Reflections

(1) "Hardly worth mentioning"! So that is how Clausewitz regards International Law, Clausewitz to whom in Germany "our most famous victors on the more modern battlefields owe their spiritual training," and on whom "everybody who to-day either makes or teaches modern war bases himself, even if he is not conscious of it." And we must regard nearly every foreign statesman as, consciously or unconsciously, a disciple of Clausewitz. It is, therefore, high time that we should cease to pin our faith on International Law, or think that it can in any way protect us, if we neglect strongly to protect ourselves. Power and expediency are the only rules that the practical politicians of foreign countries recognize, and the only question they ask themselves is, "Have we got sufficient power to do this," and if so, "Is it expedient to do it?"

(2) Treaties, too, what reliance can we place upon them for any length of time? None whatever. For treaties are only considered binding as long as the interests of both contracting parties remain the same. Directly circumstances change, and they change constantly, the most solemn treaties are torn up, as Russia tore up the Treaty of Paris, or as Austria tore up the Treaty of Berlin. All history is full of torn-up treaties. And as it has been so it will be. The European waste-paper basket is the place to which all treaties eventually find their way, and a thing which can any day be thrown into a waste-paper basket is, indeed, a poor thing on which to hang our national safety. Only in ourselves can we trust. Therefore no treaties at present existing should be allowed in any way to alter or lessen our preparations to enable us to fight alone when necessary.

(3) It cannot be too often repeated, or too much insisted on, that the success or failure of a State policy is dependent upon the amount of armed force behind it. For upon the amount of armed force behind a policy depends the greater or less amount of resistance, of friction, which that policy will meet with on the part of other nations. The prestige of a nation depends upon the general belief in its strength. The less its prestige, the more it will be checked and foiled by its rivals, till at last perhaps it is goaded into a war which would have been prevented if its prestige, or armed force, had been greater. On the other hand, the greater its prestige, its armed force, the more reasonable and inclined to a fair compromise are its rivals found. So that the greater the prestige, the armed force, of our nation is, the more likely is it that all our negotiations will be settled by peaceful compromise, and the longer we shall enjoy peace.

Therefore, under this consideration, those who would reduce our national forces are deeply mistaken, for such action would imperil our prestige, imperil our negotiations, imperil our peace, and perhaps lead eventually to a war that we might otherwise have avoided. Therefore no such deeply mistaken economy for us. A few hundred thousand pounds saved would be dear economy indeed if it led, as well it might, to the payment before many years of a War Indemnity of £800,000,000 or so. Better the evils we know than the far greater evils we know not of.

(4) Surprise in war is what we have to fear. There are two sorts of national surprise that we must consider. These are (A) the surprise by actual hostilities taking place before the actual declaration of war, such as the Japanese surprise and practical destruction of the fighting force of the Russian fleet at Port Arthur; (B) the surprise by superior preparation, silently carried out till all is ready for a decisive blow, whilst we are not ready for equally efficient defence, and then a declaration of war before we have time to get properly ready, as the surprise in this sense of France by Germany in 1870.

(A) Every successful example is always copied, and usually on a larger scale. We may be quite certain that our rivals have taken to heart the lesson of Port Arthur. It is possible that our next war will open with a similar night attack on our fleet, either just before, or simultaneously with the declaration of war. If it is successful, or even partially successful, it may produce the most grave results, as in the Russo-Japanese War. It may render possible a naval action with almost equal forces, in which our opponents might be victorious. The invasion of this country on a gigantic scale by 300,000 men or more would then follow as a certainty. This is not a probability, but a possibility which requires to be kept in our view.

