CHAPTER II
GERMAN ACTIONS CANNOT BE JUSTIFIED ON THE PLEA OF REPRISALS
The Plea of Reprisals
Violations of the law of nations and, still more, acts of cruelty committed in war, have almost always escaped punishment properly so called. The victim usually finds himself powerless to exact retribution for them. Only one course is permitted to him: that of reprisals, by which he counters acts of violence with other acts of violence. His aim, therefore, is not vengeance: the point is to compel the enemy to keep to what is permissible, through fear of penalties to which he will be exposed if he persists in wrongdoing. Reprisals may frequently involve great violence, but one rule is universally admitted—that they never justify acts of cruelty properly so called. Amongst the latter are the massacre of women and children, mutilation, cunningly devised torture, etc. Two other principles are likewise admitted as regards reprisals, to wit—
(1) that the severity of reprisals must not be out of proportion to the gravity of the offence.
(2) that in cases where the offence has been committed by individual non-combatants, reprisals must not be inflicted on their fellow-citizens, as the aggrieved army has its legitimate remedy under what is called martial law. Now the Germans have violated this rule and these principles.
Reprisals and the Germans
On many occasions the Germans have had recourse to the plea of reprisals to justify acts of violence committed by them. We shall show that this plea is a misuse of terms. One of the excuses which they have most frequently put forward is that civilians have taken part in the war, in Belgium, in France, in Poland. But the question of the civilian population taking part in military operations is bound up with the question of francs-tireurs, which Germany wanted to solve to suit herself and which will occupy our attention later on. Let us here point out one thing—that the circumstances under which, even according to the German version of events, civilians have taken part in the war, are very often quite enough to condemn Germany. For example, Herr de Bethmann-Hollweg, the Imperial Chancellor, thought he could persuade the whole world of the innocence of the German soldiers, whose admitted excesses, so far as Louvain was concerned, were due, he said, to the fact that the young girls of the town had gouged out the eyes of the German soldiers. Let us assume the Chancellor’s good faith in making such a statement. Assuredly he cannot have supposed that this happened in many instances or that it went so far as a general execution. It can only have been reported to him, and he can only have been induced to believe it as an exceptional act. It is not of the nature of such an act, alike from the cruelty which it assumes in women and from the difficulty of carrying it out, to be repeated often, and this is the reason for destroying a town, burning Louvain and pillaging the whole country. “A plea of self-defence like this,” said M. Hanotaux, “by itself gives you a picture of the German soul.”
German Slanders which Attempt to Disguise Cruel Acts of the Imperial Troops as Reprisals
All the other excuses of the Germans are of the same kind. Their very weakness proves that they are slanders. For example, Germany has endeavoured to spread in foreign countries, and especially in Switzerland, a rumour to the effect that people on their way back from enemy countries who had stopped in France, and also Swiss subjects, had been ill-treated by the French authorities. The object of this grotesque report was obviously to forestall charges under the same heading which would fall on Germany, and to prepare the public opinion of the world to think that charges outstanding against them were cancelled by the necessity of resorting to reprisals for acts committed in France. The Swiss newspapers did not fail to denounce the German manœuvre. To show the extent to which the policy of lying was being carried, the Journal de Genève published a letter from the Swiss Consul at Besançon, giving the highest praise to the manner in which Germans and Austrians had been treated in France.
Moreover, of what value can these slanders be when, on the other hand, documentary evidence proves that the French authorities have behaved to the Germans with an excess of indulgence. It is certain, at least, that nowhere in France has any hatred been shown to the prisoners. Even prisoners of war have been most energetically protected by the heads of the army against the passions of crowds. On this head here is a note which a French general, Commandant at Angers, addressed to the newspapers of this town—