The Fruits of Victory / A Sequel to The Great Illusion

by Norman Angell

‘And so,’ adds the writer, ‘it is impossible and absurd to accept the theory of Mr. Norman Angell.’

Now that theory was, not that Germany and others would not fight—I was very insistent indeed that[26] unless there was a change in European policy they would—but that war, however it might end, would not solve the question. And that conclusion at least, whatever may be the case with others, is proved true.

For we have had war; we have beaten Germany; and those million babies still confront us. The German population and its tendency to increase is still there. What are we going to do about it? The War has killed two million out of about seventy million Germans; it killed very few of the women. The subsequent privations of the blockade certainly disposed of some of the weaker among both women and children. The rate of increase may in the immediate future be less. It was declining before the War as the country became more prosperous, following in this what seems to be a well-established rule: the higher the standard of civilisation the more does the birth-rate decline. But if the country is to become extremely frugal and more agricultural, this tendency to decline is likely to be checked. In any case the number of mouths to be fed will not have been decreased by war to the same extent that the resources by which they might have been fed have been decreased.

What do we propose to Germany, now that we have beaten her, as the means of dealing with those million babies? Professor Starling, in a report to the British Government,[27] suggests emigration:—

‘Before the War Germany produced 85 per cent. of the total food consumed by her inhabitants. This large production was only possible by high cultivation, and by the plentiful use of manure and imported feeding stuffs, means for the purchase of these being furnished by the profits of industry.... The loss to Germany of 40 per cent. of its former coal output must diminish the number of workers who can be maintained. The great increase in German population during the last twenty-five years was rendered possible only by exploiting the agricultural possibilities of the soil to the greatest possible extent, and this in its turn depended on the industrial development of the country. The reduction by 20 per cent. in the productive area of the country, and the 40 per cent. diminution in the chief raw material for the creation of wealth, renders the country at present over-populated, and it seems probable that within the next few years many million (according to some estimates as many as fifteen million) workers and their families will be obliged to emigrate, since there will be neither work nor food for them to be obtained from the reduced industries of the country.’

But emigration where? Into Russia? The influence of Germans in Russia was very great even before the War. Certain French writers warn us frantically against the vast danger of Russia’s becoming a German colony unless a cordon of border States, militarily strong, is created for the purpose of keeping the two countries apart. But we should certainly get a Germanisation of Russia from the inside if five or ten or fifteen million Germans were dispersed therein and the country became a permanent reservoir for those annual million babies.

And if not Russia, where? Imagine a migration of ten or fifteen million Huns throughout the world—a dispersion before which that of the Jews and of the Irish would pale. We know how the migration from an Ireland of eight millions that could not feed itself has reacted upon our politics and our relations with America. What sort of foreign problems are we going to bequeath to our children if our policy forces a great German migration into Russia, or the Balkans, or Turkey?

This insistent fact of a million more or less of little Huns being born into the world every year remains. Shall we suggest to Germany that she must deal with this problem as the thrifty householder deals with the too frequent progeny of the family cat?

Or shall we do just nothing, and say that it is not our affair; that as we have the power over the iron of Lorraine and Morocco, over the resources of Africa and Asia, over the ocean highways of the world, we are going to see that that power, naval and military, is used to ensure abundance for ourselves and our friends; that as for others, since they have not the power, they may starve? Vae victis indeed![28]

Just note what is involved. This war was fought to destroy the doctrine that might is right. Our power, we say, gives us access to the wealth of the world; others shall be excluded. Then we are using our power to deny to some millions the most elemental of all rights, the right to existence. By the economic use of our military power (assuming that military power is as effective as we claim) we compel some millions to choose between war and penury or starvation; we give to war, in their case, the justification that it is on behalf of the bread of their children, their livelihood.