-3.9. Class _jJ_jLi Book CoTjyriglrt!^'" C70PH?IGHT DEPOSIT. COLLAPSE AND RECONSTRUCTION COLLAPSE AND RECONSTRUCTION EUROPEAN CONDITIONS AND AMERICAN PRINCIPLES BY SIR THOMAS BARCLAY w AUTHOR OF "PROBLEMS OF INTERNATIONAL PRACTICE AND DIPLOMACY" "NEW METHODS OF ADJUSTING INTERNATIONAL DISPUTES AND THE FUTURE," ETC. M6M.k^t:£Mn ^WVAD'OIS BOSTON LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY 1919 ^ -'1 Copyright, 1919, By Ljttle, Brown, and Company. All rights reserved NortDooti VirM Set up and electrotyped by J. S. Cushiag Co., Norwood, Mass., U.S.A. ©CI.Ar)l555 7 MAY kQ 1^19 PREFACE It would be pretentious to offer in a short and single volume more than suggestions on so vast a subject as the political reconstruction of a Europe which the continuance of the War beyond any prac- tical purpose but destruction has shattered to its foundations. It is futile now to express regrets that those in power turned a deaf ear to the warnings of others who had at any rate some knowledge of Central Europe, Russia and the Balkans, — to warnings as to the probable consequences of the break-up especially of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, or of indifference to the aspirations of the Russian prole- tariat, or to the meaning of social democracy and — as they are likely to do now — to the danger of relying on superannuated and imperfect sources of information and methods for dealing with many unprecedented problems. If Western Governments had not had their eyes concentrated on Berlin, they might have under- stood, as all who know Central Europe politically understand, that if the overtures of February, 1915, from Vienna had been followed up, the War might have come to an end just as it did with the Austrian collapse in 1918, without bringing down on the heads of all the scaffolding of a state system laboriously built up by generation after genera- tion of experienced craftsmen and resting on geo- vi PREFACE graphical and historical foundations which it is beyond the power of any congress of peace to alter. Empires might have been preserved whicli, what- ever their faults, were in process of transformation and were better working political entities than any cut-and-dried schemes of state formation now on the horizon are likely to become except by a process of evolution which will probably bring us back eventually to something very like what has been destroyed. A historian and thinker like President AYilson, a careful observer like INI. Jules Cambon, a political sceptic — in spite of his apparent optimism — like Mr. Lloyd George, may exercise a restraining influ- ence on the impetuosity of those who think the problems of constructive politics can be solved by efforts of imagination or the paper schemes of in- genious draftsmen. I have followed in the distribution of the subject- matter a system I have adopted in other books to the satisfaction of my readers, — that of confining the text of the chapter to controversial matter and shimting digression, historical and other, into special notes which are consequently sometimes longer than the text of the chapter itself. The principles laid down by President Wilson have been accepted by both sides to the conflict as peace preliminaries. They are mutually binding ami constitute for the time being the basis of reconstruc- tion. Anybody writing at present on the subject has no option but to treat them as such. T. B. CONTENTS FAOB PREFACE V CHAPTBR INTRODUCTION 1 Note: On Imperial Violation of German Constitution 15 I. PAST AND PRESENT 18 Note: President Wilson's Proposition as Accepted by the Allies . . 26 n. FOREIGN POLICY 32 Note : On Public Opinion and Foreign Policy in England .... 42 Note : On Interest of British Press on Foreign Policy .... 42 Note : On Germany's and Russia's Geograph- ical Situation 43 III. DIPLOMACY, SECRET TREATIES AND NEGOTIATIONS .... 45 Note: Inviolability of Treaties; Sugges- tions FOR Addition to the Agree- ment OF 1871 54 Note: Suggested Agreement as Regards Secret Treaties and Clauses . 55 rV. EVOLUTION OF UNITED STATES' FOR- EIGN POLICY .... 58 Note: On Panama Canal .... 77 Note: On the Mexican Policy ... 85 viii CONTENTS CHAPTEB PAGE V. EQUALITY OF TRADE CONDITIONS . 88 Note: On "Open-Door" Policy ... 93 Note : European Resources of Iron Ore . 97 Note : On the State of British Trade Lm- MEDIATELY BEFORE THE WaR . . 99 Note: On Effect of " Most-Fa voured-Na- tion" Clause in Cojimercial Treaties 100 Note: On Russia and Poland . . . 108 Note: On Rumania, Serbia and Monte- negro 112 Note: Treaty and Military Convention BETWEEN Rumania and the Entente Powers 118 VI. COLONIAL EXPANSION 126 Note: On Consequences; England's Posi- tion AS A Mother of Nations . 134 VII. CONQUEST AND ANNEXATION . . .135 Note: On Language as a Political Ques- tion 140 Note: On Alsace-Lorraine .... 142 Note: On "Readjustment of the Frontiers of Italy" 152 Vm. FREEDOM OF NAVIGATION . . .158 Note: On Immunity from Capture of Pri- vate Property in Naval War . 166 IX. AR^L\MENTS 178 Note: Suggested Clauses Respecting Na- tionalisation of Production of Material of War .... 185 CONTENTS ix CHAPTER PAGE X. LAW OF NATIONS 186 Note: On Preambles to Different Inter- national Conventions Relating TO War and Peace .... 190 Note: Memorandum of a Scheme for the Promotion of Law and Justice among Nations by Education . 195 XI. NEUTRALISATION 202 Note: Suggested Form of Agreement as to Proclamations of Neutralisation 210 Note : On Some of the German Theories Respecting Neutralisation and Its Guarantees 213 Note: On Buffer Zones .... 222 Xn. THE HAGUE COURT AND ITS POTEN- TIALITIES 225 Note: Draft Suggestions of a Convention FOR Improved Organisation of Hague Conferences . . . 247 XIII. BALANCE OF POWER AND FEDERATION 251 Note : On the Problem of Austria-Hungary 253 Note: On the Ottoman Empire . . . 256 Note : Allies' Agreement Relating to Con- stantinople AND THE Straits and for Partition of Asia Minor . 260 Note: On the Question of Asia Minor . 261 Note: On Imperial Federation and India . 263 XIV. A SOCIETY (OR LEAGUE) OF NATIONS . 269 XV. AMERICA'S MISSION 305 Note : Some Extracts from President Wil- son's Messages (January to April, 1917) 312 COLLAPSE AND RFXON- STRUCTION INTRODUCTION The task which the World's War ^ has imposed upon statesmen is not only one of reconstruc- tion, it is one of reconstruction on such a plan that it will eliminate as far as possible causes of war in the more immediate future. The pretentious for- mula of a "War to end War" is not based on knowl- edge we possess from experience either psychological, sociological or historical. If, however, the "War to end War" is pretentious, the duty of statesmen will none the less be to redeem the failure of their own generation and approach the future with a ^ I call the war World's War because it is the English rendering of Guerre Mondiale, itaelf probably derived from the German term Welt- krieg; neither term is based on English or French analogies. If the term Seven Years' War had not already taken a place in history, it might have lK;en applicable to the present war, the origin of which historians will probably date back to September, 1911, the date of the outbreak of the Turco-Italian War, since when the continuity of causa- tion has been unbroken. It may come to be called the Great War, but if other wars arise almost immediately out of it, as is possible if any settlement is attempted which is not sincerely democratic or based on geographical and economic necessity, historians may revert to the time- honoured method of calling it after the years of its duration. « COLLAPSE AND RECONSTRUCTION sense of the responsibility they have incurred towards posterity. The duration of peace, however, is dependent rather upon a simultaneous advance of the reason- ableness of mankind than upon any artifices of statesmen and diplomatists. I say simuliani'ouit because just as the slowest ship makes the pace of a fleet, so the most back- ward nation in the comnnmity of nations makes the pace of civilisation. But even assuming a relatively high degree of civilisation in any one State, the majority may be easily swayed by circumstances, oratory, prejudice, their mental balance disturbed by over-education, the rectitude of their vision vitiated by tradition and the different influences which determine the character of groups of mankind just as they do that of individuals. INloreover, those who get possession of power and direct a national policy may be ignorant persons who have entered political life owing to connections with those already in possession or inexperienced persons who, having had to perform absorbing menial func- tions in politics for the sake of a living, have had no experience outside their own parliament or its pur- lieus and whose training has been one of obedience to the initiative of others. These necessarily form the majority in an administration recruited from any parliament. The game of diplomacy, again, is often practically one of irritation and counter-irritation disguised in INTRODUCTION 8 courteous language. Foreign Offices are generally too absorbed by immediate and proximate details to observe clouds gathering on the horizon. None, I may say in this connection, worked harder than the British Foreign Office to avert the crisis when it burst upon them. It is neither just nor expedient to blame men in office when such a crisis arises. If subject for Vjlame there is, let it apjply to a system which has persisted in all European countries in spite of the criticism of able and experienced men who have lacked, however, the numbers and prestige to overturn a superannuated system of dealing with foreign affairs. President Wilson's notes and messages drew European attention to the difference of the American method but did not at once win approval. Some European critics treated the American method as mere cabotinage and it is only gradually that Euro- peans have begun to understand that in America foreign policy is not regarded as involving quite a different set of democratic considerations from domestic policy, in reference to which, in all self- governing countries, a government must be and remains in constant touch with the people it affects. Then again wars are gambles of nations. The States which embark on them believe they will be successful ; otherwise we must assume they would not so act. They are seldom unpopular. They appeal to the spoliative instincts of mankind because they are in the nature of gambling, and if statesmen and writers 4 COLLAPSE AND RECONSTRUCTION criminal enough to encourage war are not always condemned as they ought to be, they are not dis- tinguishable from abettors of gambling hells in a well-ordered couununity except in the scale of the enormity of the offence. And war has the effect on men's minds of all great emotions. It seems to paralyse the power to reason. The contagion of belligerent emotion, more- over, is not confined to the belligerent States; it is almost as intense among neutral nations who watch the game, and carry on a "war of opinion", almost as active as if they were parties to the struggle. The expectation that war will fall into desuetude with the growth of popidar wisdom and of the consciousness that its consequences are not ad- vantageous to the majority may therefore not be realised, and it is safer to assume that it will not, and take precautions accordingly. It is true that it was a commonplace before the War to speak of a European conflict as sooner or later inevital^le. The state of tension in Europe bad become unendurable. Industrial life was being vitiated by the prevailing imrest : the margin of speculation had grown far out of its natural pro- portion. The air was charged with tense and aggressive currents of feeling, and when war broke out it came almost as a relief — like a thunder clap after a period of enervating, sultry, storm- threatening weather. Yet postponement of what seems an inevitable event in the history of nations opens up a variety INTRODUCTION 5 of possibilities. Circumstances may change, other solutions may occur to statesmen, diplomatists, publicists, politicians ; a reaction may set in, the tide of public opinion may turn, new afi&nities may grow up, a common cause may arise. And thus wars may be avoided by mere patience and steady, untiring (effort on the part of those in charge of the destiny of nations. It will be for the future historian when he has ac- cess to all the available material still hidden from the public eye to form a dispassionate opinion as to whether statesmen, and which of them, failed ; where the system, if any, broke down ; what were the causes of the poor quality currently attributed to contemporary statesmanship. All the sciences, even astronomy,' may have a voice in the solution of its greatest problem, which, after all, is why the War took place at all. Meanwhile, those who have to deal not with history but with construction will have to build wdth the materials they possess, insufficient as they may be. If they sincerely wish to secure a period of peace for posterity they will, nevertheless, have to search for causes beyond the immediate occasion of the War, for the underlying tendencies which preceded it and distinguish between the inflammable material and the igniting flame and endeavour to counteract the revival of situations which have proved so disastrous to mankind. A perusal of the diplomatic records issued by the * See Professor Raphael Dubois' studies. 6 COLLAPSE AND RECONSTRUCTION different Foreign Offices leaves the reader under the impression that the War had no justification whatsoever. We see in it England and Russia making the most strenuous efforts to preserve peace, France playing the part of a resigned associate of both, ready to take consequences of acts to which she was not a party, Belgium the victim of unp^'ovoked aggression, Germany trying, down to a point, to preserve peace, then vaguely quarrelling with Russia, and Austria, on the eve of a settlement of the originating grievance, aghast at the course being taken by events she had started. In the whole tangle of diplomatic despatches and appeals, there is nothing which can be singled out as a matter justifying war except the violation of the neutralisa- tion of Belgium, which came rather as a consequence than as a cause of the War. Hence the bewildered anxiety with which the Foreign Offices of the bel- ligerents all tried to exonerate their respective governments from liability for a war which they alleged with equal emphasis all round they had been doing their utmost to avoid. A number of unofficial writers have endeavoured to explain how and why the War came about and much ingenuity has been exercised to gather from the different official books evidence of the guilt of the different parties involved. It was the Russian mobilisation, says Germany, which brought on the calamity. It was Germany, say England and France, who, impatient not to let the chance of war escape, hurried into it while Austria-Hungary, Russia and Serbia were still negotiating a settlement INTRODUCTION 7 and had practically come to terms. It was Eng- land, again say later German authorities, who might have prevented the war by exercising influ- ence at Petrograd. By not doing so, while at the same time protesting her devotion to peace, she played once more her old double-faced game and is really the guilty party, and so on. These attempts to saddle blame on each other are interesting features for the historian in them- selves. It is possible that diplomacy did fail. It is also possible that more than one Government involved did not bring the maximum of effort to bear on the preservation of peace. It is possible again that there were arriere-pensees ^ considerations of a compensating character, which brought con- solation for failure in the effort to preserve peace. The different objects which have been put for- ward by responsible persons, such as the annihila- tion of militarism in Germany, the destruction of British maritime supremacy and other ideas only show that writers are still groping for reasons. Among tendencies antecedent to the War, it may, however, be remembered that the German nation had drifted into a state of great irritability through constant appeals to its patriotism, appeals without which the necessary taxation for increasingly heavy expenditure on armaments would probably have appeared to the German people and their repre- sentatives unjustifiable. The Morocco incidents, especially the Agadir affair, excited Germans, as I know from personal experience, to such demon- 8 COLL.