armed
conflict between peoples, consists of the sum
total of imponderabilia which elude analysis.
Intellectual and moral equipment, as I ventured
to write when the war began, sometimes counts<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_248" id="Page_248">[248]</a></span>
for more than battalions. And I instanced the
Russo-Japanese campaign as a case in point.
One belligerent may regard the campaign as a
temporary calamity to be endured until it
can be conveniently got rid of, while another
may gird his loins and go forth to battle exultant
like the fanaticized warriors of Cromwell.
The former will contemplate the struggle and
regulate the conduct of it in the light of
immediate expediency, while the latter will
treat the war as a life-task and boldly throw
the weight of everything he has, and is, and
hopes for into the blows he deals his adversary.
Now in this struggle the Teuton is the
fanaticized warrior. He is fighting for an ideal,
which, whether or no he understands it, he
caresses and deems his very own. The hopes
and dreams of the leaders of the nation have
been communicated to the individual citizen,
who, having lived for them, is ready to die
for them. Our people, on the other hand,
have never enjoyed that education in patriotism
which is bestowed on every Teuton, and they
are wanting in the strength of imagination,
the spirit of cohesion and the energizing social
faith which might have made up for the
deficiency.</p>
<p>Then, again, over against the Allies’ inexhaustible
resources we must put the marvellous
capacity for organization which intensifies
those of our enemy. The nearest known
approach to it is found in the Japanese, who,
there is little doubt, if pressed by circumstance,
would match the Teuton in resourcefulness and
even outdo him in the spirit of self-sacrifice.
To this precious asset in Germany’s leaders
corresponds a superlative degree of docility
and self-surrender in her people which offer<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_249" id="Page_249">[249]</a></span>
a striking contrast to the strongly marked
individualist tendencies of the British, French
and Russian races. Nay, one may go farther
and assert that the central streams of national
life in each of these countries flows in channels
of party politics, which no influential leader
has ever attempted to deepen or widen. The
German, on the contrary, as we saw, associates
his every work and undertaking with ideas of
almost cosmic breadth and is actuated by
interests to which all the larger problems of
humanity are akin. And he took timely possession
of every lever that might contribute
to the success of his revolt against Europeanism,
when his far-reaching scheme was yet in
the early phases of execution.</p>
<p>Everything that human foresight could think
of was carefully studied, everything that human
ingenuity could provide for was thoroughly
effected and systematized. Royal dynasties
were founded abroad by German princes.
German colonies settled in Russia, Poland,
Palestine and Brazil. German schools were
opened in Roumania, Spain, Asia Minor, the
Ottoman Empire, the Tsardom. Foreign newspapers
were bought or subsidized. Protestant
sects with pro-German tendencies were encouraged.
Banks were founded with Entente
capital and employed to ruin the trade of
the nations that subscribed it. Colonies of
mechanics, clerks, middlemen were settled in
every European country and colony and obtained
control of the nation’s industries and
trade. Special legislation was enacted in Berlin
to enable the German to become a foreign
subject in externals while bound by all the
duties of a citizen of his own country.</p>
<p>As the hour for the military and naval<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_250" id="Page_250">[250]</a></span>
struggle was drawing near intestine strife
was industriously stirred up in all those
countries whose rivalry the Germans had
reason to apprehend. Emissaries were despatched
to Egypt who made common cause
with the disaffected and restless elements of
the population, cultivated friendship with the
Senussi and smuggled in arms to would-be
African rebels. In India German “scientific
explorers” hobnobbed with the natives, criticized
the state of “serfage” to which British
rule had reduced one of the most highly
civilized races of mankind, and made overtures
to the Afghans. To Abyssinia another “scientific
expedition” was despatched, which consisted
of a number of German officers and
one explorer. After a circuitous and difficult
journey it arrived at Massaua in March 1915,
and requested the authorization of the Italian
Governor of Erithea, the Marquess Salvago-Raggi,
to push on to Adis Abeba, in order to
re-establish communications between the German
Legation there and the Berlin Foreign
Office. The real object of the expedition, as
the Italian Government well knew, was to
incite the young Negus to attack the British
in the Sudan and the French in Djibuti. But
Italy, although still neutral, understood too
well how difficult it would have been for her
to limit Abyssinia’s warlike operations to the
French and British possessions and ward them
off from her own colonies. Baron Sonnino
accordingly declined to accord the permission
asked for, and consented only to allow a large
consignment of “correspondence” to be sent
on.<a name="FNanchor_107_107" id="FNanchor_107_107"></a><a href="#Footnote_107_107" class="fnanchor">[107]</a></p>
<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_251" id="Page_251">[251]</a></span></p>
<p>Later on Turkish officers were sent to Libya
to egg on the Arabs to harass the Italians
there. The Kaiser himself despatched a letter
in Arabic to the Senussi which was intercepted
on a Greek sailing vessel near Tripoli.
It is said to have been enclosed in an embossed
casket, and was found on board together with
£4000 in gold and a number of oriental gifts.
The letter, if genuine, is worth recording.
Wilhelm II., the Supreme Head of the Protestant
Church in Germany, gives himself therein,
among other high sounding titles, those of
Allah’s Envoy and Islam’s Protector, and
states explicitly that it is his will that the
Senussi’s doughty warriors should drive the
“infidels” from the land which is the heritage
of the true believers and their chief. This,
from the “supreme Bishop” of one of the
Christian Churches, is characteristic.</p>
<p>In Asia Minor Germany’s machinations were
carried on with a much greater measure of
success. Her former opponents had withdrawn
their opposition and undertaken to
lend her positive assistance to attain ends
which were directed against themselves. This
chapter of Entente diplomacy is marked by
broad streaks of farcical comedy calculated
to bewilder the serious student. France was
converted to political orthodoxy on the subject
of the Baghdad Railway and its cultural
significance. Some of her publicists frankly
repented that she had so long looked upon it
with disfavour, and threw the blame on Russia,
for whose sake they had kept aloof. At
Potsdam the Tsar’s Minister abandoned his
objections to the Baghdad enterprise and
undertook to build a railway line from Persia,
which would allow another stretch of country<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_252" id="Page_252">[252]</a></span>
to be tapped by the German Railway Company.
Great Britain, acknowledging the error of her
ways, agreed that Koweit should not be the
terminus and made valuable concessions to the
Teuton, the realization of which was hindered
by the outbreak of the war. Turkey, through
Enver, who had imported from the Fatherland
a band of military “instructors” under Liman
von Sanders, became the <i>âme damnée</i> of
Germany. In Persia every warlike and predatory
tribe was courted by the Teuton intruder,
and the German mission at Teheran,
as well as the Consulates in the chief towns
of the Shahdom, became centres of agitation
against Britain and Russia and branches of
the German General Staff.</p>
<p>In the Tsar’s dominions German agents
organized a series of strikes in the various
works belonging to their countrymen, paid
the strikers and fostered a subversive political
movement which bade fair to culminate in
a real revolution. In Belgium the Flemings,
who had for years been protesting against the
refusal of their Government to give them a
Flemish University in Ghent, were incited against
the Walloons, whose dialect is of French origin
and whose sympathizers were the entire French
people. And one of the joint acts of the
German administration in Brussels has been
to appoint a commission to submit a scheme
for the creation of a Flemish high school in
Ghent and accentuate the differences between
the two elements of the population.<a name="FNanchor_108_108" id="FNanchor_108_108"></a><a href="#Footnote_108_108" class="fnanchor">[108]</a></p>
<p>Meanwhile, in Germany the work of organization
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_253" id="Page_253">[253]</a></span>went steadily forward. While British
Ministers were on the look-out for reasons or
pretexts for diminishing expenditure on shipbuilding,
Germany, under von Tirpitz, was
stealing a march on us and increasing hers.
And over and above this, she was arranging a
surprise in the shape of submarines and aircraft
which, had the war been deferred for
another couple of years, might have not only
removed the odds in our favour but given
her a decided superiority over us. And, by
way of intensifying the value of her fleet, she
set to work to deepen the Kiel Canal and thus
to confer a sort of ubiquity on her battleships,
which can now concentrate in the North Sea
or the Baltic without let or hindrance from
the enemy. When the epoch of the Dreadnoughts
was opened German armoured ships
had a displacement of no more than 13,000
tons. The larger type of battleship, which
was afterwards constructed, could not pass
through the Canal, which had to be deepened.
The necessary work was so thoughtfully and
opportunely taken in hand that it was terminated
in July 1914, just when the harvest
for that year was also ingathered. Asphyxiating
gas had been manufactured in the year
1911, as the Russians have discovered on
certain of the machines. Thus when the fatal
hour struck, everything was ready.</p>
<p>In the financial sphere, too, we find the same
comprehensive survey, the same eye for detail,
the same forethought and combination. When
hostilities broke out British banks held about
£1,100,000,000 of their depositors’ money. A
large percentage of this had been employed to
discount foreign, and in especial German bills,
so that the paper remained in Great Britain<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_254" id="Page_254">[254]</a></span>
and the gold was transferred to Germany,
where it plays its part against us. But those
marvellous efforts put forth with such effect
by our enemies made no appeal to our rulers.
Nowhere in the British Empire was there any
man of mark thinking and acting for the
community. The political pilots who had
charge of the state-ship possessed neither chart
nor compass nor rudder. Neither did they
feel the need of these things. The Government
disbelieved in war and was minded, if a
struggle should be precipitated, to keep out
of it. Nobody envisaged the needs and interests
of the Empire as aspects of a single
problem. Nobody had any clear-cut plan for
the working out of the destinies of the British
people. The interests of party, the expediency
of local reforms, the squabbles between this
faction and that, constituted the burning
topics of the hour, and there were none other.
And it was while we were thus wrangling with
and threatening each other that the blast of
the clarion ushered in the day of doom.</p>
<p>The secrets of nature, revealed by science to
a nation which acknowledges no restraints,
then became weapons of wholesale destruction
to be used to subjugate all civilization. Now,
there are some reasons for assuming that
civilization will escape the thraldom, but there
are unhappily equally cogent grounds for
apprehending that some of its most precious
achievements will be irrecoverably lost and
others greatly impaired. Had there been a
master mind at the helm of the British state-ship
before the war or at its opening, we might
have been spared the necessity of signing one
day a temporary peace amid the ruins of
European culture.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_255" id="Page_255">[255]</a></span></p>
<p>But no puissant genius in any of the allied
countries towered above the dead level of mediocrity.
Great Frenchmen, Britons and Russians
were said to be available, but there was no
great man in evidence. And this want proved
disastrous. In Germany, on the other hand, it
was hardly felt. For it was compensated by the
existence of a vast human machine, adaptable
to every change of circumstance, capable of
assuming countless Protean forms simultaneously,
ready with a solution for the most
unexpected problems, provided with organs
suited to the discharge of every conceivable
function, all directed to the same end. It was
the same organism that had worked with such
brilliant success for over thirty years, growing
and perfecting itself steadily until it became
the concrete manifestation of a whole system
of thought, sentiment and co-ordinated action.
Germany had developed into a powerful national
State in which the spirit of self-surrender for
the good of the community animates all sections
alike, all of which co-operate effectively,
through the organizations which they spontaneously
created, for the realization of their
common objects. And therein lay her force.</p>
<p>On the outbreak of war Germany was faced
with a group of the most arduous and intricate
problems any Government has ever yet had to
tackle. For most of them she had had the
time and the forethought to prepare. But
others arose which had been neither provided
for nor foreseen, in consequence of her mistaken
assumption that Great Britain would
hold aloof from the war. The total value of
her exports and imports in the year 1913 was
computed at 1,000,000,000 sterling, and an
infinity of fine threads bound her industrial<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_256" id="Page_256">[256]</a></span>
activity with foreign countries. By Great
Britain’s declaration of war, for which Germany
was unprepared until the last days of July,
nearly all these threads were snapped asunder,
and the industrial and economic life of the
Empire had to be swiftly readjusted to the
new conditions. And here it was that the
nation rose as one man to the unparalleled
occasion, faced the tremendous ordeal, and,
contrary to the expectations of its adversaries—ever
prone to judge others by themselves—has
continued not merely to exist, but
to extend its conquests ever since.</p>
<p>It was in the financial sphere that the first
strain was felt. But perilous though it actually
was, it would have been intolerable but
for the precautionary measures adopted in
July and the ingenious devices applied by the
Reichsbank immediately after. The first step
taken was to substitute short-terms credit for
long. The gold in the Reichsbank increased
steadily, and from 1,009,000,000 marks on
July 7, 1913, it rose to 1,356,000,000 by
July 7, 1914. The war treasure hoarded in
the Julius-Tower was doubled, so as to enable
the Imperial Bank to issue 720,000,000 marks
on the strength of it, whereby its gold
cover was augmented from 1,253,000,000 to
1,447,000,000. A further considerable reserve
of silver was laid by, which proved extremely
useful later on. One result of this policy was
that on the fatal 31st July, no less than
4,500,000,000 marks in banknotes could be
issued without exceeding the limits prescribed
by the law.<a name="FNanchor_109_109" id="FNanchor_109_109"></a><a href="#Footnote_109_109" class="fnanchor">[109]</a> A network of Loan Banks was
also created throughout the country in which
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_257" id="Page_257">[257]</a></span>every one, possessed of property of any description,
could obtain credit to any amount, provided
the pledges warranted the advance.</p>
<p>Nor were the large groups of business men
neglected who had no pledges to offer yet sorely
needed credit. For their behoof War Credit
Banks were instituted, which transacted business
on curious lines. A city or town subscribed
a third or even more of the shares
of the borrowing company, and the Imperial
Bank conferred the right of rediscounting bills
of exchange up to an amount equal to three
times the value of the capital, and sometimes
even more. Institutions were opened for advancing
money on house property, and for
assisting special branches of industry. The
Hansa-Bund, for instance, founded a War
Credit Bank for “the Middle Classes” which,
with the authorization of the Reichsbank,
rediscounts bills of exchange drawn by individuals
for whom the Commune vouches.
