And under such influences half the people of England, let us say—professors, business men, manufacturers, workingmen, heads of colleges, and dignitaries of the church, with nine-tenths of the army and navy, are agents, conscious or unconscious, of the British armament trust. The greater the stock of weapons, the newer and more varied the instruments of physical defense, the more pitiful and more persistent are the fears of invasion. A most striking example of the collective cowardice of a great but over-armed nation, made up of men individually brave, is found in the fear to open a tunnel under the British Channel. Every need of commerce, of travel, of the friendliness with France, demands the removal of a most unpleasant and expensive obstacle. Nowhere in the world is there tolerated another such stumbling block in the way of a gigantic traffic, as that of the present system of crossing the English Channel. And yet half of England cries out against the simple remedy, lest, having over-powered Northern France, the German hordes should come pouring into Dover, before the watchman at the portcullis should have time to drop the gates.
The triumph of the war trades in Germany has been even more rapid and complete than in Great Britain. By the system of interlocking directorates, the house of Krupp is in alliance with all centres of German finance. The army, the aristocracy, the ministry, the armament syndicates, are all bound together in that mailed-fist coöperation in which the power of Germany seems to lie. The King of Prussia himself inherited from his august grandfather stock in the Krupp concern to the amount of five million of thalers, an investment now estimated at about $12,000,000.
The House of Krupp by various means has placed itself at the summit of German war patriotism, and it has made most thrifty use of its opportunities. It employs 250,000 persons, 60,000 of these on salary; 5,000 engineers. It maintains, according to Delaisi, a great hotel, the Essenerhof, "l'Auberge de la Mort," in which are entertained most royally all emissaries of all nations who come as purchasing agents of tools of death. Its specialty is "National Defense," and "Defense not Defiance" is said to be the "international code signal."
In France "armor plate patriotism" is sustained by the same methods, and in part by the same money. The leading industries bear the names of Creusot, Homicourt, and Châtillon-Commentry. A special feature of the French system, not unknown to the others, is its free use of representatives of the army and navy. Some twenty admirals and generals have left the public service for the better paid work of selling guns and ships. This transfer of allegiance is said to be "perfectly legal," but it is also dangerous to the morale of the public service. And it is to these men that we owe most of the militant revival of French war patriotism, which had lain dormant from the time of the "Affaire Dreyfus," to that of the "Affaire Agadir."
As to the war-syndicates in the United States, little that is definite is on record. Like conditions produce like results. The Secretary of the Navy, Mr. Daniels, reports the existence of a combination among the three chief producers of armor plate in America, the Midvale, Bethlehem, and Carnegie Companies. He is reported as saying: "When this administration came into office, we found that the Navy was apparently, or, so we were assured, hopelessly, at the mercy of the three big steel corporations, who submitted practically identical bids for armor forgings and other materials, and then divided the work between them to suit themselves." As a result of this condition, the Secretary rejected their bids, and by going outside, recorded a saving of $500,000 on the battleship in question.
Behind the war traders, stand their allies, the finance houses who lend money for the war system. These are not bankers, rather pawnbrokers, dealing in the credit of nations for a certain per cent., according to the straits in which the borrower finds himself. The banking system of London avoids this class of risks. Paris is now the centre of the system, and it is usually stipulated with every foreign war loan that the materials it covers should be bought in Paris. In earlier times, before the great nations had borrowed to the limit, the heads of these finance houses as "Masters of Europe" exerted great personal influence, permitting or forbidding wars. Of recent years this personal power has greatly dwindled, as joint stock companies of greater capital and more or less impersonal management, have largely taken their place. The present influence of the money-lenders is against war, but in favor of the war system. Minor wars it permits or even encourages, but these have their risks. The second Balkan war, unforeseen and undesired, is said to have entailed a loss of some $30,000,000 to the Paris backers of Bulgaria.
Interlocking with the finance houses are the great exploiting corporations of the world, operating mostly in the backward nations of the tropics. These "interests" are often all-powerful in foreign affairs. They are frequently able to control the operations of the foreign offices to such a degree that the foreign policy of a great nation is often but the expression of their will. The desire for colonial expansion, the "mirage of the map," is a reflection of these interests, and most "imperial wars" have been undertaken for their benefit. Abundant illustrations may be had from the recent history of each of the leading nations. Civil wars in the tropics, as a rule, have their origin in conflicting interests of people remote from the field of battle.
Another factor supporting the war system is the hereditary aristocracy, waning in influence, but still powerful through its control of money, of the army, and of the Church. The profession of arms is almost the only one not unworthy of the caste of nobleman. The military constitutes the right arm of aristocracy; the state church, the left; while the monarch stands as the visible head. The leaders of official religion are, with many and honorable exceptions, upholders of the war system, and apologists for the "God of Battles." The dissenting churches, having no alliance with privilege, are almost as unanimously on the side of peace.