The New Zealand Tablet THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 11, 1915. GERMANY, ENGLAND, AND AMERICA

New Zealand Tablet, 11 February 1915, Page 33

The New Zealand Tablet THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 11, 1915. GERMANY, ENGLAND, AND AMERICA

T is not a little difficult to understand why all the pother should be* made, or why, indeed, at least so far as England is concerned, there should be any commotion at all, in connection .with the threatened ‘blockade’ of the English Channel. Germany, it appears, has warned neutral States that the English Channel and southern

portion of the North Sea are to be regarded .as a blockaded area, and that neutral ships found in the danger zone, equally with those of the enemy, will be attacked and destroyed by German craft. - In other words, in order to prevent Britain from landing men and material in France, Germany is out to hit any hull that she sees in the portion of water-way which she has chosen to mark off. But that is precisely what she has been doing for weeks and months past, her latest exploits being the torpedoing of the Tokomaru and the attempt to sink the hospital ship Asturias. Already she has done her worst in the direction indicated. The public announcement that she intends to continue the policy she has been pursuing in the past is interesting, and in a sense, satisfactory, as letting the world know exactly where , she stands in relation to the rights of neutrals and to the principles of international law and usage. But there is nothing catastrophic or cataclysmic about it.

On present indications it would seem as if one;of the principal.effects of the German move-—and certainly not the least'desirable—will be to put a little stiffening into the attitude of the great . exponent of watchful waiting, President Wilson,- Representing as he* does by far the greatest of the neutral Powers, President Wilson has so far proved himself a miserably poor custodian of neutral rights. A learned American professor now visiting this country has described the President’s attitude as that of a man attempting to balance water on both shoulders; rather, we should say, President Wilson’s attitude has been one of almost complete self-effacement, at a time when strength and dignified self-assertiveness were pre-eminently called for. No sane person suggests for a moment that the American President should have committed the folly and madness of embroiling his country in the war, or of assuming in any way the role of a partisan. But posing as he does as a preacher of national righteousness and high morality, it might fairly have been expected of him that he would make some stand, however mild, on behalf of the sanctity of treaties and of the solemnly pledged rights of neutral States as embodied in the Hague Conference conventions.

The Hague Conference of 1907 gave a clear and definite guarantee of the rights of neutral States to an assured peace in the following distinct and emphatic articles:

‘ The territory of neutral Powers is inviolable. * Belligerents are forbidden to move troops and convoys of either munitions of war or supplies across the territory of a neutral Power. ‘ The fact of a neutral Power resisting, even by force, attempts to violate its neutrality, cannot be regarded as a hostile act.’ Both Germany and America signed that Convention. The serious aim and high purpose of America in signing the Convention have been set forth by the then President in an article in the New York Times. After noting that the United States were parties to the international code created in the regulations annexed' to the Hague Conventions of 1899 and 1907, Mr. Roosevelt says: ‘As President, acting on behalf of this Government and in accordance with the unanimous wish of our people, I ordered the signature of the United States to these Conventions. „ Most emphatically I would not have permitted such a farce to have gone through if it had entered my head that this Government would not consider itself bound to do all it could to see that the regulations to which it made itself a party were actually observed when the necessity for their observance arose. I cannot imagine any sensible nation thinking it worth while to sign future Hague Conventions if even such a powerful neutral as the United States does not care enough about them to protest against their open breach. Of the present neutral Powers the United States of America is the most disinterested and the strongest, and should therefore bear the main burden of the responsibility in this matter.’ At the time when Germany was tearing up the ‘ scrap of paper,’ ruthlessly violating every one of the articles above cited, and ‘ hacking its way through’ unhappy Belgium, America’s. moral influence counted - for something in the councils of the nations and a word from President Wilson would at least have served to affirm a sacred principle and might have exercised a restraining effect upon Germany throughout the whole term of the savage and sanguinary struggle. And at this supreme moment President Wilson was dumb. The great * apostle of peace and national righteousness only found his voice when the interests of the dollar-chasing copper kings were threatened.

. It was unfortunate for America that coincident with the President’s display of moral weakness there should have come the public disclosures of the present absolute inefficiency of the American' Army and Navy. The

practical result has been to reduce America, in the estimation of the nations at this particular juncture, to the status and level of a thirdrate Power. Alike from the moral and the military point of view, both parties of belligerents now appear to regard her attitude with almost complete indifference. Britain has calmly announced that she will seize the Wilhelmina and the Dacia; and Germany has flatly defied America in the announcement that * neutrals need not trouble to protest ’ at the new piece of tyranny. The American President has still an eleventh-hour opportunity to rehabilitate himself, and to make some attempt to play a part worthy of the great people of whom he is the official head. Germany’s action in attempting to coerce neutral States by means of an ineffective paper blockade is a violation of international law, which should be not only protested against but defied. It is now or never for President Wilson to assert himself.