Associations were constituted in the country
and in towns, and the nature of their work
is evidenced by the 18,000 rural Savings and
Credit Banks and 16,000 urban and trade
associations.<a name="FNanchor_110_110" id="FNanchor_110_110"></a><a href="#Footnote_110_110" class="fnanchor">[110]</a> For farmers and struggling landowners,
a Central Board, for the purchase of
machines, was created, which also superintended
the equitable distribution of orders among
industrial firms.</p>
<p>The suddenness of the declaration of war
had for its effect, and perhaps also for one of
its objects, the stemming of the flow of gold
from the Reichsbank before it had exceeded
the total of 100,000,000 marks and also
the prevention of its disappearance from the
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_258" id="Page_258">[258]</a></span>country. Soon afterwards gold was brought
in astonishing quantities to the bank by all
classes of citizens who had hoarded it jealously
in peace-time, but now recognized the criminality
of applying the principles of individual
ownership to what of right belongs to the
jeopardized community. For the nation realized
the fact that the condition of public
danger entitled the Government to wield an
unlimited degree of power over the lives and
property of the people for the welfare of the
community.</p>
<p>If we compare this intelligent appreciation
of the position by rulers and ruled, and their
readiness to accommodate their respective
actions to it and play their parts as organs for
the discharge of special functions, with the
haziness of conception, the misinterpretation
of events, and the utter lack of co-operation
displayed by the corresponding sections of the
allied communities, we shall grasp the secret
of the superiority of the seemingly weaker
group of belligerents and the paltry results
hitherto achieved by the stronger.</p>
<p>German industry, too, the source of the
nation’s prosperity, was shaken to its foundations.
It had worked largely for the foreign
market. And all at once its exports were cut
down by 60 per cent., because of the stoppage
of the supplies of raw materials. Imports
also fell by 75 per cent. One immediate
consequence of this partial stagnation was
the enormous increase of the army of the
unemployed. Although 4,000,000 men were
taken from the various industries and despatched
against the Belgians, French and
Russians, there were at the end of August
no less than 3,400,000 men thrown out of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_259" id="Page_259">[259]</a></span>
employment.<a name="FNanchor_111_111" id="FNanchor_111_111"></a><a href="#Footnote_111_111" class="fnanchor">[111]</a> Thus the total number of unemployed
was 7,400,000, and as there were
17,000,000 hands employed before the war,
it may be inferred that German industry was
reduced by 43½ per cent. It was in these
conditions that the Teuton capacity for organization
was manifested.</p>
<p>Two great industrial organizations flourished
in Germany before the war,<a name="FNanchor_112_112" id="FNanchor_112_112"></a><a href="#Footnote_112_112" class="fnanchor">[112]</a> and although
occasionally disagreeing on various points,
sensibly furthered the interests of their countrymen
at home and abroad. No sooner was war
declared than they dropped their differences
and constituted a War Committee for German
Industry. Among the varied functions of this
new body were the distribution of information
respecting orders given by the State, new
legislation, etc.; co-operation with firms for the
fulfilment of contracts despite the outbreak of
hostilities; the selection of operatives, clerks,
etc., for firms needing these; the obtainment
of places for the unemployed and the organization
of the credit system.</p>
<p>This Committee also applied for and received
permission to have all those skilled artisans
recalled from the front whose services were
deemed indispensable for war industries. It
likewise watched over the distribution of State
orders, and saw that each of the various firms
received its due share.</p>
<p>The organization of German industry during
the war was taken in hand by a group of
experts and officials possessed of the insight,
knowledge and power necessary for the discharge
of the arduous task. Among the
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_260" id="Page_260">[260]</a></span>members of the Board we find the names of
representatives of finances, industries and the
Government; the Minister of the Interior, all
the members of the Federal Council, M.M.
Gwinner, Bleichröder, Siemens, etc. Special
bureaux were opened for various kinds of
supplies, a Central Office for the War Supply
of Tobacco, another for that of chocolate, a
third for leather, a fourth for linen, etc.<a name="FNanchor_113_113" id="FNanchor_113_113"></a><a href="#Footnote_113_113" class="fnanchor">[113]</a>
Another group of organizations dealing with
the acquisition and distribution of raw stuffs
possessed in certain cases the right of expropriation,
and is not allowed to make more
than a certain limited profit on its transactions.
Among them are an association for the supply
of metals, another for chemicals, and a third
for woollen stuffs.</p>
<p>In consequence of the shortage of raw
materials, economy and the employment of
substitutes were everywhere resorted to spontaneously
before the Government had time to
intervene. From every household came old
copper vessels, copper wire, worn-out clothing
from which the manufacturers removed the wool,
leather straps, shoes, bags, etc. From Belgium
and France everything that could be utilized as
raw material was hurriedly transferred to the
Fatherland. At first the supply of aluminium
for castings and Zeppelins was insufficient, but
a composition of spelter and tin was invented,
which answered the main purposes equally
well. Nickel being also scarce, coins of 10
pfennige were withdrawn from circulation and
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_261" id="Page_261">[261]</a></span>utilized, while considerable quantities were
imported from Scandinavian countries. The
place of jute was taken by paper, and from
paper under-garments were made. Roasted
acorns, theretofore employed in lieu of coffee
only by the poorer classes, thenceforward
became the daily beverage of the middle classes
as well. A substitute for olive oil was extracted
from cherry stones, tainted meat was rendered
harmless by chemical methods, nitrates were
extracted from the air by a Norwegian process
which the Germans had perfected and applied.</p>
<p>Now, these achievements and the marvellous
adaptability, energy and resourcefulness which
they connote, are no mean elements in Germany’s
equipment for the coming economic
struggle. They proclaim that the mind of the
Teuton man of business is too firmly riveted
on the goal to be fascinated by any special
route leading towards it, and that it is sufficiently
free and disengaged to turn with eager
interest to any problem, however novel, with
which it may be suddenly confronted. Use
and want are not its masters, sluggish contentment
cannot numb its activity. The customers’
requirements, nay, their whims and fancies,
are ever sure to receive close attention and
prompt satisfaction. The contrast between
this unflagging alertness and the drowsy apathy
of the British manufacturer and tradesman is
an old story, which has evoked comments
sharp enough, it would seem, to arouse the
commercial community to a lively sense of
its danger and duty. And yet there are, unhappily,
cogent grounds for believing that the
malady of listlessness is as malignant to-day
as before the war.</p>
<p>Now, these organizing and inventive talents<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_262" id="Page_262">[262]</a></span>
of the Teuton, as compared with the subordinate
aims, fitful energies and honest but mischievous
conservatism of our own leaders and
people, bear witness to the same twofold
talent of the German for looking far ahead
and contriving expedients on the spur of the
moment. Great Britain’s participation in the
struggle cut off Germany from the sea and
gave the two Central Empires the aspect of a
beleaguered city. Hopes were entertained by
the Allies that famine might reinforce the
work of their armies and navies in compelling
the enemy to sue for peace. About 9 per
cent. of the corn used in Germany usually
came from abroad, and now the interruption
of the communications rendered this source of
supply precarious. The soldiers, too, had to
be fed on a scale of greater abundance than
usual, and the prisoners of war, however poorly
nourished, would consume a certain amount
of corn. The first measure promulgated to
meet the new conditions was a prohibition of
exportation. Potato flour was employed in
bread-baking. War bread was standardized
for the whole Empire. The principal cities
purchased vast quantities of cereals, and
Prussia founded a War Corn Association for
the acquisition of cereals to be stored until the
ensuing spring. Expropriation was legalized.
In these ways £40,000,000 worth of cereals
were got together for consumption. The War
Corn Association operated with a capital of
£2,500,000, to which the States subscribed over
one million, and the big cities one million,
and the great industrial firms £450,000.<a name="FNanchor_114_114" id="FNanchor_114_114"></a><a href="#Footnote_114_114" class="fnanchor">[114]</a> This
corn was paid for at the highest market
rates, the owners being compelled by law to
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_263" id="Page_263">[263]</a></span>declare how much they possessed. With each
of these proprietors—in the first phase with
5,000,000 landowners—separate arrangements
were concluded. The Association employed
for the purpose nearly three thousand commissioners
and five hundred other officials,
and the Credit Banks made advances on the
quantities sold.</p>
<p>Simultaneously with this home organization
the other multifarious tasks of devising new
weapons for the war, improving the various
types of aircraft, building larger submarines
and guns of greater calibre went forward with
unimpaired speed. Nothing was too vast or
too complicated to be undertaken, no detail
was too trivial to be studied. Politics,
economics, military strategy and national
psychology were all cunningly interwoven in the
various schemes laid for the destruction of the
Allies. Russia was inveigled into continuing
her trade with Germany, which, as we saw, was
during the first year a nowise negligible quantity.</p>
<p>A piquant detail in this connection is worthy
of mention.<a name="FNanchor_115_115" id="FNanchor_115_115"></a><a href="#Footnote_115_115" class="fnanchor">[115]</a> It is affirmed that the Customs
House authorities on the Russo-Swedish
frontiers discovered to their dismay that for
well over a year Germany had been receiving
from Russia a large proportion of the raw
materials necessary for the fabrication of
asphyxiating gas. It appears that Sweden,
which in peace time was wont to import
from the Tsardom a certain quantity of those
products, trebled its demands during the first
year of the war.</p>
<p>Contingents of contrabandists were despatched
to Greece, Spain, Morocco, Holland,
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_264" id="Page_264">[264]</a></span>Italy, Switzerland and the United States.
Secret stations were established for supplying
submarines with the wherewithal to carry on
their war against inoffensive passenger steamers.
Agents were kept in the neutral countries to
corrupt the local press and poison the wells
of information in order to allure the neutrals
into belligerency. A highly organized news-distributing
bureau was equipped in Berlin
with all the requisites for falsifying facts
and distorting military tidings. Its branches
are spread over the globe. Passports were
forged at first and later on genuine ones
abstracted from the Berlin Foreign Office and
handed over to spies. Strikes and outrages
were engineered in the United States, Italy,
and Russia. The Putiloff works, which before
the war were nearly falling into German hands
and have since been supplying munitions for
the Tsar’s army, were stricken with creeping
paralysis, against which exhortations and
threats were vain, and finally they had to be
sequestrated by the State. Millions of dollars
were expended in the United States in efforts
to prevent the manufacture or the transport
of munitions to the Allies. In Greece vast
sums were cheerfully disbursed by Baron
Schenk to work the elections and defeat
Venizelos. Roumania was overrun by bands
of Germans whose functions were to calumniate,
vilify, corrupt and threaten. Spain has
been wrought upon in like manner by a small
army of Teutons abundantly supplied with the
same weapons. Persia was scoured by German
agitators who deployed all their talents and
acquirements, their knowledge of the language
and acquaintance with the native religion, to
rouse the natives against Russia and Great<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_265" id="Page_265">[265]</a></span>
Britain. Abyssinia, although deprived by
Italy of the presence of the German “scientific
expedition,” was induced by the German
Minister at Adis Abeba to behave in such a
way that in the month of March 1916 King
Victor’s Government found it advisable to
issue a decree ordering <i>urgent</i> fortifications
to be constructed in Erythea.<a name="FNanchor_116_116" id="FNanchor_116_116"></a><a href="#Footnote_116_116" class="fnanchor">[116]</a> Sweden has
been provided with war news and political
information free of charge by the generous
Press Bureau of Berlin. In Belgium persevering
exertions have been put forth to sow discord
between Flemings and Walloons. In China,
where a British adviser is employed by the
Chief of the State, Yuan Shih Kai has turned
a willing ear to the mentors from the Fatherland,
with results which bear the hall-mark of
Germany. In Mexico Villa’s murderous raids
on American territory, instigated, it is asserted,
by German emissaries, compelled United States
troops to pursue him over the frontiers, and
raised an issue which may be decided only by
a regular campaign. Thus Teuton diplomacy,
at whose failures we are so prone to rail, contrived
on the one hand to pass off the assassinations
of Americans on board the <i>Lusitania</i> as
a justifiable act, and on the other to present
the New Mexico murder, which was the work
of a mere savage, as such an outrage on the
law of nations as warrants the employment of
military force.<a name="FNanchor_117_117" id="FNanchor_117_117"></a><a href="#Footnote_117_117" class="fnanchor">[117]</a></p>
<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_266" id="Page_266">[266]</a></span></p><p>That same diplomacy, seconded by the
press organization which invented facts and
moulded opinion, scored successes in Bulgaria,
Greece, Roumania, Switzerland, and contrived
not only to keep Italy from declaring war
against Germany, but to negotiate a treaty
for the protection of German property there.
