The Great Illusion Part 2

Admiral Mahan and the other Anglo-Saxons of his school have their counterpart in every European country, but more especially in Germany.

Even so "Liberal" a statesman as Baron Karl von Stengel, the German delegate to the First Hague Peace Conference, lays it down in his book that--

Every great Power must employ its efforts towards exercising the largest influence possible, not only in European but in world politics, and this mainly because economic power depends in the last resort on political power, and because the largest partic.i.p.ation possible in the trade of the world is a vital question for every nation.

The writings of such cla.s.sic authorities as Clausewitz give full confirmation of this view, while it is the resounding note of most popular German political literature that deals with "Weltpolitik." Grand Admiral von Koster, President of the Navy League, writes:

The steady increase of our population compels us to devote special attention to the growth of our overseas interests.

Nothing but the strong fulfilment of our naval programme can create for us that importance upon the free-world-sea which it is inc.u.mbent upon us to demand. The steady increase of our population compels us to set ourselves new goals and to grow from a Continental into a world power. Our mighty industry must aspire to new overseas conquests. Our world trade--which has more than doubled in twenty years, which has increased from 2500 million dollars to 4000 million dollars during the ten years in which our naval programme was fixed, and 3000 million dollars of which is sea-borne commerce--only can flourish if we continue honorably to bear the burdens of our armaments on land and sea alike. Unless our children are to accuse us of short-sightedness, it is now our duty to secure our world power and position among other nations. We can do that only under the protection of a strong German fleet, a fleet which shall guarantee us peace with honor for the distant future.

One popular German writer sees the possibility of "overthrowing the British Empire" and "wiping it from the map of the world in less than twenty-four hours." (I quote his actual words, and I have heard a parallel utterance from the mouth of a serious English public man.) The author in question, in order to show how the thing could come about, deals with the matter prophetically. Writing from the standpoint of 1911,[4] he admits that--

At the beginning of the twentieth century Great Britain was a free, a rich, and a happy country, in which every citizen, from the Prime Minister to the dock-laborer, was proud to be a member of the world-ruling nation. At the head of the State were men possessing a general mandate to carry out their programme of government, whose actions were subject to the criticism of public opinion, represented by an independent Press. Educated for centuries in self-government, a race had grown up which seemed born to rule. The highest triumphs attended England's skill in the art of government, in her handling of subject peoples.... And this immense Empire, which stretched from the Cape to Cairo, over the southern half of Asia, over half of North America and the fifth continent, could be wiped from the map of the world in less than twenty-four hours! This apparently inexplicable fact will be intelligible if we keep in sight the circ.u.mstances which rendered possible the building up of England's colonial power. The true basis of her world supremacy was not her own strength, but the maritime weakness of all the other European nations. Their almost complete lack of naval preparations had given the English a position of monopoly which was used by them for the annexation of all those dominions which seemed of value. Had it been in England's power to keep the rest of the world as it was in the nineteenth century, the British Empire might have continued for an unlimited time. The awakening of the Continental States to their national possibilities and to political independence introduced quite new factors into Weltpolitik, and it was only a question of time as to how long England could maintain her position in the face of the changed circ.u.mstances.

And the writer tells how the trick was done, thanks to a fog, efficient espionage, the bursting of the English war balloon, and the success of the German one in dropping sh.e.l.ls at the correct tactical moment on to the British s.h.i.+ps in the North Sea:

This war, which was decided by a naval battle lasting a single hour, was of only three weeks' duration--hunger forced England into peace. In her conditions Germany showed a wise moderation.

In addition to a war indemnity in accordance with the wealth of the two conquered States, she contented herself with the acquisition of the African Colonies, with the exception of the southern States, which had proclaimed their independence, and these possessions were divided with the other two powers of the Triple Alliance. Nevertheless, this war was the end of England.

A lost battle had sufficed to manifest to the world at large the feet of clay on which the dreaded Colossus had stood. In a night the British Empire had crumbled altogether; the pillars which English diplomacy had erected after years of labour had failed at the first test.

A glance at any average Pan-Germanist organ will reveal immediately how very nearly the foregoing corresponds to a somewhat prevalent type of political aspiration in Germany. One Pan-Germanist writer says:

"The future of Germany demands the absorption of Austria-Hungary, the Balkan States, and Turkey, with the North Sea ports. Her realms will stretch towards the east from Berlin to Bagdad, and to Antwerp on the west."

For the moment we are a.s.sured there is no immediate intention of seizing the countries in question, nor is Germany's hand actually ready yet to catch Belgium and Holland within the net of the Federated Empire.

