Ordeal by Battle

by Frederick Scott Oliver

THE BLOOD TAXES

For several years past the country had been watching a conspicuous example of this ingrained habit of manoeuvring round the Army in order to obtain party advantage. From 1912 onwards, until more interesting perplexities provided a distraction, a great part of the Liberal press and party had been actively engaged in the attempt to fix the Unionist party with responsibility for the proposals of the National Service League. The Opposition, it is hardly necessary to record, were innocent of this charge—criminally innocent; but it was nevertheless regarded as good party business to load them with the odium of 'conscription.' The 'blood-taxes,' as it was pointed out by one particularly zealous journal, would be no less useful than the 'food-taxes' as an 'election cry,' which at this time—more than ever before—appeared to have become the be-all and end-all of party activities.

It was obvious to the meanest capacity that these industrious politicians were not nearly so much concerned with the demerits, real or supposed, of National Service, as with making their opponents as unpopular as possible. In such an atmosphere of prejudice it would have required great courage and determination in a statesman to seek out and proclaim the true way to security, were it national service or anything else which entailed a sacrifice.

Was it wonderful that when people examined the signs of the times in the early part of 1913, they should have found themselves oppressed by feelings of doubt and insecurity? A huge German military increase; a desperate French effort in reply; war loans (for they were nothing else) on a vast scale in both countries—what was the meaning of it all? To what extent was British safety jeopardised thereby?

To these questions there was no answer which carried authority; the official oracles were dumb. We are a democratic country, and yet none of our rulers had ever yet spoken plainly to us. None of the Secretaries for War, none of the Prime Ministers since the beginning of the century, had ever stated the issue with uncompromising simplicity, as the case required. None of them had ever taken the country into his confidence, either as to the extent of the danger or as to the nature of the remedy. It is necessary to assume—in the light of subsequent events—that these statesmen had in fact realised the danger, and were not ignorant of the preparations which were required to forestall it. Certainly it is hard to believe otherwise; but at times, remembering their speeches and their acts, one is inclined to give them the benefit, if it be a benefit, of the doubt.

BRITAIN AND EUROPEAN INTERESTS

The question at issue was in reality a graver matter than the security of the United Kingdom or the British Empire. The outlook was wider even than this. The best guarantee for the preservation of the peace of Europe, and of the World, would have been a British army proportionate to our population and resources. There could be no doubt of this. For half a century or more we had, half unconsciously, bluffed Europe into the belief that we did in fact possess such an army; but gradually it had become plain that this was not the case. Since the Agadir incident the real situation was apparent even to the man in the street—in Paris, Berlin, Brussels, the Hague, Vienna, Rome, and Petrograd—in every capital, indeed, save perhaps in London alone.

If England had possessed such an army as would have enabled her to intervene with effect in European affairs, she would almost certainly never have been called upon to intervene.[[2]] Peace in that case would have preserved itself. For Europe knew—not from our professions, but from the obvious facts, which are a much better assurance—that our army would never be used except for one purpose only, to maintain the balance of Power. She knew this to be our only serious concern; and, except for the single nation which, at any given time, might be aiming at predominance, it was also the most serious concern of the whole of Europe. She knew us to be disinterested, in the diplomatic sense, with regard to all other European matters. She knew that there was nothing in Europe which we wished to acquire, and nothing—save in the extreme south-west, a rock called Gibraltar, and in the Mediterranean an island called Malta—which we held and were determined to maintain. In the chancelleries of Europe all this was clearly recognised. And more and more it was coming to be recognised also by the organs of public opinion on the Continent.

The population of France is roughly forty millions; that of Germany} sixty-five millions; that of the United Kingdom, forty-five millions. As regards numbers of men trained to bear arms, France by 1911 had already come to the end of her resources; Germany had still considerable means of expansion; Britain alone had not yet seriously attempted to put forth her strength. Had we done so in time the effect must have been final and decisive; there would then have been full security against disturbance of the peace of Europe by a deliberately calculated war.

Europe's greatest need therefore was that Britain should possess an army formidable not only in valour, but also in numbers: her greatest peril lay in the fact that, as to the second of these requirements, Britain was deficient. No power from the Atlantic seaboard to the Ural Mountains, save that one alone which contemplated the conquest and spoliation of its neighbours, would have been disquieted—or indeed anything else but reassured—had the British people decided to create such an army. For by reason of England's peculiar interests—or rather perhaps from her lack of all direct personal interests in European affairs, other than in peace and the balance of power—she was marked out as the natural mediator in Continental disputes. In these high perplexities, however, it is not the justice of the mediator which restrains aggression, so much as the fear inspired by his fleets and the strength of his battalions.