Despite its clumsiness and arrogance and
brutality, German diplomacy is unmatched as
an agency for rousing popular forces in civilized
and uncivilized countries into subversive excitement.
It surrounded the Pope of Rome with
philo-German dignitaries, gave him an Austrian
as adviser, and permeated the Vatican with
an atmosphere of Kultur which even pious
Catholics of non-Teuton countries avoid as
mephitic. It caught the Sultan and his Young
Turks, Anglophile and Francophile, in its toils,
and gave its warm approbation to the massacre
of the Armenians. It won over the young
Shah of Persia, who, with great difficulty and
only after strenuous exertions, was kept from
going over bodily to the Turkish camp. It
bought the services of the Senussi. It is
making headway with the Negus of Abyssinia.
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_267" id="Page_267">[267]</a></span>It offered a bribe to Italian socialists and found
work for Italian anarchists, whose representatives
were received in the palace of the Kaiser’s
Ambassador in Rome. And—most difficult
task of all—it reconciled, at least for a time,
the interests of Bulgaria with those of Greece
and Roumania.</p>
<p>German diplomacy has often misread foreign
political situations, mistaken the trend of
national opinion and sentiment and failed to
achieve ends which might by dint of mere
patience and quiescence have been readily
accomplished. For it has no psychological
standard by which to measure the nobler
qualities of a foreign people, however closely
it may have studied their politics, their history
and their vices. Its tests are for the lower
grades of human character, and with these it
has indeed achieved extraordinary things.</p>
<p>Thus, with infinite labour the Teuton mind
has grappled with the chaotic welter produced
by the European war. But, besides the skilful
handling of great financial and kindred problems,
its assiduity in watching for and readiness to
seize opportunities for dealing with the issues
of lesser moment is worth noting, were it only
for its value as a stimulus. One instance
occurred in the very first sitting of the Reichstag
after hostilities had begun. The legislature
agreed to introduce a slight reform of
the law, dealing with the rights of children born
out of wedlock, of whom there are in Germany
185,000 a year. The Government assented
to the change, which was embodied in a bill
affirming the right of the illegitimate children
of soldiers fallen in battle to the same pension
as if their parents had been legally married.
And the Reichstag passed the bill unanimously.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_268" id="Page_268">[268]</a></span></p>
<p>This solicitude about little things is most
saliently in evidence in the military domain.
Here nothing is neglected that can contribute
to the fighting value of the units. Hence the
care shown for the nourishment and comfort
of the soldiers. Ruthlessly though they are
sacrificed in battle, they are well looked after
in the trenches, and their career is followed
with interest and recorded with accuracy by
their superiors. I was struck with the completeness
of the information which the German
War Office possesses and can produce at a
moment’s notice about any individual soldier.
It was brought home to me in this way. The
Chief of the Berlin police had a grandson in
the war who had been missed for several weeks.
Desirous of obtaining particulars about his
capture or death, he asked a neutral friend to
obtain information from the Russians. And
by way of furnishing a description he sent a
printed card, which I read. It contained the
name and age of the soldier, the regiment to
which he belonged, the hamlet in which he was
last seen, the distances that separated that
hamlet from the next town and the next large
city, the day, the hour and <i>the minute</i> when the
man together with his comrades were attacked,
and the number of Russians who attacked
them. And all these printed particulars refer
to a private soldier! Is there anything comparable
to this to be found in any of the allied
countries?</p>
<p>The scene of another characteristic fact that
struck me was Brussels. Princess L. requested
permission from the German authorities to
repair to France to visit her mother, who, she
explained, was ill. At the Kommandantur her
request was met with the cutting remark that<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_269" id="Page_269">[269]</a></span>
many persons had been applying for permits
to visit their mothers, sisters and other relations
abroad, who all appeared to be victims
of some mysterious epidemic. Still, the official
added, he would not definitively refuse the
request, but would accord it as soon as he had
proof that the lady’s mother was really ill.
“We shall have inquiries made.” “But you
cannot have inquiries made in France during
the war,” she objected. “Just as quickly as
in peace time,” he retorted. Sceptical and sad
the petitioner returned home. But in a day
or two she was summoned to the Kommandantur
and informed that her statement had
been verified, her mother lay ill—the malady
was mentioned—and she was permitted to go.
The Germans have eyes and ears in all the
countries of their adversaries.</p>
<p>One can readily imagine the painful kind of
questions that will arise in the mind of an
intelligent ally who realizes for the first time
how great are the inventive and organizing
talents of the Teuton, how unswerving his
resolve, how tenacious he is of purpose, and how
unconscious most of us still are of the need of
bestirring ourselves to compete with him on
terms of equality. The German’s striving is
one, but all-embracing. His means are countless,
for they are restricted by no limitations.
In his search for tools and agents he enters into
human nature, but not in its entire compass;
only into the baser parts, so that his estimate
is often erroneous and his expectations are
unfulfilled. But even when ample deduction
has been made for these failures, the odds
remaining in his favour are formidable, and will
continue undiminished unless and until we
realize our plight, shuffle off the cramping coils<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_270" id="Page_270">[270]</a></span>
of conservatism, insularity and self-complacency
and brace ourselves to the most strenuous,
the most painful effort we have ever yet put
forth. On our capacity to effect this inward
change, rather than upon any diplomatic
arrangements, depends the issue of the struggle
which will begin when military and naval
hostilities have come to an end.</p>
<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_107_107" id="Footnote_107_107"></a><a href="#FNanchor_107_107"><span class="label">[107]</span></a> Cf. <i>L’Idea Nazionale</i>, March 7, 1915; <i>Tribuna</i>, April 1,
1915.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_108_108" id="Footnote_108_108"></a><a href="#FNanchor_108_108"><span class="label">[108]</span></a> A spirited protest against this poisonous endeavour
was published by a number of Belgians, including Camille
Huysmans, who refused to accept any favours from the
Germans.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_109_109" id="Footnote_109_109"></a><a href="#FNanchor_109_109"><span class="label">[109]</span></a> One-third gold cover is the amount fixed. Cf.
Professor J. Plenge, <i>Der Krieg und die Volkswirtschaft</i>.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_110_110" id="Footnote_110_110"></a><a href="#FNanchor_110_110"><span class="label">[110]</span></a> These figures are drawn from statistics published in
July 1914. Cf. Dr. Karl Hildebrand, <i>Ein starkes Volk</i>.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_111_111" id="Footnote_111_111"></a><a href="#FNanchor_111_111"><span class="label">[111]</span></a> Cf. <i>Messenger of Europe</i>, April 1915, M. Lurié.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_112_112" id="Footnote_112_112"></a><a href="#FNanchor_112_112"><span class="label">[112]</span></a> <i>Der Zentral-Verband Deutscher Industrieller</i> and <i>Der
Bund der Industriellen</i>.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_113_113" id="Footnote_113_113"></a><a href="#FNanchor_113_113"><span class="label">[113]</span></a> It is affirmed by contrabandists in Scandinavia who
are acting on Germany’s behalf, that many of the commissions
for the acquisition of raw stuffs for Germany are
composed almost exclusively of non-Russian subjects of
the Tsar.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_114_114" id="Footnote_114_114"></a><a href="#FNanchor_114_114"><span class="label">[114]</span></a> Cf. Karl Hildebrand, <i>Ein starkes Volk</i>, p. 122.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_115_115" id="Footnote_115_115"></a><a href="#FNanchor_115_115"><span class="label">[115]</span></a> It is noticed by the Italian and French press; cf., for
instance, <i>Roma</i>, October 31, 1915.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_116_116" id="Footnote_116_116"></a><a href="#FNanchor_116_116"><span class="label">[116]</span></a> On March 16, 1916.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_117_117" id="Footnote_117_117"></a><a href="#FNanchor_117_117"><span class="label">[117]</span></a> The <i>New York World</i>, in a leading article published
March 18, writes: “No pacifist proclaims the doctrine
that, although Americans had a legal right to live near
the border, they should have taken themselves out of the
danger zone in the interest of peace. No German-American
Alliance holds meetings to proclaim the dead
at Columbus as ‘Guardian angels.’ No German language
newspaper has spoken of the New Mexico massacre as
undertaken in a holy cause, or referred to the President
as incapable of understanding either German militarism
or German Kultur. Yet the Americans who were assassinated
on the <i>Lusitania</i> and the <i>Arabic</i> had as much
right to be where they were as the Americans who were
dragged from their beds at Columbus and slaughtered.
The <i>Lusitania</i> murder was deliberately planned and
ordered by the Government in Berlin, which has assumed
full responsibility therefore, and presented but one excuse,
that its victims were unexpectedly numerous. The New
Mexico murder was planned and executed by a savage,
with no pretence that there is a Government behind him,
the guilt of the outlaw of the border being not one whit
less than that of the outlaw of the sea.”</p></div>
</div>
<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XX" id="CHAPTER_XX"></a>CHAPTER XX<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_271" id="Page_271">[271]</a></span></h2>
<h3>PROBLEMS OF THE FUTURE</h3>
<p><span class="smcap">Plain</span> though these facts are, the Entente
nations, and in particular the British people,
either ignore them wholly or misinterpret their
purport. Hence we continue absorbed in the
pursuit of interests, parochial and parliamentary,
which though quite human, are
utterly off the line of racial and imperial
progress. We obstinately shut our eyes to the
magnitude of the Sphinx question that confronts
us, and we address ourselves to one—and
that the least important—of its many
facets, and content ourselves with tackling
that. We descant upon the turpitude of the
Teuton who from the regions of idealism in
which Goethe, Herder and their contemporaries
dwelt has sunk into shift, treason and
murder, and we proclaim our faith in the
ultimate triumph of right, justice and of the
democracy in which alone they flourish. But
this frame of mind, which moves us to identify
ourselves with all that is best in humanity, if
cultivated will prove fatal. It accustoms us
to dangerous hallucinations. We assume that
we are the chosen people, and we neglect the
virtues which alone would justify our election.
For generations we have been reaping and
wasting, instead of ploughing and sowing.
We have been living on our capital, nay, on
our credit, and have long since overdrawn our<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_272" id="Page_272">[272]</a></span>
account. Our successes in the past, sometimes
the result of fortuitous circumstances, more
often of the blunders of our rivals, inspire a
presumptuous confidence in successes for the
future and a conviction that come what may
we are destined to muddle through. A special
providence is watching over us—a cousin
German to the Kaiser’s “good old God.” In
truth we are tempting Fate, postulating an
exception to the law of cause and effect, and
looking for Hebrew miracles in the twentieth
century after Christ.</p>
<p>Were it otherwise, the nation would not have
continued to entrust its destinies to the men
who misguided it consistently and perseveringly
for so many years, to the watchmen who saw
nothing of the rocks and sandbanks ahead
which it was their function to discern and their
duty to avoid, and who are now unwittingly
but effectually deluding the people into believing
that the present campaign, which is but
a single episode in a long-spun-out contest, is
an independent event which began in August
1914 and may end this year or the next.
These same leaders are busily inculcating the
delusive notion that the diplomatic instrument
which will one day close hostilities will be a
treaty of peace. And they are seemingly prepared
to negotiate its terms on that assumption.</p>
<p>In truth, we are engaged in a duel which
began thirty years ago, gave the Germans such
booty as Heligoland, their world-trade, their
wealth, their formidable navy, their Baghdad
Railway, their various overseas colonies, their
European Allies, and the enormous resources
with which when this acute phase of the contest
is over they will re-transfer the venue to
the economic and political domains and carry<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_273" id="Page_273">[273]</a></span>
on the struggle with greater vigour than before.
