CHAPTER IV

THE WAR AGAINST THE WEST

On his return from his diplomatic trip to Italy, Dr. Sudek.u.m wrote in the _Vorwarts_ that the Italian comrades did not sufficiently comprehend the nature of Czarism. We agree with Dr. Sudek.u.m that a German can more easily understand the nature of Czarism as he experiences daily, in his own person, the nature of Prussian-German absolutism. The two "natures"

are very closely akin to each other.

German absolutism represents a feudal-monarchical organization, resting upon a mighty capitalist foundation, which the development of the last half-century has erected for it. The strength of the German army, as we have learned to know it anew in its present b.l.o.o.d.y work, consists not alone in the great material and technical resources of the nation, and in the intelligence and precision of the workman-soldier, who had been drilled in the school of industry and his own cla.s.s organizations. It has its foundation also in its Junker officer caste, with its master cla.s.s traditions, its oppression of those who are below and its subordination to those who are above. The German army, like the German state, is a feudal-monarchical organization with inexhaustible capitalistic resources. The bourgeois scribblers may chatter all they want about the supremacy of the German, the man of duty, over the Frenchman, the man of pleasure; the real difference lies not in the racial qualities, but in the social and political conditions. The standing army, that closed corporation, that self-sufficing state within the state, remains, despite universal military service, a caste organization that in order to thrive must have artificial distinctions of rank and a monarchical top to crown the commanding hierarchy.

In his work, "The New Army," Jaures showed that the only army France could have is an army of defense built on the plan of arming every citizen, that is, a democratic army, a _militia_. The bourgeois French Republic is now paying the penalty for having made her army a counterpoise to her democratic state organization. She created, in Jaures' words, "a b.a.s.t.a.r.d regime in which antiquated forms clashed with newly developing forms and neutralized each other." This incongruity between the standing army and the republican regime is the fundamental weakness of the French military system.

The reverse is true of Germany. Germany's barbarian retrograde political system gives her a great military supremacy. The German bourgeoisie may grumble now and then when the pretorian caste spirit of the officers' corps leads to outbreaks like that of Zabern. They may make wry faces at the Crown Prince and his slogan, "Give it to them!

Give it to them!" The German Social Democracy may inveigh ever so sharply against the systematic personal ill-treatment of the German soldier which has caused proportionately double the number of suicides in the German barracks of that in any other country. But for all that, the fact that the German bourgeoisie has absolutely no political character and that the German Socialist party has failed to inspire the proletariat with the revolutionary spirit has enabled the ruling cla.s.s to erect the gigantic structure of militarism, and so place the efficient and intelligent German workmen under the command of the Zabern heroes and their slogan, "Give it to them!"

Professor Hans Delbruck seeks the source of Germany's military strength in the ancient model of the Teutoburgerwald, and he is perfectly justified.

"The oldest Germanic system of warfare," he writes, "was based on the retinue of princes, a body of specially selected warriors, and the ma.s.s of fighters comprising the entire nation.

This is the system we have to-day also. How vastly different are the methods of fighting now from those of our ancestors in the Teutoburgerwald! We have the technical marvels of modern machine guns. We have the wonderful organization of immense ma.s.ses of troops. And yet, our military system is at bottom the same. The martial spirit is raised to its highest power, developed to its utmost in a body which once was small but now numbers many thousands, a body giving fealty to their War Lord, and by him, as by the princes of old, regarded as his comrades; and under their leadership the whole people, educated by them and disciplined by them. _Here we have the secret of the warlike character of the German nation_."

The French Major, Driant, looks on at the German Kaiser in his White Cuira.s.sier's uniform, undoubtedly the most imposing military uniform in the world, and republican by constraint that he is, his heart is filled with a lover's jealousy. And how the Kaiser spends his time "in the midst of his army, that true family of the Hohenzollerns!" The Major is fascinated.

The feudal caste, whose hour of political and moral decay had struck long ago, found its connection with the nation once more in the fertile soil of imperialism. And this connection with the nation has taken such deep root that the prophecies of Major Driant, written several years ago, have actually come true--prophecies that until now could only have appeared as either the poisonous promptings of a secret Bonapartist, or the drivellings of a lunatic.

"The Kaiser," he wrote, "is the Commander in Chief ... and behind him stands the entire working cla.s.s of Germany as one man.... Bebel's Social Democrats are in the ranks, their fingers on the trigger, and they too think only of the welfare of the Fatherland. The ten-billion war indemnity that France will have to pay will be a greater help to them than the Socialist chimeras on which they fed the day before."

Yes, and now they are writing of this future indemnity even in some _Social Democratic (!)_ papers, with open rowdy insolence--an indemnity, however, not of ten billions, but of twenty or thirty billions.

Germany's victory over France--a deplorable strategic necessity, according to the German Social Democrats--would mean not only the defeat of France's standing army; it would mean primarily the victory of the feudal-monarchical state over the democratic-republican state.

For the ancient race of Hindenburgs, Moltkes and Klucks, hereditary specialists in ma.s.s-murder, are just as indispensable a condition of German victory as are the 42 centimeter guns, the last word in human technical skill.

