THE MEANING OF WAR FOR THE FUTURE.

Otago Witness, Issue 3494, 22 February 1921, Page 49

THE MEANING OF WAR FOR THE FUTURE.

j I lie war shall end war, * so during its | course was the Great War designated, and there can be no doubt that the phrase rep j resented the genuine and fervent hope of i man .Y throughout the British Empire, and ; in other countries, too. The war had | arisen; it must be foug"??„ out; every effort I and sacrifice must be made to bring it to | a victorious close; then there would be a | just re-settlement of world politics so that j causes of international collision would be ! removed or greatly lessened ; a great j VY orld League for the maintenance of ! l )ea ce would be established, and mankind. i taught by experience, would reject the idea of war as a means of advancing national I interests. How sad has been the dis-illu-j sion! In many quarters the Peace Treaty I as finally signed at Versailles, is ironically styled “'the peace that ends peace.” How much or how little justice there may be in this innuendo I should be sorrv to have to express an opinion. Doubtless” it was over sanguine to expect that any settlement could speedily remedy the conflicting national interests and passions that were the growth of centuries. There are more | grounds for disappointment in the spectacle | of people everywhere drifting back into iust the old ways that led to the Great | War. The majority are still absorbed with making their individual way in life j and advancing their class interests; they ; do not consider how their personal and ’ clas s action affects the world and the prospect of world peace, nor think of working j actively to prevent such a catastrophe as | that which has just afflicted mankind. I And many are consciously 01' unconsciously working to inflame national enmities and thus kindle another world war, while | science is busy designing new machinery of destruction that will make the next great war far worse than the last—horrible as I was. We still hear it reiterated that war cannot be prevented. Wars always have been and always will be as long as j the world lasts, and those who say this or i passively listen to others saying it do not i take the trouble to see how greatly modern : war differs from the war of ancient times, i and even up to the end of last century, j Mr H. G. Wells, one of the most elear- | sighted and practical of pacifists, has lately contributed a series of aritcles to the , English Review of Reviews on the menn- ; ing of modern war and the action that i should be taken to obviate wars. His style is so clear and forcible that I will give some quotations: Most states and empires have been intermittently at war throughout their ■ periods of stability and prosperity. But 1 their warfare was not the warfare' of the ! present time. . . . In 1914 the Euroj pean great powers resorted to war. as they | had resorted to war on many previous j occasions, to decide certain open issues, j This war flamed out with an unexpected J rapidity until all the world was involved, | and it developed a horror, a monstrosity I of destruction, and, above all. an incoiil elusiveness quite unlike am preceding | Wllr -” "The point that concerns us here is j this, that before the age of discovery com j inanities had fought and struggled with j each other much as naughty children might | do in a crowded nursery, within the j measure of their strength. They had hurt j and impoverished each other,' but they | had rarely destroyed each other completely j Their squabbles may have been distressing, j but they were tolerable. It is even posI sible to regard these former wars as I healthy, hardening, and invigorating con-

flicts. But into this nursery 1:a? Sine science, and has put into the hands of these children razor blades with poison in them, bombs of frightful explosive corrosive fluids, and the like. The comparatively harmless conflicts of these infants are suddenly fraught with quite terrific possibilities, and it is only a question of sooner or later before the nursery becomes a heap of corpses, or is blown into smithereens. A real nursery invaded by a reA.k-ua person distributing such gifts would be promptly saved by the intervention of the nurse, but humanity has no nurse but its own poor wisdom. And whether that poor wisdom can rise to the pitch of effectual intervention is the most fundamental problem in mundane affairs at the present time.” Yes; to prevent war matters infinitely more than to enrich our country or ourselves. For the workers it matters far more than higher wages and lighter labour; for women far more than political and legal equality and unrestricted freedom for economic competition. Yet most men and many women are struggling lor these things, while few are even thinking of how war may be prevented. As the late war advanced there was a- steady increase iri its destructiveness and in the frightfulness of the methods of destruction, the British being impelled to imitate the Germans in the employment of poisonous gas, flame throwers, and aerial bombs. This gives a hint of what we may look for in the next war. “The next well-organised war, we are assured, will he far more swift and extensive in its destruction—more particularly of the civilian-population. Armies will advance no longer along roads, but extended in line, with heavy tank transport, which will plough uji the entire surface of the land they traverse ; aerial bombing, with bombs each capable of destroying a small town, will be practicable a thousand miles beyond the military front, and the seas will be swept clear of shipping by mines and submarine activities. There will be no distinction between combatants and non-combatants, because every able-bodied citizen, male or female, is a potential producer of food and munitions; and probably the safest, and certainly the best supplied shelters in the universal cataclysm will t>e the carefully buried, sand-bagged, and camouflaged general headquarters of the contending armies. There military gentlement of limited outlook and high professional training will, in comparative security, achieve destruction beyond their understanding. War is war; you mutft hit always as hard as you can. Offensive and counter-offensive methods continue to prevail over merely defensive ones. The victor in the next great war will be bombed from the air, starved and depleted almost as much as the loser. His victor will be no easy one; it will lie a triumph of the exhausted and dying ocef the dead.’’ That is to say, if war is still to be the final method of settling international disputes, if all the resources of science are still to be devoted to make it more deadly —as they certainly will be while there is any prospect of a conflict—the result will be the decadence, probably the destruction of the civilisation of the white races. The world will be left for the barbarian and semi-civilised, and such Asiatic civilised races as may have wisdom enough to refrain from imitating the white races in their frantic pursuit of war. Surely one of the greatest calamities of modern times is the refusal of the great nation of the United States to co-operate with the European great powers in devising maeknnery for the preservation of world peace. There can be no League of Nations that is not a mockery unless all the leading nations of the world are included in it. But whether or not an effective scheme for the prevention if war be devised it is essential that the war spirit and all forms of national rivalry that make for war shall decline. Justice, humanity, sympathy must increase and embrace every nation and race. Saner ideals of life must prevail ; unrestricted competition both within and between nations must yield to co-operation for human good. People must learn to see that selfiisli pursuit of wealth, the desire to live on the labours of others instead of contributing one’s full share of labour and sacrifice. and all forms of class, national, and racial arrogance go to nurture the war spirit and to give occasion for wars. Doubtless a radical alteration in habits of thought is hard to bring about in men and women ; the world’s chief hope lies in the education of the children of this and the succeeding generation in right ideals of life and conduct. And here is where women are all powerful. As mothers they may teach their children that to work and give for others is better tha nto get for one’s self. They may create round them an atmosphere of love that will make all forms of selfishness and cruelty repellent to them. Most of our teachers are women, arid in their field they may work in the same direction. The noted writer on sociology, Benjamin Kidd, in his last work, “The Science of' Power,’’ lays great stress on the power of women to reform the world. Tie adduces the instance of modern Germany to show how national ideals may be transformed through education within one generation. Before the establishment of the Empire the Germans generally were peaceful in thought and devoid of national arrogance. Then the Prussian military system gained dominance ; society became militarised, military ideals and a perverted patriotism were sedulously inculcated in the schools. German thinkers and educational authorities went far in the wrong direction, with what resulting calamity to the world? Our thinkers, our teachers, and above all our mothers, may, if they will strive, be yet more powerful to overcome the evil teaching of the past and to win peace and human brotherhood for tlie world.