And peace terms concluded on any other
supposition cannot be conducive to the national
welfare. We are locked in a deadly embrace
with a compact people of 120,000,000, of indomitable
spirit, boundless resources, unquenchable
faith and a single aim. Yet we
are already looking forward to the time in the
near future when our intercourse, however
circumscribed, with this nation will be essentially
pacific, and when we can revert to our
cherished narrow interests and our easy-going
dilettantism. We feed upon the hope that in
a few brief years the British nation will have
got safely back to its old beaten grooves, and
not only business and sport but everything
else will go on as usual. Yet all the salient
facts which force themselves on our attention
to-day, all the decisive events of the past thirty
years are cogent proofs of the unbroken sequence
of a trial of strength which the future
historian and the present statesman, if there
be one, must characterize as a life-and-death
struggle between the champions of the new
Teuton politico-social ordering and the partisans
of the old. But after the lapse of a generation
and with the record of all our losses before
us, we have not yet formed a right conception
of the situation, and its issues, or of the historic
forces at work. In these circumstances, no
degree of sagacity can help us to devise the
only policy in which salvation resides. The
prevailing mistaken conception must be rectified
before any headway can be made against
the currents that are fast bearing us down.
And the time at our disposal is brief.</p>
<p>It needs few words to characterize the
effects which the dreamy optimism of the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_274" id="Page_274">[274]</a></span>
Entente nations had on their method of
mobilizing their resources to carry on the war.
Taken unawares they had nothing ready.
Misapprehending the nature of the issues and
the redoubtable character of the contest, they
pursued subordinate aims with insufficient
means. The most daring strategical moves of
the enemy, in war as in diplomacy, they
ridiculed as either bluff or madness. The
journalistic campaign in neutral countries they
scoffed at as vain, and put their faith in the
final triumph of truth. Their financial measures,
oscillating from one extreme to another,
denoted the absence of any settled plan, of any
clear-cut picture of the needs of the moment.
The odds in their favour, which circumstance
had given and circumstance might take away
again, they looked upon as inalienable, until
they ended by forfeiting them all. Viewing
the campaign as a transient event, the British
Government prosecuted it by means of make-shifts,
instead of radical measures. Obligatory
service was scouted at as un-English. Discriminating
customs tariffs were condemned as
heretical. It was not until the enemy had
occupied Poland, overrun Serbia, driven the
Allied troops from the Dardanelles, bent
Montenegro to the yoke, threatened Egypt,
Riga and Petrograd, that some rays of light
penetrated the atmosphere of ignorance and
prejudice through which the Allies surveyed the
European welter. They had begun by counting
upon the breaking up of the Habsburg
Monarchy. They felt sure that the Tsar’s
armies would capture Budapest and advance
on Berlin. They planned the defeat of Germany
by famine. They built another fabric
of hopes on “Kitchener’s Great Army” in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_275" id="Page_275">[275]</a></span>
the spring of 1915. But one after another
these anticipations were belied by events.
And now the nation blithely accepts the
further forecasts of the men who are chargeable
with this long sequence of avoidable errors.</p>
<p>Respect for individual liberty was carried
to such a point in Great Britain that organizations
against recruiting were tolerated in
England and Ireland, and strikes, which not
only inflicted heavy pecuniary losses on the
nation but actually stopped its supplies of
munitions and brought it within sight of discomfiture,
were treated with soft words and
immediate concessions. One cannot read even
Mr. Lloyd George’s summary narrative of the
preposterous doings of British slackers without
wondering whether salvation is still possible.
These men not only refused to work their best
for the community, but forbade their comrades
to work well. At Enfield, we are told, a man
was obliged by trade union regulations so to
regulate his work that he did not earn more
than 1<i>s.</i> an hour, though he could easily
have earned 2<i>s.</i> 6<i>d.</i><a name="FNanchor_118_118" id="FNanchor_118_118"></a><a href="#Footnote_118_118" class="fnanchor">[118]</a> Another man was doing
two and a half days’ work in two days, and
when he refused to carry out the behest of the
Ironfounders’ Board to waste the other half
day he was fined £1.<a name="FNanchor_119_119" id="FNanchor_119_119"></a><a href="#Footnote_119_119" class="fnanchor">[119]</a> A consequence of this
anti-national attitude was that “we had to
wait for weeks in Birmingham with machinery
lying idle, with our men without rifles, with
our men with a most inadequate supply of
machine guns to attack the enemy and defend
themselves.”<a name="FNanchor_120_120" id="FNanchor_120_120"></a><a href="#Footnote_120_120" class="fnanchor">[120]</a> Every one will re-echo the
Minister’s comment on the outlook, if this
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_276" id="Page_276">[276]</a></span>attitude is persisted in—“we are making
straight for disaster.”</p>
<p>Compare this state of things with that
which rules in Germany. It is a British
Minister who describes it: “If you want to
realize what organized labour in this war
means, read the story of the last twelve months.
By the end of September the German armies
were checked. They sustained an overwhelming
defeat in France, Russia was advancing
against them towards the Carpathians,
and I believe in East Prussia. That is not
the case to-day. Why? The German workmen
came in; organized labour in Germany
prepared to take the field. They worked and
worked quietly, persistently, continuously, without
stint or strife, without restriction for months
and months, through the autumn, through the
winter, through the spring. Then came that
avalanche of shot and shell which broke the
great Russian armies and drove them back.
That was the victory of the German workmen.”<a name="FNanchor_121_121" id="FNanchor_121_121"></a><a href="#Footnote_121_121" class="fnanchor">[121]</a></p>
<p>Great Britain is the classic land of strikes.
Strikers are sacred among us. Industrial compulsion
is rank heresy.</p>
<p>That is one of our difficulties, and by no
means the least formidable. The nation, despite
the superb example of patriotic heroism
given by all classes, parties, provinces and
colonies of the Empire, is still deficient in
cohesiveness. No fire of enthusiasm has yet
burned fiercely enough among all sections of
the Empire and all members of the race to
fuse them in such a compact unified organism
as we behold in the Teuton’s Fatherland.
Read the characteristic given of us by the
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_277" id="Page_277">[277]</a></span>ex-German Minister Dernburg, and say whether
it is over-coloured. Discoursing on the difficulties
which Britain has to cope with in
carrying on the war, he says: “They are
intensified ... by the narrow-minded customs
of the English trade unions, which contrast
with the patriotic behaviour of the
German associations of the like nature as night
contrasts with day.”<a name="FNanchor_122_122" id="FNanchor_122_122"></a><a href="#Footnote_122_122" class="fnanchor">[122]</a> This is melancholy
reading for those whose hopes are fervent for a
bright future of the British race, and it prepares
them to listen in anxious silence to the general
conclusion at which the Prussian ex-Minister
arrives: “It is in the highest degree improbable,”
he says, “that after the winding up
of this contest England will be able to keep
or wield any form of economic superiority
whatever over Germany.”</p>
<p>In our Allies we find a strong touch of
resemblance to ourselves. Their state of unpreparedness
is amazing, if less desperate than
ours. Russia, it is true, did much better at
the outset than friend or foe anticipated, and
she might have done quite well if only she had
been supplied with munitions. But she had
not nearly enough, and her armies were
slaughtered like sheep in consequence. Then
there were no boots for the soldiers, who were
forced to wear thin canvas leggings with
leather soles. And scores of waggon-loads of
incapacitated men were taken to Petrograd
and other cities whose feet had been frozen
for lack of shoe-leather. One of the urgent
wants of the Tsardom are railways, which the
late Count Witte was so eager to construct.
When hostilities opened, the insufficiency of
communications became one of the decisive
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_278" id="Page_278">[278]</a></span>factors in Russia’s disasters. And it was
heightened by the conduct of, shall we say,
the prussianized officials,<a name="FNanchor_123_123" id="FNanchor_123_123"></a><a href="#Footnote_123_123" class="fnanchor">[123]</a> who are reported to
have disposed of waggons for large sums to
greedy merchants, who used to raise the prices
of the merchandise and batten on the misery
of their fellows.</p>
<p>Trains, needed to supply the fighting men
at the front with food and the wounded at the
rear with medicaments, were kept back to
suit the schemes of these greedy cormorants.
Gratuities, it is openly affirmed, had to be paid
by Red Cross and other officers to those subordinate
railway servants who had it in their
power to send on a train or shunt it off for
days on a side-track. Bribery is working
havoc in the Tsardom. In January 1916 the
Moscow municipality discussed the advisability
of voting a certain sum of money and
putting it at the disposal of the chief officer
of the city, to be discreetly employed in transactions
with complacent railway officials, in
order to further the work of reducing prices
on necessaries of life. The motive adduced
for this homœopathic way of treating a social
distemper were the conditions of life in Russia
and the necessity of complying with them.
But as the Statute Book does not recognize
these conditions and condemns bribery absolutely,
a vote on the subject was not taken.<a name="FNanchor_124_124" id="FNanchor_124_124"></a><a href="#Footnote_124_124" class="fnanchor">[124]</a></p>
<p>Acting on instructions issued by the Finance
Minister, a Member of the Council of the
Finance Ministry, D. I. Zassiadko, visited the
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_279" id="Page_279">[279]</a></span>Kharkoff circuit for the purpose of studying
the bribery problem on the spot. M. Zassiadko
acquired the conviction “on the spot”
that the railway officials do really take bribes,
“and even of considerable amounts.” But,
that ascertained, the representative of the
Ministry decided to delve deeper to the root
of the matter. And he reached the conclusion
that railway servants belong to the class of
the tempted. The evil, he reported, resides
not in the circumstance that they take bribes,
but that bribes are offered whereby these weak
little souls are seduced. The representative of
the Ministry discovered an entire category of
bribes which do not bear the signs of extortion,
but only of “gratitude.” To us this conclusion
sounds somewhat naïve. The most
widely circulated journal of Petrograd prefaces
an article on the subject as follows.<a name="FNanchor_125_125" id="FNanchor_125_125"></a><a href="#Footnote_125_125" class="fnanchor">[125]</a></p>
<p>“The misdeeds of the officials and bribery
on the railway system cry out to heaven,”
writes the organ of the Constitutional Democrats.
“Compared with the reverses on the
Carpathians and in Poland, the defeats we are
sustaining in our own house and behind the
enemy’s back are much greater....” On the
important line Petrograd-Moscow-Perm scandalous
cases of corruption took place in which,
according to Russian journals, officials of a
class who might reasonably be regarded as
unbribable were implicated. They are alleged
to have let out to firms of speculators for large
sums of money, goods waggons which were
already destined to carry consignments to the
front.<a name="FNanchor_126_126" id="FNanchor_126_126"></a><a href="#Footnote_126_126" class="fnanchor">[126]</a> Russia’s purchases abroad have made
a profound impression on the peoples in whose
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_280" id="Page_280">[280]</a></span>midst they were effected. The principles on
which these transactions were carried on provoked
lively comments. It is not that they
revealed a superlative degree of disorganization.
That touch would have merely marked
the kinship of the men concerned with their
allies. By the discovery that the Russian
Government’s purchasing Commissioners, the
representatives of one of its embassies, the
agents of the British Government and the
equally zealous agents of the French Government
were all secretly bidding against each
other for the same rifles to be delivered to the
Tsar’s Ministers, only a smile of recognition was
elicited. It may have seemed at once amusing
and consolatory to find that all were tarred
with the same brush. But when it was discovered
that the offer of certain army necessaries
was put off for weeks and weeks, although
they were to be had under cost price, and was
then accepted at a much higher price, profound
sympathy was felt for the Tsar’s armies.</p>
<p>Chaos, waste and a variety of abuses that
pressed heavily on the poorer classes marked
the efforts made by the Russian Government
to cope with the scarcity of fuel, corn and other
necessaries which began to be felt soon after
the war. The rolling stock, it was complained,
was utterly insufficient, yet it was found
possible to transport 1,000,000 poods<a name="FNanchor_127_127" id="FNanchor_127_127"></a><a href="#Footnote_127_127" class="fnanchor">[127]</a> weight
of mineral water of doubtful quality. When
trains arrived bringing supplies to the suffering
population, it turned out that there were
no hands to unload the waggons. And when
labour was requisitioned, vehicles were not
to be had. In October 1915 on the rails of
Moscow station five thousand waggons, laden
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_281" id="Page_281">[281]</a></span>with life’s necessaries, stood waiting and waiting
in vain for the unskilled labour which
ought to have been abundant, considering the
number of the population and of the refugees.
