I. THE CREEPING TIDE.
We must now deal with the second factor which makes the conditions worse in Belgium than in Germany. While German peace-factories, ruined by the blockade, have been turned into war-factories, the majority of Belgian industries have remained idle. In spite of the high wages offered by the Germans—some skilled workmen were offered as much as £2 and £2 10s. per day—the workers resisted the constant pressure exerted upon them and preferred to live miserably on half-wages or with the help given them by the "Comité National" rather than accept any work which might directly or indirectly help the occupying power. If a few thousands, compelled by hunger or unable to resist their conquerors' threats, passed the frontier, all the rest of the working population kept up, under the most depressing conditions, a great patriotic strike, the "strike of folded arms." If they could not, as the 20,000 young heroes who crossed the Dutch frontier, join the Belgian army on the Yser; they could at least wage war at home and oppose to the enemy the impenetrable rampart of their naked breasts. It should not be said, when King Albert should return to Brussels at the head of his troops, that his subjects had not shared the sufferings of his soldiers. They should also have their wounds to show, they should also have their dead to honour.
When, at the beginning of November last, the protests of the Belgian Government and the "Signal of Distress" of the Belgian bishops made known the slave raids which had taken place, most of the outside world was shocked and surprised. It had lived, for months, under the impression that "things were not so bad" in the conquered provinces. After the outcry caused by the atrocities of August, 1914, there came a natural reaction, a sort of anti-climax. Fines, requisitions, petty persecutions do not strike the imagination in the same way as the burning of towns and the wholesale massacre of peaceful citizens. It had become necessary to follow things closely in order to understand that, instead of suffering less, the Belgian population was suffering more and more every day. Besides, news was scarce and difficult to check. When alarming reports came from the Dutch frontier, it was usual to think that the newspaper correspondents spread them without much discrimination.
But to those who were familiar with the policy pursued by the German administration since the spring of 1915, the bad news which they received lately only confirmed the fears which they had entertained for a long time. As the war went on, it became more and more evident that Germany, whose man-power was steadily decreasing, would no longer tolerate the resistance of the Belgian workers, and would even attempt to enrol in her army of labour all the able-bodied men of the conquered provinces. The slave-raids coincide with the "levée en masse" in the Empire and with the organisation of the new "Polish Army": "If every German is made to fight or to work, ought not every Belgian, every Pole, to be compelled to do the same? The fact that they should turn their arms or their tools against their own country is not worthy of consideration, as it is supposed already to enjoy the blessings of German rule and has become an integral part of the Fatherland."
There is a great deal to be said for the slavery of ancient times. It was at least free from cunning and hypocrisy. The conqueror ill-treated the vanquished, but he spared him his calumnies. The only law was the law of the stronger, but the stronger did not pretend to be also the better. The tyrant was always right, of course, but he did not pretend to show that the victim was always wrong.
Now the worst aspect of the German policy is that it associates the subtlest dialectics with the most insane brutality. When the time comes, they act with the blind fury of the bull, but they have already thought it all over with the wisdom of the serpent. That is why the popular appellation of "Huns" is so misleading. It suggests merely the brutality of primitive men, which is not always so dangerous and so depraved as the brutality of civilised men. Brutality does not exclude honesty and pity. Attila listened to the prayers of the Pope and spared Rome. The Kaiser's lieutenant does not listen to Cardinal Mercier's protests. The Huns, as most strong men, made a point of keeping their word. The Germans seem to make a point of breaking theirs. When I compared the fight of Belgium and Germany to the unequal fight of Jack and the Giant, of David and Goliath, I was forgetting that David and Jack were cleverer than their antagonists. Folklore and fairy-tales always equalize the chances by granting more wit to the small people than to the big ones. It is a healthy inspiration. But we are confronted to-day with a new monster, a wise giant, a cunning dragon, a subtle beast.
We must therefore not imagine that Governor von Bissing got up one fine morning, called for pen and ink, like King Cole for his bowl, and wrote a proclamation to the effect that all Belgians of military age would be reduced to slavery and obliged, under the penalty of physical torture and under the whip of German sentries, to dig trenches behind the Western front or to turn shells in a German factory. Any fool—any Goliath—might have done that.