\PSE AND RECONSTRUCTION strative anger that in 1911 war was only prevented through the direct action of the Kaiser himself. The Germans felt that their enormous and well- trained army and their expensive and efficient fleet had not saved them from a humiliating diplomatic defeat at the hands of a country they believed them- selves capable of crushing in a six weeks' campaign. The intervention of England in 1911 had been a warning, but the circumstances in 1914 were dif- ferent. It was currently stated that England was no longer pledged to support France after she had come into possession of her stake under the arrange- ment of 1904. In these circumstances, the absten- tion of England was expected. Germany, however, had forgotten that if she had her grievances against England, England was in a state of similar irrita- bility owing to the constant increase of the German navy and the intimations of German writers re- corded by excitable English writers that the object of these increases was to dispute British supremacy at sea. As regards other countries, in France a certain number of wild young patriots and unwise older ones thought that to excite German hostility was good sport. As a fact, however, France is involved in the War only through her alliance with Russia, and as regards Russia herself, it is difficult to see what problem, difficulty or ambition it was possible to solve or realise by a war, whatever its result, unless djTiastic objects were concerned, and in that case the German declaration of war may have been a prolongation of the life of a tottering dynasty. INTRODUCTION 9 Still, while actual facts warranting recourse to war are conspicuously absent, the War has brought tendencies, feelings and ambitions to the surface which are now so strongly marked that they can only be accounted for by the assumption that they have been accumulating energy while in a more or less latent condition. This would explain the extra- ordinary popularity of the War not only in Germany, but in England and even in France and, if I am rightly informed, at the beginning also in Russia and Italy. I do not, in saying this, mean to suggest that the War might not have been averted or that it is less a calamity because it appealed to dififerent national sentiments. As between Germany and England it has been waged with an animosity so unprecedented that one must look for explanation elsewhere than in the more or less factitious hatred begotten of war in general. On the German side, it has made thinkers whose processes of thought have influenced the mind of man throughout the world belie their intellectual independence and assume a hostile attitude towards a nation whose whole polity stands for those rights of independence and justice which most of them have themselves championed. Among the Anglo-Saxons, it has taken the form of "black- guarding" the enemy in a manner quite foreign to their traditions of chivalry and sport.^ ' In a country of voluntary service, allowance must of course be made for the fact that appeals for recruiting purposes are necessarily highly coloured and that many newspapers actuated by the patriotic desire to increase the multitude of our fighting forces may not have exer- 10 COLLAPSE AND RECONSTRUCTION Fortunately for civilisation and for the good name of England and America these exaggerations of language were not translated into action and the tradition and spirit of their armies in spite of, per- haps on account of, its mainly civilian character, remained as chivalrous and sportsmanlike as ever. The object of war being to bring it to its own conclusion, the shorter it is the less inconvenience it causes to the commimity and the less ultimate slaughter and suffering to the forces engaged. Unless the sources from which it can be sustained are paralysed and the trade and profit-earning resources of a nation ci'ippled so that the war can strike at the national revenue, money will flow into the treasury and the fighting can continue. The civilian, in general, claims relative exemption from the evils of war and efforts have been made by humanitarians to attenuate the evils of war for him; but in every war he is indignant at having to suffer at all from its effects. With the develop- ment of the interdependence of nations and the universal adoption of national military service the civilian becomes more and more involved in its consequences, and the prospects are that he will become rather more than less a victim of them. \Mien a duel is fought the seconds stand watch- incr everv thrust and parrv to prevent the antag- onists in the excitement of the fight from violat- ing the rules of combat. But for their vigilance, cised all tlie discrimination they would use in peace time in the selection of their news. INTRODUCTION 11 the combatants are exposed to losing their self- control and disregarding the rules. In war the neutrals are the seconds. In this War the seconds have not been strong enough to call the combatants to order and eventually have joined in it themselves. Thus we have had a melee in which the thin voice of impotent onlookers has only been a source of further irritation to combatants, smarting from wounds and the more angry because they felt their own inability to recover their reason. International law, in so far as it treats of war, is essentially the work of neutrals. In time of peace all are potential neutrals and owing to this much of international law has been codified by agreement and these agreements, however much they have been violated, are still acknowledged by belligerents to be binding upon the parties to them. Subject to these agreements publicists try to ascer- tain what the practice is and endeavour to bring it into such harmony with European morals as the character of war permits. This was the method of Grotius at a time not unlike the present, when war as ruthless as that of the World's War was devastating Central Europe. When his famous book appeared in 1625, the war was ten years old and had still twenty to run. The memory of the atrocities, cruelty and extortions of the League has descended to posterity and still brands with infamy the names of Wallenstein and Tilly. They excited the indignation of the man- kind of that age, and Grotius, subject of a neutral State, produced his famous book as a revolt against 12 COLLAPSE AND RECONSTRUCTION the ruthlessness of these military commanders. The more humane and generous Gustavus Adolphus approved this attempt to attenuate the horrors of war. The sack of Magdeburg, the burning of the city, and the massacre of twenty thousand of its citizens some six years after the appearance of "De Jure BelH ac Pacis", however, show, as in the recent War, how Httle respect commanders in the field have for the requirements of law and humanity. To deal effectively with the problems involved in the consideration of terms of peace calculated to avert danger of war in the future, the public must constantly bear in mind that a distinction exists between the causes and the occasions of war. I repeat this, not because I claim to be the discoverer of what is obvious when attention is drawn to it, but because a whole system proposed for insuring the world against the repetition of similar catastrophes is based upon the prevention of occasions of war instead of upon removal of the causes of war. The failure of the peace movements of a generation of civilised mankind, in fact, is due to concentration of eft'ort on arbitration and other methods of dealing with incidents of inter- national trouble and not with causes. It seems hardly necessary to labour a point on which all pathology is based, and statesmen, in dealing with the life and polity of mankind, can only follow with safety the analogies of individual human Ufe. INTRODUCTION 13 In the endeavour to deal with causes the states- men of the respective negotiating nations will do well to give their adversaries credit for equally sincere desires to do their best for their own coun- tries. They are all subject to suspicion of each other's objects, all necessarily more or less ignorant of each other's difficulties and all in charge of under- takings involving knowledge, capacity and a sense of responsibility out of proportion to any they have been able to attain in an official or political career. They are subject to fits of alarm and panic like other human beings, and just as subject to nervous breakdown and hysteria. For the discussion of the conditions of permanent peace, even patriotism is a disqualification if com- bined with ignorance of the subtle influences exer- cised by the physical, social, historical and indus- trial circumstances of different countries on the minds of their peoples and statesmen. Assuming that the primary object of negotiations for peace is the attainment of a peace which will have as permanent a character as the foresight of living men can achieve, the following principles seem calculated to serve as a basis of effort for its attainment : 1. The avoidance of solutions which create or which will or may be reasonably expected to create a national grievance or grievances present or future ; 2. The avoidance of solutions which may reason- ably be regarded as having a humiliating character ; 3. Consideration for reasonable claims of any 14 COLLAPSE AND RECONSTRUCTION State which do not essentially curtail the reasonable realisation by another State of its geographical and economic requirements. On these principles the analysis of the situation to which the present book is devoted will more or less be based. NOTES TO INTRODUCTION Note on Imperial Violation of German Constitution The apparently cynical effrontery of the German Declaration of War to France reminded one at first sight of the provocation of the Capulets. It read : "The German administrative and military authorities have established a certain number of flagrantly hostile acts committed on German territory by French military aviators. Several of these have openly violated the neutrality of Belgium by flying over the territory of that country ; one has attempted to destroy buildings near Wesel ; others have been seen in the district of the Eifel ; one has thrown bombs on the railways near Carlsruhe and Niirnberg. "I am instructed and I have the honour to inform Your Excellency, that in presence of these acts of aggres- sion the German Empire considers itself in a state of war with France in consequence of the acts of this latter Power." Louis XIV would have said : " C'est mon bon plaisir, " but there was a reason for this nonsense not very flatter- ing to the political intelligence of those to whom it was addressed. The Imperial Constitution (Reichs-Verf as- sung) provides (Article 11) that the Emperor "declares war and concludes peace in the name of the Empire." "For the declaration of war, however, the consent of 16 COLLAPSE AND RECONSTRUCTION the Imperial Council (Bundesrat) is requisite, except in ease of attack on imperial territory or on the coast." Article 63 adds that the whole armed force of the Empire, in time of war as in time of peace, is under the orders of the Emperor. It is not without significance, therefore, that the denial, later on, that any bombs were thrown near Niirnberg or elsewhere in Bavaria came from the country whose concurrence in the War was thus forced. Note on Diplomacy during the War With the progress of the War the presence in it, as regards Germany, of Russia became as accidental as the Austro-Hungarian quarrel with Serbia. Her war was with Austria-Hungary. With the latter she was carry- ing on practically an independent though parallel war, in spite of Germany having been the first to throw down the gauntlet. It soon became obvious that both Russia and Austria-Hungary were likely to have enough internal difficulties to occupy them at home to negative any effec- tive cooperation as partners of the Western belligerents. In the diplomacy of the War, the question for the Western belligerents thus came to be whether the loss of Russian cooperation would not be more than amply compensated by the effect of the collapse of Austria- Hungary on the German ability to continue the struggle. Hence, probably, the persistent refusal of France, Eng- land, and Italy to listen to repeated overtures to enter into separate negotiations with Austria-Hungary which might have brought the War to an end as early as February, 1915. Whether the diplomacy of the Allies was well-consid- ered, judicious or based on accurate knowledge of the state of Central Europe, it is premature to discuss. All that INTRODUCTION 17 can meanwhile be said is that judging by impending possible consequences it seems probable that they would have been less fatal in all the belligerent countries, if peace had been made before the calamities of war had undermined the foundations of modern European polity. CHAFTER I PAST AND PRESENT *'TiiE past and the present are in deadly grapple and the peoples of the world are being done to death between them," said President Wilson in his speech delivered at the tomb of Washington on Jnly 4. 