(B) The surprise by superior preparation, as I term it, for want of a better name, is a danger to which we are peculiarly liable. As Lord Salisbury said, "The British constitution is a bad fighting machine," and it is made an infinitely worse fighting machine by the lack of interest which our politicians appear to take in all that appertains to war. Hence they are always liable to oppose, as excessive, preparations which are in reality the minimum consistent with national safety. Consequently our preparations for war, controlled as they are by those who have no special knowledge of war, are always apt to be insufficient, as were those of France in 1870. In former days this did not perhaps so very much matter, although it resulted in the unnecessary loss of hundreds of thousands of British lives and hundreds of millions of British treasure. But still we were able, at this somewhat excessive price, to "muddle through," owing to the heroic efforts of our soldiers and sailors to make bricks without straw and retrieve the mistakes of our policy. For our opponents then conducted war in such a slow way as to give us time to repair after the outbreak of war our lack of preparation before it. But opposed to a modern nation-in-arms, guided by statesmen and led by generals brought up in the school of Napoleon, Clausewitz, and Moltke​—​all will be different. In such a war the national forces brought into play are so immense that it is only possible to do so efficaciously if everything has been most carefully prepared and organized beforehand. It is not possible to improvise such organization of national force after the war has begun, for there cannot be sufficient time. If our rival makes adequate preparation before the war to bring to bear in that war the whole of its national force, material, moral, and physical, while we only prepare to bring to bear a small portion thereof, then there will be no time afterwards for us to repair our negligence. The war will be conducted with the utmost energy, and the aim will be to utilize to the utmost the superiority obtained by superior preparation, so as to make the decision as rapid as possible before we have time to recover from the effects of our surprise. That is the danger we have to fear, and to keep ever in mind.

[CHAPTER VIII]
WAR AS POLICY

"War," says Clausewitz, "is only a continuation of State policy by other means." The first question that at once arises in the mind is what is meant by Policy. We may safely lay down that State policy is the defence and furtherance of the interests of the nation as a whole amidst the play of the conflicting tendencies towards rest and towards acquisition, and that its instruments are the pen and the sword. There can, of course, be any degree of consistency or fickleness, of strength or weakness, of success or failure, in the policy of a State.

Clausewitz expressly stated that he hoped "to iron out many creases in the heads of strategists and statesmen," such, for instance, as the idea that it is possible to consider either policy or war as independent of the other.

It is only possible to obtain a proper conception of policy if we regard it as continuous both in peace and war, using sometimes peace negotiations, sometimes war negotiations, as circumstances require, to attain the political object.

War is only a part of policy, a continuance of the previous negotiations; but the instrument is now the sword and not the pen. As Clausewitz says, "In one word, the art of war, in its highest point of view, is policy; but no doubt a policy which fights battles instead of writing notes." War is merely a means whereby a nation attempts to impose its will upon another nation in order to attain a political object. This object is settled by policy, which also orders the war, determines what sort of war it is to be, with what means and resources and expenditure it is to be waged, when its object has been attained, and when it is to cease. In fact, policy prepares, leads up to, orders, supports, guides, and stops the war. As Clausewitz said, "All the leading outlines of a war are always determined by the Cabinet​—​that is, by a political, not a military functionary."

Unity of thought is only to be obtained by "the conception that war is only a part of political intercourse, therefore by no means an independent thing in itself." "And how can we conceive it to be otherwise? Does the cessation of diplomatic notes stop the political relations between different nations and governments? Is not war merely another kind of writing and language for political thoughts?" "Accordingly war can never be separated from political intercourse; and if, in the consideration of the matter, this is done in any way, all the threads of the different relations are, to a certain extent, broken, and we have before us a senseless thing without an object."

"If war belongs to policy, it will naturally take its character from policy. If the policy is grand and powerful, so will also be the war, and this may be carried to the point at which war attains to its absolute form." "Only through this kind of view war recovers unity; only by it can we see all wars of one kind, and it is only through it that the judgment can obtain the true and perfect basis and point of view from which great plans may be traced out and determined upon."

"There is upon the whole nothing more important in life than to find out the right point of view from which things should be looked at and judged of, and then to keep to that point; for we can only apprehend the mass of events in their unity from one standpoint; and it is only the keeping to one point of view that guards us from inconsistency." "We can only look at policy here as the representative of the interests generally of the whole community," and "wars are in reality only the expressions or manifestations of policy itself."

To the student of history this unity of conception is equally necessary, for it supplies the key to many a military puzzle. Without it we can never understand, for instance, Napoleon's conduct in 1812, 1813, 1814; nor without it can we see the compelling reason of many battles, apparently fought against military judgment, such, for instance, as Borodino, Leipzig, Sedan, etc. We have to remember that these and many other battles, as, for instance, Ladysmith, were fought from a political, not a military, motive. It is a well-known fact that the strategist frequently has to alter and adapt his plans so as to suit overmastering political necessity. Yet many people have failed to draw therefrom the generalization of Clausewitz that "war is only a continuation of State policy by other means." But having got it now, let us hold fast to it, with all its consequences.