"But," he says, "all these changes will happen within our epoch," and he fixes the time when the map of Europe will thus be rearranged as from twenty to thirty years hence.

Germany, according to the writer, means to fight while she has a penny left and a man to carry arms, for she is, he says, "face to face with a crisis which is more serious than even that of Jena."

And, recognizing the position, she is only waiting for the moment she judges the right one to break in pieces those of her neighbors who work against her.

France will be her first victim, and she will not wait to be attacked.

She is, indeed, preparing for the moment when the allied Powers attempt to dictate to her.

Germany, it would seem, has already decided to annex the Grand Duchy of Luxemburg, and Belgium, incidentally with, of course, Antwerp, and will add all the northern provinces of France to her possessions, so as to secure Boulogne and Calais.

All this is to come like a thunderbolt, and Russia, Spain, and the rest of the Powers friendly to England will not dare to move a finger to aid her. The possession of the coasts of France and Belgium will dispose of England's supremacy for ever.

In a book on South Africa ent.i.tled "Reisen Erlebnisse und Beobachtungen," by Dr. F. Bachmar, occurs the pa.s.sage:

"My second object in writing this book is that it may happen to our children's children to possess that beautiful and unhappy land of whose final absorption (_gewinnung_) by our Anglo-Saxon cousins I have not the least belief. It may be our lot to unite this land with the German Fatherland, to be equally a blessing to Germany and South Africa."

The necessity for armament is put in other than fictional form by so serious a writer as Dr. Gaevernitz, Pro-Rector of the University of Freiburg. Dr. Schulze-Gaevernitz is not unknown in England, nor is he imbued with inimical feelings towards her. But he takes the view that the commercial prosperity of Germany depends upon her political domination.[5]

After having described in an impressive way the astonis.h.i.+ng growth of Germany's trade and commerce, and shown how dangerous a compet.i.tor Germany has become for England, he returns to the old question, and asks what might happen if England, unable to keep down the inconvenient upstart by economic means, should, at the eleventh hour, try to knock him down. Quotations from the _National Review_, the _Observer_, the _Outlook_, the _Sat.u.r.day Review_, etc., facilitate the professor's thesis that this presumption is more than a mere abstract speculation.

Granted that they voice only the sentiments of a small minority, they are, according to our author, dangerous for Germany in this--that they point to a feasible and consequently enticing solution. The old peaceful Free Trade, he says, shows signs of senility. A new and rising Imperialism is everywhere inclined to throw the weapons of political warfare into the arena of economic rivalry.

How deeply the danger is felt even by those who sincerely desire peace and can in no sense be considered Jingoes may be judged by the following from the pen of Mr. Frederic Harrison. I make no apology for giving the quotations at some length. In a letter to the London _Times_ he says:

Whenever our Empire and maritime ascendancy are challenged it will be by such an invasion in force as was once designed by Philip and Parma, and again by Napoleon. It is this certainty which compels me to modify the anti-militarist policy which I have consistently maintained for forty years past.... To me now it is no question of loss of prestige--no question of the shrinkage of the Empire; it is our existence as a foremost European Power, and even as a thriving nation.... If ever our naval defence were broken through, our Navy overwhelmed or even dispersed for a season, and a military occupation of our a.r.s.enals, docks, and capital were effected, the ruin would be such as modern history cannot parallel. It would not be the Empire, but Britain, that would be destroyed.... The occupation by a foreign invader of our a.r.s.enals, docks, cities, and capital would be to the Empire what the bursting of the boilers would be to a _Dreadnought_. Capital would disappear with the destruction of credit.... A catastrophe so appalling cannot be left to chance, even if the probabilities against its occurring were 50 to 1. But the odds are not 50 to 1. No high authority ventures to a.s.sert that a successful invasion of our country is absolutely impossible if it were a.s.sisted by extraordinary conditions. And a successful invasion would mean to us the total collapse of our Empire, our trade, and, with trade, the means of feeding forty millions in these islands. If it is asked, "Why does invasion threaten more terrible consequences to us than it does to our neighbors?" the answer is that the British Empire is an anomalous structure, without any real parallel in modern history, except in the history of Portugal, Venice, and Holland, and in ancient history Athens and Carthage. Our Empire presents special conditions both for attack and for destruction. And its destruction by an enemy seated on the Thames would have consequences so awful to contemplate that it cannot be left to be safeguarded by one sole line of defence, however good, and for the present hour however adequate.... For more than forty years I have raised my voice against every form of aggression, of Imperial expansion, and Continental militarism. Few men have more earnestly protested against postponing social reforms and the well-being of the people to Imperial conquests and Asiatic and African adventures. I do not go back on a word that I have uttered thereon. But how hollow is all talk about industrial reorganization until we have secured our country against a catastrophe that would involve untold dest.i.tution and misery on the people in the ma.s.s--which would paralyze industry and raise food to famine prices, whilst closing our factories and our yards!