1018. lie hud just before stated: "There must now be settled once for all what was settled in America in the great age upon whose inspiration we draw to-day." Washington and his associates had con- sciously planned that ""men of every class should be free", and the President summed up the ultimate goal of American intervention in the words : "What we seek is the reign of law based on the consent of the governed." In the view of America's spokesman, if I read his ditl'erent utterances aright, the recent War has not been a war for social betterment. It was a war for political betterment. Nobody would deny that Germany possesses an elementary education, meth- ods of promoting research, and a variety of inter- mediate stages affording means for the develop- ment of the individual which other nations may PAST AND PRESENT 19 envy. Nor would anybody deny that Germany's efforts to cope with pauperism and disease have been a subject of admiration to the whole world of experts in such matters. Nor would anybody even deny that German statesmen, and first among them Kaiser William II himself, have strenuously and unremittingly sought to give every German his share in the comforts of life, and, in short, that the German people, under the fostering influence of an efficient and conscientious government before they were plunged into war, enjoyed, along with an extraordinary prosperity, social welfare appre- ciated universally. But what boots all this prosperity and social welfare if enjoyed under a system that by a stroke of the pen can cast all the progress of generations into a whirlpool of devastation; that, by merely turning a handle, can open the sluices and sweep away in a flood of bloodshed not only the work of our own age, but that created by the toil, art and wisdom of our forefathers ; that can jeopardise not only prosperity and social welfare at home but overwhelm in an artificial catastrophe nation after nation, bringing ruin, misery and mourning into the homes of all mankind ! The Kaiser, in a speech delivered a few days (June 16) before that of the President from which I have quoted above, contrasted civilisation based on two different Weltanschauung en — the German principle which seeks to promote the virtue and value of the individual and the Anglo-Saxon which leaves the individual at the mercy of its capitalist 20 COLLAPSE AND RECONSTRUCTION ruler. With tlie unconsciousness of the ''benefi- cent tyrant" he did not see the real issue. He did not seem to know that the Anglo-Saxons have borrowed, and gratefully so, much in the realm of social progress from Germany and that the present struggle is not against Germany, nor against his or their social j^rinciples, but is against a system of which he has the misfortune to be the presiding genius.^ That I take to be the President's message to the German people, to whom America comes as a saviour as nuich as to the rest of Europe. The enemy of all mankind, of universal man, is the power to destroy. That power to destroy belongs to the past. All arbitrary power to let loose the forces of destruction left to rulers and governments is a survival of periods when wars were waged in the interest of dynasties and peoples were slaughtered for causes in which they had no concern ; of an age when might was the only right respected as between sovereign and sovereign. Populations then, as pieces on a chessboard, were moved about as suited the fancy of the players, diplomacy laid its plans with deceit on its lips, and governments acted as if they were not bound in their relations with ^ Under the heading "O^ipt^ition of the German Government : Friend- ship towanl the German Pix^ple" see Fre.sident's me&sage to Congress, April i. 1917 : "W> are, let me say again, the sincere friends of the German People, and shall desire nothing so much as the early re^stablishment of intimate relations of mutual advantage between us — however hard it may be for them, for the time being, to believe that this is spoken from our hearts. We have borne with their present Government through all these bitter months because of that friendship — exercising a patience and forbearance which would otherwise have been impossible." PAST AND PRESENT 21 each other to respect their engagements and act honourably, but as if they were Hcensed to prostitute the noblest names and qualities in the service of objects long since banished from intercourse among civilised individuals. These are the things America had entered the "death-grapple" to exterminate. A close examination of the fourteen points laid down by President Wilson in his address of January 8, 1918, reaffirmed in the four of that of July 4, 1918, and the five of that of September 27, 1918,^ reveals several underlying principles which may be considered as constituting the foundation of the President's programme. This programme the Allies have adopted with one reservation in its entirety. That reservation referred to in Mr. Lansing's reply to Germany of November 5, 1918, relates to the second of the President's four- teen points. In the same letter a principle has been added, viz. : that of compensation for damage done to civilian property. A synthesis of the points is therefore indispensable to the proper understanding of the matters, ques- tions and problems of peace. As enunciated in the fourteen and completed in the others they may be summed up as follows : 1. No secret international agreements (1 — also one of the five) ; 2. Freedom of the sea and its channels (2, 12 — subject to reservations referred to in Mr. Lansing's letter of November 5th) ; * See Notes to the present chapter. President Wilson's principles and Mr. Lansing's letter confirming their adoption by the Allies. 22 COLLAPSE AND RECONSTRUCTION 3. Most favoured nation treatment to be general- ised (3 — also one of the five) ; 4. Restriction of armaments (4) ; 5. Acquiescence of populations in all matters affecting sovereignty over them (5, 6 — also one of the four) ; 6. Abolition of the "right of conquest" (7, 8, 11 — also among both the four and the five) ; 7. Access to the sea a right of all States (11, 13) ; 8. All States as settled by the Treaty of Peace to be guaranteed an equal right to their independence and integrity (14 — also among the four) ; 9. Racial homogeneity of population to be a ground of adjustment of frontiers (9, 12).^ These I take to be the principles which have been agreed to as such by the Allies. Details are matters for negotiation, and by details I mean the appli- cation to each individual case of such of the prin- ciples as expediency warrants or dictates. Thus, principle Number 5 may in some instances conflict with principle Number 9 ; Number 3 may not always tally with Number 8, some of them may not be capable of universal application. Nevertheless they ^ The President distinguishes between "must" and "should", and the first six points, those of general application, he gives as "heads" only. Belgium "must" be evacuated, but of "French territories" he says the invaded portions "should" be restored and the wrong done to France in 1871 in the matter of Alsace-Lorraine "should" be righted. Of Italian, Slav, Rumanian, Serbian, Montenegrin. Polish and other claims he uses the same conditional "should." Even of the permanent opening of the Dardanelles to the ships ;md trade of all nations ho uses it. Of the Society of Nations he states it " must " be formed. PAST AND PRESENT 23 constitute the main lines on which it has been promised to European democracy a resettlement of Europe shall be based. Alongside these pledges of the governments of the Allies to the democracies of the world there are necessarily generalisations or principles ^ to which all political effort is as subject as surgery is to nature. I have picked out some such generalisations or principles which seem to apply to present circum- stances and submit them for consideration. They are as follows : 1. The movable or changeable yields to the immutable; therefore, in a conflict between racial and geographical considerations, the latter neces- sarily prevail; 2. Natural boundaries are such as offer the mini- mum of obstacles to their preservation as such ; there- fore navigable rivers, being highways of commerce, do not afford the requisites of natural boundaries ; 3. An independent State is entitled to enjoy ^ If of any practical value at all principles are at best general- isations, but the use to which they are generally put in politics is that which appears, for the time being, to be in the interest of those whose action they seem to justify. Louis Blanc, a man of sincere devotion to principles, writing of the intervention of France in Spain in 1823, in spite of its cruelty and reac- tionary character, said, "lorsque un gouvernement croit representer une cause juste, qu'il la fasse triompher partout oil le triomphe est possible; c'est plus que son droit, c'est son devoir." ("Histoire de dix Ans," Edition de 1846, t. I, p. 112.) He was in the middle of a period when cosmopolitanism and inter- nationalism were forces of reaction against three powerful autocracies which sought to determine the destinies of Europe. His principle was just as handy a weapon for the one side as for the other. 24 COLL.VPSE AND RECONSTRUCTION the ooiisequonccs of its indopciuloiice, such as territorial inviohibiUty, its right to determine its own form of government, its right of diplomatic and consular representation, and its right generally to share in the international intercourse of the world, subject only to qualifications dictated by other principles {\\\ independent States are in- ternational persons and entitled to exercise their rights on terms of equality with other States) ; 4. A State which is dependent on other States for revenue lacks an element of independence; 5. A State without free access to the sea is dependent on its neighbors and lacks an element of independence ; 6. A State enjoys its right of participation in pacific international intercourse subject to its ob- servance of its contractual obligations and of the principles of humanity, honour and social and commercial integrity regarded as essential in the conduct of individuals. All these principles are necessarily subject to an axiom which is self-evident. It constitutes an ele- ment of permanency. I venture to state it and its corollaries in the following propositions : Evolution of Slates is subject to the general processes of evolution and implies adjustment of organisms to environment and a coalescing of apposite tissues. Checking evolution in progress may bring about unforeseen, undesirable and possibly disastrous consequences. PAST AND PRESENT 25 Racial, industrial, traditional and political im- pulses within any State in course of time have always yielded to each other. Compromise is a conscious acceptance of such natural adjustment of tendencies. Preference should therefore be given, ceteris 'pari- bus and where it works without violent resistance, to the status quo. NOTES TO CHAPTER I President Wilson's Proposition as Accepted by THE Allies The fourteen points of January 8, 1918, were : 1. Open covenants of peace, openly arrived at, after which there shall be no private international understand- ings of any kind but diplomacy shall proceed always frankly and in the public view. 2. Absolute freedom of navigation upon the seas, out- side territorial waters, alike in peace and in war, except as the seas may be closed in whole or in part by inter- national action for the enforcement of international covenants. 3. The removal, so far as possible, of all economic barriers and the establishment of an equality of trade conditions among all the nations consenting to the peace and associating themselves for its maintenance. 4. Adequate guarantees given and taken that national armaments will be reduced to the lowest point consistent with domestic safety. 5. A free, open-minded, and absolutely impartial adjust- ment of all colonial claims, based upon a strict observance of the principle that in determining all such questions of sovereignty the interests of the populations concerned must have equal weight with the equitable claims of the government whose title is to be determined. 6. The evacuation of all Russian territory and such a settlement of all questions affecting Russia as will PAST AND PRESENT 97 secure the best and freest cooperation of the other nations of the world in obtaining for her an unhampered and un- embarrassed opportunity for the independent determina- tion of her own poHtical development and national policy and assure her of a sincere welcome into the society of free nations under institutions of her own choosing; and, more than a welcome, assistance also of every kind that she may need and may herself desire. The treat- ment accorded Russia by her sister nations in the months to come will be the acid test of their good will, of their comprehension of her needs as distinguished from their own interests, and of their intelligent and unselfish sympathy. 7. Belgium, the whole world will agree, must be evacu- ated and restored, without any attempt to limit the sover- eignty which she enjoys in common with all other free nations. No other single act will serve as this will serve to restore confidence among the nations in the laws which they have themselves set and determined for the govern- ment of their relations with one another. Without this healing act the whole structure and validity of interna- tional law is forever impaired. 8. All French territory should be freed and the invaded portions restored, and the wrong done to France by Prussia in 1871 in the matter of Alsace-Lorraine, which has unsettled the peace of the world for nearly fifty years, should be righted, in order that peace may once more be made secure in the interest of all. 9. A readjustment of the frontiers of Italy should be effected along clearly recognizable lines of nationality. 10. The peoples of Austria-Hungary, whose place among the nations we wish to see safeguarded and assured, should be accorded the freest opportunity of autonomous development. 28 COLLAPSE AND RECONSTRUCTION 11. Roumania, Serbia, and Montenegro should be evacuated ; occupied territories restored ; Serbia accorded free and secure access to the sea ; and the rehitions of the several Balkan states to one another determined by friendly counsel along historically established lines of allegiance and nationality ; and international guarantees of the political and economic independence and territorial integrity of the several Balkan states should be entered into. hi. The Turkish portions of the present Ottoman Empire should be assured a secure sovereignty, but the other nationalities which are now under Turkish rule should be assured an imdoubted security of life and an absolutely unmolested opportunity of autonomous devel- opment, and the Dardanelles should be permanently opened as a free passage to the ships and commerce of all nations under international guarantees. 13. An independent Polish State should be erected which should include the territories inhabited by indis- putably Polish populations, which should be assured a free and secure access to the sea, and whose political and economic independence and territorial integrity should be guaranteed by international covenant. 14. A general association of nations must be formed under specific covenants for the purpose of affording mutual guarantees of political independence and terri- torial integrity to great and small states alike. The four points of July 4 were : 1. The destruction of every arbitrary power anywhere that can separately, secretly, and of its single choice distm-b the peace of the world ; or, if it cannot be presently destroyed, at least its reduction to virtual impotence. 2. The settlement of every question, whether of terri- tory or sovereignty, of economic arrangement or of PAST AND PRESENT 29 political relationship, upon the basis of the free accept- ance of that settlement by the people immediately con- cerned, and not upon the basis of the material interest or advantage of any other nation or people which may desire a different settlement for the sake of its own exterior influence or mastery. 3. The consent of all nations to be governed in their conduct towards each other by the same principles of honour and of respect for the common law of civilised society that govern the individual citizens of all modern States, and in their relations with one another, to the end that all promises and covenants may be sacredly observed, no private plots or conspiracies hatched, no selfish injuries wrought with impunity, and a mutual trust established upon the handsome foundation of a mutual respect for right. 