The first point which emerges is that the reply of the Allied Governments to President Wilson (which afterwards furnished the text of his notification of Nov. 5, 1918, addressed to Germany), defining their interpretation of the references to Reparation in the Fourteen Points, was drawn up and approved at the same session of the Supreme Council (that of November 1, 2) which drew up the relevant clauses of the Armistice Terms; and that the Allies did not finally approve the reply to President Wilson until after that they had approved that very draft of the Armistice Terms which, according to the French contention, superseded and negatived the terms outlined in the reply to President Wilson.[97]
The record of the proceedings of the Supreme Council (as now disclosed) lends no support to the existence in their minds of the duplicity which the French contention attributes to them. On the other hand, it makes it clear that the Council did not intend the references to Reparation in the Armistice Terms to modify in any way their reply to the President.
The record, in so far as it is relevant to this point, may be summarized as follows:[98] M. Clemenceau called attention to the absence of any reference in the first draft of the Armistice Terms to the restitution of stolen property or to reparation. Mr. Lloyd George replied that there ought to be some reference to restitution, but that reparation was a Peace condition rather than an Armistice condition. M. Hymans agreed with Mr. Lloyd George. MM. Sonnino and Orlando went further and thought that neither had any place in the Armistice Terms but were ready to accept the Lloyd George–Hymans compromise of including Restitution but not Reparation. The discussion was postponed for M. Hymans to draft a formula. On its resumption next day, it was M. Clemenceau who produced a formula consisting of the three words Réparation des dommages. M. Hymans, M. Sonnino, and Mr. Bonar Law all expressed doubt whether this was in place in the Armistice Terms. M. Clemenceau replied that he only wanted to mention the principle, and that French public opinion would be surprised if there was no reference to it. Mr. Bonar Law objected: “It is already mentioned in our letter to President Wilson which he is about to communicate to Germany. It is useless to repeat it.”[99] This observation met with no contradiction, but it was agreed on sentimental grounds and for the satisfaction of public opinion to add M. Clemenceauʼs three words. The Council then passed on to other topics. At the last moment, as they were about to disperse, M. Klotz slipped in the words: “It would be prudent to put at the head of the financial questions a clause reserving the future claims of the Allies, and I propose to you the wording ‘without prejudice to any subsequent claims and demands on the part of the Allies.’”[100] It does not seem to have occurred to any of those present that this text could be deemed of material importance or otherwise than as protecting the Allies from the risk of being held to have surrendered any existing claims through failure to mention them in this document; and it was accepted without discussion. M. Klotz afterwards boasted that by this little device he had abolished the Fourteen Points, so far as they affected Reparation and Finance (although the very same meeting of the Allies had despatched a Note to President Wilson accepting them), and had secured to the Allies the right to demand from Germany the whole cost of the War. But I think the world will decide that the Supreme Council was right in attaching to these words no particular importance. Personal pride in so smart a trick has led M. Klotz, and his colleague M. Tardieu, to persist too long with a contention which decent persons have now abandoned.
There was an episode which has lately come to light connected with this passage which may be recounted as illustrating the pitfalls of the world. As M. Klotz only introduced his form of words as the Council was breaking up, it is likely that no undue attention was concentrated on it. But ill–fortune may dog any one, and the same state of affairs seems to have led to one of the scribes getting the words down wrong. Instead of revendication which means demand, the word renonciation which means concession got written in the text handed to the Germans for signature.[101] This word was not so suitable. But M. Klotz suffered less inconvenience from this mistake than might have been expected; since at the Peace Conference no one noticed that the French text of the Armistice Agreement as officially circulated, which M. Klotz used in arguing before the Reparation Committee, agreed in its wording with what he had intended it to be and not with the text which Germany had actually signed. Nevertheless it is the word renonciation which is still to be found in the official texts of the British and German Governments.[102]
2. The other line of argument raises more subtle intellectual issues and is not a mere matter of prestidigitation. If it be granted that our rights are governed by the terms of the Note addressed to Germany by President Wilson in the name of the Allies on November 5, 1918, the question depends on the interpretation of these terms. As Mr. Baruch and M. Tardieu have now published between them the greater part of the official reports (including very secret documents) bearing on the discussion of this problem during the Peace Conference, we are in a better position than before to assess the value of the Alliesʼ case.
The pronouncements by the President which were to form the basis of Peace provided that there should be “no contributions” and “no punitive damages,” but the invaded territories of Belgium, France, Rumania, Serbia, and Montenegro were to be restored. This did not cover losses from submarines or from air raids. Accordingly the Allied Governments, when they accepted the Presidentʼs formulas, embodied a reservation, on the point as to what “restoration” covered, in the following sentence: “By it (i.e., restoration of invaded territory) they understand that compensation will be made by Germany for all damage done to the civilian population of the Allies and to their property by the aggression of Germany by land, by sea, and from the air.”
The natural meaning and object of these words, which, the reader must remember, are introduced as an interpretation of the phrase “restoration of invaded territory,” is to assimilate submarine and cruiser aggression by sea and aeroplane and airship aggression by air to military aggression by land, which, in all the circumstances, was a reasonable extension of the phrase, provided it was duly notified beforehand. The Allies rightly apprehended that, if they accepted the phrase as it stood, “restoration of invaded territory” might be limited to damage resulting from military aggression by land.
This interpretation of the reservation of the Allied Governments, namely that it assimilated offensive action by sea or air to offensive action by land, but that “restoration of invaded territory” could not possibly include pensions and separation allowances, was adopted by the American Delegation at Paris. They construed the German liability to be in respect of the “direct physical damage to property of non–military character and direct physical injury to civilians”[103] caused by such aggression; the only further liability which they admitted being under a different part of the Presidentʼs pronouncements, namely, those relating to breaches of International law, such as the breach of the Treaty of Neutrality in favor of Belgium, and the illegal treatment of prisoners of war.
I doubt if any one would ever have challenged this interpretation if the British Prime Minister had not won a General Election by promises to extract from Germany more than this interpretation could justify,[104] and if the French Government also had not raised unjustifiable expectations. These promises were made recklessly. But it was not easy for their authors to admit, so soon after they had been given, that they were contrary to our engagements.