WHAT IS WAR?

Evening Post, Volume CV, Issue 23, 27 January 1923, Page 11

WHAT IS WAR?

DISPASSIONATE INQUIRY

THE INSTRUMENT OF POLICY

GOVERNMENT RESTS ON FORCE.

Attesting a service for Territorial in a London church not long ago I was treated by the preacher, who himself, wore a war medal, to an impassioned denunciation of war's horrors, and an eloquent appeal to the entire congregation to support the League of Nations and so make war for the future impossible, writes the Hon. John Fortescue in the "Morning Post." There could be no question of the orator's intense sincerity; but his discourse only set me asking myself for the thousandth time, "What do we mean when we speak of war—in short, what is war?" We are told that it is an instrument, .of policy for, the imposition of the will of one ■ community or nation upon another; but this is only another way of saying that it-is the employment of physical force by one set of persons. A, to compel another set of persons. B, to do what A desires, and what B desires not. And this doee not cairy us very much further; for precisely the same definition could be applied to legislation. It is an unpleasant but admitted fact that all government in this world rests in the last resort upon physical force; and it is a still more unpleasant and less readily admitted fact that physical force rests in the last resort upon the taking of life and the infliction of physical pain. Legislation enforced by penalties is neither more nor less than a declaration of war against all persons who decline to conform with certain rules. Wise legislators, therefore, naturally endeavour so to frame their laws that they shall be acceptable to the vast majority of citizens. They wish, since there may always be resistance from some small section to have the levy en masse on their side. Representative government endeavours to compass the same end by ascertaining in a very crude fashion whether a majorjty'is in favour of any new la.w before it is passed. Its methods are not always efficient, nor the results satisfactory; but the wit of man so far has devised no better means of assuring government by consent. > THE ARMY AS POLICE. , It was assumed in old days that all pood citizens would obey the sheriff, or other representative of the King, and help him to enforce the law; but, of oourse, this expectation .was frequently disappointed; and hence arose the need of a police to carry on the declared war against transgressors. For a century and a. half after the establishment of the Regular Army the most important of this work was done by soldiers. For instance, the, law had declared war against. all persons who introduced one or more of an immense variety of articles into the kingdom without paying duty on the same; and the prosecution ot hostilities against smugglers occupied the full time of at least three regiments ■of light dragoons, to say nothing of revenue-cutters. But this was not a satisfactory arrangement. The British have no great love for soldiers, except when employed for their defence in time of peril'; and ( they so contrived matters that _a soldier might be hanged for murder if he killed a law-breaker, and shot for mutiny if he did not. This foolish' arrangement was due to our English disinclination to face facts. Any lawbreaker is assumed to levy war against .the King; in certain cases he is said to break the Kmg's peaqe; but those who suppress the law-breaker by force equally perpetrate an act of war; and the perfectly just conclusion is that every community lives, as in fact it does] in a state of perpetual war.

In 1829 there began in England the establishment of a Standing Army to carry on the 'Campaign continuously required by. legislation. This Army has since grown to huge dimensions, and is called the police. No constitutional history that I have seen takes the slightest notice of the fact. It is. not even-men-tioned ir the excellent compilation of Acland and Ransome; yet to me the establishment of the Metropolitan Police by Wellington and Peel seems the most _ important constitutional •administrative innovation of the 13th Century The wars declared by legisla- ( won have- since then been waged with a rigour and efficiency hitherto unknown; and it* need hardly be added that they have been many. Hostilities against r those who are reluctant to pay rates and -taxes are perennial; and within my own lifetime the law has pronounced that those wiio fail to send their children to school or to get them vaccinated, youths under sixteen years of age- who s#oke tobacco, and sundry others are all among its enemies., In the matter of vaccination, the war has ended in the defeat of the law; and the campaign against boysmokers has not yet been begun. NOT ALL LEGISLATION JUST. It will be objected that , the wars waged by legislation are just and necessary. Most certainly, and, of course, they may be; but it does not follow that tKey all of them are. In the past sundry laws were enacted to make people think alike on political and religious subjects—the task which has baffled all statesmen from the beginning of time- • and will baffle them to, the end. We profess shame for such legislation now. We dignify those who resisted it to the death by the* name of martyrs, and we stigmatise those who slew them as persecutors. Yet the lino between persecution and legislative war is not easily drawn. There are plenty of fanatics who long to persecute those who do not believe, with them, that all property should be held in common. They would probably try to excuse themselves by pretending, after the fashion of all revolutionists, that their will is the wilj of the- people; but this does not affect the main,issue. All legislation enforced by penalties, is, I repeat, in essence a declaration of war. , It. may be justifiable, it may be in tho highest degree beneficial; or it may be neither the one nor the other; but war it is, though the casualty list may show many fewer killod than prisoners.

■ WAR NEVER ENDING. j Such is the war that rages without ceasing in every civilised community. We accept it for the most part because in the main it delivers us from private war—-from the state' of things that at this moment afflicts Ireland. " Revenge," says Bacon, " is a kind of wild justice, which the more man's nature runs to the more ought law to weed it out." And so the law bids every aggrieved person to carry his grievance to the King, who will set his standing army in motion to give redress. Every privilege which places any subject outside the law. as in old days peers and members of Parliament, and in these days trades unions, is a provocation to provide war, and therefore objectionable. Equally condemnable, upon precisely the same ground, is reluctance on the part of any Government to enforce the law and preserve order. Such a Government is to be compared to a general who deserts hi*!

army—a rare occurrence in our military annals, though frequent in our political history.

