JX 
 
 1975 
 
 B 3 t,53 Hfifi 
 
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PRIQE Id. . 
 
 Serijs J. JPcmphle^. Na) 1 . 
 
 22, BUCKINGHAM GATE, S.W.I. 
 
 THE EMBARGO v. THE GUN. 
 
 ^ BY -^An 
 
 ARNOLD LBENNETT. •£%. 
 
 SEVEN-EIGHTHS of the world are bound togelher 
 against the other eighth. The seven-eighths might form 
 a League of Free Nations at once among themselves, and 
 thus, at any rate, make a start towards common-sense- But 
 some people among the seven-eighths object. There are two 
 classes of these objectors. 
 
 One class says: " The Allies already are a League. They 
 have not been able to stop the war. Hence the notion of a 
 League to prevent war is absurd." I am not travestymg the 
 so-called argument. It is seriously put forward. I do not, 
 however, propose to take it seriously. If there exist noddles 
 which cannot understand that the presenit Alliance is an Alliance 
 for the express purpose of making war, whereas the express 
 purpose of the proposed League of Free Nations is to keep the 
 peace, then I am not going to worry myself about those noddles, 
 for they deserve only to be 'ignored. 
 
 A League of Nations Now? 
 
 The other class of objectors to the immediate formation of 
 a League can put up a somewhat better show of reason. This 
 class says that the immediate formation of a League among the 
 Allies would place the Central Powers in an invidious position 
 after the war, would tend to the splitting up of the world into 
 two rival groups, and might result in the oppression of the 
 Central Powers andl the permanence of hate. In this argument 
 I trace a little of the working of the type of mind which is 
 always anxious to be rather more than fair to Germany — the 
 type of mind which, while remembering that Christ said : " Love 
 your enemies," forgets that Christ never said : " Love your 
 enemies better than )-our friends." Still, the argument merits 
 a reply. 
 
 I assume, of course, that the Central Powers will be beaten, 
 because if they are not beaten the League of Nations will not 
 be worth talking about for fifty years to come. If the Central 
 Powers are beaten, there can't possibly be the rival groups 
 foreseen in the argument. The Central Powers v/ill not be 
 
 ivitkOJiOll 
 
•'••a jirjnp;'tln?y*<\'i11'be j'detail, or, rather, several scatteied and 
 incoherent details. Consider what the Central Powers now are. 
 They are not a group of equals. They are a group of four chief 
 slaves and a master. The world is not fighting lor its libertx 
 against the might of Bulgaria or Turkey, or against the terrible 
 efficiency of Austria or Hungary, or even against the cast-iron 
 ideals of Bavaria or Saxe-Coburg-Golha. The world is fighting 
 for its liberty against Prussia, and against nothing^ else. 
 Prussian ambition, Prussian arrogance, and Prussian efficiencv 
 arc the sole menace to civilisation as we understand it. Defeat 
 Prussia and the Central Powers lose their life-force and fall 
 apart. 
 
 Prussia's Bad Time. 
 
 Prussia has a population less than that of the United King- 
 dom, and I positively do not see Prussia pitting hersvlf against 
 the remainder of the human race after the war. Prussia is 
 undoubtedly in for a bad time. Itnmities will persist; resent- 
 ments will have their effects; nothing but the slow passage of 
 time can turn bad blood into good. Prussia, no longer a rival, 
 is certain to feel uf>on her the heavy oppressive hand of an 
 outraged and indignant world. If she is defeated she will get 
 some of the treatment of a defeated enemy. She will suffer 
 severely. 
 
 Everybody with any nobility of soul will hope, for the sake 
 of the world, that Prussia may be treated with as much mag- 
 nanimity as she is capable of comprehending — not more ! Will 
 this desirable result be more likely with a League of Nations 
 in being or without a League of Nations? The answer cannot 
 be in doubt. The existence of a fully constituted League of 
 Nations at the end of the war — a League of Nations whose 
 avowed object is to suppress militarism — will assuredly help to 
 mitigate the excesses of that militaristic and merely revengeful 
 spirit which is bound to follow a victory, and which, if it is 
 not curbed, will tend to perpetuate the very evils which we are 
 trying to cure. 
 
 There is another point quite as inxportant. The chances 
 of successfully forming a League of Free Nations at once, 
 without waiting for the end of the war, are probably more 
 favourable than they will be later, because now the .Mlies — 
 that is to say, nearly all the nations of the earth — are united 
 by a common aim. When that aim has been accomplished, 
 they will tend to separate again; they will not have the same 
 unTqiie and tremendously powerful reason for agreeing with one 
 anotiier; old differences will show themselves; the atmosphere 
 will be changed; the great Fear which has so rapidly matured 
 the idea of a League of Nations w ill be exorcised — at any rate 
 temporarily; and the odds against unanimous decisions will be 
 much increased. Moreover, unless a League of Free Nations 
 
exists, the principles upon which the Peace Treaty are based 
 will be less sound and less just than they otherwise would be. 
 
 \\'ill it be better for the Allies to say to Prussia : " Come, 
 let us make a League of P>ee Nations against war," or will 
 it be better for them to say : " A League of Free Nations against 
 war is actually created. Its constitution is settled. It lives; it 
 fumctions. Come and' join it as it is, or you will be an outcast 
 from human society "? The reply is plain. In every way, and 
 for a thousand reasons, it will be better that Prussia should be 
 faced with the accomplished fact than that she should have to 
 be invited, with her dangerous characteristics, to help in accom- 
 plishing- the fact. The terrific prestige of the accomplished fact 
 is a thing that Prussia will comprehend; it may l3e doubted 
 whether she will comprehend anything else. 
 
 Thus far for the arguments in support of the immediate 
 establishment of a League of Free Nations without the Central 
 Powers . 
 
 " But," you may urge, " supposing that Prussia decliies 
 to join a League of Free Nations in whose constitution she has 
 had no hand. Even if defeated she will not be totally disarmed. 
 Is she to remain armed while the rest of the world disarms? If 
 so, a few Prussian army corps might soon make mincemeat of 
 your pleasing Utopia." I am not proposing anything so fan- 
 tastic as that the rest of the world should deliver itself into the 
 clutches of a Prussia defeated but armed. I admit that if Prussia 
 decided to resume war as soon as she had made peace, and so 
 on indefinitely, the League of Nations would have to wait until 
 Prussia had been exterminated. 
 
 Preparing for More Wars. 
 
 But Prussia will not be in a position to make war again as 
 soonr as she has made peace. At the worst this war will neces- 
 sarily be follow-ed by a very considerable pause. There cannot 
 in practice be any appeal to arms for a number of years after 
 the conclusion of this war. There may be and there will be, 
 unless the idea of the League of Free Nations is insisted upon, 
 a fresh and suicidal preparation for battle; but actual fighting 
 there will not be, and the arbitrament of the gun can therefore 
 be ruled out for the period of the pause. In the period of the 
 pause the Leagtie of Free Nations can, if it chooses, triumph. 
 Moral force can, if it is wielded with a single and pure aim, put 
 an end to the reign of the gun for ever. It can, however, only do 
 so by a public and solemn renunciatiom of the gun, It cannot 
 do .so by taking a gun of its own and shooting the man who is 
 in the act of making a gun. That would be simply a victory 
 for the gun. 
 
 Then how can it do .so? It can do so by presenting an ulti- 
 matum of exile to a nation which refuses to abandoni gun- 
 making. I doubt whether people adequately realise the enor- 
 
mous power which a League of Nations for the suppression ofj 
 war could bring to bear ag^ainst any nation refusing; to join it. 
 If FVussia, temporarily unable to exercise force, defied thel 
 Leag^ue, the eyes of Prussia could very quickly be opened tol 
 this paramount truth : mimely, that whereas Prussia is[ 
 dependent upon the rest of the world, the rest of the world is 
 not dependent upon Prussia. And a League of Free Nations 
 could demonstrate this truth with almost no risk to itself. 
 
 The New Way to Win. 
 
 Why should the League trouble ta invade and subdue! 
 Prussia to its will when it could paralyse Prussia by putting a 
 stop to all postal, telegraphic, or telephonic communication 
 between Prussia and the outside world? Why should thel 
 League send its own subjects to danger and death when it couldj 
 reach the same end by forbidding all its own subjects to entcrj 
 Prussia? Why should the League put itself to the inconveniencel 
 of destroying Prussian towns when it could intimidate Prussia! 
 just as effectively by prohibiting all imports from Prussia and I 
 all exports to Prussia? Why should the League go forth to 
 sink Prussian ships when it could by a single order intern all 
 of them that touched at a foreign port? Why should the League 
 pile up a war-debt and make Prussia pile up a war-debt, when it 
 could derange the whole of Prussia's finance by withholding all 
 payments due to Prussia? Why should the League stop to 
 argue with Prussia for one hour when it absolutely controls the 
 supply of raw materials that Prussia cannot possibly do without ? 
 
 I need not continue. It must surely be plain that as a method 
 of subduing an enemy the gun is an extremely clumsy, barbaric, 
 and ineffective woapon compared with the moral and economic 
 embargo. The world-embargo is the most efficient and the least] 
 brutal of all weapons, and, if a League of Nations is in exist- 
 ence at the end of the war, and Prussia is unwilling to disarm, 
 the League of Nations could employ that weapon immediately. 
 I venture to prophesy that Prussia would not hold out against 
 it for a month. The British Empire itself could not hold out 
 against such a weapon. 
 
 War may continue after this war, but if it continues the 
 rea.son will be, not that a world-.society cannot in practice 
 destroy militarism without the aid of guns, but because a world- 
 society does not really want to destroy militarism, because it 
 has not yet learnt its lesson, because it will not sacrifice a small 
 gun for a great gain, because it cannot see beyond the end of 
 its nose, because, in a word, it is still damnably stupid. 
 
 (Ilrprinlril from TiiB Daily NEWS for July 16tli. 1918. ■> 
 
 Fublished by tlie Oenoral Secretary, Captain W. Hf-nry Willuims. of the Lbagtb 
 
 op Fheb Nations Association, at their Head Offloes, 22, Buckingha m G ate. 
 
 lyvndon. .S.W. 1; and printM bv Thb National Press Agency Ijmitbd, ht 
 
 Wliifofriars House, Carmelite Street, Ijondon, E.C. 4. 
 
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