CHAPTER III

THE GREAT ILLUSION

These views founded on a gross and dangerous misconception--What a German victory could and could not accomplish--What an English victory could and could not accomplish--The optical illusion of conquest--There can be no transfer of wealth--The prosperity of the little States in Europe--German Three per Cents. at 82 and Belgian at 96--Russian Three and a Half per Cents. at 81, Norwegian at 102--What this really means--If Germany annexed Holland, would any German benefit or any Hollander?--The "cash value" of Alsace-Lorraine.

I think it will be admitted that there is not much chance of misunderstanding the general idea embodied in the pa.s.sage quoted at the end of the last chapter. Mr. Harrison is especially definite. At the risk of "d.a.m.nable iteration" I would again recall the fact that he is merely expressing one of the universally accepted axioms of European politics, namely, that a nation's financial and industrial stability, its security in commercial activity--in short, its prosperity and well being depend, upon its being able to defend itself against the aggression of other nations, who will, if they are able, be tempted to commit such aggression because in so doing they will increase their power, prosperity and well-being, at the cost of the weaker and vanquished.

I have quoted, it is true, largely journalistic authorities because I desired to indicate real public opinion, not merely scholarly opinion.

But Mr. Harrison has the support of other scholars of all sorts. Thus Mr. Spenser Wilkinson, Chichele Professor of Military History at Oxford, and a deservedly respected authority on the subject, confirms in almost every point in his various writings the opinions that I have quoted, and gives emphatic confirmation to all that Mr. Frederic Harrison has expressed. In his book, "Britain at Bay," Professor Wilkinson says: "No one thought when in 1888 the American observer, Captain Mahan, published his volume on the influence of sea-power upon history, that other nations beside the British read from that book the lesson that victory at sea carried with it a prosperity and influence and a greatness obtainable by no other means."

Well, it is the object of these pages to show that this all but universal idea, of which Mr. Harrison's letter is a particularly vivid expression, is a gross and desperately dangerous misconception, partaking at times of the nature of an optical illusion, at times of the nature of a superst.i.tion--a misconception not only gross and universal, but so profoundly mischievous as to misdirect an immense part of the energies of mankind, and to misdirect them to such degree that unless we liberate ourselves from this superst.i.tion civilization itself will be threatened.

And one of the most extraordinary features of this whole question is that the absolute demonstration of the falsity of this idea, the complete exposure of the illusion which gives it birth, is neither abstruse nor difficult. This demonstration does not repose upon any elaborately constructed theorem, but upon the simple exposition of the political facts of Europe as they exist to-day. These facts, which are incontrovertible, and which I shall elaborate presently, may be summed up in a few simple propositions stated thus:

1. An extent of devastation, even approximating to that which Mr.

Harrison foreshadows as the result of the conquest of Great Britain, could only be inflicted by an invader as a means of punishment costly to himself, or as the result of an unselfish and expensive desire to inflict misery for the mere joy of inflicting it. Since trade depends upon the existence of natural wealth and a population capable of working it, an invader cannot "utterly destroy it," except by destroying the population, which is not practicable. If he could destroy the population he would thereby destroy his own market, actual or potential, which would be commercially suicidal.[6]

2. If an invasion of Great Britain by Germany did involve, as Mr.

Harrison and those who think with him say it would, the "total collapse of the Empire, our trade, and the means of feeding forty millions in these islands ... the disturbance of capital and destruction of credit," German capital would also be disturbed, because of the internationalization and delicate interdependence of our credit-built finance and industry, and German credit would also collapse, and the only means of restoring it would be for Germany to put an end to the chaos in England by putting an end to the condition which had produced it. Moreover, because of this delicate interdependence of our credit-built finance, the confiscation by an invader of private property, whether stocks, shares, s.h.i.+ps, mines, or anything more valuable than jewellery or furniture--anything, in short, which is bound up with the economic life of the people--would so react upon the finance of the invader's country as to make the damage to the invader resulting from the confiscation exceed in value the property confiscated. So that Germany's success in conquest would be a demonstration of the complete economic futility of conquest.