4. The establishment of an organisation of peace which shall make it certain that the combined power of free nations will check every invasion of right, and serve to make peace and justice the more secure by affording a definite tribunal of opinion to which all must submit and by which every international readjustment that cannot be amicably agreed upon by the peoples directly concerned shall be sanctioned. The five points of September 27 were : 1. The impartial justice meted out must involve no discrimination between those to whom we wish to be just and those to whom we do not wish to be just. It must be a justice that has no favorites and knows no standard but the equal rights of the several peoples concerned. 2. No special or separate interest of any single nation or group of nations can be made the basis of any part of the settlement which is not consistent with the common interest of all. 30 COLLAPSE AND RECONSTRUCTION 3. There can be no leagues or alliances or special cov- enants and understandings within the general and com- mon family of the league of nations. 4. And more specitically, there can be no special, selfish economic combinations within the league and no employment of any form of economic boycott or exclusion except as the power of economic penalty by exclusion from the markets of the world may be vested in the league of nations itself as a moans of discipline and control. 5. All international agreements and treaties of every kind must be made known in their entirety to the rest of the world. ]Mr. Lansing's letter was as follows : Washington, November 5, 1818 :ti ***** * In my Note of October 23, 1918, 1 advised you that the President had transmitted his correspondence with the German authorities to the Governments with which the Government of the United States is associated as a belligerent, with the suggestion that, if those Govern- ments were disposed to effect peace upon the terms and principles indicated, their military advisers and the military advisers of the United States be asked to submit to the Governments associated against Germany the necessary terms of such an armistice as would fully pro- tect the interests of the peoples involved and insure to the Associated Governments the unrestricted power to safeguard and enforce the details of the peace to which the German Government had agreed, provided they deemed such an armistice possible from the military point of view. The President is now in receipt of a memorandum of observations by the Allied Governments on this corre- spondence, which is as follows : PAST AND PRESENT 31 " The Allied Governments have given careful considera- tion to the correspondence which has passed between the President of the United States and the German Govern- ment. Subject to the qualifications which follow, they declare their willingness to make peace with the Govern- ment of Germany on the terms of peace laid down in the President's address to Congress of January 8, 1918, and the principles of settlement enunciated in his subse- quent addresses. They must point out, however, that clause 2, relating to what is usually described as the free- dom of the seas, is open to various interpretations, some of which they could not accept. They must, therefore, reserve to themselves complete freedom on this subject when they enter the peace conference. "Further, in the conditions of peace laid down in his address to Congress of January 8, 1918, the President declared that invaded territories must be restored as well as evacuated and freed. The Allied Governments feel that no doubt ought to be allowed to exist as to what this provision implies. By it, they understand that compensations will be made by Germany for all damages done to the civilian population of the Allies and their property by the aggression of Germany by land, by sea and from the air." I am instructed by the President to say that he is in agreement with the interpretation set forth in the last paragraph of the memorandum above quoted. I am further instructed by the President to request you to notify the German Government that Marshal Foch has been authorized by the Government of the United States and the Allied Governments to receive properly accredited representatives of the German Gov- ernment, and to communicate to them the terms of an armistice. . . . CHAPTER II FOREIGN POLICY The policy of a nation necessarily reflects more or less the national character behind it. Those who direct it are merely average citizens who have been selected without reference to any special ability from a nmnber of men who had originally' ob- tained entrance into the diplomatic service by an examination test in average general Isjiowledge. After this intellectual test come the influences begot- ten of school and family connections on the one hand and an average intelligent obedience to higher officials who have gone through the same or simi- lar tests and training on the other. The traditions of any office thus necessarily tend to become stereo- typed and the mode of giving effect to them may be predicated with relative accuracy by any observer who is familiar with the average national intellect and more particularly that of the class concerned. In England the average intellect is dull but honest. School life is based on the development of character and a robust sort of honour which easily takes the external form of arrogance. The reputation abroad of British diplomacy is, however. FOREIGN POLICY 33 and therefore, that though arrogant, it is straight- forward, well-meaning and trustworthy. In Ger- many diplomacy has endeavoured to follow the English example but the basis is different. Early training in that country is occupied with the acqui- sition of exact knowledge and habits of intellectual accuracy and the average German has a much more effective culture than the Englishman. The devel- opment of character is neglected and boys do not acquire in school that individual sense of honour which distinguishes English training. In many cases they are encouraged to play the part of traitor to each other. The master does not respect the privacy of the child nor are children expected to respect it among themselves. A child who reports the evil doings of a companion is not reproached, the principle being that the teacher ought to know everything about every child to be able to correct shortcomings before they grow into habits. This method has spread into the whole life of Germany. Clerks spy upon each other in offices; soldiers, even officers, spy upon each other in their daily life, and a faculty for spying has factitiously become characteristic of a whole people. Even in the exalted entourage of the Kaiser himself, there is none of that discreet respect for private conversation which is part of the training of the upper and higher middle-class Englishman. Yet in Germany to be like an Englishman is or was the aim of every well-born German. Among delusions nursed with admiration in Germany and fortified with historical examples 34 COLLAPSE AND RECONSTRUCTION is the idea that a ruthless pursuit of self-interest is the source of England's success among nations. This had developed into the worship of force and necessity. Necessity is merely a way of expressing that something is highly desirable and the use of force is justified to secure what is highly desirable. If physical force is not available or applicable, then superior cunning takes its place. ^ German diplomacy bears the marks of these initial shortcomings and while it brings a much more exhaustive and more accurate knowledge to bear in the treatment of international questions than the English, it falls far short of it in the faculty ' A German manufacturer once showed me a card-box of handker- chiefs he had manufactured. Inside the box was a card bearing the words "Made in England" with initials. This had been inserted by the middleman. My friend did not condemn him as a rogue but ex- plained to me that the only way to get Germans to buy certain goods was to pass them off as English. Necessity justified tlie roguery or, as my friend said to call it, the stratagem, for the goods, he said, were certainly of better quality than could be had for the price had they been really "made in England." Another case of similar roguery was practised by one of the largest firms of electrical apparatus manufactiu"ers. They formed a small English company with an English name and paid a couple of English- men salaries to act as directors. They then issuermed that the words "Made in Germany" could be clipped off while lea\-ing the disk intact. The obvious object of this was to cheat the ultimate purchaser into thinking he bought a machine of English manu- facture. "Necessity", said the manager. The English purchaser wanted a good quality of machine. He had the mistaken notion that he could get this only from an English house. They created an English house to satisfy him and they merely used the addition to the disk to pass the Customs. The purchaser obtained a better article than he could have bought for the money if it had been made in England. He was not robbed. Far from it. He was merely humoured ! FOREIGN POLICY 35 of inspiring a sense of its honesty, or respect and consideration on the part of others. From the point of view of general culture the French diplomatist is superior to both the English and German and he has the intellectual and social gifts of most Frenchmen which make him a favourite in every milieu into which he tumbles. As a diplo- matist he is "to the manor born" and if the pursuit of diplomacy were exclusively one of making friends for one's country, which it largely is, the French diplomatist would be easily first. In dealing with diflSculties when they arise, however, French diplo- matists are not equal to the cool-headed and obstinate Englishmen or to the accurate but more or less unscrupulous diplomatists of Germany. The diplomacy of the United States is based on a different principle from that of England, France or Germany, viz. : that of more or less permanency of the staff and subjection of the diplomatic chiefs to the party system. An American ambassador or minister plenipotentiary, like a member of the Cabinet, is regarded as having a close connection with the presidential policy and as such he is cho- sen from among his trusted political supporters. Though they have not always been successes, the same may be said of carriere diplomatists, while many of the American diplomatists have shown a greater ability for the understanding of their coun- try's material interests. The system of permanent counsellors, moreover, has proved its value and is worthy of accentuation as regards both prestige and rewards. 36 COLLAPSE AND RECONSTRUCTION Wliile diplomacy is affected by training and class environment, national characteristics have their share in foreign policy generally. Thus na- tional sentiment plays a great part in the decisions of statesmen, who not only use it against one another as an excuse or disguise for pretensions not based on right or reason, but also in just cases of claim. National sentiment is the reason of the nuiltitude and while statesmen have responsibilities which forbid their sacrificing permanent interests to pass- ing waves of sentiment and pledging the future to the fluctuating feelings of contemporary crowds, they cannot neglect them without danger of being carried off their feet. It is, therefore, a part of the business of a statesman to utilise public senti- ment for the national interest or draw it into chan- nels in which it can flow oft' without jeopardising any permanent national interest. National ideals begotten of national sentiment like all other manifestations of national mentality are subject to the processes of evolution. Their seeds are planted by some contagious emotion, they grow in intensity to their full bloom and then their vitality declines, while more robust ideals of like origin, struggling into fruition, take their place. National ideals, be it said to the honour of mod- ern civilisation however, are the outcome of a high level of collective thinking. The American Declara- tion of Independence was a splendid vindication of the rights of peoples, but it was not a national FOREIGN POLICY 37 manifestation. It was rather a manifestation in favour of the preservation of local liberties against encroachments of a central administration. To ascribe the French Revolution to any ideal, either specific or general, is to confuse cause and effect. Nothing we know of the French Revolution justifies the conclusion that it was anything but a revolt like the many revolts which have produced organic changes in national polity. Collective thinking was a reaction which succeeded the French Revo- lution as a part of the political revival of which it was the starting point. Successive reactions in France, Germany, England and the Netherlands during a period of peace after the upheaval produced a sort of racial crystallisation. Men speaking the same language began to be conscious that they had something in common ; the migration of agri- cultural populations into industrial centres and the growth of the newspaper made them articulate. With the building of railways the processes were accentuated ; nations as such began to exist and nationalism as a political idea forced itself on the attention of political thinkers. For half a century writers competed with each other in the interpretation of what was now appealed to as pubhc opinion. Since then we have passed through stages of State unification according to race and language. Dynasties gradually became mere adjuncts of this national development and now a new conscious- ness of the incompatibility of hereditary sovereignty with the freedom of self-government has suddenly 38 COLLAPSE AND RECONSTRUCTION led to the capsizing of the whole monarchical system in three empires without an attempt to save it. With the weakening of authority grew up the theory of the continuity of foreign policy — a continuity expounded by Lord Rosebery and ma- terialised by Sir Edward Grey but practised in France long before either. It seems destined to undergo the transformation which the undertaking of governments to abandon secret diplomacy implies. Foreign offices have always had traditional poli- cies, simply because they "descend" from official to official and involve the least individual initiative. No doubt if an incoming Ministry considers that the policy of its predecessors exposed the country to dangerous or costly difficulties, it is not likely to be guided by any theory of continuity or to refrain from a critical examination and balancing of the advantages and disadvantages of any previous line of conduct; and a strong Foreign Minister can shake off superannuated traditions and stereo- typed attitudes towards other countries. But after a Foreign Minister has been inhaling a Foreign Office atmosphere for a certain time, he seems, in spite of himself, to become sooner or later inoculated by it. Thus, even a far-seeing statesman like the late Lord Salisbury, when he was approached, in 1901, by a very distinguished Frenchman as to placing the relations of his country and France on a permanent footing of amity, curtly replied : "C'est de I'utopie." It was the superannuated FOREIGN POLICY 39 tradition of the British Foreign OflSce to regard France as an uncertain quantity, "one thing one day, another thing another ", with a pohcy as fluctuating as her governments, and a poUtical pendulum swinging wildly and sending the world round at far too great a speed for its good. The Foreign OflBce official is necessarily more or less bound by knowledge collected from the diplo- matic missions abroad. The chiefs of such mis- sions, however, seldom have any opportunity, even if they remain long enough in any post, of obtaining an intimate acquaintance with the country to which they are accredited. As a rule they are the last to know what is happening of importance to them because they are conspicuous.