At the same time 2000 waggons were on the
rails of the Petrograd station, their contents
lying unutilized.<a name="FNanchor_128_128" id="FNanchor_128_128"></a><a href="#Footnote_128_128" class="fnanchor">[128]</a> It is only by the lack of
order and organization that one can explain
the facts that in Petrograd the inhabitants have
no butter, while in the places where butter is
made it is being sold cheaper than before, at
12 in lieu of 16 to 18 roubles a pood. In the
province of Ekaterinograd, mines which own
800,000 poods of coal cannot get more than a
few waggon loads of it every month.</p>
<p>Russia has incomparably more than enough
fuel, without importing any, to satisfy all the
needs of her 180,000,000 inhabitants. But
owing to the insufficiency of communications,
and still more to the lack of forethought and
enterprise, the population of many cities and
towns underwent serious hardships in consequence
of the impossibility of acquiring coal or
wood. In September 1915 the Petrograd region
could obtain no more than 65 per cent. of the
necessary quantity, and a month later only 49
per cent. In Moscow the plight of the inhabitants
was worse. In September they could get
but 26 per cent. of their needs and in October 40
per cent. According to the Minister of Commerce,
who volunteered these data, the condition
of the towns of Rostoff, Novotcherkassk,
Nakhitchevan, Taganrog, Ekaterinodar and
others was not a whit better. The city of
Vyatka was, according to the <i>Novoye Vremya</i>,<a name="FNanchor_129_129" id="FNanchor_129_129"></a><a href="#Footnote_129_129" class="fnanchor">[129]</a>
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_282" id="Page_282">[282]</a></span>in January 1916 without fuel, while the mercury
registered 30 degrees Reaumur below
freezing-point. The unfortunate citizens
heated their homes with fragments of hoardings,
tables, desks and stools. And yet there
is abundant fuel in the superb forests with
which Vyatka is surrounded, and, what is
more to the point, the city authorities had
received during the preceding spring 60,000
roubles for the purpose of purchasing a supply
of wood for the winter. But they did nothing,
organization not being one of their strong
points.</p>
<p>Live stock in Russia has diminished during
the war to a much larger extent than was
anticipated. The peasantry, owing to the
prohibition of alcohol, now consume from 150
to 200 per cent. more meat than before, and
what with the refugees from Poland, the
prisoners of war and the increased needs of
the army, no less than 20 per cent. of the
cattle of the entire Empire was used during
the first eighteen months<a name="FNanchor_130_130" id="FNanchor_130_130"></a><a href="#Footnote_130_130" class="fnanchor">[130]</a> and 30 per cent. of
the stock of all European Russia. In consequence
of the shortage and of the irregularity
of the transport, three days of abstinence
from meat were ordained. Yet in January
1916 a discovery was casually made in the
Kieff forests between Byelitch and Pushtsha
Voditzka, which caused considerable lifting
of the eyebrows. About 8000 head of cattle
and several thousand sheep were found with
no cowherds, shepherds or owners, wandering
about from place to place. Scores of them
were succumbing to hunger and cold every day.
The paths in the woods were covered with
the dead bodies of kine, calves and sheep. The
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_283" id="Page_283">[283]</a></span>journal which records this fact affirms that
these herds belong to the Union of Zemstvos,
which had purchased them from the peasants
who had to flee from the occupied provinces.
The President of the Union of Zemstvos is
said to have confirmed this odd story with the
qualification that the forlorn horned cattle and
sheep are the property not of the Union of
Zemstvos, but of the Ministry of Agriculture,
which is alone answerable.<a name="FNanchor_131_131" id="FNanchor_131_131"></a><a href="#Footnote_131_131" class="fnanchor">[131]</a></p>
<p>The card system of distributing provisions
that are scarce found its way first into Germany
and then into Austria and Russia. But
in the last-named empire it was much less
successful than in the two first mentioned.
According to the Petrograd journals in Pskoff,
where it was tried, many individuals got no
cards, and therefore no provisions. Many who
possessed the cards found nothing to buy.
And some of those who obtained the articles
they wanted paid dearer for them than if they
had bought them without cards. And as with
cards one has to lay in a stock to last a
fortnight, the poorer families were unable to
utilize them.<a name="FNanchor_132_132" id="FNanchor_132_132"></a><a href="#Footnote_132_132" class="fnanchor">[132]</a></p>
<p>In France, as well as in Russia, the professional
organizers, especially the civilians, were
very much adrift. In the army all the sterling
qualities of the French nation at its best, and
many that were deemed extinct, but are now
seen to have been only dormant, shone forth
resplendent. Valour, fortitude, staying power,
self-abnegation for the common good, became
household virtues. Friends and foes were
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_284" id="Page_284">[284]</a></span>equally surprised. But the civil administration
remained well-meaning, patriotic and
unregenerate to the last. The old Adam lived
and acted up to his reputation.</p>
<p>Before the war the French railway administration
had been criticized severely. It is not
for a foreigner to express an opinion on the
internal ordering of a country not his own,
but unbiassed French experts found that the
strictures were called for and the verdict, in
which the public acquiesced, was well grounded.
Subsequently, when the struggle began and the
railway system was tested, people had reason
to remember the previous complaints, for they
saw how little had been done in the meanwhile
to remove the causes of dissatisfaction.
The first drawback was the want of rolling
stock. “Give us waggons and we will execute
all orders and supply the War Ministry,” cried
the munitions firms. “There are no waggons
in the ports, and we cannot get the coal
delivered,” exclaimed the importers. “The
country is threatened with general paralysis,”
wrote the <i>Journal</i>;<a name="FNanchor_133_133" id="FNanchor_133_133"></a><a href="#Footnote_133_133" class="fnanchor">[133]</a> “we can neither forward
nor sell anything.” The railway administration
asked for a fortnight’s notice, then for
three weeks and finally an indefinite period,
before it could provide a single truck. “I
have fertilizing stuff to forward before the
season is past,” pleads the representative of
one firm. “We have no waggons,” is the
reply. “I must have my produce delivered
at once to the Government,” argues another,
“for it is wanted for the fabrication of
powder.” But the answer came promptly:
“There are no waggons.” “But you have
waggons. I see them over there” (the station
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_285" id="Page_285">[285]</a></span>was Cognac). “Yes, but we may not touch
them. They belong to the military engineering
department.” “Well, but what are they
doing there?” “Ah, that is none of our
business.”<a name="FNanchor_134_134" id="FNanchor_134_134"></a><a href="#Footnote_134_134" class="fnanchor">[134]</a></p>
<p>And in the ports, at the termini, at intermediate
stations, the merchandise lay heaped
up, immobilized, while the merchants, the
middlemen, the manufacturers, the Government,
the army were waiting, time was lapsing,
and the fate of the Republic and the nation
hanging in the balance. At Havre great
machines, destined for a Paris firm which was
to have delivered them to factories making
shells, lay untouched for two months. The
number of shells lost in this way has never
been calculated. Yet it was well known that
during all that time there were numbers of
waggons available. What had become of them?
The answer was: They are to be found everywhere,
immobilized. It is a case of general
immobilization of the rolling stock. People
slept in them, turned them into cottages, used
them as warehouses, each individual reasoning
that one waggon more or less would not
be missed. And as this argument was used
by large numbers of easy-going, well-meaning
people the result was appalling.</p>
<p>The most terrific war known to history was
raging in three Continents, and one group of
belligerents, unaware or heedless of the magnitude
of the issues, kept wasting its enormous
resources and throwing away its advantages.
At the little station of Cognac waggons laden
with all kinds of war materials, barbed wire,
galvanized wire, etc., were detained from
September 1914 until November 1915, 400
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_286" id="Page_286">[286]</a></span>days in all, doing nothing. Forty-two waggons
ready to move were found on two grass-covered
rails. Fourteen waggons were there
since September 1914. Eight since December
of the same year, twenty since June. Altogether
at the modest little station of Cognac
the total recorded by Senator Humbert’s
<i>Journal</i> was 228,500 tons-days. “All this
during the most tremendous war the world has
ever witnessed, in which hundreds of thousands
of men have been slain, where we have
continually been short of war material, while
industry and commerce are agonizing for lack
of means of transport. It may well seem a
dream.”<a name="FNanchor_135_135" id="FNanchor_135_135"></a><a href="#Footnote_135_135" class="fnanchor">[135]</a></p>
<p>Seven hundred French railway stations were
devoid of rolling stock. On the other hand,
from the beginning of the war down to November
1915, 729 waggons were lying immobilized
at the station of Blanc-Mesnil. Seven hundred
and twenty-nine!<a name="FNanchor_136_136" id="FNanchor_136_136"></a><a href="#Footnote_136_136" class="fnanchor">[136]</a> Merchants, manufacturers,
importers, all were being literally
beggared for lack of transports while hundreds
of waggons lay rotting at obscure little
stations for over a year. “The whole region
of the West is encumbered,” we read, “with
30,000,000 hectolitres of apples, valued at
300,000,000 francs, which cannot be conveyed
anywhither, and which people are beginning to
bury in the earth as manure. Sugar is scarce
and is rising in price, whereas ever since last
August<a name="FNanchor_137_137" id="FNanchor_137_137"></a><a href="#Footnote_137_137" class="fnanchor">[137]</a> a single firm has unloaded 10,000
tons of sugar at Havre which it cannot have
transported to Paris. Innumerable army purveyors
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_287" id="Page_287">[287]</a></span>are unable to send the machines for the
shells....” An official order to the army prescribed
a substitute for barbed wire, which
was not to be had at any price, yet at a single
station at least 135 tons of barbed wire were
lying for a twelvemonth unused, untouched.<a name="FNanchor_138_138" id="FNanchor_138_138"></a><a href="#Footnote_138_138" class="fnanchor">[138]</a>
On November 27, 1915, the military hospital
N16 at Poitiers needed coal. A request was
made by telephone. The reply received was:
“We have coal at La Rochelle, but there
are no waggons to carry it.” Yet there were
forty-two waggons immobilized at Cognac, 729
at Blanc-Mesnil and 121 standing laden with
barbed wire and other materials for over a
year!</p>
<p>Organization and intelligence!</p>
<p>With engines the experience was the same.
The French Government, anxious to make up
for the deficiency, purchased 140 engines of
British make to be delivered some time in
1916. Yet at that time there were at the
station of Mezidon (Calvados) over 500 engines
immobilized, nobody knew why or by whom.
This cemetery of locomotives was photographed
by the <i>Journal</i>. Such was the harvest reaped
by the enterprising Senator Humbert’s commission
at that one station. There were
others. At Marles six Belgian engines, at
Serquigny twenty, etc.</p>
<p>The attention of the French authorities
having been called to this unqualifiable neglect,
a senatorial railway commission was
appointed to inquire into the matter, and it
reported that: “The engines in question,
numbering about 2000, of which 1000 on the
State railway system are now going to be
repaired.” “There are therefore 2000 engines
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_288" id="Page_288">[288]</a></span>scandalously abandoned,” comments the <i>Journal</i>,
... “forgotten during sixteen months,
and having passed from the state of being
inutilized to that of being inutilizable. For
if these machines, which were in service before
the war and came from Belgium, are to-day,
like the waggons of Blanc-Mesnil, incapable
of being utilized in their present state, as the
official note puts it, the reason is that they
were left to decay in the rain and the wind
without cover or case for five hundred days.”<a name="FNanchor_139_139" id="FNanchor_139_139"></a><a href="#Footnote_139_139" class="fnanchor">[139]</a></p>
<p>Interesting in a smaller way is the reply
given by the French War Minister to a question
by a deputy, the Marquis de Ludre, who
asked for information about a consignment
of knives which had been provided for the
army, but were found to be quite useless.
The Minister explained that the Generalissimus
having requested the immediate dispatch
of 165,000 knives, the department
charged with the execution of the order had
no time to examine the goods, and the circumstance
was overlooked that all kinds of
knives were supplied, without any reference
to the purpose for which they were destined.<a name="FNanchor_140_140" id="FNanchor_140_140"></a><a href="#Footnote_140_140" class="fnanchor">[140]</a>
The Minister added that no one should be
blamed for this, inasmuch as it was “the
result of exaggerated but praiseworthy zeal.”
This construction is charitable and may be
true in fact. But the soldiers who, in lieu
of a serviceable blade, found themselves in
possession of a dessert knife may have taken
a different view of the transaction.</p>
<p>This is hardly what is understood by
organization.</p>
<p>Beside those scenes from chaos set this
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_289" id="Page_289">[289]</a></span>picture of order: “In a small French town
in which the supreme <i>etape commando</i> of
Kluck’s army was situated, we inspected a
field postal station. On the ground floor the
letters were being received and delivered.
The stream of soldiers was endless. They
were sending field postcards, which are forwarded
gratuitously. The difficult work of
sorting the correspondence was being transacted
on the first storey. Every day from
1800 to 2000 post sacks arrive, mostly with
small packets and postcards, and day after
day the same difficult problem presents itself—how
to find the addressee. Many regiments,
it is true, have permanent quarters, but there
are mobile columns as well. Quick transfers
are possible, and individuals may be shifted
to another place or incorporated in a different
regiment. The arranging of the correspondence
went forward in a spacious room; the
letters which it was difficult to deliver were
handed over to a number of specialists, who sat
in an adjoining apartment and studied all the
changes caused by the transfer of troops.
