It is, of course, impossible to state precisely what were those unuttered thoughts that passed through Gladstone's mind as he spoke these characteristically cautious words, but what in general they were can be satisfactorily gleaned from a letter that he had written six days before this to John Bright:
That we should simply declare _we_ will defend the neutrality of Belgium by arms in case it should be attacked. Now, the sole or single-handed defense of Belgium would be an enterprise which we incline to think quixotic; if these two great military powers [France and Prussia] combined against it--that combination is the only serious danger; and this it is which by our proposed engagements we should, I hope, render improbable to the very last degree. I add for myself this confession of faith: If the Belgian people desire, on their own account, to join France or any other country, I for one will be no party to taking up arms to prevent it. But that the Belgians, whether they would or not, should go "plump" down the maw of another country to satisfy dynastic greed is another matter. The accomplishment of such a crime as this implies would come near to an extinction of public right in Europe, and I do not think we could look on while the sacrifice of freedom and independence was in course of consummation.
Fight to the Bitter End
AN INTERVIEW WITH ANDREW CARNEGIE.
Retired ironmaster and philanthropist; builder of the Peace Temple at The Hague; founder of the Carnegie Institution at Washington; founder and patron of a chain of libraries in the United States and Great Britain, and benefactor of many societies and institutions.
By Edward Marshall.
Here is the report of a truly remarkable statement by Mr. Carnegie. He is the world's most notable peace advocate, and in this interview he voices the reflections suggested to him by the great European war.
They are unusual, and make this interview especially worthy of a place upon the pages of the Christmas issue of THE TIMES, although it principally deals with war, and Christmas is the festival of peace.
"Has war ever settled anything which might not have been settled better by arbitration?" I asked Mr. Carnegie.
"No; never," he replied. "No truer inference was ever made than may be found in Milton's query, penned three centuries ago and never answered: 'What can war but wars breed?'
"War can breed only war. Of course, peace inevitably must follow war, but, truly, no peace ever was born of war. We all revere the memory of him who voiced the warning: 'In time of peace prepare for war'; but, as a matter of fact, we all know that when one nation prepares for war others inevitably must follow its dangerous lead.
"Hence, and hence only, the huge armaments which have oppressed the world, making its most peaceful years a spectacle of sadness--a spectacle of men preparing and prepared to fight with one another.
Sooner or later men prepared to fight will fight; huge armaments and armies mean huge battles; huge battles mean huge tragedies.
"This never has been otherwise, and never can be. Peace can come only when mankind abandons warful preparation. And so I seem to have replied to your inquiry with an answer with a tail to it; and the tail is more important than the answer, for the answer merely says that war never settled anything which might not have been settled better by arbitration, while the tail proclaims the folly of a world prepared for war."
How to Prevent War.
"Armament must mean the use of armament, and that is war. If we are to prevent war we must prevent preparation for war, just as if we are to prevent burglary we must prevent preparation for burglary by prohibiting the carrying of the instruments of burglary. The only cure for war" [Mr.
Carnegie in speaking italicized the word "cure"] "is war which defeats some one; but two men who are unarmed are certain not to shoot at one another. Here, as in medicine, prevention is much better than cure.
"Plainly it must be through such prevention, not through such a cure as victory sometimes is supposed to represent, that warfare can be stopped.
Warfare means some one's defeat, of course, and that implies his temporary incapacity for further war, but it goes without saying that all conquered nations must be embittered by their defeat.
"Few nations ever have fought wars in which the majority of at least their fighting men did not believe the side they fought for to be in the right. Defeat by force of arms, therefore, always has meant the general conviction throughout conquered nations that injustice has been done."
Nations Like Individuals.
"In such circumstances nations must be like individuals under similar conditions. The individual believing himself to have been in the right, yet finding himself beaten in his efforts to maintain it, will not accept the situation philosophically; he will be angry and rebellious; he will nurse what he believes to be his wrong.
"To nurse a wrong, whether it be real or fancied, is to help it grow in the imagination, and that must mean at least the wish to find some future means of righting it, either by strategy or increased strength.
"There are two things which humanity does not forget--one is an injury, and, no matter how strongly some may argue against the truth of this contention, the other is a kindness.