Every German crime is preceded by a series of false promises and followed by a series of calumnies. Between such a prelude and such a finale, you may perform a symphony of frightfulness with Dr. Strauss' orchestration—it will sound as innocent and artless as the three notes of a shepherd's pipe. The violation of Belgian neutrality is bad enough, but if you begin to lull Belgium to slumber by repeating, on every occasion, that she has nothing to fear, and if you end by declaring to the civilised world that Belgium was plotting with England and France a traitorous attack against Germany, then it becomes quite plausible. To massacre 6,000 civilians and burn 20,000 houses in cold blood looks rather harsh, but if you begin by giving "a solemn guarantee to the people that they will not have to suffer from the war" (General von Emmich's first proclamation) and end by saying that women have emptied buckets of boiling water on the heads of your soldiers and that children have put out the eyes of your wounded, it becomes almost a kind proceeding. In the same way, to seize and deport hundreds of thousands of men and compel them to work in exile against their country seems the act of Barbarians, but if you accumulate assurances that "normal conditions will be maintained" and that nobody need fear deportation, and if you end by declaring that the Belgian working classes are exclusively composed of loafers and drunkards, it becomes a measure of providence and wisdom for which your victims in particular, and the whole civilised world in general, ought to be deeply grateful.
The promise testifies to your good intentions and the calumny explains how you were regretfully obliged not to fulfill them. The promise keeps your victims within reach, the calumnies shift to them the responsibility for your crime. Who doubts that every town visited by a Zeppelin is fortified, that every ship sunk by a U boat carries troops or guns? The old Hun killed everything which stood in his way; the modern Hun does the same and then declares that he is the victim. The old Hun left the dead bodies of his enemies to the crows; the modern Hun throws mud at them. The old Hun tried to kill the body; the modern Hun tries to ruin the soul.
For this last and most monstrous of all Germany's crimes we have to register not one promise only, but a series of promises, an accumulation of solemn pledges. It seemed worth while apparently to keep the Belgian workmen at home. Let us record them here, in chronological order:
1st. September 2nd, 1914. Proclamation of Governor von der Goltz posted in Brussels: "I ask no one to renounce his patriotic sentiments..."
2nd. October 18th, 1914. Letter of Baron von Huene, Military Governor of Antwerp, to Cardinal Mercier, read in every church of the province in order to reassure the people after the fall of Antwerp and to stop the emigration: "Young men need have no fear of being deported to Germany, either to be enrolled in the army or to be subjected to forced labour."
3rd. On the same day, a written declaration of the military authorities of Antwerp to General von Terwisga, commanding the Dutch army in the field, declaring without foundation "the rumour that the young men will be sent to Germany."
4th. A few weeks later, this promise was confirmed verbally to Cardinal Mercier and extended to the other provinces under German rule by Governor von der Goltz, two aide-de-camps and the Cardinal's private secretary being present. (See letter from Cardinal Mercier to Baron von Bissing, October 19th, 1916).
5th. November, 1914. Assurances given by the German authorities to the Dutch Legation in Brussels in order to persuade the refugees to come back: "Normal conditions will be restored and the refugees will be allowed to go back to Holland to look after their families." (See also the letter of the Dutch Consul in Antwerp urging the refugees to come back to their homes.)
6th. July 25th, 1915. Placard of Governor von Bissing posted in Brussels: "The people shall never be compelled to do anything against their country."
7th. April, 1916: Assurances given to the neutral powers after the Lille raids that such deportations would not be renewed.
Now, let us confront these texts, not even with the facts which come to us from the most trustworthy sources, but with the German decrees and proclamations preparing and ordering the recent deportations. We are not opposing a Belgian testimony to a German one, neither are we, for the present, propounding even our own interpretation of what occurred. We will merely oppose a German document to another German document and let them settle their differences as best they can.
The first trouble began in April and May, 1915, in Luttre, at the Malines arsenal, and in several other Flemish towns, when the German authorities exerted every possible pressure to compel the Belgian workmen to resume work. They were brought, under military escort, to their workshops, imprisoned, starved, and about two hundred of them were deported to Germany, where they were submitted to the most cruel tortures. (See the Nineteenth Report of the Belgian Commission of Enquiry.) The threats and persecutions are sufficiently established by three placards issued by the German authorities.
The first one, posted on the walls of Pont-à-Celles, near Luttre, says, among other things: "If the workmen accept the above conditions (that is to say, resume work with handsome wages) the prisoners will be released...." The "prisoners" being several hundred workers who had been imprisoned in their shops and deprived of food. (April, 1915.)