They found help in an address-book containing
a list of all the field formations. About
once every four days, or even oftener, a new
edition of this work was issued. By the middle
of December 1914 the eighty-fourth edition
was in print.”<a name="FNanchor_141_141" id="FNanchor_141_141"></a><a href="#Footnote_141_141" class="fnanchor">[141]</a></p>
<p>This talent for organization, this capacity
of thought concentration in circumstances
which tend to strengthen emotion at the cost
of reason, have been constantly displayed by
our enemies throughout the entire struggle
of the past thirty years, and never more conspicuously
than during the present war. Every
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_290" id="Page_290">[290]</a></span>emergency found them ready. The most unlikely
eventualities had been foreseen and
provided for. Private initiative, which
“grandmotherly legislation” was supposed
to have killed, was more alert and resourceful
than among any of the Entente nations.
Every German is in some respects an agent
of his Government. Each one thinks he
foresees some eventuality with the genesis of
which he is especially conversant, and he
forthwith communicates his forecast and at
the same time his plan for coping with the
danger to some official. And all suggestions
are thankfully received and dealt with on
their intrinsic merits. For such matters the
rulers of the Empire, however engrossed by
urgent problems, have always time and money.</p>
<p>It is instructive and may possibly be helpful
to compare this spirit of detachment from
the personal and party elements of the situation,
this accessibility to every call of patriotic
duty, this self-possession under conditions
calculated to hinder calm deliberation, with
the hesitations, the bewilderment, the conflicting
decisions of the Entente leaders and
their impatience of unauthorized initiative
and offers of private assistance. Outsiders
are not wanted. Their money is not rejected,
but nothing else that they tender is readily
received.</p>
<p>In other more momentous matters the
Allies also lagged behind their adversaries.
Despite their vast resources and the generous
offers of private help, the care taken of the
wounded left a good deal to be desired. The
articles on this subject which were published
in the London Press provided ample food for
bitter reflection. In France, at the beginning<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_291" id="Page_291">[291]</a></span>
of the war, wounded soldiers, after receiving
first aid, were conveyed for days in carts over
uneven roads to the hospitals in which they
were to be treated. An American gentleman,
witnessing the sufferings of these victims of
circumstance, collected a number of motors
in which to have them transported rapidly
and with relative comfort. But his offer of
these conveyances was rejected by all the
departments to which he applied. And it
was only after he had spent weeks in visiting
influential friends in London that he finally
obtained an introduction to the Secretary for
War, who, overriding the decisions of his
subordinates, closed with the proposal and
sent the benefactor with his motors to the
front.</p>
<p>It has been affirmed by unbiassed neutral
witnesses who evinced special interest in the
subject that tens of thousands of the allied
wounded who died of their injuries might
have been saved had they had proper care.
But defective organization and other avoidable
causes deprived them of efficient medical
help.</p>
<p>By Great Britain more comprehensive measures
were fitfully taken, of which our wounded
have reaped the benefit. A French journal<a name="FNanchor_142_142" id="FNanchor_142_142"></a><a href="#Footnote_142_142" class="fnanchor">[142]</a>
enumerated, with a high tribute of praise, the
results of the observations made by a commission
of British physicians in the Grand
Palais Hospital in Paris: “More than half,
to be exact 54 per cent., of the wounded
entrusted to the care of the doctors of the
Grand Palais since last May have been sent
back to the front, completely cured. What
an achievement!” Undoubtedly it is a feat
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_292" id="Page_292">[292]</a></span>to be proud of, if we compare it with the
percentage of cured in certain other countries
and in the Dardanelles. But if we set it side
by side with what is claimed for and by the
Germans, it may appear less remarkable. It
cannot be gainsaid that the British authorities
have spared neither money nor pains to alleviate
the sufferings and heal the injuries of the
wounded. And if the measure of their success
is still capable of being extended, the reason
certainly does not lie in any lack of good will.</p>
<p>On the incapacitated German soldier every
possible care is bestowed. His every need is
foreseen and when possible provided for with
an eye to thoroughness and economy. Waste
and niggardliness are sedulously eschewed.
Every man is provided with a square of canvas
with eyelets, which serves as a carpet on which
he lies at night, as a stretcher on which,
when wounded, he is carried to the place
where he can have his injuries attended to,
and which, when he is killed, is used as a
winding-sheet. The medical organization of
the army is as thorough as the military. And
the results attained justify the solicitude displayed.
From month to month the percentage
of wounded who are able to return to the front
has been augmenting steadily, and the death-rate
has decreased correspondingly. During
the first month of the war, out of every hundred
wounded there were 84·8 capable of further
service, 3·0 dead, and 12·2 incapacitated or
sent home. In September of the same year
the number of those able to return to the front
rose to 88·1, or about 4 per cent. more. And
at the same time the death-rate sank from
3 to 2·7 per cent. In the third month the
proportion of soldiers able to resume their<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_293" id="Page_293">[293]</a></span>
places in the ranks of fighters was 88·9, while
the deaths had been reduced to 2·4. During
the period beginning with November and
ending in March the number of the wounded
who went back to the front oscillated between
87·3 and 88·9. In November the percentage
of deaths was only 2·1 per cent., and in
December only 1·7 per cent. January 1916
showed a further improvement, the death-rate
having fallen to 1·4 and in February 1·3
per cent. During the two following months
the percentage rose again to 1·4, but declined
slowly until in June and July it had descended
to 1·2 per cent. The number of wounded men
who were sent back to their places at the
front had meanwhile increased by April to
91·2, and by June 1915 to 91·7, and in May and
July to 91·8. Seven per cent. were wholly
incapacitated or dismissed to their homes.
Among the latter a considerable percentage
returned subsequently to the ranks. Altogether,
then, about 91·8 per cent. of the
wounded German soldiers who fall in battle
are so well taken care of that they are able to
fight again, and no more than 1·2 per cent. of
the total number succumb to their wounds.<a name="FNanchor_143_143" id="FNanchor_143_143"></a><a href="#Footnote_143_143" class="fnanchor">[143]</a></p>
<p>This strict conformity to the material and
psychological conditions of success marks the
method by which the Germans proceed to
realize a grandiose plan which is understood
and furthered by one and all. Their talent
for organization, their insight, their inventiveness,
and their highly developed social sense
are all pressed into the service of this patriotic
cause. And it is to these permanent qualities,
more even than to their thirty years’ military
and economic preparation, that they owe
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_294" id="Page_294">[294]</a></span>their many successes. The cynicism and
ruthlessness of our arch-enemy should not be
allowed to blind us to his enterprise, his
stoicism, his meticulous applications of the
law of cause and effect. These are among
his most valuable assets, and unless we have
solid advantages of our own to set against
and outweigh them, our appeals to the justice
of our cause and our denunciations of his
wicked designs will avail us nothing. It is
to our interest to seek out and note whatever
strength is inherent in himself or his methods
and to appropriate that. The struggle will
ultimately be decided by the superiority of
equipment, material and moral, which one
side possesses over the other. As for the
conceptions of public law and international
right which the antagonists severally stand
for, they must be gauged by quite other
standards than heavy guns and asphyxiating
gases. It is not impossible that in the course
of time, and by dint of reciprocal action and
reaction, the German views may be sufficiently
modified and moralized to render possible the
usual process of assimilation with which the
history of speculative ideas and social movements
has rendered us familiar. Meanwhile,
truth compels us to admit that part at least
of the western system is being overtaken by
decay, and stands in need of speedy and
thorough renovation.</p>
<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_118_118" id="Footnote_118_118"></a><a href="#FNanchor_118_118"><span class="label">[118]</span></a> Mr. Lloyd George’s speech at Bristol. Cf. <i>Daily
Telegraph</i>, September 10, 1915.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_119_119" id="Footnote_119_119"></a><a href="#FNanchor_119_119"><span class="label">[119]</span></a> <i>Ibid.</i></p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_120_120" id="Footnote_120_120"></a><a href="#FNanchor_120_120"><span class="label">[120]</span></a> <i>Ibid.</i></p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_121_121" id="Footnote_121_121"></a><a href="#FNanchor_121_121"><span class="label">[121]</span></a> Mr. Lloyd George’s speech at Bristol. Cf. <i>Daily
Telegraph</i>, September 10, 1915.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_122_122" id="Footnote_122_122"></a><a href="#FNanchor_122_122"><span class="label">[122]</span></a> <i>Berliner Tageblatt</i>, March 9, 1916.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_123_123" id="Footnote_123_123"></a><a href="#FNanchor_123_123"><span class="label">[123]</span></a> It is but fair to say that venality is not one of the
characteristics of the German bureaucracy. Their sense
of duty towards the State is the nearest approach to
morality of which they now seem capable.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_124_124" id="Footnote_124_124"></a><a href="#FNanchor_124_124"><span class="label">[124]</span></a> The German press gave great prominence to this
item of news. Cf. <i>Frankfurter Zeitung</i>, January 8, 1916.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_125_125" id="Footnote_125_125"></a><a href="#FNanchor_125_125"><span class="label">[125]</span></a> <i>The Bourse Gazette</i>, February 21.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_126_126" id="Footnote_126_126"></a><a href="#FNanchor_126_126"><span class="label">[126]</span></a> Cf. <i>Reitch</i> (about February 17, 1916), March 5, 1916.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_127_127" id="Footnote_127_127"></a><a href="#FNanchor_127_127"><span class="label">[127]</span></a> A pood is equal to 36.11 lbs.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_128_128" id="Footnote_128_128"></a><a href="#FNanchor_128_128"><span class="label">[128]</span></a> Cf. <i>Novoye Vremya</i>, October 9, 1915.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_129_129" id="Footnote_129_129"></a><a href="#FNanchor_129_129"><span class="label">[129]</span></a> The German press welcomes items of information
like this. Cf. <i>Frankfurter Zeitung</i>, January 13, 1916.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_130_130" id="Footnote_130_130"></a><a href="#FNanchor_130_130"><span class="label">[130]</span></a> Over a hundred million head.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_131_131" id="Footnote_131_131"></a><a href="#FNanchor_131_131"><span class="label">[131]</span></a> Cf. the Russian journal, <i>Kieff</i>, also the <i>Frankfurter
Zeitung</i>, January 29, 1916.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_132_132" id="Footnote_132_132"></a><a href="#FNanchor_132_132"><span class="label">[132]</span></a> <i>Novoye Vremya</i>, January 1916. <i>Frankfurter Zeitung</i>,
January 21, 1916.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_133_133" id="Footnote_133_133"></a><a href="#FNanchor_133_133"><span class="label">[133]</span></a> <i>Le Journal</i>, November 26, 1915.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_134_134" id="Footnote_134_134"></a><a href="#FNanchor_134_134"><span class="label">[134]</span></a> <i>Le Journal</i>, November 26, 1915.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_135_135" id="Footnote_135_135"></a><a href="#FNanchor_135_135"><span class="label">[135]</span></a> <i>Le Journal</i>, November 26, 1915.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_136_136" id="Footnote_136_136"></a><a href="#FNanchor_136_136"><span class="label">[136]</span></a> <i>Le Journal</i>, December 2, 1915. They were photographed
and the photograph reproduced in that paper.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_137_137" id="Footnote_137_137"></a><a href="#FNanchor_137_137"><span class="label">[137]</span></a> That was published in December 1915.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_138_138" id="Footnote_138_138"></a><a href="#FNanchor_138_138"><span class="label">[138]</span></a> <i>Le Journal</i>, December 2, 1915.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_139_139" id="Footnote_139_139"></a><a href="#FNanchor_139_139"><span class="label">[139]</span></a> <i>Le Journal</i>, December 4, 1915.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_140_140" id="Footnote_140_140"></a><a href="#FNanchor_140_140"><span class="label">[140]</span></a> Journal Official, answer to question No. 5730.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_141_141" id="Footnote_141_141"></a><a href="#FNanchor_141_141"><span class="label">[141]</span></a> Karl Hildebrand, <i>Ein starkes Volk</i>, p. 108.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_142_142" id="Footnote_142_142"></a><a href="#FNanchor_142_142"><span class="label">[142]</span></a> <i>The Figaro</i>, February 22, 1916.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_143_143" id="Footnote_143_143"></a><a href="#FNanchor_143_143"><span class="label">[143]</span></a> <i>Deutsche Medizinische Wochenschrift.</i></p></div>
</div>
<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXI" id="CHAPTER_XXI"></a>CHAPTER XXI<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_295" id="Page_295">[295]</a></span></h2>
<h3>THE FINAL ISSUE</h3>
<p><span class="smcap">To</span> come victorious out of the present ordeal—if,
indeed, that be possible with the leaders,
principles, methods and strivings that still
characterize us—will not suffice to effect the
triumph of our cause. The present, momentous
though it be, cannot with safety be separated in
thought or action from the future. The struggle
will go on relentlessly after this campaign until
one side has worsted the other definitively.