^ Exceptions, of course, there have always been. Lord Lyons was one, another was Lord Lytton, who had a keen understanding of French character. Nevertheless he did not succeed in breaking the continuity of British policy towards France or in reacting against the obvious Franco-Russian policy which a recent French "yellow book" has shown to have been in process of secret formation unsus- pected by him and the continuity of which, by the way, might have exposed France to disaster but for the accession to it of England, against whom the policy was more or less calculated to operate. It is barely twenty years since the relations be- tween Great Britain and France underwent this change. Popular feeling, which had been whirling ^ A French diplomatist once described his position to me as that of a man going about with a danger warning on his top hat. 40 COLLAPSE AND RECONSTRUCTION round a vortex of indignation and hatred, as if the two nations were moved by subterranean forces as uncontrollable as those of unconscious Nature itself, exhausted itself and on the wave of reaction a new feeling was fostered by an active agitation which brought about a break in the continuity of the policies of both France and England and saved both from the horror of a war as terrible as the one which has just been brought to a close. The rise of Germany was a new and inconvenient factor in the official scheme of British policy. That she had a foreign policy at all, not to speak of a *'Welt-politik", which had to be reckoned with, aroused a sort of unconscious indignation at dis- turbance of time-honoured habits of political thought and the older foreign offices tried to deal with old problems which had existed before Germany as a *'Welt-staat" came upon the scene, without taking her into consideration. More suppleness, more accurate knowledge, more publicity, a wider-spread public interest in foreign affairs, a greater influence of the back benches of parliaments in external relations would possibly save nations from repetition of some errors, but the insistence by democracy on parliamentary control is the most promising reform on the horizon, because it may counteract the danger of drifting into those "spirited" foreign policies which ingen- ious, ambitious but irresponsible heads of depart- ments are prone to cultivate in the privacy of their offices and in which often a political chief finds FOREIGN POLICY 41 himself entangled before he has mastered the details, complications and reactions of the national interests. One of the most dangerous consequences of detachment of diplomacy from parliamentary con- trol is the discretion left to Foreign Offices to enter into secret engagements binding States to coopera- tion and pledging their future often even without reference to the Cabinet itself, as we have seen re- vealed in the above-mentioned French "yellow book" on the Franco-Russian alliance. NOTES TO CHAPTER II Note on Pubuc Opinion and Foreign Policy in England The influences which atTect British pubhc opinion in international pohcy at present seem to be: (1) The Foreign Othce itself, which has a sort of traditional line of conduct in regard to each country and question, and of which the Foreign Minister is the spokes- man ; (^'2) The responsible Press which looks for guidance to the Foreign Oflice clerks to whom its writers have access ; (3) The more or less competent critics who examine questions freely in the reviews and a few men\bers of the House of Parliament who take an interest in such subjects tmd some of whom, though possessing more than usual competency, are heard, occasionally at any rate, witJiin the Houses themselves. Note on Interest of British Press in Foreign POIJCY In his valuable volume entitled "Common Sense in Foreign Policy", page 4, Sir Harry Johnston observes: "The new press has concerned itself more and more with questions of Foreign Policy. Leading iirticles and communiques, inspired by the highest authorities in England and potentates abroad, have begim. with the FOREIGN POLICY 43 new century, to appear in other journals as well as in the Times: In the Daily Telegraph, Daily Chronicle, Morning Post, Daily Mail, Daily Graphic, Standard, Westminster Gazette, Pall Mall and Star; In the Man- chester Guardian, Yorkshire Post, Scotsman, Northern Whig of Belfast, Birmingham Post, Western Morning News and Liverpool Courier." Note on Germany's and Russia's Geographical Situation Germany was sandwiched in between England and the Russian Empire. Both held positions which the War is not likely to change essentially, because of their situa- tion both demographically and geographically. The one has an overflowing population in an overcrowded area and the other an immense area, thinly peopled. Ger- many was becoming overpeopled but her overflow tended rather westwards than eastwards, because German indus- trial education turned out artisans more in demand in highly civilized than among under-civilized peoples, not to speak of their own preference for countries not subject to either political or religious persecution. As regards Russia, it may be useful to consider her geographical position in connection with her foreign policy. Russia is ice-bound for several months of the year. Arch- angel is closed to traffic from September to April, Kron- stadt from December to April and Vladivostock sees its shores covered with a thin crust of ice from December till April, though the Peter the Great Gulf on which it stands does not freeze. Russia's attempt to get into the Pacific at Port Arthur was frustrated by Japan, her attempts to reach Con- stantinople were frustrated by the Western Powers, and to reach the Persian Gulf by England. 44 COLLAPSE AND RECONSTRUCTION Russian statesmen, obliged to keep foreign war in reserve for the maintenance of autocracy, have made it a principle of their foreign policy to seek an outlet to ports accessible to navigation throughout the year, and owing to lack of opposition to expansion eastwards across Northern Asia, Russia has extended her dominion across the vast continent to the ocean. Russia is now confronted on the eastern as well as on western sides by Powers which are in greater need than she of colonisable areas for their growing popula- tions. On the east as on the west, she is being driven from the sea. This lateral pressure may bring Russia to concentrate her policy on the historic effort south- wards. The dangers to the future of closing the valves of expanding population or trade are too obvious to require emphasis and are still too vague to be dealt with in detail. It is to the interest of the future that they shall not be overlooked. CHAPTER III DIPLOMACY, SECRET TREATIES AND NEGOTIATIONS President Wilson has evidently concluded after careful examination of numerous historic cases that secret clauses hidden from the public view and entered into for the purpose of disguise of some kind are a danger to peace and has therefore pre- scribed among his conditions of peace : "Open covenants of peace, openly arrived at, after which there shall be no private international under- standings of any kind but diplomacy shall proceed always frankly and in the public view." The President no doubt had more especially in view the different agreements between Germany and Austria-Hungary, the more or less secret na- ture of which excited distrust throughout Europe at the time and led to the dividing of Europe into two hostile camps under the guise of a "balance of power", which less acute historians had not per- ceived had never led, either in Greek times, or in Italy when the idea was revived, or in the eighteenth century in northern Europe, or, as has now been shown, in our own times, to the assurance of peace but always ultimately to war. 46 COLLAPSE AND RECONSTRUCTION And with that independence which characterises him, the President has no doubt had misgivings as to what may have been the eti'ect of the secret clauses annexed to the Anglo-French agreement of 1904, which potentially negatived the effect of the agreement published to the world. As it is possible that the President had these clauses, which affected the trade of the LTuited States, as they did all other trades, also in view, I may remind the reader that they related to Egypt and Morocco and that the two contracting powers agreed that any alteration of status of the one Power, viz. : Great Britain in Egypt ; or of the other, viz. : France in Morocco, would release them from their reciprocal self-denying engagements. In other words they foreshadowed the protectorates and practical annexa- tions which have now been effected. He has now further material for reflection in the revelations made in the new French "yellow book" as to secret engagements between the French and Russian governments which were hidden for several years entirely from the public view, and the exact nature of which has only just been made known. Apart from the fact that to conceal any inter- national engagements binding a nation is an insult to its intelligence, concealment is a violation of a first principle of democratic government, viz. : that national consent, direct or indirect, can alone pledge it to action. No doubt the advocates of a different view maintain that in the process of evolu- tion democracy necessarily inherits the practices SECRET TREATIES AND NEGOTIATIONS 47 of foreign offices and diplomacy and thus also gives tacit consent to that practice till deliberately can- celled. Mr. Wilson would, no doubt, reply : It is time to cancel it deliberately. But, before finally making up our minds to pole-axe the abom- ination, let us look a little more closely into the subject and try, at any rate, to avoid regretful precipitation. It must, I think, be conceded that the object of secrecy is necessarily to conceal an ultimate purpose, object or contingency from the knowledge of others whose interests might lead them to raise objections, or take up some antagonistic attitude. Merely to suspect or have good reason to suspect the existence of secret clauses, though their precise character be unknown, may therefore lead, even oblige other governments to take action or prepare to take action to protect their interests and defeat the suspected purpose. Who, for instance, knows whether possible secret understandings between the German and other governments with a view to appeasing the former after discovery of the secret clauses of 1904, sus- pected understandings which at the time excited the Portuguese Government and shortly afterwards startled the Italian Government, were not at the bottom of Italy's anxiety to set up a fait accompli against any attempt to frustrate another secret understanding which had recognised her priority in the Tripolitaine whenever it should be available, and did not lead her, with such unseemly and unjust precipitation, into the war with Turkey? 48 COLLAPSE AND RECONSTRUCTION Without much casuistry it would be possible to connect these secret agreements, imderstandings and eventualities with one another and evolve out of them a sequence of cause and effect culminating in the complete breakdown and present discredit of European diplomacy which instead of averting bungled into mere bludgeonry. One more word about secret clauses before we pass to another aspect of secrecy : It is difficult to keep them secret for long. Any one who, like myself, has made a lifelong study of diplomacy and its methods, especially as an outsider unbound by Foreign Office restrictions, will testify that there is no such thing as absolute secrecy. The fact that several persons are necessarily "in the know" or more or less "in the know" soon begets a rumour. The rumour spreads, the suspected clauses grow in magnitude with the effect to justify apprehension, and eventually they lead to that vague unrest to which international trouble can nearly always be traced. President Wilson is right to place them at the top of the scale in his attempt to summarise the matters affecting the future peace of the world. When President Wilson says "diplomacy shall proceed always frankly and in the public view", he has no doubt in mind the American system of addressing Congress and the nation at every step in the progress of any matter of foreign policy, a system of which he himself is not only a consistent ex- ponent but has shown himself a consistent practiser. SECRET TREATIES AND NEGOTIATIONS 49 Interpretations may have warranted the idea that President Wilson aimed at the suppression of diplomatic action and that, in connection with negotiations for peace there must be no privacy. This is certainly a misconstruction. The Presi- dent cannot but know that in the course of a war or even in the midst of any ordinary heated inter- national controversy, argument in public is neces- sarily tinged with its glow and it is in the detached coolness of privacy and even secrecy alone that pre- liminaries and details can be effectively discussed. I have been so often behind the scene of such diplomatic preliminaries that I can bear witness to a practice which we might call a method, were it not simply the necessary consequence of cir- cumstances beyond need of an act of volition. The first step to peace in the course of a war is the prise de contact. This may be through a common neutral friend or through two friends technically enemies. Several efforts of this kind had been made during the recent conflict. If they have failed, it has been through faulty selection of men, error in the choice of the moment, or through at- tempting to start negotiations before the prise de contact was firm. To make a prise de contact effect- ual, it is essential that it shall be absolutely secret, covered by some different object which conclusively explains it, such as meeting to arrange exchange of prisoners or their treatment, or to -deal with Red Cross understandings, or for any other purpose, official or private, which can serve to disguise the object. Any open proceeding would obviously 50 COLLAPSE AND RECONSTRUCTION create false hope and might seriously interfere with the national morale, which as every one knows counts for much in the prosecution of war. The prine de contact satisfactorily established, the belligerents can talk with one another and seek jointly the bases of negotiation. If these secret non-binding agents are two old friends, as may be — as ought to be — the case, they will know one another well enough to venture on frankness. The secret history of wars of the past has shown the difficulty of reaching even elementary bases of negotiation. It took ten years of such efforts to bring the Powers engaged in the Thirty Years' War down to the point of signing preliminaries. For before preliminaries are signed by accredited agents of their governments, the prise de contact must have eventuated in pourparlers of an imbinding character leaving negotiators and governments alike perfectly free, and this may involve many secret meetings before the propitious moment arrives when suitable draft preliminaries can be submitted and agreed to. Thereafter only can the official diplomacy safely step on to the stage. It is not likely that President \\'ilson was opposed to a procedure which is also that of any important business operation in private life. All he probably had in mind was that no secret agreements be made finally binding upon nations without their knowledge and consent. The experience of late years and modern notions of democratic government cannot but encourage the President to insist on this public- ity in the interest of civilised mankind. SECRET TREATIES AND NEGOTIATIONS 51 Between secrecy and publicity there arc many stages of privacy and discretion of a relative character and responsible Ministers take opportunities of lift- ing the veil in answers to questions in Parliament, communications through newspapers and speeches on the platform or at banquets. By a strange sur- vival and anomaly, however, the British Parliament is practically the only parliament of any nation hav- ing pretensions to be regarded as "free" in President Wilson's sense that exercises no parliamentary con- trol over the most momentous issues which can en- gage the lives, treasure and honour of a people. It is true that there has been a revolt among younger and more progressive members of Parlia- ment against leaving momentous international issues to the uncontrolled discretion of their respective Foreign Offices. The only consequence down to now of this revolt has been to induce politicians to pay more attention than they have hitherto done to foreign affairs. In France, in 1902, for the purpose of enabling private members to take an active part alongside the Ministers in the preparatory part of legislation and the examination of suggestions and amend- ments, sixteen grand committees were appointed, among which practically all the special work of Parliament was divided up. One of these deals exclusively with foreign affairs, protectorates and colonies. Members of it, it is true, complain that they are not consulted more frequently or more consecutively, but they, nevertheless, keep a close watch on the work which is in train at the 51 COLL.VPSE .VND RECONSTRUCTION Quai D'Orsay, and all proposed troaty ongago- meuts a 10 necessarily referred to the coniniittee under Fi-endi parliamentary procedure. Though this is done generally only after the country is practically pledged, the nunnbers of the coniniittee. all the same, obtain post Juk' experience of the special work allotted to them, and can receive ministerial explanations, when there may be doubt or hesita- tion, which it would be ditiicult to furnish in public. This in turn covers to some extent the foreign minis- ter's responsibility. Nothing prevents him. more- over, from anticipating criticism even in the course of negotiations by conference with the committee. In the United States Senate, the Foreign Relations Committee is in still closer contact with tlie State Department, and by no means confines itself to registering the acts of the Secretary of State. So strongly do American statesmen and politicians view the need of parliamentary control over foreign atfairs that no clause in the American Constitution is more jealously enforced than that which requires Senatorial approval for all international engage- ments of the I'nited States. Senatorial debates on such matters are usually conducted with closed doors, and nothing is more interesting to the British visitor to the Capitol than the frequency of these secret executive sittings. Recent events seem to slunv the desirability of the institution of a special committee of the House of Commons for foreign relations, which, recruited without party preference, should be able to com- municate its views as a whole, as well as the views SECRET TREATIES AND NEGOTIATIONS 53 of individual mombors of it, to the Foreign Secretary as a mailer of rigid and not as one of mere sulYer- ance. There are many members of Parliament who luive business interests in different eouidries vvliieh bring them into close contact with these countries, and enable them to obtain a greater personal experience of British interests in connection with tliem than ])nblie oflicials, however efficient, ever have a chance of obtaining. The fact that a certain number of competent representatives of the country in the House of Commons were J^aying special and eft'ective attention to the national interests abroad would have a reassuring effect among the electorate. Such a committee, moreover, would serve as a nursery for the training of a cer- tain number of members of Parliament in foreign affairs, and this again would enable these mem- bers to create throughout the country a greater and more intelligent interest in our foreign relations. The public has undoubtedly begun to feel, especially in the north of England, that foreign affairs are conducted in a manner not suited to the repre- sentative character of the institutions of a self- governing country. The cooperation of an advi- sory committee of Parliament would certainly help the Foreign Office to bring British foreign policy into closer harmony with the national feeling and interests, and it would meet to a great extent charges of the inadequacy of diplomacy, when, as often, it is bound to fail, not through its incompetency, but tlu-ough the ignorance of those who have the dicta- tion of the policy to be pursued. NOTES TO CHAPTER III ixv101-\b1l1ty of treaties Suggestions for Addition to the Agreement of 1871 Whereas allegations of violation of treaty engagements are snbject to so many qualitieations and counter allega- tions that all the H. C V. may confess to some measure of guilt in the past, and whereas for the future they all soleumly once more pledge themselves to strict observance of all Treaty engagements and agree to revive and uphold the protocol signed in London on January 17, 1S71, which is as follows : The Plenipotentiaries of North Germany, of Austria- Hungary, of Great Britain, of Italy, of Russia, and of Turkey, assembled today in conference, recognize that it is an essential principle of the law of nations that no power can liberate itself from the engagements of a Treaty nor modify the stipulations thereof, unless with the con- sent of the (Contracting Powers by means of an amicable arrangement. In faith whereof the said Plenipotentiaries have signed the present Protocol. Whereas, however, it is not reasonable to bind States, under the more or less rapidly changing circumstances of the modern world to perpetual observance of all the engagements they may cuter into with other States; Whereas it is one of the connnonplaces of diplomacy to allege the absence of any moral cogency binding a Party to a Treaty obtained under duress ; SECRET TREATIES AND NEGOTIATIONS 55 Whereas among the sanctions which have been proposed or suggested for enforcing observance of international agreements, none can liave the weight of a solemn under- taking made freely before the whole world present and future to honestly and conscientiously observe such agreements and in case of un workability or obsolescence, or desirability of release, to resort to some procedure for the revision of such agreements ; Whereas, therefore, to enable States to revise inter- national agreements or any clauses thereof, not on juridical grounds but on grounds of expediency, alteration of cir- cumstances, ethnical, demographic, commercial, social, liygienic or other ; It is agreed to make the following addition to the Protocol of 1871, viz. : If any of the H. C. P. shall desire on any ground what- soever to so liberate itself from any Treaty engagement or to obtain a modification thereof, it shall give notice accordingly to the other or all other Contracting Parties with a full statement of the grounds upon which such release or modification is demanded and the Contracting Parties shall within reasonable time reply thereto. In case of any difference of opinion the respective statements shall be submitted for advice and recommenda- tion to some authority to be created under the Constitu- tion of the Society of Nations. Suggested Agreement as Regards Secret Treaties AND Clauses Whereas the object of secret treaties or clauses is to conceal from parties other than those immediately concerned objects likely to excite the opposition of such others or be prejudicial to their interests ; And whereas when they come to light they necessarily 56 COLLAPSE AND RECONSTRUCTION cause resentment and are a cause of international em- bitterment ; And whereas the possibiUty of entering into such secret clauses or treaties is a cause of international dis- trust and the bare suspicion thereof may be a cause of taking precautions against them and this reciprocal action accentuates bad feeling wherever it may exist ; Whereas, nevertheless, the affairs of nations can only be conducted in accordance with the practice of negotia- tions between individuals, but whereas, a reputation for honesty in business averts distrust, suspicion and bad feeling and induces a frank and friendly attitude even where the solution of differences may be difficult, there is equal reason to believe the effect of such conduct in the transaction of business between States would be similar ; Whereas, however, there may be secret agreements which are merely secret in the sense that they are of no concern to others but those immediately interested and these are not to be regarded as agreements deliberately concealed from other States and are beyond the scope of this present undertaking and pledge ; Whereas it is a principle of the sovereignty of the people that its future action shall never be pledged without its knowledge ; Whereas even merely informal moral or ad referendum engagements pledge a nation's honour; It is agreed as follows : The H. C. P. solemnly pledge themselves not to enter into any secret agreements which shall be contrary in effect or sense to agreements made with other States or to agreements communicated to or made known directly or indirectly to other States ; And they further solemnly pledge themselves to regard SECRET TREATIES AND NEGOTIATIONS 57 honesty, truth and sincerity In international concerns and in the observance of international undertakings, even verbal promises, as a principle of conduct sacred to the maintenance of national honour and they agree, in case of any alleged violation of such principle, to the submission of the question to a Court of Honour or some other author- ity to be instituted in connection with the Society of Nations. CHAPTER IV EVOLUTION OP THE UNITED STATEs' FOREIGN POLICY Washington's famous Farewell Address is a much used and much abused document. Frag- ments of it are often quoted and from time to time the text is twisted into arguments more or less foreign to its nature. For more than a century it has served, in fact, as a guiding line for all the Presidents. As the basis of American foreign policy, it is necessarily the starting point of any study of this policy. Its language is so simple, clear and dignified and its counsels are so apposite to the present scheme that it would be mere super- erogation to attempt to present it in any paraphrased abridgment or any but its own form. I therefore quote the whole of that part of it which is essential to this work : "Here," said Washington, "perhaps, I ought to stop. But a solicitude for your welfare, which cannot end but with my life, and the apprehension of danger, natural to that solicitude, urge me, on an occasion like the present, to offer to your solemn contempla- tion, and to recommend to your frequent review, some sentiments, which are the result of much reflection, of no inconsiderable observation, and UNITED STATES' FOREIGN POLICY 59 which appear to me all-important to the permanency of your felicity as a People. These will be offered to you with the more freedom, as you can only see in them the disinterested warnings of a parting friend, who can possibly have no personal motive to bias his counsel. Nor can I forget, as an encour- agement to it, your indulgent reception of my senti- ments on a former and not dissimilar occasion. "Interwoven as is the love of liberty with every ligament of your hearts, no recommendation of mine is necessary to fortify or confirm the attach- ment, "The unity of Government, which constitutes you one people, is also now dear to you. It is justly so; for it is a main pillar in the edifice of your real independence, the support of your tran- quillity at home, your peace abroad ; of your safety ; of your prosperity ; of that very Liberty, which you so highly prize. But as it is easy to foresee, that, from different causes and from different quarters, much pains will be taken, many artifices employed, to weaken in your minds the conviction of this truth ; as this is the point in your political fortress against which the batteries of internal and external enemies will be most constantly and actively (though often covertly and insidiously) directed, it is of infinite moment, that you should properly estimate the immense value of your national Union to your collective and individual happiness ; that you should cherish a cordial, habitual, and immovable attach- ment to it; accustoming yourselves to think and speak of it as of the Palladium of your political GO coi.L.vrsi: am> uixoNsrui c riox safety ami prosperity; watohiui;" for its prosorvation willi jealous anxiety; diseoiiutenaueing whatever may sui;i;est even a sus[>ieioii. that it c:u\ in any e\"iMit be abandoned; and indignantly frowning upon the tirst dawnini;' of every at ten>pt to aUenate any pi>rtiiM\ of our eountry from the rest, or to tMifeeble the sai'red ties whieh now Hnk togi^ther the various parts. "For this you have every iuihieement of sympathy and interest. C^iti/.ens. by birth or ehi>iee. of a eonunon country, tliat eountry has a richt to eou- i'enlrate your atVeetious. The name of American, wiiicli beK>ni::s to you. in your national capacity, must always exalt the just pride of Patriotism, more than any appellation ilerivcd from local discriminations. \Vith sliuht shailes of ditVerence, you have the same relijiion. manners, habits, anil political principles. You ha\e in a common cause, fouiiht and triumphed together; the Independence ami Liberty you possess are the work of joint coun- sels, anil joint etVorts. of common dangers. sutVer- iugs, and successes. . . . "It is important, likewise, that the habits of thinking in a free country should inspire caution, in those intrusted with its administration, to contine themselves within their respective constitutional spheres, avoiding in the exercise of the powers of one department, to encroach upon another. The spirit of encroachment tcTids to consolidate the powers of all the departments in one. and thus to create, whatever the form of government, a real despotism. A just estimate of that love of power. UNITED STATES' lORETCN POLICY Gl jiri COLLAPSE AND KKCONSirvLC^ llOX tMi just