The second, signed von Bissing (so that nobody could imagine that these measures were taken by some too zealous subaltern) and posted in Malines, on the 30th of May, tells us that "the town of Malines must be punished as long as the required number of workmen have not resumed work." These workmen were employed by the Belgian State—which owns the country's railway—for the repair of the rolling stock. When they had refused to resume work, at the beginning of the occupation, a few hundred German workmen had filled their posts. These had been sent back to their military depots. The patriotic duty of these Belgians was evident enough: by resuming their work, they released German soldiers for the front and increased the number of coaches and engines, of which the enemy was in great need for the transport of troops. If you will compare this poster with the one printed above and dated July 25th, you will be confronted with one of the neatest examples of German duplicity. Other people have broken their promises after making them. It was left to Governor von Bissing to make them after breaking them.
The third document is still more conclusive. On June the 16th the citizens of Ghent could read on their walls that: "The attitude of certain factories which refuse to work for the German Army under the pretext of patriotism proves that a movement is afoot to create difficulties for the German Army. If such an attitude is maintained I will hold the communal authorities responsible and the population will have only itself to blame if the great liberties granted to it until now are suspended." This clumsy declaration is signed by Lieutenant-General Graf von Westcarp. And to think that, even now, Governor von Bissing perseveres in maintaining that no military work has ever been asked or will ever be asked from the Belgian workers! As the French proverb says: "On n'est jamais trahi que par les siens." [[4]]
But, like the man who marries his mistress after the birth of the first child, the Governor General was thinking of "regularising the situation." He knew that his attitude was illegal. He decided, therefore, to concoct a few decrees in order to legalize it in the eyes of the world. He had, you see, to save appearances. You cannot get on with no law at all. It might shock neutrals. So, if you break all the articles of the Hague Convention one by one, like so many sticks, the only thing to do is to manufacture some fresh regulations to replace them. And everything will again be for the best in the best of worlds.
That is where German subtlety comes in. You must not do things rashly, at once. Like a skilful dramatist, you must prepare the public to take in a situation. There is a true artistic touch in the way this General of Cavalry succeeds in gradually legalizing illegality.
In a first decree, dated August 10th, 1915, a fortnight after his last pledge, Governor von Bissing promises from fourteen days' to six months' imprisonment to anyone dependent on public charity who refuses to undertake work "without a sufficient reason" and a fine of £500 or a year's imprisonment to anyone who encourages refusal to work by the granting of relief. Notice that the accomplice is punished more heavily than the principal culprit. The idea is clearly to deprive every striker of the help of his commune and of the "Comité National." However, as it is still left to Belgian tribunals to decide which reasons are "sufficient" and which are not, this decree is not very harmful.
On May 2nd, 1916, the rising tide creeps nearer to us. The power of deciding on the matter passes from the Belgian tribunals to the military authority, and thereupon every striker becomes a culprit.
On May 13th, there is a new decree by which "the governors, military commanders, and chiefs of districts are allowed to order the unemployed to be conducted by force to the spots where they have to work." This, no doubt, in order to avoid the crowding of prisons, which would have necessarily followed the last decree. It only remains to declare that the workers can be deported to complete the process and to legalise slavery.
This step was taken on October 3rd last, when an order, signed by Quartier-Meister Sauberzweig and issued by the General Headquarters of the German Army, was posted in all the communes of Flanders. This order warned all persons "who are fit to work that they may be compelled to do so even outside their places of residence," when "they should be compelled to have recourse to public help for their own subsistence or for the subsistence of the persons dependent on them."
[!-- Note Anchor 4 --][Footnote 4: Another poster dated from Menin (August, 1915) reads as follows: "From to-day the town is forbidden to give any support whatever even to the families, wives, or children of workmen who are not employed regularly on military work..">[
But there is more to come in the story. Three guarantees were left, which have been quoted again and again by the German Press and by Baron von Bissing in his various answers to Cardinal Mercier. It was first stated that the men seized would not be sent to Germany, then that only the unemployed were taken, and finally that these would not be used on military work. These last guarantees have been repeatedly broken. Again, I will leave the Germans to condemn themselves.
In his decree published at Antwerp, on November the 2nd, General von Huene (the same man who had given Cardinal Mercier his formal written promise that no deportations should take place) declares that the men are to be concentrated at the Southern Station, "whence ... they will be conveyed in groups to workshops in Germany."
