Page 12 of 31

[p. 86]

A consideration of difficulties like these brings us to a realisation of the fact that the chances are small that a nation, in the heat of a dispute, will admit the likelihood of its being in the wrong. To refuse to admit this is generally tantamount to a refusal to submit the difficulty to arbitration. And neither international law, nor the moral force of public opinion can induce a state to act contrary to what it believes to be its own interest. Moreover, as international law now stands, it is not a duty to have recourse to arbitration. This was made quite clear in the proceedings of the Peace Conference at the Hague in 1899.[94] It was strongly recommended that arbitration should be sought wherever it was possible, but, at the same time definitely stated, that this course could in no case be compulsory. In this respect things have not advanced beyond the position of the Paris Congress of 1856.[95] The wars waged in Europe subsequent to that date, have all been begun without previous attempt at mediation.

But the work of the peace party regarding the[p. 87] humaner methods of settlement is not to be neglected. The popular feeling which they have been partly the means of stimulating has no doubt done something to influence the action of statesmen towards extreme caution in the treatment of questions likely to arouse national passions and prejudices. Arbitration has undoubtedly made headway in recent years. Britain and America, the two nations whose names naturally suggest themselves to us as future centres of federative union, both countries whose industrial interests are numerous and complicated, have most readily, as they have most frequently, settled disputes in this practical manner. It has shown itself to be a policy as economical as it is business-like. Its value, in its proper place, cannot be overrated by any Peace Congress or by any peace pamphlet; but we have endeavoured to make it clear that this sphere is but a limited one. The "good-will" may not be there when it ought perhaps to appear: it will certainly not be there when any vital interest is at stake. But, even if this were not so and arbitration were the natural sequence of every dispute, no coercive force exists to enforce the decree of the court. The moral restraint of public opinion is here a poor substitute. Treaties, it is often said, are in the same position; but treaties have been broken, and will no doubt be broken again. We[p. 88] are moved to the conclusion that a thoroughly logical peace programme cannot stop short of the principle of federation. Federal troops are necessary to carry out the decrees of a tribunal of arbitration, if that court is not to run a risk of being held feeble and ineffectual. Except on some such basis, arbitration, as a substitute for war, stands on but a weak footing.

Disarmament.

The efforts of the Peace Society are directed with even less hope of complete success against another evil of our time, the crushing burden of modern armaments. We have peace at this moment, but at a daily increasing cost. The Peace Society is rightly concerned in pressing this point. It is not enough to keep off actual war: there is a limit to the price we can afford to pay even for peace. Probably no principle has cost Europe so much in the last century as that handed down from Rome:---"Si vis pacem, para bellum." It is now a hundred and fifty years since Montesquieu[96] protested[p. 89] against this "new distemper" which was spreading itself over Europe; but never, in time of peace, has complaint been so loud or so general as now: and this, not only against the universal burden of taxation which weighs upon all nations alike, but, in continental countries, against the waste of productive force due to compulsory military service, a discontent which seems to strike at the very foundations of society. Vattel relates that in early times a treaty of peace generally stipulated that both parties should afterwards disarm. And there is no doubt that Kant was right in regarding standing armies as a danger to peace, not only as openly expressing the rivalry and distrust between nation and nation which Hobbes regards as the basis of international relations, but also as putting a power into the hand of a nation which it may some day have the temptation to abuse. A war-loving, overbearing spirit in a people thrives none the worse for a consciousness that its army or navy can hold its own with any other in Europe. Were it not the case that the essence of armed peace is that a high state of efficiency should be[p. 90] general, the danger to peace would be very great indeed. No doubt it is due to this fact that France has kept quietly to her side of the Rhine during the last thirty years. The annexation of Alsace-Lorraine was an immediate stimulus to the increase of armaments; but otherwise, just because of this greater efficiency and the slightly stronger military position of Germany, it has been an influence on the side of peace.

The Czar's Rescript of 1898 gave a new stimulus to an interest in this question which the subsequent conference at the Hague was unable fully to satisfy. We are compelled to consider carefully how a process of simultaneous disarmament can actually be carried out, and what results might be anticipated from this step, with a view not only to the present but the future. Can this be done in accordance with the principles of justice? Organisations like a great navy or a highly disciplined army have been built up, in the course of centuries, at great cost and at much sacrifice to the nation. They are the fruit of years of wise government and a high record of national industry. Are such visible tokens of the culture and character and worth of a people to be swept away and Britain, France, Germany, Italy, Spain, Turkey to stand on the same level? And, even if no such ethical considerations should arise, on what method are[p. 91] we to proceed? The standard as well as the nature of armament depends in every state on its geographical conditions and its historical position. An ocean-bound empire like Britain is comparatively immune from the danger of invasion: her army can be safely despatched to the colonies, her fleet protects her at home, her position is one of natural defence. But Germany and Austria find themselves in exactly opposite circumstances, with the hard necessity imposed upon them of guarding their frontiers on every side. The safety of a nation like Germany is in the hands of its army: its military strength lies in an almost perfect mastery of the science of attack.

The Peace Society has hitherto made no attempt to face the difficulties inseparable from any attempt to apply a uniform method of treatment to peculiarities and conditions so conflicting and various as these. Those who have been more conscientious have not been very successful in solving them. Indeed, so constantly is military technique changing that it is difficult to prophesy wherein will lie, a few years hence, the essence of a state's defensive power or what part the modern navy will play in this defence. No careful thinker would suggest, in the face of dangers threatening from the[p. 92] East,[97] a complete disarmament. The simplest of many suggestions made---but this on the basis of universal conscription---seems to be that the number of years or months of compulsory military service should be reduced to some fixed period. But this does not touch the difficulty of colonial empires[98] like Britain which might to a certain extent disarm, like their neighbours, in Europe, but would be compelled to keep an army for the defence of their colonies elsewhere. It is, in the meantime, inevitable that Europe should keep up a high standard of armament---this is, (and even if we had European federation, would remain) an absolute necessity as a protection against the yellow races, and in Europe itself there are at present elements hostile to the cause of peace. Alsace-Lorraine, Polish Prussia, Russian Poland and Finland are still, to a considerable degree, sources of discontent and dissatisfaction. But in Russia itself lies the great obstacle to a future European peace or European federation: we can scarcely picture Russia as a reliable member of such a union. That Russia should disarm is scarcely[p. 93] feasible, in view of its own interest: it has always to face the danger of rebellion in Poland and anarchy at home. But that Europe should disarm, before Russia has attained a higher civilisation, a consciousness of its great future as a north-eastern, inter-oceanic empire, and a government more favourable to the diffusion of liberty, is still less practicable.[99] We have here to fall back upon federation again. It is not impossible that, in the course of time, this problem may be solved and that the contribution to the federal troops of a European union may be regulated upon some equitable basis the form of which we cannot now well prophesy.