Surely the first and crying need is to effect a redistribution of these organic chemical forces. This, indeed, is the one solid chemical disarmament measure which can and must he brought about.
The certain establishment of these industries in the chief countries outside Germany must be fixed far beyond the hazard of local politics and the reach of organised German attack. True, it is essential that no such support should in any way drug the will, weaken the initiative and impoverish the service of the fostered industries. This must depend upon wise organisation and control in the country concerned.
I claim, however, that it is one of the main duties of any League of Nations or other organisation dealing with disarmament to proceed two steps beyond the paragraph in Article 8 of the Covenant. This runs as follows: "The members of the League undertake to interchange full and frank information as to the scale of their armaments, their military, naval, and air programmes, and the conditions of such of their industries as are adaptable to warlike purposes." Such an exchange of information must be used, first, to isolate that industry which is of a vital or key nature to the armament of the period, either on account of its value as a universal check, or because it fosters some particularly deadly new type of weapon or aggressive agent. The chemical industry at present fulfils both conditions, for without it, all weapons except the bayonet become silent, and it includes the organic chemical industry which fosters the deadly weapon of the period.
Secondly, rational disarmament must prevent the existence of monopoly in this critical industry. It may be objected that we are interfering with the play of ordinary economic laws. But we must face the possibility that the war of the future can never be averted without such interference. Indeed, if we accept the reports of the American Alien Property Custodian, this very monopoly which now threatens us was established by methods open to the same objections. It is indeed an interesting question whether the German dye monopoly resulted from forces which directly opposed the play of economic law. Further, the question is not so simple as it appears, for, in the industries which disarmament most concerns, governing technical changes are constantly occurring, and the normal home for the production of a whole range of chemical products may be shifted by a change of process which demands new raw materials or new types of energy and power. We must be ready, in certain critical cases, to regard disarmament as the paramount need. International agreement, through the League or otherwise, must find a suitable method to control the critical industry and prevent its use against world peace.
To be the ardent possessor of an ideal, to be its official guardian, does not allow us to ignore the technical aspect of an international and national issue. After our gigantic praiseworthy, but wasteful, attempts at chemical armament, let us at least disarm on rational lines.
CONCLUSION
THE TREATY AND THE FUTURE
I have endeavoured to present the facts of chemical warfare as briefly yet as truly as possible, giving a glimpse of the war possibilities inherent in this branch of applied chemical science. Nor have I ignored the hidden forces which inspired, stimulated, and supported the huge war chemical experiment. The great Rhine factories of the I.G. still cast their shadow on the outer world, obscuring the issues of reconstruction. This looming menace, its share in the past and future of chemical warfare, and the fatal growth of the latter present questions demanding an imperative answer. It is the weak point of world disarmament.
The Treaty of Versailles answers the riddle in principle, but have the actual clauses been unfulfilled?
Article 168 demands the limitation of munitions production to factories or works approved by the Allied and Associated Governments. "All other establishments for the manufacture of any war material whatever shall be closed down."