Page:Karl Liebknecht - Militarism (1917).djvu/76

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MILITARISM

men in the American navy, in 1905, we see that the United States, too, furnishes a choice collection of the main forms of the armed forces of the state.

In Switzerland there existed until lately a real people's army, a general arming of the people. Every Swiss citizen, able to bear arms, had his gun and ammunition continually in his house. That was the army of democracy of which Gaston Moch treats in his well-known book. Switzerland enjoying an international guarantee equal to that of Belgium, it was only natural that in this country "militarism for abroad" should assume and retain a particularly mild character, a result to which numerous other circumstances contributed their share. But the "militarism for home" changed with the accentuation of class antagonism. The fact that the proletariat possessed arms and ammunition was increasingly felt, by the capitalist class that wanted to dominate, to be an impediment to its liberty to exploit and oppress and even a danger to its existence. So, in September, 1899, they began to disarm the people by taking