Other sources of revenue that are enabling the Kaiser to pay for the war are Treasury Bills sold at home and a taxation that is moderate compared with the colossal pre-war taxation which spelled Germany's Preparedness. At the time I write this chapter her war expenditure had passed the $14,000,000,000 mark. Tack on to this Germany's peace debt of $5,000,000,000 more and you begin to see—with all the uncertainty of the war's duration—the immense burden that the Fatherland will have to carry. The war's drain on the German future is perhaps greater than that of any other country because all her war loans are long term. She has also loaned nearly $1,000,000,000 to Austria, Turkey and Bulgaria.
The Teutonic war cost has one distinct advantage over all others in that it is confined within the German borders. Hence Germany can do as she pleases with regard to its settlement. If the Mailed Fist obtains after the war she can clamp it down on her loans, wipe them out as she chooses and no one can offer a protest.
Now let us dump all these statistics that represent so much blood, agony and sacrifice into the middle of the table and strike a final balance sheet.
On one hand you have the assets of the warring countries as represented by their national wealth. For the Allies, including Roumania, they show a total of $273,000,000,000: for the Central Powers they register $134,000,000,000. If wealth is the winning factor then the Allies have the advantage in weight of buying metal.
Take the other side of the ledger and you see that up to November 1, 1916, the four principal allied countries, England, France, Russia and Italy, had spent on direct war cost approximately $34,000,000,000, while the total Teutonic war expenditures have been $21,000,000,000. To this actual war cost must be added the peace debts of the belligerent nations which would supplement the allied expense account by $17,465,000,000 and that of the enemy nations by $9,808,000,000.
Striking a grand total of liabilities, you find that if the war mercifully ends by August 1, 1917 (as Kitchener predicted it might), the fighting peoples would face a debt burden of all kinds that had reached $105,773,000,000.
After this colossal scale of expenditures you may well ask: Will it ever be possible for European finance to see straight or count normally again?
Be that as it may, no one can doubt that the battling nations, individually or with the marvellous team-work that kinship in their respective causes has begot, are able to pay their way while the struggle lasts. Grim To-day will take care of itself under the stress of passion born of desire to win. It is the Reckoning of that Uncertain To-morrow that will prove to be the problem.
You cannot bankrupt a nation any more than you can ruin an individual so long as brains and energy are available. Peace therefore will not find a ruined Europe but it will dawn on a group of depleted countries facing enormous responsibilities. War ends but the cost of it endures. Just as present millions are paying with their lives so will unborn hosts pay with the sweat of their brows.
Meanwhile our Financial Stake in the Great Struggle is secure. How much more we will have to put into Europe's Red Pay Envelope remains to be seen. In any event, we have learned how to do it.