1899

THE FUTURE OF THE GREAT ARMIES

THE late 'Peace' Conference-which ought to have been called the War Conference, since it was mainly occupied in arranging how future wars are to be carried on-has justified the unfavourable anticipations which were ventured in the pages of this REVIEW and in other quarters. Most people who think seriously about public affairs are aware that it has been a failure, as it was expected to be by all but a few enthusiasts. But it is over now, and its obsequies have been celebrated by the European press with exemplary politeness. The august' initiator meant so well, and so many distinguished soldiers, sailors, diplomatists, and professors worked so hard during those dusty days at the House in the Wood, that it would be unkind to point out too plainly how futile the efforts of these eminent personages have been. The majority of the delegates at the Conference seem to have been inspired by two leading ideas. In the first place, they wanted to reduce armaments; in the second, they wished to cut the claws of Great Britain, so far as that operation could be performed without inconvenience to themselves. But when it came to business, it was found that the former project was a chimerical fantasy, which could not be discussed without absurdity by practical men. Consequently, the 'Limitation of Armaments,' which was the nominal and ostensible cause of the whole expensive entertainment, was quietly shelved, and appears only in the 'Final Act' as an innocuously pious generalisation.' As to the second-the unavowed, but very obvious object of the proceedings-not much came of that either. This was largely owing to the ability and alertness of the British delegates, and in particular to Lord Pauncefote, Sir John Ardagh, and Sir John Fisher, whose quickness of apprehension, adroit readiness, and clearness of expression, were in conspicuous contrast to the woolly indefiniteness exhibited by the representatives of some other Powers.

The Conference considers that the limitation of the military charges at present weighing upon the world is greatly to be desired for the increase of the material and moral welfare of humanity.' This is the sole reference to the subject in the Final Act, and it is not embodied either in the Conventions or the Declarations, but is merely one of the vœux or virtuous suggestions.

The country owes these admirable public servants more than it appears inclined to acknowledge, both for what they did and for what they prevented others from doing. Knowing their facts thoroughly— which was more than could be said for certain of the distinguished amateurs commissioned to the Hague by various foreign governments -they were able to veto several suggestions ingeniously devised to embarrass the greatest of the Maritime Powers; and they succeeded in convincing some of their most influential colleagues that the nail-paring operation above referred to could not be carried out so as to annoy and injure the British Lion exclusively. In the result, we emerge from the Huis ten Bosch not so very much worse than we entered that historic building. A little the worse we are. It is no advantage to us to have it placed solemnly on record that the weapon with which our troops are armed is too barbarous for employment in civilised warfare. The Conference adjourned with a testamentary recommendation that a fresh series of congresses should be summoned to discuss this and other matters, including the proposed inviolability of private property at sea. The last suggestion is distinctly awkward for us, since it raises a question we cannot afford to debate, and one on which, unhappily, we are compelled to take absolutely different views from those that prevail in the United States.

The great success of the Conference is supposed to be the Arbitration Convention. At present that agreement is in a highly inchoate condition, since it has not been accepted by several of the chief military and naval Powers represented at the Hague. However, we are no doubt entitled to assume that, in due course, some International Treaty, to which the more important civilised states will become parties, will be framed upon the lines of the Convention. This will be a praiseworthy proceeding, since it will be an official recognition of the principle that it is better to arrange disputes peaceably when possible. At the same time one feels inclined to ask, with Mrs. Gamp: Who's a denigeing of it?' To listen to some of the talk that is current, one might think that it is quite a brilliant new idea-a sort of political Happy Thought, that never struck anybody until it suddenly dawned upon the Hague Commissioners. In this spirit, the British and Foreign Arbitration Association has addressed a memorial to the Czar, pointing out that his Imperial Majesty might dispense with the Russian Army and Navy, having no further use for such luxuries. There is no doubt,' says this philosophic body, 'that now a method has been plainly pointed out of settling differences without war, the different governments, including,' adds the Association rather neatly, 'your Majesty's, must see the utter uselessness of keeping up enormous military establishments, which press so very heavily upon the industry and commerce of all civilised countries.' But surely it is not the first time or the five hundredth time that

'a method has been plainly pointed out of settling differences without war.' There is no novelty in the text. The difficulty lies in the application. And with all respect to the 'permanent '-but not compulsory-tribunal, which is to be set up, we are no nearer the universal use of the remedy than before. Nations will not be induced to abstain from war, because there is a secretary and an arbitration bureau, with an office in Brussels or some other conveniently accessible capital.

The Conference showed by its actions, if not by its words, that it thoroughly agreed with certain opinions, which have been from time to time enunciated in these pages. It realised that the great armaments, so far from being a constant menace to peace, are, in fact, its best guarantee. Nothing is half so likely to convert nations to a belief in the sacred merits of Arbitration as the conviction that the other alternative is too ruinous to be attempted. There are times, in public and private life, when men will fight, though they know that fighting is a mere blind tempting of fate. Maddened by passion, vanity, revenge, or an unendurable sense of wrong, nations may occasionally rush upon war regardless of consequences. But this is rare, and is likely to become more infrequent still as the masses of the people acquire a greater share of political power, combined with increased material prosperity. As a rule governments count the consequences before proceeding to extremities; and the more costly war is made, the more national suffering and loss it involves, the larger the proportion of the civil population it touches, the less likely is it to be rashly adventured on. There is no argument in favour of arbitration and negotiation so forcible as a huge conscript army. In spite of the jealousies and the conflicting interests of the great European Powers, there has been no war among them for eight and twenty years, and it almost seems as if there never could be one again. The risks are too heavy for the nerves even of a Bismarck to face. Nations will not plunge into hostilities when they see that victory itself would involve something like industrial ruin and commercial collapse, owing to the withdrawal of practically the entire adult male population from the work of production. To Great Britain a war means, at the worst, only suffering and loss of life to some thousands of soldiers and sailors, a comparatively limited class who stand apart from the mass of their fellow-citizens. It comes home to the rest of us chiefly in the shape of some additional pennies on the income tax, which is not quite the same thing as requiring a son or brother from every second household in the country.