And now let us pass from the perpetual domestic war, which is waged to uphold (though, if unwise, it may equally endanger) the King's peace, to the external war, which is a breach of the ■ world's peace. We may parody Bacon's words aud say that war, in this case, is a kind of wild legislation, which inflicts the penalties first, and'lays down the law, commonly called a treaty, afterwards.' It is really an attempt to apply on a large scale the most effective method of silencing one who differs from oneself in opinion, namely, to kill him. Hitherto our powers of destruction have been limited to the killing of men enough to frighten the survivors, into submission; and then the treaty is signed, ' and the victorious party leaves a police foree —otherwise an army of occupation—to see that it is observed. For a treaty that is not heartily accepted by the defeated party—and few penal treaties can be—is like a law which can only be enforced by the police. It is practically a fresh declaration of war. For that reason most treaties of peace are parties either piecemeal or, if a safe and are thrown over by one or other ofthe parties, either piecemeal or, if a safe and convenient opportunity presents itself, bodily and entirely. EXTENUATING CIRCUMSTANCES. We are now told, however, that science promises in future wars comparatively easy means of exterminating whole communities with certainty and dispatch. This will obviate the necessity of treaties, which might seem at first sight to be an advantage, since war, in such a case, would not lead so inevitably to fresh war. No point, however, is so persistently urged by advocates of the League of Nations as the prospect that every man, woman, and child in this island may be suddenly, speedily, and (it is to be presumed) painlessly done to death within a few days or hours before or after the declaration of hostilitier. It may be granted that there are many to whom such a vision is appalling, but, after all, these things are only a question of degree. There are at least two countries in Europe where the process of exterminating enemies is going forward not less steadily, and far less humanely, than we are taught to expect in the nest war. And what we call the law is quit© as ruthless in its own way. In old days the forest-laws did their utmost to exterminate poachers by slaughter and sterilisation. In these days the law lays violent hands on- the insane and the feeble- : minded; and good and humane men are j seriously considering whether it would be feasible to apply to them the remedies formerly applied to poachers. It is common to call these poor people by the name of undesirables; but it would be far better if we styled them outright 1 the State's enemies, for that is what they are; otherwise why should we declare war against them and take them prisoners? It is idle to plead that they are not responsible for their actions- They are enemies, all the more .dangerous enemies for their irresponsibility, and that is ■ enough, v. THE ESSENCE OF ENMITY. And what is an enemy ? An enemy; I imagine; is anyone who wishes us ill, and will do us an ill-turn if he can, either with risk to himself or preferably with- • out it. The essence of enmity is, I conceive, hatred, the commonest, most intractable, and most unreasonable of human passions. Everyone must respect the object for which the League of Na- j tions has been formed; and, if by its efforts it can persuade conflicting nations to adjust their differences amicably, all must wish it well. But its weak point is that it aspires to deal not with national differences only, bat with national hatreds. It is vain to pretend that national hatreds do 1 not exist, because they do. There are thousands of Irish who would exult in the thought of exterminating the* inhabitants of Great Britain within an hour. And there are many hatreds in the world, racial, national, tribal, and religious, which are quite as bitter as that of the Irish towards the English. It is possible that the speedy extermination of one or the other of these hating parties might, on the whole, make for the world's peace. It took the Spaniards eight centuries to drive the Moors from Spain, but they accomplished it at last. The total casualty list might have been greatly reduced if they could have done as much in eight hours. I am very far from making light of. the hideous slaughter of the late war; but^ the really appalling novelty about it was that it was achieved in so short a time. Yet the speed of destruction with modern weapons has been growing steadily, ever since the introduction of the percussion cap eighty years ago;, and we can. hardly say that it has taken us by surprise. We must expect it to increase still further, as unquestionably it will. We must expect also that it will take toll not only of the cream of a nation's manhood, but I of all ages and both sexes. But there { is nothing new in this; and English women in particular, who have lately, won many of the full rights of citizenship and are still struggling to pot themselves on a level with men. will welcome , the masculine privilege of being slain. That by any convention nations, generally, can be brought to abjure the latest scientific engines of destruction is not to be thought of. They would not trust each other to observe it, and they would be quite right. The Pope ones tried to prohibit the cross-bow as too deadly for Christian warfare; but he failed; and where a Pope failed in the twelfth century a League of Nations will hardly succeed in the twentieth! THE "LEAGUE" POLICY. j In the face of these facts the attitude of the advocates of the League of Nations in this country seems to be one of sheer terror. They protest loudly that England hates no nation (which is, perhaps, true), that she should proclaim the fact by disarmament, and call upon all other nations to do likewise. But though England hates no one, there are many that hate England; and to these the advocates of the League to all intent open their arms, and say, "Come over and exterminate us." This is not, indeed, what they profess to want. They have a parrot-cry that there must never be another war, and that, if there is, it will be the death of Western civilisation. Biit that death, which at some period is, of course, inevitable, will not be delayed but rather hastened by the extermination of the inhabitants of Great Britain. The truth is that to use the word war to express an abnormal condition of things is absolutely fallacious. We live in a world of war, in a parpetual state of war, and under perpetual, though constantly changing, conditions of war. We no longer wail our vilJages, nor huddle our houses round some powerful noble's castle for protection; but that is only because we have a policeman outside our doors. Possibly the policeman may. in his turn give "place to electric alarms and protections, but .that will not alter the fact that our normal condition is a state of war.