"In the long run both will be repaid. And nations, like individuals, prefer the coin which pays the latter debt. Military force never has accomplished kindness. Kindness means industrial armies decked with the garlands of peace; military armies, armed and epauletted, must mean minds obsessed with the spirit of revenge or conquest, hands clenched to strike, hearts eager to invade.
"Every military implement is designed to cut or crush, to wound and kill. Nations at peace help one another with humanity's normal tenderness of heart at times of pestilence, of famine, of disaster.
Nations at war exert their every ounce of strength to force upon their adversaries hunger, destruction, and death. Starvation of the enemy becomes a detail of what is considered good military strategy in war time, just as world-embracing charity has become a characteristic of all civilization during times of peace. Must we not admit flotillas carrying grain to famine-stricken peoples to be more admirable than fleets which carry death to lands in which prosperity might reign if undisturbed by war?"
"But do you not admit that wars sometimes have helped the forces of civilization in their conquest against barbarism?"
"War has not been the chief force of civilization against barbarism,"
Mr. Carnegie replied with emphasis. Then he continued more thoughtfully:
"That is one way of saying it. Another is, no effort of the forces of civilization against barbarism is war in the true sense of the word.
"Such an armed effort is a part of the force pushing barbarism backward, and therefore, in the last analysis, tends toward kindness and peace; while, in the sense in which we use the word, war means the retrogression of civilization into barbarism. It is usually born of greed--greed for territory or for power.
"Such war as that of which we all are thinking in these days is war between civilized men. One civilized man cannot improve another civilized man by killing him, although it is not inconceivable that a civilized man may do humanity a service by destroying human savages, for with the savages he must destroy their savagery.
"But a war in civilized Europe destroys no savagery; it breeds it, so that it and its spawn may defile future generations.
"There has been much balderdash in talk about unselfish motives as the origin of warfare. It is safe to say that 99 per cent of all the slaughter wrought by civilization under the cloak of a desire to better bad conditions really has been evil. It is impossible to conceive of general betterment through general slaughter. There have been few altruistic wars."
"But how about our Spanish war?" I asked. "Surely it was not greed which sent our men and ships to Cuba."
"No," said Mr. Carnegie, "that was not war, but world-police work.
"Our skirmish with Spain was a most unusual international episode. We harmed none of the people of the land wherein we fought, but taught them what we could of wise self-government and gave them independence. To battle for the liberation of the slave is worthy work, and this of ours was such a battle.
"Our Spanish war was not the outgrowth of our rivalry with any one or any one's with us; it was the manifestation of our high sense of responsibility as strong and healthy human beings for the welfare of the weak and oppressed."
That Was Police Work.
"It did not make toward militarism on this continent, but the reverse; in a few months it established permanent peace where peace had been a stranger. It was police work on the highest plane, substituting order for disorder."
"But did it not emphasize the need for the maintenance, even here, of a competent and efficient naval and military force?" I asked.
Mr. Carnegie shook his head emphatically.
"That is the old, old argument cropping up again," said he, "the argument that a provocative is a preventive. For us to maintain a great army for the purpose of preventing war thereby would be as sensible as for each of us to be afraid to walk about except with a lightning rod down his back, since men have been struck by lightning. No nation wants to fight us. We have friends throughout the world.
"Millions now resident in military nations are hoping that some day they may be able to become citizens of our beloved republic, principally because it now is not, nor is it every likely to be, military. Humanity loves peace. Here peace abides, and, if we follow reason, will remain unbroken.
"Note the advantages of our own position. Imagine what the task would be of landing seventy thousand hostile soldiers on our shores! First they would need to cross three thousand miles of the Atlantic or five thousand miles of the Pacific.
"And what if they should come? My plan of operation would be to bid them welcome as our visitors, considering them as men, not soldiers; to take them to our great interior, say, as far west as Chicago, and there to say to them:
"'Here we shall leave you. Make yourselves at home, if that thought pleases you; fight us if it does not. If you think you can conquer us, try it.'
"They would make themselves at home and, learning the advantages of staying with us, would become applicants for our citizenship, rather than our opponents in warfare.