principles, ackmnvloilged, >vo could not view any interposition for the pnrpose of oppressing them or eonlroUing in any other manner their des- tiny l\v any European power in any other liglit than as the manifestation of an unfriendly tlispositiou to\Yard the United States." This declaration of President ^lonroe, known as the iNIonroe Doctrine, was made at a tin\e when the French Ciovernment was preparing an expedition to Spain, ^fr. Canning, then British Secretary for Foreign Atfairs, signilicd his country's intention to remain neutral on certain conditions, among which was the one that France should not attempt to annex any of the Spanish Colonies. The French expedition resulted in the reinst a lenient of the legitimist dynasty in Spain, Fearing a possible union between the two related dynasties, dreat Britain deelarcil that, though she would not inter- vene between Spain and her American colonies, she nevertheless consiilered that help given by any foreign l^ower to Spain's expedition against tliese colonies would constitr.le a new question in reference to which Ilis ]Majesty's Government would take sucli decision as Great Britain's interest required. ]Mr. C^anning had already informed the United States' ^Minister in London, then INlr. Rush, of a proposal he had in contemplation to make after the l^vnch expedition to Spain, with a view to the holding of some congress, meeting or conference for the settlement of matters aifecting South America. In his convcrsatious on the subject with Mr. Rush, IJNirKl) SI AIRS' forei(;n rOlJCY G7 Mr. Canning i)roi)0.sc(J iJuiL the United States Gov- crnnicnl, sliould u^rce wilh llie Government of (Jlrcat JJrilaIn lo ])role,sl .'igaliisl. any aelion wlileli miglit endanger the n(;w Soutli American repuhlics. Mr. lliish, wliile a(hnil ling that any attempt on the part of France and tlie (^ontinenlal Alliance to reassert Euroj)ean supremacy over the new rei)u])lics would he "an act of national injustice disclosing a very aJjirmiiig progressive amhillon", wiis nevertheless of I lie o])inion that to join Great IJritain in tlie proposed protest would seem contrary to the tradi- tional policy of the United States of standing aloof from European })()lltlcal affairs. Mr. Canning was insist(Mit. The Unlled States were the master power on llie American continent. They were in close relalion with Sj)aiiish America l)y their geograi)hical i)osition as well as witJi Europe by their intercourse ; and they were also hound to the new States of South America by political ties. Wjis it possible that they could stand aloof while the fale of these new Slates was being settled by Europe? Had not a modification taken place in the United States' i)Osition towards Europe, which Euroi)e itself was bound to recognise? Were the great political and commercial interests hang- ing on the fate of the new continent to be debated and directed in tin's hemisphere without the co- oi)eration or even the knowledge of the United States? Were they to be debated and directed without some prior agreement between the United States and Great Britain, the two leading commercial and maritime powers of the two worlds ? On ivcoipt of ^Iv. Kiish's dospatchos, IVcsidont ^loiiroo sont ^Ir. Canning's oorrosponilonco to Mr. JotVorson anil ^[r. Madison, the most eminent Anioriean statesmen of the ilay, to ask their advice. JNlr. JetVerson's reply throws a eerlain light on the present poliey to whieh. without laying too nuieh stress on it. I nevertheless eall the reader's attention. The qnestion was the most important that had been snbmitted for his consideration sinee the i|Ui\stion of independence. "This c^ne," said he, "made ns a nation and the other will set om* com- pass and point to the eonrse we are to follow across the seas of time lying before ns ami never eonld we have sailed towards onr goal in more propitions eircnmstances. Ouv tirst fnndamental maxim nnist be never to obtrnde npon Knropean dispntes; onr second, never to sntl'er Knrope to meddle with cisatlantic atfairs. North and Sonth America have a series of interests ilistinct from those of Europe and which are proper to itself. For that reason, Enrope and America nnist have separate and distinct systems; while the former labonrs to become the seat of despotism, onr etVorts shonld certainly tend to make onr hemisphere the home of liberty. "C>ne nation, especially, eonld distnrb ns in the prosecntion of this goal and she now otVers to gnide, to help and accompany ns. l>y acceding to her reqnest we shonld detach her from Knropean com- binations, we shonhl throw that nation's weight in the scales of free i:;overnment and, at one stroke. UNriEl) STATES' FOREIGN POLICY OJ) we sliould einaiicij)aio Ji continent wlncli otherwise ml^lil liinguisli for ii loii<^' lime in unecrlMiiily jind dillieulLies. (jieat IJriUiin is tlie nation wliieli can do us most harm among the nations of the worhl, whereas, if slie is with us, we need not fear the wliole world. Tt is ini])orlant, tluTefore, for us to enter- tain willi (Ircjit IJrilain i(>lali()ns of eorchal friend- ship and nolln'ii^' wonld licl]) lo liglilen I lie ties of afl'eclion so nnieh as to fi^hl once more in the same cause. Not that I wonld pm-ehase its friendship by taking j)art in its wars. Hut tlie war in which the present ])roj)osal could involve us, if war were to come of it, would nol he I^'.ngland's war hul ours. The object is to iulroduce and to establish the American system of kee])ing away from our con- tinent all foreign Powt^-s, of never allowing European Powers to meddle with our peoples' affairs. It is a question of vindicating our own princij)le not of departing from it, and if, in order to facilitate the realization of this scheme, we can create a division in the European camp and bring on our side its most powerful member, we nuist surely do so. But, I am entirely of Mr. Camiing's opinion that this step will ])revent war rather than y)rovoke it. The moment Great Britain would be taken away from their side and thrown on this one, the whole of Europe combined would not dare to undertake such a war, for how indeed could these Powers attack either of these two enemies, without some superior fleet. And we must also not neglect this oppor- tunity to enter our j)rotest against the other vio- kitions of the rights of all nations perpetrated as a 70 COLLAPSE .VXD RECONSTRUCTION result of the interference of any one whatsoever .in his neighbour's home affairs, these violations so shamelessly begun by Buonaparte and now con- tinued by the Alliance which dubs itself *Holy* and which is as little respectful as he was of justice." Mr. Madison shared Mr. Jefferson's views in another letter which is not so important. For the purpose of this article it is unnecessary to retrace the vicissitudes through which the prin- ciples in question have passed, nor need I recall the United States' attitude in the crisis created by the French intervention in Mexico. The ]Monroe Doctrine could only become a hard and fast rule of American policy after the consolidation of central government after the close of the Civil War. It is sufficient to say that the policy of noninter- vention in European affairs and its corollary, the Monroe Doctrine, have been the keystone of the foreign policy of the United States for a century devoted to the internal development of unparalleled material resources. "Up to the jiresent," said Mr. Olney in his famous despatch of August 7, 1895, on the Venezuela question, '* we have been spared in oiu' history the evils and burdens attendant upon immense armies and all the other accessories of large war establish- ments, and this exemption has contributed in no small measure to our national greatness and pros- perity as well as to every citizen's interest." This is no exaggeration of the advantages the United States have drawn from a situation which UNITED STATES' FOREIGN POLICY 71 enables their Government to keep aloof from the rivalries and difficulties of Europe. Mr. Olney further says: "The United States ai'e practically sovereign on their continent, their word is law for those subjects on whom they impose their intervention. And why is it so ? It is not merely an effect of their friendship or of their good will ; it is not by reason of their standing as a highly civilized power, nor because wisdom, justice and equity are the invariable characteristics of the United States' actions. It is because, in addition to all other motives, their inexhaustible resources, combined with their isolated position, make them masters of the situation and invulner- able towards every one of the other Powers either singly or in coalition." To be supreme on the American continent amidst weak though turbulent neighbours while preserving its immunity from burdens similar to those under which European States are groaning is quite a natural wish on the part of the chief American Power. Thence springs the foreign policy of the United States, — that is, noninterference in extra-Ameri- can affairs and intervention in American affairs wherever a European interest is asserted. It is easy to foresee fm-ther consequences of a policy which is passing at the present moment through a period of active evolution without going to the length which Mr. Olney foreshadowed for it in his despatch of August 7, 1895. "Three thousand miles of ocean," said he, "which separate these continents make any permanent 7"^ COTT.VrSF WD KFCOXSTKUCTTON political union botwoon an American and an Euro- pean State unnatural and inopportune." The question was asked in Kui^land at the time whether the emancipation of the European colonies in America could ever luxxune part of the foreign policy of the l^iited States. The Uispano-American War brought about a situation which did not seem entirely to agree with tlie Monroe Doctrine. Nevertheless President Roosevelt in a sptnvli delivered in 101-2 on the results of the Hispano-American War det^larcd : "The Monroe Doctrine is simply a statement of our very tirm belief that the nations now existing on this continent nuist be left to work out their own destinies among themselves and that this continent is no longer to be regarded as the coloniz- ing ground of any European Power. The one Power on this cimtinent that can make the power etVective is. of course, ourselves, for in tlie world as it is. a nation which advancvs a given doctrine, likely to interfere in any way with other nations, must p*.>ssess tlie power to back it up, if it wishes the doctrine to be respected." We now come to our own tin\es, the eve of the opening of the Panama Canal. On August '2, 101^, the United States Senate adopted the following resolution proposed by Sena- tor Lodge by a majority of tifty-one votes to four. "Resolvei-i that when any harbor or other place in the American continent is so situated that the occupation thereof for naval or military purposes UNTIED STATES' FOREIGN POLICY 73 mipht threaten the coiriinunications or tlic safety of the United Slaies, the (lovernnient of the United States could not see williout ^rave concern the possession of sncli harbor or oilier phice by any cor- poration or association which has such a relation to another (Jovernnient not American as to give that (lovernment pniclical power of control for national ])urposes." This action of the Senate gnnv out of the report that a stretch of territory boniering on Magdalena Bay, Mexico, nn'ght be acquired by the subjects of a foreign country and thus through control by their own national Government become tlie base of permanent naval or military occupation. In supi)ort of the resolution Senator Lodge said : ''The declaration rests on a much broader and older ground than the Monroe Doctrine. This resolution rests on the generally accepted prin- ciple that every nation has a right to protect its own safety. It is its duty and right to intervene." The Senator added that the opening of the Panama Canal gave to Magdalena Bay an importance that it had never before possessed, the Panama routes passing in front of it. The political situation of the United States had undergone an im])ortant alteration by the annexa- tion of the Philippine Islands which was already a departure from the principles enunciated by Washington. The opening of the Panama Canal was an event of still greater importance in the evolution of the United States' foreign policy. 74 COLLAPSE AND RECONSTRUCTION This canal was bound to have upon the United States' policy an effect analogous to that of the opening of the Suez Canal upon British foreign policy. The utilisation by overseas trade of the Suez Canal resulted in organic changes in the construction of ships which no longer had to cross vast stretches of ocean without putting in at any port on the way. But especially the new route to India brought about an alteration in a commercial system which adapted itself to new markets. The closing of the Canal for a few days, nay, for a few hours, might entail loss not only material but also a dislocation of methods and schemes on which the regular exercise of Imperial control in India and elsewhere is built up. The result was the Egyptian question, the main-mise on Egypt and finally its annexation. The Panama Canal cannot but produce a similar transformation of a commercial system hitherto based on totally different traffic conditions between the two shores of the Atlantic continent, and new interests which the closing of the canal would threaten with disaster. Now, between the United States territory and the Panama Canal there is a large State which for several years has been unable to restore itself to a condition of internal peace. One need only study the history of the Suez Canal to perceive what may be the possible development of American collateral policy interests in connec- tion with the Panama Canal. It will necessarily affect the relations of the United States with their nearer neighbours. UNITED STATES' FOREIGN POLICY 75 The reader has seen in this brief analysis of the evokitiou of the United States' foreign policy a relationship between the notion of detachment from European affairs and that of de facto hegemony on the American continent. He has seen that the desire to keep the American continent free from the necessity of creating permanent armies and to avoid the European evil of militarism had given birth to both the Washington and Monroe declarations. He has seen principles, new circumstances, shake the foundations of these. The Great War was a new circumstance of still greater cogency. On the one hand, the United States had to con- sider the possibility of a defeat of Great Britain which would not only have completely upset the political and economic condition of their overseas trade but would have threatened their hegemony on the American continent and their control of the Panama Canal. Successes on land of either of the European belligerents had, it is true, a senti- mental, even warm sentimental interest for the United States but so long as the maritime supremacy of Great Britain remained intact, the American people confined their interest to helping the Allied Powers keep up a defensive war Ciipable of pre- venting the Central Powers from extending their conquests. By their financial resources and their industries, the United States did this to the extent of their private means. When the maritime su- premacy of Great Britain seemed threatened by submarine warfare, a large number of new poten- tialities had to be considered. 