And it is for that struggle that it behoves us to
prepare while the war is still at its height.</p>
<p>The Germans, true to their practice, have
set us the example. Their curious combinations
for dividing the Allies while negotiating
their own schemes for reorganizing political
Europe have been worked out in almost every
detail. Their projects for creating a vast and
powerful economic organization, to be known
as Central Europe,<a name="FNanchor_144_144" id="FNanchor_144_144"></a><a href="#Footnote_144_144" class="fnanchor">[144]</a> with its first appendix in
the Balkan Peninsula, have been carefully
woven, and will be duly embellished when
the hour for unfolding them has struck. In
a word, when opportunity suddenly appears
like the bridegroom of the Gospel, the German
will be found waiting, with girded loins and
trimmed lamp. He has distributed the parts
of each nation in the international drama, and
if the rôles cannot be taken over to-morrow,
he will wait until the day after.</p>
<p>The world is henceforth no longer a field of
labour for the individual. Co-operation is
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_296" id="Page_296">[296]</a></span>the open sesame to the economic life of the
future. And co-operation means organization.
Organization, then, is the Alpha and Omega
of the new era. That is the mysterious radium
which has enabled a single race to assail and
hold its own against a group of powers whose
territory and population are many times
greater than its own. That race has demonstrated
the quasi-omnipotence of organized
labour, and has thereby itself become almost
omnipotent. On the success or failure of its
adversaries to create a like force and rise to
the same height depends the future of Europe
and the British Empire. One of the first
corollaries of the new principle is the enlargement
of all great units, including political
communities. Germany and Austria, therefore,
are bound, if not precisely to coalesce in one
whole, at least to co-operate and combine for
their common ends against common competitors,
and thus to form the nucleus of that federal state
which is, our enemies hope, one day to be commensurate
with the continent of Europe.</p>
<p>At present, however satisfactory the military
situation may be said to be, the general outlook
is far from bright. Our aims are impoverished,
our creative energies are clogged by prejudice,
our political vision is narrowed by party goals,
and the forces inherent in the nation which should
be employed in readjusting its life to the new
conditions are being frittered away in abortive
efforts to neutralize dissolvent ideas that are sapping
only those organs of our social and political
system which are already vicious or decayed.
The waste of the empire’s resources has no parallel
in history. Supreme confusion marks our internal
condition. Our leaders have done nothing to
familiarize the nation with the dangers that<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_297" id="Page_297">[297]</a></span>
threaten it, the means by which they should be
met, or with the social and political ideas which
are destined to shape and sway the new order
of things which is already close at hand.</p>
<p>In the absence of constructive leaders it is
for the nation itself to make due preparation
for the momentous changes in the social and
political system of Europe to which the
present crisis is but the prelude.</p>
<p>And although much has been spoken and
written on the subject since the war began,
little permanent work has as yet been done.
And there are few signs of a radical change
for the better. The confusion and incongruousness
that mark the ideas of the reformers,
and the hesitancy and conflicting interests of
politicians make one dubious of the outcome of
the present contest. Almost everything essential
would appear to be still lacking to the
Allies, and the nature of the coming “peace
period” is not realized, because the war is
looked upon as an isolated phenomenon which
began in July 1914, and will end when hostilities
have ceased. Another belief equally misleading
and mischievous is that the Teuton
race can be paralysed if not crushed, and that
for fifty or sixty years to come no revival of
its energies, no recrudescence of its morbid
aggressiveness need be apprehended. If we
continue to shape our conduct on that assumption
we may find ourselves one day in a
Serbonian bog from which there is no rescue.
However stringent the conditions which the
Allies may be able to impose on their enemies,
there will still remain a keen, strenuous, irrepressible
race of at least a hundred and twenty
millions, endowed with rare capacities for
organization, cohesion, self-sacrifice and perseverance,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_298" id="Page_298">[298]</a></span>
whom no treaties can bind, no scruples
can restrain, no dangers intimidate. At any
moment a new invention, a favourable diplomatic
combination, would suffice to move them
to burst all bounds and resume the military,
naval and aerial contest anew.</p>
<p>Even now, while the war is still raging, they
are busy with comprehensive plans for the
economic struggle which will succeed it. Nor
are they content to weave schemes. They
have already begun to carry them out. To
mention but a few of the less important
enterprises, as symptoms of the German
solicitude for detail, there was a numerous
gathering of railway representatives, Austrian,
Hungarian and German, in August 1915, to
consider the means of readjusting the railway
service to the conditions which the peace
would usher in. Among the projects laid
before the meeting and insisted on by various
financial institutions was the reconstruction
on a new basis of the Sleeping Car Company,
from which Belgian capital is to be excluded.<a name="FNanchor_145_145" id="FNanchor_145_145"></a><a href="#Footnote_145_145" class="fnanchor">[145]</a></p>
<p>In Italy many of the German commercial
houses are, so to say, hibernating during the war.
They merely altered their names and substituted
well-paid, friendly Italians for Germans, and
the feat was achieved. In this way the Kaiser’s
mercury mines of Abbadia, San Salvatore and
Corte Vecchia in Tuscany are being protected,
and nobody in Italy is under any misapprehension
as to what is going on there. They are
nominally in the hands of Swiss.</p>
<p>One of the most successful manœuvres by
which the Germans have already parried the
strokes of their rivals in the economic struggle
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_299" id="Page_299">[299]</a></span>is by crossing the frontiers and carrying on
the contest in the enemy’s country. It was
thus that, when Russia, by way of protecting
her own nascent textile industries, levied
heavy duties on imports from abroad, the
Germans transported their plant and their
workmen across the border, built extensive
works in Lodz which gradually grew into a
prosperous German city and rendered sterling
services to the Teuton invader during the
present war. They intend to have recourse
to the same device as soon as hostilities have
ceased. German trade papers announced this
to their readers and urged them to communicate
with the staff with a view to receiving
information respecting ways and means.</p>
<p>One Berlin trade journal—the most widely
circulated in the German capital—had recently
a great headline entitled: “How to keep up
German Exportation after the War!” After
a preamble enumerating the difficulties that
would be thrown in the way of exporters by
the Allies, the article went on thus: “For
some years to come the means of extricating
ourselves from this cruel predicament will
consist in transporting the work of manufacturing
or refining our merchandise to a
neutral country. We are now in a position
to offer information and advice on this head
to those German manufacturers who are working
for exportation, and we shall endeavour to
extend our action in the future. We advise
all those manufacturers who are desirous of
developing their business in this way to enter
into relations with us without delay.”<a name="FNanchor_146_146" id="FNanchor_146_146"></a><a href="#Footnote_146_146" class="fnanchor">[146]</a></p>
<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_300" id="Page_300">[300]</a></span></p>
<p>The device is simple, and has hitherto been
efficacious. In Switzerland the number of
German firms is large and continues to augment.
They are branches of German houses, and their
aim is to further the interests of these. They
mask their intentions by assuming Swiss names
and also by obtaining for their employees
naturalization papers in the little republic.
How, it may be asked, do the Allies propose
to thwart these manœuvres? They probably
have not given the matter a moment’s serious
consideration. A Swiss journal of repute<a name="FNanchor_147_147" id="FNanchor_147_147"></a><a href="#Footnote_147_147" class="fnanchor">[147]</a>
published some time ago a characteristic letter
received by a Swiss business man from a
German textile manufacturer. One passage
is worth reproducing: “The actual situation
renders it impossible for us to maintain relations
with our former customers. Hence,
it is of the utmost importance for us to be
informed respecting the commercial and financial
situation with a view to the resumption
of our intercourse in a lucrative form after
this long interruption. It is our intention,
therefore, to have our products sold through
a Swiss branch by Swiss agents.”<a name="FNanchor_148_148" id="FNanchor_148_148"></a><a href="#Footnote_148_148" class="fnanchor">[148]</a></p>
<p>With their incorrigible disposition to judge
others by themselves, the British people fancy
that after the war a wave of liberalism will
sweep over Germany, demolish the strongholds
of militarism there, and reveal a pacific,
level-headed nation with whom it may be
possible to hold friendly intercourse. This,
to my thinking, is also a delusion. Even if
the Kaiser and his environment were dislodged
from their places, Germany’s ideals, aims
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_301" id="Page_301">[301]</a></span>and strivings would remain unchanged. But
the Kaiser and his Government are minded
to leave nothing to chance. They, too, have
their plans, which are simple and comprehensive,
and would appear to have escaped the
notice of British optimists. And yet they
are well worth consideration. The Germans
themselves put the matter thus—</p>
<p>The enormous expenditure necessitated by
the war will call for special financial legislation
of which the keynote will be found in monopolies.
Now, the present German Finance
Minister, who is a banker by training, intends
that the monopolies to be created shall be
effected, not by the unaided resources of the
State, but by its co-operation with the interested
business men and banks. On this basis
he is working at monopolies of cigarettes, life
insurance and electric power. This complex
arrangement is facilitated by the machinery of
the banks and their peculiar activity. And
here we touch upon one of the main sources
whence German organization after the war
will draw its vitality. It is on the operations
of these financial institutions that it behoves
us to lay stress. They are so many magnetic
centres which attract nearly all the free
capital of the country and then employ it as
they think fit. And one momentous consequence
of this command of money is the
possession of almost unrestricted power over
industrial enterprises, present and future. For
it depends on the banks to extend these and to
restrict the output of those in consonance with
the economic policy pursued by the State.</p>
<p>Nor should it be forgotten that the power
and influence of the banks is not limited by
the amount of capital they actually possess.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_302" id="Page_302">[302]</a></span>
Over and above this they wield all the financial
force conferred by the vast amounts deposited
with them by customers. This was evidenced
in the case of the Banca Commerciale in Italy,
which had a working capital of £6,240,000 in
the year 1914. Now, of that sum only 2·5
per cent. was owned by Germans, yet the
bank itself and all the industries dependent
on it were exploited by the German Board of
Directors.<a name="FNanchor_149_149" id="FNanchor_149_149"></a><a href="#Footnote_149_149" class="fnanchor">[149]</a> In the Fatherland we observe
the same phenomenon. All the German banks
together, excepting the hypothecary institutions,
owned £195,000,000 sterling, about 44
per cent. of which belonged to the eight principal
banks of the empire.<a name="FNanchor_150_150" id="FNanchor_150_150"></a><a href="#Footnote_150_150" class="fnanchor">[150]</a> Possessing only
£86,050,000 of their own, they disposed of
£259,600,000 belonging to other people.</p>
<p>One effect of the establishment of groups
of monopolies will be to increase the number
of persons dependent for their livelihood on
the State. It is calculated that the total,
including heads of families, will amount to
tens of millions. The corn monopoly will bring
in five million farmers, heads of families,
who will have to look to the State for the
amount of their yearly income. For it is
evident that the Government will be “co-operating”
not with the peasants, but with the
great landed proprietors. Now, these are the
men whose backing is indispensable, and has
never been wanting, to the military and court
<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_303" id="Page_303">[303]</a></span>parties who are primarily responsible for the
war. Once the wages of the workmen and the
interest on capital become dependent on the
State, the entire nation is but a vast machine
worked by the men in power. To suppose
that these will lend a willing ear to the demands
for political liberty which are certain to be
made after the conclusion of peace is to expect
the impossible. What will probably happen
is a keen struggle between the classes and the
masses for the mastery, but until it is decided in
favour of the latter, the Germany of the future
will continue to be the Germany of to-day.</p>
<p>In the meanwhile, the Teutons, despite
their striking inferiority in numbers and
resources, have kept the Great Powers of the
world at bay, have defeated their armies, sunk
their mercantile marine, occupied their territory,
drained their wealth, paralysed their
trade and deprived them of all the odds which
they owed to circumstance. Organization has
thus more than made up for the seemingly
overpowering advantages possessed by the
Allies at the outset. That it will suddenly
lose its worth during the remainder of the
campaign is hardly to be expected. The contingency
which we may have to face, if we
continue to move at our present pace, is
manifest to the observant student of politics.</p>
<p>By the average man and our “leaders of
men” it is hardly even suspected. Our easy-going
optimism is largely the result of temperament
and partly, too, of presumptuous
confidence born of past luck, and in especial
of the relief we feel at our escape from most
of the obvious dangers that menaced us at
the outset of the war. There has been no
trouble over Ireland, no rising in India, no<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_304" id="Page_304">[304]</a></span>
serious defection in South Africa, no invasion
of Egypt. And we irrationally feel that these
dark clouds, having drifted harmlessly past,
the others will follow them. It was said of
the Swiss in mediæval times, that they were
kept together by the bewilderment of men and
the providence of God, confusione hominum
et providentia Dei. The same might be truly
predicated of the British people of to-day.</p>
<p>But there is no reason for assuming that
they will be thus providentially cared for in
the future. The Allies have not yet driven
the Germans out of Belgium, France, Serbia,
Montenegro, Poland or Kurland. Neither have
they contrived to starve them into sueing for
peace. They talk glibly of exhausting them
as though their own resources were inexhaustible.
