Armageddon—And After

by W. L. Courtney

An Aggressive Policy

And now let us watch this policy in action in recent events. In 1897 Germany demanded reparation from China for the recent murder of two German missionaries. Troops were landed at Kiao-chau Bay, a large pecuniary indemnity of about £35,000 was refused, and Kiao-chau itself with the adjacent territory was ceded to Germany. That was a significant demonstration of the Emperor's determination to make his country a world-power, so that, as was stated afterwards, nothing should occur in the whole world in which Germany would not have her say. Meanwhile, in Europe itself event after event occurred to prove the persistent character of German aggressiveness. On March 31, 1905, the German Emperor landed at Tangier, in order to aid the Sultan of Morocco in his demand for a Conference of the Powers to check the military dispositions of France. M. Delcassé, France's Foreign Minister, demurred to this proposal, asserting that a Conference was wholly unnecessary. Thereupon Prince Bülow used menacing language, and Delcassé resigned in June 1905. The Conference of Algeçiras was held in January 1906, in which Austria proved herself "a brilliant second" to Germany. Two years afterwards, in 1908, came still further proofs of Germany's ambition. Austria annexed Bosnia and Herzegovina. Russia immediately protested; so did most of the other Great Powers. But Germany at once took up the Austrian cause, and stood "in shining armour" side by side with her ally. Inasmuch as Russia was, in 1908, only just recovering from the effects of her disastrous war with Japan, and was therefore in no condition to take the offensive, the Triple Alliance gained a distinct victory. Three years later occurred another striking event. In July 1911 the world was startled by the news that the German gunboat Panther, joined shortly afterwards by the cruiser Berlin, had been sent to Agadir. Clearly Berlin intended to reopen the whole Moroccan question, and the tension between the Powers was for some time acute. Nor did Mr. Lloyd George make it much better by a fiery speech at the Mansion House on July 21, which considerably fluttered the Continental dovecots. The immediate problem, however, was solved by the cession of about one hundred thousand square miles of territory in the Congo basin by France to Germany in compensation for German acquiescence in the French protectorate over Morocco. I need not, perhaps, refer to other more recent events. One point, however, must not be omitted. The issue of the Balkan wars in 1912 caused a distinct disappointment to both Germany and Austria. Turkey's defeat lessened the importance of the Ottoman Empire as an ally. Austria had to curb her desires in the direction of Salonica. And the enemies who had prevented the realisation of wide Teutonic schemes were Servia and her protector, Russia. From this time onwards Austria waited for an opportunity to avenge herself on Servia, while Germany, in close union with her ally, began to study the situation in relation to the Great Northern Empire in an eminently bellicose spirit.

Militarism

Now that we have the proper standpoint from which to watch the general tendency of events like these, we can form some estimate of the nature of German ambition and the results of the personal ascendancy of the Kaiser. We speak vaguely of militarism. Fortunately, we have a very valuable document to enable us to understand what precisely German militarism signifies. General von Bernhardi's Germany and the Next War is one of the most interesting, as well as most suggestive, of books, intended to illustrate the spirit of German ambition. Bernhardi writes like a soldier. Such philosophy as he possesses he has taken from Nietzsche. His applications of history come from Treitschke. He has persuaded himself that the main object of human life is war, and the higher the nation the more persistently must it pursue preparations for war. Hence the best men in the State are the fighting men. Ethics and religion, so far as they deprecate fighting and plead for peace, are absolutely pernicious. Culture does not mean, as we hoped and thought, the best development of scientific and artistic enlightenment, but merely an all-absorbing will-power, an all-devouring ambition to be on the top and to crush every one else. The assumption throughout is that the German is the highest specimen of humanity. Germany is especially qualified to be the leader, and the only way in which it can become the leader is to have such overwhelming military power that no one has any chance of resisting. Moreover, all methods are justified in the sacred cause of German culture—duplicity, violence, the deliberate sowing of dissensions between possible rivals, incitements of Asiatics to rise against Europeans. All means are to be adopted to win the ultimate great victory, and, of course, when the struggle comes there must be no misplaced leniency to any of the inferior races who interpose between Germany and her legitimate place in the sun.[3] The ideal is almost too naïve and too ferocious to be conceived by ordinary minds. Yet here it all stands in black and white. According to Bernhardi's volume German militarism means at least two things. First the suppression of every other nationality except the German; second the suppression of the whole civilian element in the population under the heel of the German drill-sergeant. Is it any wonder that the recent war has been conducted by Berlin with such appalling barbarism and ferocity?

[3] Germany and the Next War, by F. von Bernhardi. See especially Chap. V, "World-Power or Downfall." Other works which may be consulted are Professor J.A. Cramb's Germany and England (esp. pp. 111-112) and Professor Usher's Pan-Germanism.

The Evils of Autocracy

Our inquiry so far has led to two conclusions. We have discovered by bitter experience that a personal ascendancy, such as the German Emperor wields, is in the highest degree perilous to the interests of peace: and that a militarism such as that which holds in its thrall the German Empire is an open menace to intellectual culture and to Christian ethics. But we must not suppose that these conclusions are only true so far as they apply to the Teutonic race, and that the same phenomena observed elsewhere are comparatively innocuous. Alas! autocracy in any and every country seems to be inimical to the best and highest of social needs, and militarism, wherever found, is the enemy of pacific social development. Let us take a few instances at haphazard of the danger of the personal factor in European politics. There is hardly a person to be found nowadays who defends the Crimean war, or indeed thinks that it was in any sense inevitable. Yet if there was one man more than another whose personal will brought it about, it was—not Lord Aberdeen who ought to have been responsible—but Lord Stratford de Redcliffe. "The great Eltchi," as he was called, was our Ambassador at Constantinople, a man of uncommon strength of will, which, as is often the case with these powerful natures, not infrequently degenerated into sheer obstinacy. He had made up his mind that England was to support Turkey and fight with Russia, and inasmuch as Louis Napoleon, for the sake of personal glory, had similar opinions, France as well as England was dragged into a costly and quite useless war. Napoleon III has already figured among those aspiring monarchs who wish "to sit in the chair of Europe." It was his personal will once more which sent the unhappy Maximilian to his death in Mexico, and his personal jealousy of Prussia which launched him in the fatal enterprise "à Berlin" in 1870. In the latter case we find another personal influence, still more sinister—that of the Empress Eugénie, whose capricious ambition and interference in military matters directly led to the ruinous disaster of Sedan. The French people, who had to suffer, discovered it too late. "Quicquid delirant reges plectuntur Achivi." Or take another more recent instance. Who was responsible for the Russo-Japanese war? Not Kuropatkin, assuredly, nor yet the Russian Prime Minister, but certain of the Grand Dukes and probably the Tsar himself, who were interested in the forests of the Yalu district and had no mind to lose the money they had invested in a purely financial operation. The truth is that modern Europe has no room for "prancing Pro-consuls," and no longer takes stock in autocrats. They are, or ought to be, superannuated, out of date. To use an expressive colloquialism they are "a back number." The progress of the world demands the development of peoples; it has no use for mediæval monarchies like that of Potsdam. One of the things we ought to banish for ever is the horrible idea that whole nations can be massacred and civilisation indefinitely postponed to suit the individual caprice of a bragging and self-opinionated despot who calls himself God's elect. Now that we know the ruin he can cause, let us fight shy of the Superman, and the whole range of ideas which he connotes.