The Crime Against Europe: A Possible Outcome of the War of 1914

uropean militarism, the writer is now persuaded to publish these articles, which at least have the merit of having been written well before the event, in the hope th

s and their claims, intentions, and positions being what they are. To find the causes of the war we must seek the motives of the combatants, and if we would have a lasting peace the foundations upon which to build it must be laid bare by revealing those foundations on which the peace was bro

ho it is that broke the peace, whatever the dipl

pe, but because certain Powers, and one Power in particular, nourished ambitions and asserted claims that involved not only ever increasing armaments but insured ever increasing animosities. In these c

n our power to render war inevitable it is no use now to beg people not to make a dis

ses of this investigation we can eliminate at once three of the actual combatants, as being merely "accessories after the fact," viz.:-Servia, Belgium and Japan, and confine our study of the causes of the conflict to the aims and motives of the five principal combatants. For it is clear that in the quarrel between Servia and Austria, Hungary is only a sid

itish interests in Servia were nil, and a war on behalf of that country would never be sanctioned by British public opinion," the Russian Minister of Foreign Affairs replied that "we must not forget that the general European q

ons of Servia to Austria, the neutrality of Belgium or the wis

apan came into the contest solely because Europe had obligingly provided one, and because one European power preferre

, self-preservation, that binds them much more closely together than mere formal "allies." In this war Austria fights of necessity as a Germanic Power, although the challenge to her has been on the ground of her Slav obligations and activities. Germany

ch strangely consorted allies as England, Russ

e Book, or in any statement publicly put

causes of the war, and if we would hope to erect an

people are so obsessed with admiration for it that they longed to test it on their neighbours, is to accept as an explanation a stultifying contradic

them as the victims of an autocracy, cased in mail and beyond their control. We thus arrive at "the real crime against Ge

find the causes of the alliances of Eng

is eight years old has involved Europe, America, Africa, and Asia in a world conflict. We must find the motive for England allying herself with France and Russia in an admittedly anti-German "understanding" if we would understand the causes of the present war and why it is that many besides Bernard Shaw hold that "after having done all in our power to render w

one else. It is wrongly named. It is founded not on predilections but on prejudices-not on affection but on animosity. To put it

mselves, and the greater the plunder derived from t

gs with most white people (n

alings with all,

ngs with subject races within the Empire-the Indians, notably, or the Irish. To the Indians her rule is that of an absentee autocracy, differing in speech, colour, religion and culture from those s

to democratic principles. Her affinity with Russia is found then, not in t

such grounds of contact

ersia, to such it must giv

mbowel the constitutionalists, whilst it divided their country into "spheres of influence" and to-day we se

eat Britain as a democracy (by eliminating India, Egypt, Ireland) had the same gui

on a cordial regard of the parties to it for each other, but on a cordial

her? She has doubtless committed many crimes, as have all the great powers, but in what respect has she so grievously sinned against Europe that the Czar, the Emperor of India, the King of Great Britain and Ireland, the Mi

sm. It was born, not of wars of aggression, but of wars of defence and unification. Since it was welded by blood and iron in

n militarism or of French mili

ines of Russian territory; French militarism, since it was overthrown at Sedan, has carried fire and sword across all Northern Africa, has penetrated from the Atlantic to the Nile, has raided Tonquin, Siam, Madagascar, Morocco, while English navalism in the last forty years

acrifices on the people sustaining it. We are asked, however, to believe that French militarism is maintained by a "democracy" and German militarism by an "autocracy." Without

he nation as those of France, and the German Reichstag has sanctioned every successive levy for the support of German armaments. As to Russian militarism, it may be presumed no

e machines, we must seek the justification fo

l so many youthful Germans to the colours? On what grounds of moral sanction does Grea

ritory, it is unassailable, and never has been invaded with success. No power can plunder or weaken Russia as long as she remain

he continent of Siberia into which to overflow. Russia cannot be threatened within Russia and has no need to go outside Russia. A Russian army of 4,000,000 is not necessary to self-defence. Its inspiration can be due only to a polic

e incorporation of the Slavs within the mightiest empire upon earth-this is the main reason why Russia maintains the mightiest army upon earth. Its threat to Germany, as

ts first line troops almost equal to G

again and again within the last thirty years to attack France at a disadvantage, if not even with impunity. Why has she refrained-whose hand restrained her? Not Russia's-not England's. During the Russo-Japanese war or during the Boer war, France could have been assailed with ease and her army broken to pieces. But German militarism refrained from striking that blow. The object of the great army France maint

way of attacking Germany), and to "recover" Strasburg meant a

nch attack upon Germany only a question of time and opportunity. Until England appeared upon the scene neither Russia nor France, nor both combined, could

needed money to perfect the machinery of invasion, so sorely tried by the disastrous failure to invade Korea and Manchuria. France had the money to advance, but she still doub

and the circle round Germany grew taut. From that day the counsels of the allies and their new found "friend" thickened and qui

at sea it became the enemy of civilization. These trading people not content with an army that kept French "revanche" discreetly silent and Slav "unity" a dream of the future presumed to have a sea-born commerce that grew by leaps and bounds, and they dared to build a

derstanding had the same clear purpose to serve, and while the aim to each was different the end was the same. Germany's power of defence must be des

rporation of the Slav elements in part into her own vast emp

and of Alsace with Strasburg and their 1,500,000

r and along with it the permanent crippling of

a useless burden for a nation of philosophers to maintain, so that the future status of maritime efficiency in Europe

it only remained to get ready for the day when the matter could be brought to issue. The murder of the Archduke Ferdinand furn

hich might be required of her by her interests." (Reply of the Fren

ld have joined her "friends" in the assault on Germany, as Sir Edward Grey was forced to admit when

lt of the military compact between France and England signed, sealed and delivered in November, 1912, and withheld from the cognizance of the British Parliament until after war had bee

British Ambassador in St. Petersburg on 27th of July, requiring him to assure the Russian Foreign Mini

in view when King George reviewed it earlier in the month, and when His Majesty so hurriedly summoned the unconstitutional "Home Rule" conference at Buckingham Palace on 18th of July. Nothing remained for the "frien

s well and carefully laid, tested and tried beforehand. Every rung of the scaling ladder being raised for

That wheel was the ever faster driven purpose of Great Britain to destroy the gro

the first time in the history of world trade Great Britain would have been put in the second place. German exports from January to June had swelled to the enormous tota

re being discarded. England fights not to defend the neutrality of Belgium, not to destroy German militarism, b

victims the United States are invited to approve, in order that to-morrow their

Charles Beresford yesterday magnanimously suggested, how long may it be before the Panam

Admiralty controlling it is seated at Whitehall, will always be an eyesore to

trols the highways and waterways of mankind by a fleet whose function is "to dictate the maritime law of nations," will beget indeed a new Europe, but a Europe whose acqui

eace. If she go down to-day before a combination of brute force and unscrupulous intelligence her fall cannot be permanent. Germany has within herself the forces th

ew Europe will be to hold a sword, not her own, over the struggling form of a resurgent Germany in the interests of another people. Let Germany lose 1,000,000 men in the fighting of to-day, she can recover them in two years of peace. But to France the losses of this war, whether she win or lose, cannot be made good in a quarter of a century of child births. Whatever comes to Russia, to England, France as a gr

f commerce. In order to keep it from those fields England fanned the dying fires of French

hat whatever the immediate fate of German

in Europe was one of friendship with Germany. But that meant, inevitably, the discovery by Europe that the chief barrier to Europea

and a Europe kept apart is a Europe armed, anxious and watchful, bent on mutual attack, its eyes fixed on the earth. Euro

but not of Europe, immune themselves from all attack, and sure that whatever suffering they inflict on others can never be visited on their own shores,

rds a despatch from Sir Alfred Sharpe, the correspondent of a London paper in France, comes to hand. It sho

tion caused by the German invasion, it is only by an actual experience that a full realization of the horror comes. To return to England after visiting the French war zone is

Daily Chronicle from the

by "an actual experience that the full realization of the horror comes." Until that horror strikes deep on English soil her statesmen, her Ministers, her

ong her own people, and on the head of those who devise her policies, then we might talk of arbitrati

ctor that ensures at will peace or war on others, there can be only armam

d the spectacle of Celtic freedom beyond the outposts of the Roman legions; as Agricola phrase

al exploitation, whether it call itself a

servitude at sea on the Greek world, so the British Empire, in the name

perial democrats assailing her from East and

siatic, African, American, Canadian and European enemies, t

o prohibit the one league of concord that alone can bring freedom and peace

ravaged fields of mid-Europe, but mid the wasted coasts a

oundation of peace among men can only be found when mastery of th