They do well perhaps to make light
of the Zeppelins, but they pay far too little
attention to the submarines, and seem not to
realize the magnitude of the losses which these
weapons have inflicted on our merchant shipping,
nor to have calculated how long it can hold
out at the present rate of destruction. Freights
have increased enormously, and they have not
yet reached the highest point they are likely to
attain. Imports have been restricted, prices
have gone up and taxation has increased.
Time may not be on the side of our enemies, but
is it on ours? It is a fickle ally at best, and to
rely on its support is to lean on a split reed.</p>
<p>Optimism of the unreasoning kind prevalent
in Great Britain is unwarranted, whether
we confine our view to the actual campaign or
extend it to the greater struggle of which that
forms but an episode. Taking the former case
first, one is struck with certain considerations
which, without inspiring dismay, ought surely to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_305" id="Page_305">[305]</a></span>
preserve us from that excessive self-confidence
which is too often a hindrance to fruitful
exertion. The financial burden and its relation
to the limits of the allied nations’ capacity to
bear it is a fit subject for meditation when we
feel uplifted in self-complacency. Doubtless it
is encouraging to watch the symptoms of slow
exhaustion displaying themselves in the central
empires and to speculate on the consequences
of the further fall of the German mark. But
these consequences we are too apt to exaggerate.
For we misjudge the character, the
staying powers, the ideals, the psychology of
the German people. We fancy that because
they have been reduced from comfort to hardship
therefore they are on the verge of collapse.
We imagine that because their commercial
and industrial classes are keen on making
money and ardently desire peace, they are
also ready to purchase it by acquiescing in
conditions which would dispel their dreams of
world power. We feel certain that if Prussia
and all the German States received genuine
parliamentary government, the costly ambitions
of the military party would forthwith be
dispelled for all time.</p>
<p>It is by delusions such as these that the
British people were hoodwinked in the past,
and it is by the same vain imaginings that
they may be victimized in the future. For
they seem incapable of gauging the German
psyche. The two races meet each other in
masks. The apparent ingenuousness of the
English-speaking Teuton is calculated to throw
the most vigilant Anglo-Saxon intelligence off
its guard. We have no psychological X-rays
by which to pierce the peculiar racial vesture
in which the German soul is shrouded, nor<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_306" id="Page_306">[306]</a></span>
are we endowed with the gift of patient observation
which might enable us to extract
those rays from facts. And so we stumble
along, dealing with an imaginary people whom
we ourselves have created after our own image
and likeness, falling into fatal blunders and
recommencing anew.</p>
<p>It is true that the mark has fallen, and that
the German financial fabric is in a parlous
condition. But that fabric is kept from
crumbling away by the war, just as the Egyptian
papyrus is preserved so long as it does not
come into contact with the air. Moreover,
common prudence should impel us to find out
at what a cost to ourselves we have reduced
the value of the mark. If financial exhaustion
be among the ways in which one group of
belligerents may be made to succumb, it is
wise to ask whether it is the States which have
to pay gold for their huge requirements or
those which can get almost everything they
need for paper that are likely to succumb first.</p>
<p>The question is relevant, yet, because it has
not been moved into the foreground of discussion,
there are few people who ponder on it.</p>
<p>Personally, I am convinced that impecuniosity
and loss of credit will never bring the
Germans to their knees.</p>
<p>Great Britain has achieved wonders in the
financial sphere during this war, as the Allies
and certain neutrals can testify. Our budgets
are monuments of the nation’s spirit of self-sacrifice.
But we have not come scathless
out of the ordeal. And besides our inevitable
losses we are suffering from criminal waste. No
other country is so thriftless as ours. In this
respect we are a byword among the peoples of
the world. But we give no thought to the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_307" id="Page_307">[307]</a></span>
consequences. Yet the yearly outlay on the
one hand and the means of meeting it on the
other hand are calculable, and it would be well
if those who rely upon Germany’s financial
prostration would carefully reckon up and
compare the two, were it only for the sake of
the sobering effect. On this aspect of the
problem it is needless to dwell further. It will
compel close and painful attention before the
end of the campaign.</p>
<p>Another point to which inadequate heed has
been paid, is the lack of working men. This
dearth of labour is not felt in Germany or
Austria, because they have two million prisoners
and two million Poles on whom they can draw
not only for agricultural work but also for
skilled labour. And the authorities of both
those empires are employing their war prisoners
very freely. Here, as everywhere else, the
Teuton is enterprising. I have seen photographs
of Russians in Germany harnessed and
employed as beasts of burden. At any rate,
it is no secret that from the latter half of the
year 1915 Germany and Austria were far ahead
of Great Britain, France, Russia, the United
States and Japan <i>combined</i> in the amount of
munitions they turned out every week. And
they are still ahead of them to-day. This
fact, which can be verified, has an ominous
ring. What it connotes is that our enemies
have no strikes, no conscientious objectors,
no fiddling with obligatory service, industrial
or military. Each man is at his country’s
beck and call. Germany is free from strikers,
slackers and such-like anti-social types.</p>
<p>In Russia the want of working men is felt
keenly. It is one of the main elements of the
sharp rise of prices there. In France, too, the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_308" id="Page_308">[308]</a></span>
number of hands needed is very great, and
the loss inflicted by their withdrawal from the
labour market is more sensible than the average
reader has any notion of. And far from being
filled, these gaps are becoming wider day by
day. This shortage is a source of solicitude
to the Government of the Republic.</p>
<p>What it portends may readily be imagined.
It certainly compels us to qualify the cheering
assertion that time is on our side. What else
it implies may be left to the imagination of
the reader.</p>
<p>More serious still than the financial burden,
or the dearth of workmen, is the inadequacy of
the mercantile marine to the needs of the Allies
in general, and of Great Britain in especial.
To this privation submarine warfare has contributed
materially. And there is not the
slenderest ground for hope that the Germans
will desist from it during this campaign. On
the contrary, they will intensify it. Of the
neutrals, some are too weak and others too
timid to enter an energetic protest against this
violation of international law. The freight-carrying
capacity of the transports still available
is less than the British optimist realizes.
How much less, it would be unfruitful to
inquire. It is enough to know that in this
matter, too, we had better seek a more helpful
ally than time. Those who are most conversant
with these elements of the problem are
haunted by a restive consciousness of disappointment
and apprehension.</p>
<p>For the power, the independence, the destinies
of the Empire are interwoven with our
command of the sea. On our merchant tonnage
depend our economic life, our army
and navy, everything we have and are and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_309" id="Page_309">[309]</a></span>
hope to be. That destroyed or paralysed,
nothing remains but a memory. And the
Germans are working hard and not unsuccessfully
to cripple it. During the week ending
April 13, 85,000 tons of British and neutral
shipping were destroyed. Since the beginning
of the submarine blockade over 3,000,000 tons
have been sent to the bottom of the sea.
On an average 50,000 tons a week are being
torpedoed or mined, and our losses tend to
augment rather than diminish. Nor is that
all. Not only is our merchant tonnage being
whittled down below the minimum needed for
our strict requirements, but we are also being
hindered from utilizing the transports available.
And herein lies a danger the full significance
of which has not yet received proper attention.
Shortage of labour is pleaded as the reason why
effective measures have not been adopted to fill
the gaps made by the enemy submarines. And
labour is inadequate because the Government
eschewes industrial as well as military compulsion.
It possesses the power, but shrinks from
wielding it. To my thinking, this is one of the
symptoms of that madness with which the gods
strike a nation before destroying it.</p>
<p>And the longer this process of—shall we call
it mutual?—exhaustion goes on, the more important
grow the neutral States and the
louder sound their voices. They are like
Jeshurun, who waxed fat and kicked. Without
special aptitudes for arithmetic one may
calculate, with a rough approach to accuracy,
the time when the process of mutual exhaustion
will enable the neutrals to exert an absurdly
disproportionate and possibly dangerous influence
over the belligerents. That is a calculation
which those optimists would do well to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_310" id="Page_310">[310]</a></span>
make who tell us that all is well because “time
is on our side.”</p>
<p>It is still open to us to utilize our superior
resources, realize our latent strength, and ward
off the dangers that beset us. But the first
advance towards the goal must be to face the
facts, behold things and persons as they are, and
apply our new-found knowledge to the work of
self-rescue. Our conception of the nature of
the contest in which we are engaged must be recast.
Our demands on our national leaders—not
those now in power who only mislead—must
be greatly enlarged. Truth, however
bitter, must take the place of fancy. Ideas
and institutions incongruous with the new
social and political conditions must be displaced.
The nation’s aims and policy should
be stated boldly and clearly, and adequate
machinery set up to achieve them. In a word,
system will have to be substituted for confusion,
method for haphazard. Destitute of
a great or strong man, it behoves us to imitate
our enemy and create a vast organization with
branches all over the empire. But the influence
of the government ever since the outbreak of
the war has militated against all those reforms.</p>
<p>If these changes had been effected at the
outset the story of the present campaign would
have been different from what it is. A group
of belligerents representing only 5,921,000
square kilometres of territory and 150,199,000
inhabitants, or, say, 4 per cent. of dry land
and 9·1 per cent. of human beings, would not
have held its own for twenty-one months
against a group disposing of 68,031,000 square
kilometres of territory and a population of
770,060,000, or 46 per cent. of the land on the
globe and 47 per cent. of the human race.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_311" id="Page_311">[311]</a></span>
Providence has bestowed upon the Allies the
wherewithal to attain their legitimate ends.
The Allies’ leaders are frittering them away.</p>
<p>For the thirty years of preparation do not
afford us an adequate explanation of the
Teuton superiority. The clue is to be found in
the psychological factor. Germany is wholly
alive, physically, intellectually and psychically.
And she lives in the present and future. We
either drowse or vegetate in and for the past.
She has the decisive advantage of possessing
organization and organizers. Therein lies the
secret of her sustained success. The Allies
lack both, and are hardly conscious of the
necessity of making good the deficiency.
Therein lies their weakness. It has made
itself felt throughout the campaign and will
determine the upshot of the war. And in the
politico-economic struggle that will follow the
war, it is the same psychological factor which the
Allies rate so low that will decide the final issue.</p>
<p>Unless we wake up to the reality and readjust
our ideas and methods to that—and of such
awakening there is as yet no sure token—the
outcome of the present war will be a draw, and
the final upshot of the larger contest will be
our utter defeat. No journalistic optimism, no
ministerial magniloquence can alter that. These
contingencies are already fullfronting us, as we
shall soon learn to our cost, and the people who
are veiling them from the public view, however
praiseworthy their intentions may be, are leading
the nation to ruin. And if we continue to uphold
our present chiefs and methods national disaster
is as inevitable as destiny. But it is well to
remember that it is not Fate that is pursuing
us; it is we who are overtaking Fate.</p>
<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_144_144" id="Footnote_144_144"></a><a href="#FNanchor_144_144"><span class="label">[144]</span></a> Cf. Friedrich Naumann, <i>Mitteleuropa</i>.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_145_145" id="Footnote_145_145"></a><a href="#FNanchor_145_145"><span class="label">[145]</span></a> <i>Giornale del lavori pubblici.</i> Cf. also <i>Giornale d’Italia</i>,
August 22, 1915.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_146_146" id="Footnote_146_146"></a><a href="#FNanchor_146_146"><span class="label">[146]</span></a> <i>Zeitschrift des Handelsvertragsvereins</i>, March 30, 1915.
Cf. also <i>La Gazette de Lausanne</i> and <i>L’Idea Nazionale</i>,
December 5, 1915.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_147_147" id="Footnote_147_147"></a><a href="#FNanchor_147_147"><span class="label">[147]</span></a> <i>Neue Zurcher Zeitung.</i></p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_148_148" id="Footnote_148_148"></a><a href="#FNanchor_148_148"><span class="label">[148]</span></a> <i>Neue Zurcher Zeitung</i>, also <i>L’Idea Nazionale</i>,
December 5, 1915.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_149_149" id="Footnote_149_149"></a><a href="#FNanchor_149_149"><span class="label">[149]</span></a> Giovanni Preziosi, <i>La Germania alla Conquista d’Italia</i>,
2d edizione, p. 150.</p></div>
<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_150_150" id="Footnote_150_150"></a><a href="#FNanchor_150_150"><span class="label">[150]</span></a> Deutsche Bank, 248 million marks; Diskonto Gesellschaft,
149 millions; Dresdner Bank, 261 millions;
Darmstädter Bank, 192 millions; Berliner Handelsg.
145 millions; Commerz- u. Diskonto Bank, 100 millions;
Nationalbank, 98 millions; Mitteldeutsche Kreditbank,
69 million marks.</p></div>
</div>
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