Broadly speaking, the machinery of modern warfare adds a thousand-fold to the potentiality of the soldier in battle above his potentiality at the time of the Civil War.
Ten thousand men, armed with modern guns and all the paraphernalia of modern warfare, would on the battle-line be more than a match for a million men armed with the old smooth-bore guns of the Civil War. As a matter of fact they could kill all that surrounded them as fast as they approached from every quarter, and they could advance through the opposing lines with absolute freedom without the loss of a single man from the fire of the enemy.
Let us see for one moment what ten thousand men would be able to do upon such a host in open frontal attack: Let us assume that the ten thousand were armed with a thousand automatic guns, and, say, a hundred rapid-fire field-guns, in addition to the usual magazine shoulder-rifle. As soon as the enemy came in sight, the ten thousand would open on them with their hundred field-guns, pouring into their ranks a perfect storm of shrapnel. The old, smooth-bore field-guns of the enemy would be completely disabled before they could be brought within cannon-shot of the ten thousand. As soon as the enemy came within rifle range, the ten thousand would open on them with their thousand automatic machine-guns and magazine-rifles. As an automatic machine-gun fires at the rate of 600 shots a minute, a thousand would fire at the rate of 600,000 shots a minute. The magazine shoulder-rifles would fire aimed shots at the rate of twenty-five a minute, and the quick-firing field-guns would each fire shrapnel at the rate of forty a minute. Making every allowance for stoppages and for variables, dispersion of fire and bad marksmanship, there would be enough effectual hits with the shrapnel, the automatic machine-gun fire, and the magazine-rifle fire, to kill or wound every man of the enemy before that enemy could get near enough to reach the ten thousand with their old smooth-bore muskets.
Every automatic gun and every quick-firing field-gun and every magazine shoulder-rifle puts in the hands of our soldiers the means of avoiding a corresponding sacrifice of their lives. Not only this, but every automatic gun that we make and furnish our troops enables one man to do the work of a hundred men; it enables a hundred men to remain at home engaged in peaceful pursuits while only one man has to go to the battle front and fight.
Then let us realize the fact that every automatic gun saves a hundred lives from jeopardy. Every magazine-rifle saves ten lives, and every quick-firing field-cannon saves easily a hundred lives.
This should make a strong appeal to the professional pacifists who pretend that they want to save life. Surely, if war cannot be prevented, and all history, and the present moment as well, prove that it cannot, then we should make it as merciful as possible, and fight it in a way that will cause as little sacrifice of life as possible.
In estimating the cost of war in human lives, we cannot count values that may be placed upon them by sentiments of humanity, but only such values as, when destroyed, make the losing nation economically so much the poorer.
According to I. S. Bloch, a new-born child of the farming class has a value of twenty-five dollars. At five years of age, he has a value of two hundred and fifty dollars; at ten years of age, he is worth about five hundred dollars; at fifteen, he is worth almost a thousand dollars; and at twenty, he is worth a little more than a thousand dollars. His maximum value is at twenty, and he begins to depreciate in value as he grows older, because of his shortened days of service.
Therefore, the average economic value of soldiers may, according to Mr. Bloch, be put at a thousand dollars.
According to David Starr Jordan, it costs about fifteen thousand dollars for each soldier killed in battle, so that, according to these two eminent peace advocates and peace propagandists, when the Germans slay, say, a thousand of the Allies, the loss to the Allies is the value of the thousand men, namely, a million dollars, and as it costs the Germans fifteen times as much to kill them as they are worth, the loss to the Germans is fifteen million dollars; so that the actual German loss is fifteen times as great as that of the Allies. But as the Allies are killing a good many Germans, they are generously sharing with the Germans a fair proportion of the cost of the war.