76 COLLAPSE AND RECONSTRUCTION This was one of the situations President Wilson had now to examine. There was also a nearer contingency which he had to consider : the possible aUiance between Germany and Mexico, an alliance which, as is now known from the correspondence which has been captured, had been contemplated and which might always materialise. I lay no stress on consequences too obvious to require ex- planations. By the declaration of war, President Wilson at one and the same time made the United States* hegemony on the American continent effective, upheld in its entirety the Monroe Doctrine and insured the protection of the Panama Canal. As regards Mexico, the existence of an adequate Ameri- can army reduced it, in fact, to a condition of practi- cal vassalage which brought to an end a perilous state of things of which some short-sighted politicians did not realize the gravity. The declaration of war was therefore but the last step in the policy of a century, and those who think that it throws over that policy and constitutes a "new departure" will do well to shake off that illusion. The only unaccountable and disconcert- ing "departure" from the safe and well-considered policy of the founders was the annexation of the Philippines, which we may some day learn was due more to sentimental reasons than to more trust- worthy considerations based on permanent interests and the established principles of American general policy. NOTES TO CHAPTER IV Note on Panama Canal ^ One need only notice on the map the shape of the Guh' of Mexico and compare it with the shape of the Caribbean Sea in order to be convinced that, whereas the Gulf of Mexico as a consequence of American domina- tion over Cuba has become a lake which the United States have the means of closing, the Caribbean Sea could only be closed by acquiring some form of domina- tion over a number of islands at present belonging to different Powers. It follows that, as regards the sending of forces, in all possible hostile combinations, for the defence of the Panama Canal, it would be necessary either to go through Mexico or to cross the Gulf of Mexico. Moreover, in case of war, it would be impossible to con- template an effective barrage of the Caribbean Sea in spite of the possession of the island of Porto Rico. There are, it is true, railways across Mexico but only some sec- tions of railway systems in the other States of Central America. The problem of providing means of defence for the canal, in fact, has become by reason of events in Mexico more acute, but it is not confined to Mexico. That the creation of this new waterway would bring about changes in the relations between Spanish America 1 Translated by Mr. A. Wright, from Sir T. Barclay's "Le President Wilson et revolution de la politique ^trangere des Etats-Unis." Armand Colin, Paris, 1918. 78 COLLAPSE AND RECONSTRUCTION and the active and somewhat restive States of the east of the Union, was too obvions not to occasion anxiety on different sides. This anxiety seems to express itself rather in respect to poHtical than material interests. In tliis connection, the following observations by a writer (P. A. Monjas) in "Espana y America" (1911) are interesting : "That the United States, in constructing the canal, have no purely commercial object in view, is evident from the considerable disproportion between the enormous cost of the work and the small importance of their mer- chant service, as also from the fact that they have con- nected the two shores of the canal by railways, some of which, for instance the Tehuantepec Railway, constitute a great danger, and lastly from the further fact of the rapid completion of the Panamerioan. "What is then the end which is being pursued by the White House Government in protecting the emancipa- tion of Panama and in expending without reckoning such considerable amounts in order to realise the colossal scheme first evolved by Ferdinand de Lesseps? Simply to convert this strategical point into a veritable arsenal for war, a permanent threat for the peoples of Latin America, more particularly for those of South America, and to show in the world's face that it has laid the founda- tions for further conquests. "It has been shown, hundreds of times, that the com- mercial exchanges between the Northern Colossus and the Southern nations are unequal; stress has been laid, ad nauseam, on the advantages of all kinds for the Euro- pean traders in Brazil. Argentine, Chile, Uruguay and other producing coimtries, and on the fact that in spite of the opening of the canal, distances will continue more favourable for the old continent. How' then can one UNITED STATES' FOREIGN POLICY 79 explain the enthusiasm of the United States? Did the Washington Government then, as some persons have alleged, undertake this work with so much energy in the interests of the Republics of Latin America, out of purely commercial altruism? If so, why these fortifications and these excessive duties which affect equally Europeans and South Americans ? "The commercial waterway so patronised at the outset, let us be allowed to say it without hesitation, has lost its character and has been transmuted into a strategical and military measure. "South American statesmen must not close their eyes to the danger arising out of the opening of this new waterway in the hands of an imperialist govern- ment. . . . "Once the Panama Canal is open, who will be able to prevent the United States from exercising their power- ful influence over the Southern Pacific, just as they exer- cise it now over the West Indies Sea ? . . . "The fortifying of the Panama Canal, in violation of all usage and customs recognized in International Law is a danger and a threat to the Republics of Spanish America. It is not sufficient to say that preponderance in these seas is necessary to check the voracity of other nations and more particularly of Japan. Those are pre- texts invented by the Government and Press of the United States, in order to mislead credulous souls. Such acts of sovereignty constitute an infraction of the Monroe Doctrine and the modern tendency of the United States is Imperialist. From defenders, they have become cum- bersome protectors. "The peoples of South America must prepare for the future and compose their quarrels in order to form one block in the interest of their race and of their dignity. 80 COLL.\PSE AND RECONSTRUCTION for that is the only way for thoin to make themselves invinciblo aiul unassailable. "The South Auieiiean family united in a supreme desire for freedom in tlie defence of a race shall not be van- quished by the Yankee's formidable squadrons nor by the dollars of their multi-millionaires ; whereas if divided, it will drift further and further from the ideal of its destiny and the Northern octopus shall slo^Yly and surely erush it in its frightful tentacles. It will thus work at the dig- ging of its own grave. "Let us say Nvhat we think. The Pananui Canal will for a long time be the source of sensational rumours. The fortitications theme was scarcely exhausted before tlie problem of the acquisition of the Galapagos Islands arose; then came the attempt by President Arosemena to ei\tcr into pourparhm with Colombia, and on all sides one sees dangers, some real, some imaginary, as soon as the presence of the star-spangled Hag is signalled in the Pacitic. '* Time will confirm once more the radical transformation which the Monroe Doctrine has undergone and the naivete of certain South American statesmen and of a part of the South American Press who remain imdisturbed when conquerors are at the doors of l>yzantium." Similar alarm has been shown by M. D'Estournelles de Constant in his interesting work on **Les Etats Unis d'Amerique", Paris, 10l:> (new edition, 1017). It seems however to me to overlook a situation which I have pointed out in the text.* M. n'Kstournclles de Constant says: "In Panama, in the Philippines, the Americans could have restricted themselves to a useful and magniticent mission ; they ' "1^ Piw^ident Wilson ot revolution de ,1a politique ^trangere des Etat^-Unis." Anmud Coliu, Paris. IDIS. UNITED STATES' FOREIGN POLICY 81 went beyond ; in Panama tlu^y liave assumed liabilities without limit and i'ruii^lit with peril for every one; tliey have assiinu^d tlie nisponsibilily of" a route where every aceident of a purely administrative order will be fatally eiilar^'(Ml ovvinj^ to tlu'ir political domination and will assume a poliLieal eliaraeter. What a blow to the civiliza- tion and to the higher interests of the United States ! What bravado and senseless (iu(;.st for impoj)ularity ! (!an one imagiiu^ th(i ships of all countries wliicli for forty years have been freely sailing through the Suez Canal, henc«;forward filing past the guns of the American forts! Wliat a startling dill'erence of treatment! What a shock to every one's mind ! It is by pretensions of that kind, by blows of Might superseding Right, that Germany did so much harm to herself in universal opinion; and now we se(; the American democracy falling into this imperial mistake even before it has an army and the necessary maritime squadrons to supj)ort such an attitude. "Tliese precautions, alleged to have been taken in the interest of American commerce, will do it harm. The Panama ('anal should be an iiu[)rov<'ment on the Suez Canal : it should have been not in the hands of one Power, that is to say in the hands of one Goverrnuent and one day perhai)s in the hands of a coterie, but rather under the safeguard of all. "An unfortified l*anajna Canal would have been still more neutral, still less threatened, and hence, better de- fended by general interest than the Suez Canal. "Let us suffer this belittling of a great scheme; let us submit to these fortifications more humiliating still for those who impose them than for those who accept them. But let us follow the consequences of this Ameri- can mistake. Under the ])retext of protecting a neutrality which had nothing to fear from anybody, the United 82 COLLAPSE .\ND RECONSTRUCTION States are going to inflict upon thoniselvos garrisons, squadrons which will call for other squadrons and so forth. That is not all. Provision had to be nuuie for the bill to be jKiid ; and, in order to lind the enormous sums which all these precautions will cost the United States, they had to go further along the road of violation of every one's rights ; imder the jn-etext of giving prefer- ential treatment to a few national navigation companies vet unborn, they had to get ready to extort from foreign ships ditl'erential taxes which in some cases will be pro- hibitive, and from which the United States alone will derive any profit; this is the boycotting of international commerce on its way through : taxes, guns, nothing will be wanting to greet it in this canal .^oi-diiiant universal" (p. 497). ^ As regards the relations between England and the United States iu the western hen\isphere and the Panama Canal, IVIr. Coolidge (A. C. Coolidge, "Les Etats-Unis Puissance Mondiale", Paris, 1008, pp. oOO ft seq.) points out that these relations are not confined solely to the questions concerning Canada ; apart even from the Great Dominion, Great Britain occupies in the New "World a position which the Americans constantly have to take into accoimt. '*In the coralliferous Bermuda Islands fortified and almost impregnable, she possesses an excellent base for operations whence a hostile fleet could threaten the whole American coast from Maine to Florida. ^Nlore to the south the Bahanui Islands group commands the entrance to the Florida Canal ; Jamaica stands as a sentinel in front of any canal which might go through Nicaragua or Panatna ; the British possessions in Guyana and the Lesser Antilles command the exit from the Caribbean Sea. In short, all these posts make a formidable chain. The Bermuda Islands are isolated UNITED STATES' FOREIGN POLICY 83 and have given rise to no quarrel. The United States may be annoyed at their being in possession of the Eng- hsh but there is nothing to be done. They have rather turned their attention towards the Caribbean Sea and the neighbouring waters where during nearly the whole of the nineteenth century they have had keen rivalry with the English — a rivalry which has only just come to an end. "When the Panama Canal is at last completed, New York as well as the ports of the Mexican Gulf will be much nearer the western shores of South America ; they will also be able to communicate with Australia and the Far East in much more advantageous conditions than to-day. What will these advantages exactly be? It is difficult to say ; distance does not prevent Bremen from competing with Marseilles in the same regions, but this is a factor nevertheless which must be reckoned for something. It is easier to see what the American fleet will gain : the canal will enable it to concentrate its forces rapidly in either of the great oceans, and as a neutral line of water communication, it would be invalu- able if one was at war on both sides at the same time. Even now American supremacy is solidly established in the Mexican Gulf and the Caribbean Sea. It might take umbrage at the arrival of the Canadians in these waters, but they need not make it a serious case. If Great Britain again wished to become a rival of the United States in that part of the world, she no longer has the means. Although their present situation is satisfactory, certain signs warrant the belief that the United States will not be satisfied with it. I^d by the impulse of natural forces and hereditary traditions rather than by deliberate purpose, they must, it seems, fortify their position in these waters." 84 roi.i.ArsF wn KFCONsiKirru'»N l>t\Mdoi\t UiHv^ovolt. oti his siilo. txvalls that in the past mo.i\givssos have Ihvu opiHv< Japan, to CuTuuniy. to F.ng- land or to ai^v nation w1k> is jiwornod by nion. not by ounuohs I Ix^i thoni givo up also tho Monnv Pootriuo «nd tu> lonsivr pnMoiul that thoy prv'itov't lifo and proporty in Moxi*.v I In short, lot us Kwnuo a ^Vostorn China. and in woaknoss and inipotoniv wait for tho d;iy whou our torrilory shall W split up Ivtwivn nion^ onorjiotio raiH^s I But if wo iiitond to play our ][vvrt as a gn^it nation, to bo rx\idy to dofoud our own intotx'sts and to W \isoful to othors. lot us u\ako up our nui\ds what wo ought to do and ct^t rtwdy to do it I Svnith of tho txpiator, on a lino noariuji" on In^th sides the Taixanxa Canal, wo no loncor iKwl «.\M\».xTn oursolvos alxnit tho Monrw Pootriuo. Braril. Chile and tho Argeixtino art^ onpablo of upholding this dvX'trine for the whole of Soul)\ .Vinorioa. ox^vpt in the extrxMuo ixorthoni parts, (.'oiisidor for inslan«.v tho ease of tho Arctnitino. As in Switzerland. t\»ilitary sor\ iix' thort^ is cvnipnlsory, whioh SiX'ially and indus- trially has Ihvu of nvuoh Ivnotit. It has also given the State an ann\* of abu^vst half a million n\on : although the [H^pulation is not one ninth that of the l"uitt\l States. The ArgtMitino is inuoh n\ore ready to defend its territory in ease of sudden attaok by a powerful enemy. \Yo shoidd do well to join itjs soIkx^I aud to learu the le^ou it gives UNITED STATES' FOR ETC N POLICY 85 "llourf we tM"ci.u;y The Mcxicjin m Vebruarv. 11>1^>. to July. lt>14. Public rumour a«.vused him of boiuc favourable to forxngu iutcn,\