The entire capitalist press is already talking of the unshakable stability of the German Monarchy, strengthened by the war. And German professors, the same who proclaimed Hindenburg a doctor of All the Sciences, are already declaring that political slavery is a higher form of social life.

"The democratic republics, and the so-called monarchies that are under subjection to a parliamentary regime, and all the other beautiful things that were so extolled--what little capacity they have shown to stand the storm!"

These are the things that the German professors are writing now.

It is shameful and humiliating enough to read the expressions of the French Socialists, who had proved themselves too weak to break the alliance of France with Russia or even to prevent the return to three-years' military service, but who, when the War began, nevertheless donned their red trousers and set out to free Germany. But we are seized with a feeling of unspeakable indignation on reading the German Socialist party press, which in the language of exalted slaves extols the brave heroic caste of hereditary oppressors for their armed exploits on French territory.

On August 15, 1870, when the victorious German armies were approaching Paris, Engels wrote in a letter to Marx, after describing the confused condition of the French defense:

"Nevertheless, a revolutionary government, if it comes soon, need not despair. But it must leave Paris to its fate, and continue to carry on the war from the south. It is then still possible that such a government may hold out until arms and ammunition are bought and a new army organized with which the enemy can be gradually pushed back to the frontier. That would be the right ending to the war--for both countries to demonstrate that they cannot be conquered."

And yet there are people who shout like drunken helots, "On to Paris."

And in doing so they have the impudence to invoke the names of Marx and Engels. In what measure are they superior to the thrice despised Russian liberals who crawled on their bellies before his Excellency, the military Commander, who introduced the Russian knout into East Galicia.

It is cowardly arrogance--this talk of the purely "strategic" character of the War on the Western front. Who takes any account of it? Certainly not the German ruling cla.s.ses. They speak the language of conviction and of main force. They call things by their right names. They know what they want and they know how to fight for it.

The Social Democrats tell us that the War is being waged for the cause of national independence. "That is not true," retorted Herr Arthur Dix.

"Just as the high politics of the last century," wrote Dix, "owed its specially marked character to the _National Idea_, so the political-world events of this century stand under the emblem of the _Imperialistic Idea_. The imperialistic idea that is destined to give the impetus, the scope and the goal to the striving for power of the great (_Der Weltwirtschaftskrieg_, 1914, p. 3).

"It shows gratifying sagacity," says the same Herr Arthur Dix, "on the part of those who had charge of the military preparations of the War, that the advance of our armies against France and Russia in the very first stage of the War took place precisely where it was most important to keep valuable German mineral wealth free from foreign invasion, and to occupy such portions of the enemy's territory as would supplement our own underground resources" (Ibid., p. 38).

The "strategy," of which the Socialists now speak in devout whispers, really begins its activities with the robbery of mineral wealth.

The Social Democrats tell us that the War is a war of defense. But Herr Georg Irmer says clearly and distinctly:

"People ought not to be talking as though the German nation had come too late for rivalry for world economy and world dominion,--that the world has already been divided. Has not the earth been divided over and over again in all epochs of history?" (_Los vom englischen Weltjoch_, 1914, p. 42.)

The Socialists try to comfort us by telling us that Belgium has only been temporarily crushed and that the Germans will soon vacate their Belgian quarters. But Herr Arthur Dix, who knows very well what he wants, and who has the right and the power to want it, writes that what England fears most, and expressly so, is that _Germany should have an outlet to the Atlantic Ocean_.

"For this very reason," he continues, "we must neither _let Belgium go out of our hands_, nor must we fail to make sure that the coast line from Ostende to the Somme shall not again fall into the hands of any state which may become a political va.s.sal of England. We must see to it that in some form or other _German influence_ is securely established there."

In the endless battles between Ostende and Dunkirk, sacred "strategy" is now carrying out this programme of the Berlin stock exchange, also.

The Socialists tell us that the War between France and Germany is merely a brief prelude to a lasting alliance between those countries. But here, too, Herr Arthur Dix shows Germany's cards. According to him, "there is but one answer: _to seek to destroy the English world trade, and to deal deadly blows at English national economy_."

"The aim for the foreign policy of the German Empire for the next decades is clearly indicated," Professor Franz von Liszt announces.

"'Protection against England,' that must be our slogan" (_Ein mitteleuropaischer Staatenverband_, 1914, p. 24).

"We must crush the most treacherous and malicious of our foes,"

cries a third. "We must break the tyranny which England exercises over the sea with base self-seeking and shameless contempt of justice and right."

The War is directed not against Czarism, but primarily against England's supremacy on the sea.

"It may be said," Professor Schiehmann confesses, "that no success of ours has given us such joy as the defeat of the English at Maubeuge and St. Quentin on August 28."

The German Social Democrats tell us that the chief object of the War is the "settlement with Russia." But plain, straightforward Herr Rudolf Theuden wants to give Galicia to Russia with North Persia thrown in.

Then Russia "would have got enough to be satisfied for many decades to come. We may even make her our friend by it."

"What ought the War to bring us?" asks Theuden, and then he answers: