THE CAUSES OF WAR

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LV, Issue 275, 12 April 1913, Page 9

THE CAUSES OF WAR

j AN AMERICAN VIEW. In discussing the contingency of peace and war few as a rule take into account the importance of popular sentiment as a determining factor (says Ex-Attache in the "Chicago Tribune."). Yet it is the one to which must be ascribed the entire responsibility for the outbreak of the war in the Balkans, a war which statecraft and la haute finance strove in vain to avert. Great Britain, France, Russia, Austria and Germany separately and collectively laboured with unprecedented sincerity to preserve Europe from the conflagration, realising that it might spread far before extinction. I

But the means of diplomacy and economic pressure to which they had recourse proved as unavailing as their threats of armed' force. The rulers of Bulgaria, Servia, Greece and Montenegro gave the Great Powers to understand that in throwing down the gage of battle to the Sultan they were submitting to the irresistible will of their people and were confronted with the alternative of the loss of their thrones —nay, possibly their lives. WAR. OF POLITICAL ORIGIN. With regard to the struggle between Turkey and Italy, which, after raging for a little over a year, was recently brought to a close through the successful negotiations for peace at Lausanne, on the shores of the Lake of Geneva, in Switzerland, it was a war that was purely of political and economic origin.

True, it aroused much military enthusiasm among the Italian people once it had started. But if King Victor Emmanuel despatched his troops to invade the Turkish province of Tripoli it was in order to safeguard the extensive Italian commercial and financial interests there and to prevent their loss through their acquisition by Germany on lease from the Sublime Porte.

In one word, the motives that prompted Italy to declare war upon Turkey were purely political and economic, and popular sentiment played no role in the matter; at any rate, in its inception. CONFLICT FOR PERSONAL GAIN. The same may be said of the war between Russia and Japan eight years ago which resulted in such terrible loss of human life. There, too. the causes were purely political and economic, and had it not been for the Yalu timber concessions in Korea in which Secretary of State BezobrazolT, Admiral Alexieff, the Viceroy of Russia's possessions in the Far Orient, and their associates were interested, and the realisation by the Japanese Government of the great value which Korea would prove in an industrial and commercial sense as a colonial dependency of their empire, peace would have been preserved.

As'it was the rank and file of the Russian army were in complete ignorance throughout the campaign concerning the cause for which they were fighting, and it is doubtful whether the ordinary Japanese soldier was any more enlightened than his foe in this respect.

At any rate, there was both on the one side and on the other a lack of that enthusiasm and spirit which men display when fighting either in defence of their native land or for a cause which they consider sacred.

Perhaps the most remarkable instances of the power of popular sentiment in deciding whether the gates of the Temple of Janus are to open or remain closed is to be found in the war of IR7O between Germany and France.

Rismarck wanted the war for the purpose of the creation of what is now the German Empire. He was perfectly aware that most of the independent States; of Germany were hostile at heart *o Prussia, and unwilling to contribute in any way to its aggrandisement.

TTe realised, too, that his own Sovereign, the late Emperor William, was anxious to preserve pence, and that all the great financial interests of Berlin. Hamlmr<r. Bremen, and Frankfort were averse to anv complications calculated to disturb their relations with foreign markets. INFLAMES POPULAR SENTIMENT. So he set to work in the most insidious fashion to inflame popular sentiment in France against Germany, and contrived matters so cleverly that ere long he had the populace of Paris shouting: "A Berlin!" ("On to Berlin!"), and Napoleon TIT. forced, with the utmost reluctance, by tlie will of his people into declaring war upon Prussia and invading Hernia n v.

TTe realised that he was not in any condition of health in the summer of IR7O to assume the direction of military operations or even to determine great national issues in Paris. Possessed of considerable political sagacity, he was able to appreciate that in declaring war upon Prussia and in invading Germany he was playing Bismarck's game by arousing popular sentiment Jn the southern German States to such an extent as to compel their unwilling rulers to throw in their lot with Prussia for the defence of Teuton soil, thus paving the way for the creation of a German Empire, with the Kins' of Prussia on the throne.

NAPOLEON FEARED FOR THRONE. In one word, Napoleon, fully measured the consequences and the prospects of defeat; but on the other hand he also knew that public sentiment in France had been aroused to such an extent against Prussia, that, unless he yielded thereto and complied with the excited and reckless demands of his subjects they would drive him then and there from the throne, as incapable of championing and defending the national honour.