3. For allied reasons, in our day the exaction of tribute from a conquered people has become an economic impossibility; the exaction of a large indemnity so costly directly and indirectly as to be an extremely disadvantageous financial operation.

4. It is a physical and economic impossibility to capture the external or carrying trade of another nation by military conquest. Large navies are impotent to create trade for the nations owning them, and can do nothing to "confine the commercial rivalry" of other nations. Nor can a conqueror destroy the compet.i.tion of a conquered nation by annexation; his compet.i.tors would still compete with him--_i.e._, if Germany conquered Holland, German merchants would still have to meet the compet.i.tion of Dutch merchants, and on keener terms than originally, because the Dutch merchants would then be within the German's customs lines; the notion that the trade compet.i.tion of rivals can be disposed of by conquering those rivals being one of the ill.u.s.trations of the curious optical illusion which lies behind the misconception dominating this subject.

5. The wealth, prosperity, and well-being of a nation depend in no way upon its political power; otherwise we should find the commercial prosperity and social well-being of the smaller nations, which exercise no political power, manifestly below that of the great nations which control Europe, whereas this is not the case. The populations of States like Switzerland, Holland, Belgium, Denmark, Sweden, are in every way as prosperous as the citizens of States like Germany, Russia, Austria, and France. The wealth _per capita_ of the small nations is in many cases in excess of that of the great nations. Not only the question of the security of small States, which, it might be urged, is due to treaties of neutrality, is here involved, but the question of whether political power can be turned in a positive sense to economic advantage.

6. No other nation could gain any advantage by the conquest of the British Colonies, and Great Britain could not suffer material damage by their loss, however much such loss would be regretted on sentimental grounds, and as rendering less easy a certain useful social co-operation between kindred peoples. The use, indeed, of the word "loss" is misleading. Great Britain does not "own" her Colonies. They are, in fact, independent nations in alliance with the Mother Country, to whom they are no source of tribute or economic profit (except as foreign nations are a source of profit), their economic relations being settled, not by the Mother Country, but by the Colonies. Economically, England would gain by their formal separation, since she would be relieved of the cost of their defence. Their "loss" involving, therefore, no change in economic fact (beyond saving the Mother Country the cost of their defence), could not involve the ruin of the Empire, and the starvation of the Mother Country, as those who commonly treat of such a contingency are apt to aver. As England is not able to exact tribute or economic advantage, it is inconceivable that any other country, necessarily less experienced in colonial management, would be able to succeed where England had failed, especially in view of the past history of the Spanish, Portuguese, French, and British Colonial Empires. This history also demonstrates that the position of British Crown Colonies, in the respect which we are considering, is not sensibly different from that of the self-governing ones. It is _not_ to be presumed, therefore, that any European nation, realizing the facts, would attempt the desperately expensive business of the conquest of England for the purpose of making an experiment which all colonial history shows to be doomed to failure.

The foregoing propositions traverse sufficiently the ground covered in the series of those typical statements of policy, both English and German, from which I have quoted. The simple statement of these propositions, based as they are upon the self-evident facts of present-day European politics, sufficiently exposes the nature of those political axioms which I have quoted. But as men even of the calibre of Mr. Harrison normally disregard these self-evident facts, it is necessary to elaborate them at somewhat greater length.

For the purpose of presenting a due parallel to the statement of policy embodied in the quotations made from the London _Times_ and Mr. Harrison and others, I have divided the propositions which I desire to demonstrate into seven clauses, but such a division is quite arbitrary, and made only in order to bring about the parallel in question. The whole seven can be put into one, as follows: That as the only possible policy in our day for a conqueror to pursue is to leave the wealth of a territory in the complete possession of the individuals inhabiting that territory, it is a logical fallacy and an optical illusion to regard a nation as increasing its wealth when it increases its territory; because when a province or State is annexed, the population, who are the real and only owners of the wealth therein, are also annexed, and the conqueror gets nothing. The facts of modern history abundantly demonstrate this. When Germany annexed Schleswig-Holstein and Alsatia not a single ordinary German citizen was one _pfennig_ the richer.

Although England "owns" Canada, the English merchant is driven out of the Canadian markets by the merchant of Switzerland, who does not "own"

Canada. Even where territory is not formally annexed, the conqueror is unable to take the wealth of a conquered territory, owing to the delicate interdependence of the financial world (an outcome of our credit and banking systems), which makes the financial and industrial security of the victor dependent upon financial and industrial security in all considerable civilized centres; so that widespread confiscation or destruction of trade and commerce in a conquered territory would react disastrously upon the conqueror. The conqueror is thus reduced to economic impotence, which means that political and military power is economically futile--that is to say, can do nothing for the trade and well-being of the individuals exercising such power. Conversely, armies and navies cannot destroy the trade of rivals, nor can they capture it.

