Germany and the Next War

by Friedrich von Bernhardi

So long as we live under such a State system as at present, the German Imperial Chancellor certainly hit the nail on the head when he declared, in his speech in the Reichstag on March 30, 1911, that treaties for arbitration between nations must be limited to clearly ascertainable legal issues, and that a general arbitration treaty between two countries afforded no guarantee of permanent peace. Such a treaty merely proved that between the two contracting States no serious inducement to break the peace could be imagined. It therefore only confirmed the relations already existing. "If these relations change, if differences develop between the two nations which affect their national existence, which, to use a homely phrase, cut them to the quick, then every arbitration treaty will burn like tinder and end in smoke."

It must be borne in mind that a peaceful decision by an Arbitration Court can never replace in its effects and consequences a warlike decision, even as regards the State in whose favour it is pronounced. If we imagine, for example, that Silesia had fallen to Frederick the Great by the finding of a Court of Arbitration, and not by a war of unparalleled heroism, would the winning of this province have been equally important for Prussia and for Germany? No one will maintain this.

The material increase in power which accrued to Frederick's country by the acquisition of Silesia is not to be underestimated. But far more important was the circumstance that this country could not be conquered by the strongest European coalition, and that it vindicated its position as the home of unfettered intellectual and religious development. It was war which laid the foundations of Prussia's power, which amassed a heritage of glory and honour that can never be again disputed. War forged that Prussia, hard as steel, on which the New Germany could grow up as a mighty European State and a World Power of the future. Here once more war showed its creative power, and if we learn the lessons of history we shall see the same result again and again.

If we sum up our arguments, we shall see that, from the most opposite aspects, the efforts directed towards the abolition of war must not only be termed foolish, but absolutely immoral, and must be stigmatized as unworthy of the human race. To what does the whole question amount? It is proposed to deprive men of the right and the possibility to sacrifice their highest material possessions, their physical life, for ideals, and thus to realize the highest moral unselfishness. It is proposed to obviate the great quarrels between nations and States by Courts of Arbitration—that is, by arrangements. A one-sided, restricted, formal law is to be established in the place of the decisions of history. The weak nation is to have the same right to live as the powerful and vigorous nation. The whole idea represents a presumptuous encroachment on the natural laws of development, which can only lead to the most disastrous consequences for humanity generally.

With the cessation of the unrestricted competition, whose ultimate appeal is to arms, all real progress would soon be checked, and a moral and intellectual stagnation would ensue which must end in degeneration. So, too, when men lose the capacity of gladly sacrificing the highest material blessings—life, health, property, and comfort—for ideals; for the maintenance of national character and political independence; for the expansion of sovereignty and territory in the interests of the national welfare; for a definite influence in the concert of nations according to the scale of their importance in civilization; for intellectual freedom from dogmatic and political compulsion; for the honour of the flag as typical of their own worth—then progressive development is broken off, decadence is inevitable, and ruin at home and abroad is only a question of time. History speaks with no uncertain voice on this subject. It shows that valour is a necessary condition of progress. Where with growing civilization and increasing material prosperity war ceases, military efficiency diminishes, and the resolution to maintain independence under all circumstances fails, there the nations are approaching their downfall, and cannot hold their own politically or racially.

"A people can only hope to take up a firm position in the political world when national character and military tradition act and react upon each." These are the words of Clausewitz, the great philosopher of war, and he is incontestably right.

These efforts for peace would, if they attained their goal, not merely lead to general degeneration, as happens everywhere in Nature where the struggle for existence is eliminated, but they have a direct damaging and unnerving effect. The apostles of peace draw large sections of a nation into the spell of their Utopian efforts, and they thus introduce an element of weakness into the national life; they cripple the justifiable national pride in independence, and support a nerveless opportunist policy by surrounding it with the glamour of a higher humanity, and by offering it specious reasons for disguising its own weakness. They thus play the game of their less scrupulous enemies, just as the Prussian policy, steeped in the ideas of universal peace, did in 1805 and 1806, and brought the State to the brink of destruction.

The functions of true humanity are twofold. On the one hand there is the promotion of the intellectual, moral, and military forces, as well as of political power, as the surest guarantee for the uniform development of character; on the other hand there is the practical realization of ideals, according to the law of love, in the life of the individual and of the community.

It seems to me reasonable to compare the efforts directed towards the suppression of war with those of the Social Democratic Labour party, which goes hand in hand with them. The aims of both parties are Utopian. The organized Labour party strives after an ideal whose realization is only conceivable when the rate of wages and the hours of work are settled internationally for the whole industrial world, and when the cost of living is everywhere uniformly regulated. Until this is the case the prices of the international market determine the standard of wages. The nation which leaves this out of account, and tries to settle independently wages and working hours, runs the risk of losing its position in the international market in competition with nations who work longer hours and at lower rates. Want of employment and extreme misery among the working classes would inevitably be the result. On the other hand, the internationalization of industries would soon, by excluding and preventing any competition, produce a deterioration of products and a profound demoralization of the working population.

The case of the scheme for universal peace is similar. Its execution, as we saw, would be only feasible in a world empire, and this is as impossible as the uniform regulation of the world's industries. A State which disregarded the differently conceived notions of neighbouring countries, and wished to make the idea of universal peace the guiding rule for its policy, would only inflict a fatal injury on itself, and become the prey of more resolute and warlike neighbours.