The great armies-and incidentally, it may be added, the great navies will remain, for they are the best security against needless and hasty disturbance of the peace. The refusal of the Hague delegates to touch the Disarmament problem may be regarded as

The age of

putting an end to the matter for many years to come. 'bloated armaments' is not yet over, nor is it nearing its conclusion. On the contrary, Europe, not to mention Asia and America, will continue to 'groan' under the burden of military and naval establishments, until some decisive, and at present unforeseen, change occurs in international relations. Though we may confidently hope that wars will become more and more uncommon, warlike preparations will be pushed on with unceasing and unsleeping vigilance. Year after year the young men of most civilised nations will spend the first years of their manhood in being exercised to the use of arms, and will pass through life, and grow old, and die, without ever being called upon to draw a trigger against an enemy. The 'contingent' of growing lads will come up to the colours, will pass their two or three or five years in the barrack-room and on the parade-ground, and may yet never be required to practise the arts acquired with so much labour from the drill-sergeant and the musketry-instructor. No doubt there is something paradoxical and almost fantastic in this condition of affairs-this constant indefatigable preparation against an emergency which is exceedingly unlikely to occur.

The paradox has so forcibly struck M. de Bloch, the author of the famous work which is understood to have inspired the Czar to dictate the Muravieff Circular, that it has induced him to denounce not only all war, but also all warlike expenditure, as an anachronistic absurdity. War, he urges, between great nations, equipped with modern armies and modern resources, has become impossible. It would involve bankruptcy, suicide, starvation, not for one, but for both combatants. Two huge hosts of a couple

of millions each, sent into the field, with quick-firing artillery and repeating rifles, would spend months of marching, countermarching, and besieging before they got into touch. When they did fight a battle, it would be an affair of earthworks and entrenchments, which would endure for weeks, or else both hordes would be swept away in a few minutes. If the campaign were not speedily at an end the armies would inevitably starve, for there would not be enough hands left behind to supply them with food, or enough money in the country to pay for it. At the present moment M. de Bloch thinks it extremely doubtful whether either Germany or France would be able to feed its own population, when once the whole machine of agricultural production had been broken up by the mobilisation en masse of the Reserves. Every great state in time of war would be in the position of a beleaguered city; and, brave as its soldiers might be, they could not hold out against famine, which would attack the victorious as well as the defeated competitor. But if nations cannot fight on the large scale, and are scarcely likely even to try the experiment, what, asks M. de Bloch,

is the use of their Armies and their Navies? Why 'waste' 250,000,000l. sterling every year 'in preparing to wage a war which can only be waged at the price of suicide-that is to say, which cannot be waged at all, for no nation willingly commits suicide?' Why not save the money and spend it in ameliorating the condition of the people'? It is strange that this humane and industrious, if somewhat speculative, thinker does not see that he has himself supplied the answer to the questions he propounds. Why is war 'impossible,' or at least suicidal? Because of the growth of armies and the improvement in appliances. Reduce the armies and render the weapons less deadly, and those grim phantoms of ruin, dearth and massacre, which, as the Moscow banker sees, are the guardian angels of peace, will lose some of their terrors. There is nothing in M. de Bloch's elaborate argument which really tends in favour of disarmament. If we could get back to a state of things in which each European General Staff had at its disposal a compact little professional army of 80,000 or 100,000 men, with no conscripts and no huge civilian reserve, there would be no fear of 'suicide' or famine, and it would be as easy for ambitious sovereigns and intriguing ministers to bring about hostilities as it used to be in the days of Frederick the Great and Kaunitz.

Necessary or not, the mammoth army seems to many people nothing but a national misfortune of the gravest kind. 'Militarism,' they would say, is a curse to any country. It brings the most pestilent evils in its train. It hampers industry, since it takes away in the flower of their youth hundreds of thousands of workers who ought to be at the forge, the factory, or the farm. It grinds the faces of the poor, for it involves heavy taxes and high tariffs. It is wasteful, since it spends the savings of the people on guns, and swords, and gold lace, and pipe-clay, and other articles not adapted to 'assist future production.' It is immoral, since it trains the young to contemplate and deliberately prepare themselves for the killing of human beings; and it creates a caste, to whom the 'honour' of their uniform is more than the welfare of the nation, and who are degraded by the inhuman and brutal harshness of military discipline. Such is the indictment uttered by Mr. Bryan and the anti-imperialists in America, by the Socialists all over the world, and no doubt by many Englishmen, when they read of the iniquities perpetrated by the generals and colonels of the French general staff. The amazing Dreyfus case has been regarded, not unnaturally, as a sort of object-lesson in the perils and abuses of the military system. If the 'honour' of an army requires that subornation and forgery and wholesale lying should be patronised and practised by officers in the highest places-if it authorises false charges against innocent men, and permits the Merciers and the Rogets to go unpunished, while it covers with infamy the nobly