The Germs of War/Chapter 5
5. Sign-Boards That Point Toward War.
There are social differences and differences in ideals. Yes, and there are differences in race, in language, and in religion. But here are no necessary causes of war. They are handy tools to use after war has been declared. They are handy instruments for the development of hatred and fear. But the men of different race, nationality, language, and religion, work side by side in American mills, and live side by side in American towns. In the second generation, they go side by side up the aisle of the church, and are pronounced man and wife. And all of this without any more hard feeling than is found among people having the same race, nationality, language and religion. Even the people that have been taught to hate one another in Europe get along very well together in America. They live in the same neighborhoods and send their children to the same schools.
Differences in race, nationality, language and religion do not make wars in the Twentieth Century. They help, but they are not at the bottom of the trouble. The germs of war are not here.
There are political causes of war.
The army and navy is a branch of the political government, and the army and navy wants war.
Men get tired of uselessness. "Here we are these many years," they complain, "doing nothing. We have been educated and equipped for war. We are tired of just showing off; we want the real thing." One of the great militarists of Europe is reported to have said regarding the army, "It is just like a big machine. It gets rusty if you do not use it."
Satan gloats over idle hands. Swaggering officers and gossiping army and navy circles are a constant menace to the peace of any nation.
Military men reason thus within themselves, "Why have officers if there is to be no war?" And, by the same token, if there are officers, why not have war? Any man trained for a profession, and then held continually away from it, would reason in exactly the same way. The military establishment is as likely to lead a nation toward war as guns and dogs are likely to lead a household toward hunting.
Still, the army is a relatively small factor in American life. There are less than twenty thousand military and naval officers in the United States. Their business is war, but they are the merest handful as compared with the whole country. If there were two or three hundred thousand officers in the United States they might constitute a serious menace to the peace of the country, as they do in those European countries that have a great militarist caste.
Secret diplomacy is a fruitful cause of misunderstanding among nations. The statesmen write notes for weeks or perhaps for years; the tension between the countries grows greater; intrigue breeds rumor; people are white hot with expectancy, fear, and uncertainty. Then a pin drops somewhere, and the nations are mobolizing.
If the records of the correspondence between the warring nations of Europe had been published before the war began instead of after it started, there might have been no war. The negotiations between nations should be as open as the sessions of the legislatures or the courts. Daylight diplomacy would eliminate much bad feeling between the nations.
There are politicians who would make war to get votes. Such men are undoubtedly in a hopeless minority, yet the type exists, and in a grave crisis it must be reckoned with.
Still this is not the answer. None of these things will explain the causes of great wars, like the present struggle in Europe. None of them will explain the campaign for national preparedness called on so effectively in the newspapers, schools, colleges, and pulpits of the United States; or the campaign for intervention in Mexico that has been so persistently waged for years past. Differences in ideals, race, language, and religion help to develop hatred. The military caste, star-chamber diplomacy and political ambition play their part in fostering the war spirit, but they are not the germs of war. They are merely the medium in which the germs develop.
The germs of war lie deeper in the competition for economic advantages that has plagued mankind for ages, and that still rides like a nightmare on the neck of the human race.