He was face to face with the alternative of revolution at home or war with Oermany. There were some few chances that lie might succeed in the latter. There was no chance of his saving- his throne in the event of an insurrection at heme. So he chose war, just in the same way as the sovereign of (he Balkan States have done in the ease of Turkey.

If OLD OFF STRIFE MANY YEARS. These Balkan monarchs indeed, have shown a greater amount of courage and of fortitude than Napoleon 111. For. whereas the anti-fierman craze in France broke out for two or three weeks before the declaration of war of IS7O. the profound resentment against Turkey has been seething in the Balkan States for vears.

Tndeed. it has only been kept under control for so long by the cleverness and the courage of these various rulers concerned, who have been obliged to sacrifice many Ministers and Cabinets, and to submit to the constant danger of the loss of their thrones and of assassination because they declined to give way and persisted in maintaining peace. FERDINAND'S LIFE TN T DANC.'ER. Ferdinand of Bulgaria, in particular, has had repeated attempts made upon his life, owing to his refusal to yield to 'the demands of his subjects that he would march his fine army into Macedonia to protect the Bulgarians of that Turkish province and their Christian co-religionists from Moslem cruelty, oppression and massacre. On two occasions conspiracies to kidnap liis two boys when in their childhood, were frustrated in the nick of time, while at least half a dozen of his Cabinet Ministers have been murdered in the streets of his capital because they were believed to be obstacles of the Bulgarian invasion of Macedonia,

Ferdinand, like George of Greece, like King Nicholas of Montenegro and Peter of Servia, lias repeatedly pointed out to the Great Powers of Europe that his position was rendered not only intolerable but untenable by Turkish misrule in Macedonia, and has urged their effective intervention at Constantinople.

But it has been without avail. And now these Balkan sovereigns, confronted hv the same alternative as Napoleon 111. in 1870, and by that which King Milan of Servia faced in 1870, and King George of Greece in 1890, have yielded to the clamour of their subjects and have embarked upon war with Turkey rather than lose their, thrones by internal revolution. JAP RANK AND FILE U.S. ENEMIES. It is this potency of popular sentiment, that must be taken into account to a far greater extent than has hitherto been the case in considering the future relations of this country with Japan, and those of Great Britain with Germany. There is no prejudice, in the United States against the people of Dai Nippon, and the authorities at Washington, irrespective of political party, are imbued with the friendliest feelings towards the island empire of the Pacific. But while the new Mikado, like his predecessor on the throne, reciprocates these sentiments, which are moreover shared bv most of the leading statesmen at Tokio, the Japanese people at large entertain a greater degree of hostility towards the United States than toward any other Foreign Power—even 'Russia.

: Their pride is humiliated bv the American noliov which excludes them, like the Chinese, from their shores. Thev nro flllert with resentment hv fh» conviction that it was the United Stntes that st.iveil th»ir bind in fheir defwt of Rusiia in (bo Mfiichurian war and which forced "rmn them n nreniptiive ""i 1 " t lnof '-olili".l tlio m of most of the fruits of their victory. MASTERY OF PACIFIC THE AIM. Finally, they see in Uncle Sam an obstacle to the realisation of their national dream of mastery of the Pacific, Their principal newspapers—those which reflect more closely the real ideals of the people rather than the mere Government organs—have from time to time given expression to these popular views about America in a most unvarnished manner, and I can recall discussing their utterances of this, character in a talk I had with Field Marshal Lord Kitchener—a friend of old Cairo days—when he last visited New York.

The field-marshal was on his way back to England from Japan, where he had been made much of by the late Emperor and my military authorities. He expressed his belief, in reply to my questions, that the Japanese Government was absolutely sincere in its professions of friendship but that the hostile articles in the Japanese Press voiced popular sentiment in the islands.

"Is the Imperial Government sufficiently strong to keep this public feeling under control?" I asked. Lord Kitchener paused for a moment, and then replied slowly and pensively. "For the present I should say yes. How it will be in the future it is impossible to tell." This may be construed to mean that the issue of peace or war between the United States and Japan depends mainlv nnon the power of the Imperial Government, to maintain a mastery over public feeling that the professions of amity from the Mikado and his Ministers must always lie accepted with reserve.