The great nations of Europe do not destroy the trade of the small nations for their own benefit, because they cannot; and the Dutch citizen, whose Government possesses no military power, is just as well off as the German citizen, whose Government possesses an army of two million men, and a great deal better off than the Russian, whose Government possesses an army of something like four million. Thus, as a rough-and-ready though incomplete indication of the relative wealth and security of the respective States, the Three per Cents. of powerless Belgium are quoted at 96, and the Three per Cents. of powerful Germany at 82; the Three and a Half per Cents. of the Russian Empire, with its hundred and twenty million souls and its four million army, are quoted at 81, while the Three and a Half per Cents. of Norway, which has not an army at all (or any that need be considered in this discussion), are quoted at 102. All of which carries with it the paradox that the more a nation's wealth is militarily protected the less secure does it become.[7]

The late Lord Salisbury, speaking to a delegation of business men, made this notable observation: The conduct of men of affairs acting individually in their business capacity differs radically in its principles and application from the conduct of the same men when they act collectively in political affairs. And one of the most astonis.h.i.+ng things in politics is the little trouble business men take to bring their political creed into keeping with their daily behavior; how little, indeed, they realize the political implication of their daily work. It is a case, indeed, of the forest and the trees.

But for some such phenomenon we certainly should not see the contradiction between the daily practice of the business world and the prevailing political philosophy, which the security of property in, and the high prosperity of, the smaller States involves. We are told by all the political experts that great navies and great armies are necessary to protect our wealth against the aggression of powerful neighbors, whose cupidity and voracity can be controlled by force alone; that treaties avail nothing, and that in international politics might makes right, that military and commercial security are identical, that armaments are justified by the necessity of commercial security; that our navy is an "insurance," and that a country without military power with which their diplomats can "bargain" in the Council of Europe is at a hopeless disadvantage economically. Yet when the investor, studying the question in its purely financial and material aspect, has to decide between the great States, with all their imposing paraphernalia of colossal armies and fabulously costly navies, and the little States, possessing relatively no military power whatever, he plumps solidly, and with what is in the circ.u.mstances a tremendous difference, in favor of the small and helpless. For a difference of twenty points, which we find as between Norwegian and Russian, and fourteen as between Belgian and German securities, is the difference between a safe and a speculative one--the difference between an American railroad bond in time of profound security and in time of widespread panic. And what is true of the Government funds is true, in an only slightly less degree, of the industrial securities in the national comparison just drawn.

Is it a sort of altruism or quixotism which thus impels the capitalists of Europe to conclude that the public funds and investments of powerless Holland and Sweden (any day at the mercy of their big neighbors) are 10 to 20 per cent. safer than those of the greatest Power of Continental Europe. The question is, of course, absurd. The only consideration of the financier is profit and security, and he has decided that the funds of the undefended nation are more secure than the funds of one defended by colossal armaments. How does he arrive at this decision, unless it be through his knowledge as a financier, which, of course, he exercises without reference to the political implication of his decision, that modern wealth requires no defence, because it cannot be confiscated?

If Mr. Harrison is right; if, as he implies, a nation's commerce, its very industrial existence, would disappear if it allowed neighbors who envied it that commerce to become its superiors in armaments, and to exercise political weight in the world, how does he explain the fact that the great Powers of the Continent are flanked by little nations far weaker than themselves having nearly always a commercial development equal to, and in most cases greater than theirs? If the common doctrines be true, the financiers would not invest a dollar in the territories of the undefended nations, and yet, far from that being the case, they consider that a Swiss or a Dutch investment is more secure than a German one; that industrial undertakings in a country like Switzerland defended by an army of a few thousand men, are preferable in point of security to enterprises backed by two millions of the most perfectly trained soldiers in the world. The att.i.tude of European finance in this matter is the absolute condemnation of the view commonly taken by the statesman. If a country's trade were really at the mercy of the first successful invader; if armies and navies were really necessary for the protection and promotion of trade, the small countries would be in a hopelessly inferior position, and could only exist on the sufferance of what we are told are unscrupulous aggressors. And yet Norway has relatively to population a greater carrying trade than Great Britain,[8] and Dutch, Swiss, and Belgian merchants compete in all the markets of the world successfully with those of Germany and France.