This is a totally new state of things in comparison with 1870, when Germany was still an agrarian country and had, moreover, a free supply on all her frontiers.
Can the French Government allow a considerable portion of their own population actually to starve, or be obliged to emigrate to other parts of France, there to live the life of nomads at the expense of England, while the deserted provinces are given over to desolation?
The idea prevails here that the French will compel their Government to enter on and conclude a separate treaty of peace when the fatal consequences of the war begin to assume this awful guise. England does not appear to have considered that this would be the result of her system of blockade.
The German conditions of peace as regards France will be governed by two principal factors with respect to their chief issues.
The first is the complete unanimity of the Emperor and the Chancellor that no population, not speaking German, will be incorporated in the German Empire, or obtain representation in the Diet. Germany already has sufficient trouble with the foreign element now present in the Diet. Consequently there can be no question of any considerable acquisition of territory from France, but the demands of Germany simply extend to the iron-ore fields of Lorraine, which are certainly of considerable value. For France these mining fields are of far less consideration than for Germany, whose immense iron trade is far more in need of the iron mines.
The second factor is that the Germans, owing to the strong public opinion, will never consent to Belgium regaining her liberty. The Chancellor of the Empire has, as long as it was possible, been opposed to the annexation of Belgium, having preferred, even during hostilities, to have re-established the Belgian Kingdom. It is significant that the military authorities have prohibited the German press from discussing the question of the future of Belgium. It is evident that there has prevailed a wish to leave the question open in order to insure a solution offering various possibilities. But subsequent to the discovery of the Anglo-Belgian plot, as previously stated, all idea of reinstating Belgium has been discarded.
The annexation of Belgium, however, makes it possible to grant France less stringent conditions. So long as Belgium—under some form of self-government—is under German sway there is no hope of revenge of France, and the conviction prevails here that after this war France will abstain from her dreams of aggrandizement and become pacific. Germany can then make reductions in the burdens laid on her people for military service by land.
To arrange the position of Belgium in relation to Germany will be a very interesting problem for German policy.
It is obvious that the annexation of Belgium cannot be defended from the point of view of the principle of nationality. The Belgians—half of them French, half of them Flemish—undoubtedly deem themselves but one nation. As a mitigating circumstance in favor of the annexation it is urged—above and beyond the intrigues carried on by Belgium with the English—that Belgium, in days of yore, for a long time formed a portion of the German Empire, and that the inhabitants of the little country, to a considerable degree, gain their livelihood by its being a land of transit for German products. Nationally, the annexation is not to be defended, but geographically, economically, and from a military point of view it is comprehensible.
At the east front of the central powers very different conditions prevail. Austria has no desire to make the conquest of any territory; indeed, just the contrary, would probably be willing to cede a portion of Galicia in favor of new States. Germany has not the slightest inclination to incorporate new portions of Slav or Lettish regions. Both Germans and Austrians wish to establish free buffer States between themselves and the great Russian Empire.