In a letter sent by General Hurt, Military Governor of Brussels and of the province of Brabant, to all burgomasters, it is said that "where the Communes will not furnish the lists (of unemployed) the German administration will itself designate the men to be deported to Germany. If then ... errors are committed, the burgomasters will only have themselves to blame, for the German administration has no time and no means for making an inquiry concerning the personal status of each person."
Finally, an extraordinary proclamation of the "Major-Commandant d'Etapes" of Antoing, dated October 20th, announces that "the population will never be compelled to work under continuous fire," this population being composed, according to the same document, of men and women between 17 and 46 years of age. If they refuse "they will be placed in a battalion of civil workers, on reduced rations." Here is the address of one of these militarised civilians dropped from a train leaving for the Western front and picked up by a friend: X., 3 Comp. Ziv. Arb. Bat. 27.—Et. Indp.—Armee No.
This did not prevent Governor von Bissing from declaring, a week later (letter to Cardinal Mercier, October 26th), that: "No workman can be obliged to participate in work connected with the war (entreprises de guerre)"! [[5]]
The last fatal step has been taken. From decree to decree, from proclamation to proclamation, the last threads of the curtain of legality which remained between the victim and the tyrant have been cut one by one. Between the acts of the German administration in Belgium and those of the African slave drivers, we are now unable to discover any difference whatever. The old plague which had been the shame of Europe for more than two centuries has risen again from its ashes. It appears before us with all its hideous characteristics. People are torn from their homes and sent away to foreign lands without any hope of returning. Any protest is crushed by the application of torture in the form of starvation, exposure, and their kindred ills ... There is, however, one new point about the modern slave: his face is as white as that of his master.
The nineteenth century stamped out black slavery. It was left to the twentieth century to reinstate white slavery. It is the purest glory of the English-speaking people to have succeeded in eradicating the old evil. It will be the eternal shame of the German-speaking people to have replaced it by something worse. Civilisation forbade any man, sixty years ago, to force another man to work for him. Civilisation to-day does not forbid a man—a conqueror—to force another man to work against himself. The old slave only lost his liberty. The new slave must lose his honour, his dignity, his self-respect. He has only one other alternative: death. And this, not the glorious death of a martyr which makes thousands of converts and shines all over the world, not the death of Nurse Cavell, but the anonymous death of X.Y.Z., the death of hundreds and hundreds of unknown heroes who will die under the whip or in the darkness of their cells in the German prison camps.
I had almost forgotten a last distinction between the old and the new forms of slavery: The average slave driver of past days was only a trader who sold human beings instead of selling oxen or sheep. When his trade was prohibited, he took heavy risks and ran great danger of losing his fortune and his life. But the German rulers of Belgium, whether they be in Brussels or in Berlin, whether we call them von Bissing or Helfferich, live in the comfort of their homes, surrounded by their families, and when assailed by protests, can still play hide and seek around the broken pillars of the Temple of Peace and wave arrogantly, like so many flags, the torn articles of international law: "I assert," said Dr. Helfferich in the Reichstag (December 2nd)—"I assert that setting the Belgian unemployed to work is thoroughly consonant with international law. We therefore take our stand, formally and in practice, on international law, making use of our undoubted rights."
Let Dr. Helfferich beware. He is not the only judge on international law. His stand may come crashing down.
[!-- Note Anchor 5 --][Footnote 5: I should ask the reader to confront this declaration with the statement made by the Belgian workmen in their appeal to the working classes of the world. "On the Western Front they force them, by the most brutal means, to dig trenches, construct aviation grounds...."
In his letter sent to the Belgian Ministers to the Vatican and to Spain, Baron Beyens, the Belgian Minister for Foreign Affairs, says: "The men are sent to occupied France to construct sets of trenches and a strategic railway, Lille-Aulnaye-Givet."
Among many trustworthy reports, we hear that the 5th Zivilisten-Bataillon, including some men of Ghent and Alost, has been forced to work, under threat of death, on the construction of a strategic railway between Laon and Soissons. Some of the men, exhausted by the bad treatment inflicted upon them, have been sent back to Belgium in a critical condition, and have written a full statement relating their experiences, signed by twenty of them. On the other hand, the Belgian General Headquarters report that Belgian civilians, obliged to dig trenches and dug-outs near Becelaere (West Flanders), were exposed to the fire of the English guns.]