Holland and Switzerland would have done the same thing under similar circumstances, as would any other self-respecting nation. Moreover, what weight could Belgium attach to Germany's promise of immunity in case she yielded, when at the very moment Germany, by her own act, was demonstrating but too clearly how little she considered herself bound by her promise or indeed by a solemn international treaty?
What the Germans have accomplished on the battlefields, as well as within their own country, is proof of such great national qualities, that it compels the tribute of admiration, even from your enemies. These qualities would indeed have gone far to justify her claim to hegemony, had they not been linked unfortunately—at least among your ruling classes and intellectual leaders—with ways of thought and action which are anti-humanitarian, oppressive and generally intolerable to the rest of the world.
The theory of "frightfulness" in the conduct of warfare which Germany now preaches and practises is no new discovery. On the contrary it is a very ancient one—so old, in fact, that long ago it had come to be discarded and superseded in European warfare and passed into the limbo of forgotten things. There, until resurrected by your countrymen, it lay for generations, along with much else which the human race had overcome and left behind in the progress of culture and humanity—a progress achieved by strenuous toil, sacrifices and suffering in the course of many centuries.
Such words and ideas are met with contempt and derision by your spokesmen and termed mere phrases and sentimentality. If these are mere phrases then the whole upward struggle of the world for endless years past has been based upon and aiming at phrases and sentimentality.
I read recently an article in a German paper written by one of your professors of international law, in which he maintained, evidently quite unconscious of the incredible monstrosity of his logic, that, because the Russians in their invasion of East Prussia had acted like barbarians, you therefore had the unquestioned right, as a measure of reprisal, to bombard and destroy Oxford and Cambridge!
And what have you gained from your "frightfulness"? Your victories have been due to quite other qualities. By your "frightfulness" you have steeled your enemies to the utmost limit of sacrifice; you have embittered neutral opinion; you have disappointed and grieved your friends and "sown dragons' teeth," the offspring of which will arise against you many years even after the conclusion of peace.
How differently would you be judged now if you had tempered your mighty power with mercy and self-restraint; if with the consciousness and use of superior strength and ability you had coupled chivalry and generosity!
You say that Germany is the only great Power which has kept the peace for forty-four years, and made no conquest of territory of any kind by force of arms. It is pertinent to recall in reference to this statement, that in the course of these forty-four years Germany virtually by force has taken a strategically important piece of China, waged war against the Hereros and annexed colonies in Africa and in the Pacific (receiving in exchange for one of them the strategically most valuable island of Heligoland). Yet, speaking generally, the world is bound to recognize with gratitude and admiration that from 1871 to 1914 Germany has refrained from using her enormous military power in attempts at conquest.
Has she had cause to complain of the results of this wise and far-seeing policy?
During that comparatively short period of time she had grown more powerful than any other country. In the well-being of her people, in her wealth and prestige she had advanced and flourished as no other nation. Her industries, her merchant marine had brought her conquest and triumph unequalled in the world's economic history, which find a parallel only in the wonderful military achievements of the Napoleonic era.