New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1915-07-04
The Warning Governments Mr.. Morel
Calls Blind Leaders of the Blind:
Nothing More Can Be Gained BY Pro-
longing the War
Wilson Only Can Call Halt to a World
Driven to Destruction by Fear, and He
Is Asked to Act for Humanity i

coercive action in support Of the counchs de-
cigions; q principle which would automatic
ally involve the gradual disappearance Oh
ritarism and colossal ornaments as tne
dominant factors in international politics and
eventually. the decentralization OF land
ornaments and armies the British people
would, if Germany were thus minded De
brought TO reconsider that claim TO absolute
dominion over the natural highways OF the
globe which has been hitherto the basis Oh
their foreign policy and a bulwark OF their
national freedom, but which cannot in itself
alone continue to be so, in any event, tor
long in view of the development OF submarine
mowers of offence and of airism, the advent OF
which have-although we perceive 1t not IN the
fury of the combat-totally altered the BRUSH
national and imperial problem. Moreover II
/, self-evident that there can be no lnterna-
tio7alization of land power, if there be none OF
sea power.
A DIsPAsSIONATE VIEW OF GERMANY.
And is it inconccivable that Germany should
be so minded? No doubt if you take the view
that Germany cynicaly planned and executed
this war for the purpose of "subJugatlng
Europe" striking when she thought the hour
had come; it is inconceivable. But not only
will posterty reject that Legend when the
mists of passion have cleared and when things
reassume their true perspective, when men OF
the present generation once again see them
selves as they really are, they will wonder how
they came to credit it. That legend will perish,
lust as surely as Germany's crime in her relent-
less treatment of a small people who had done
her no wrong and did but defend what they
had right to defend, will ring down the
centuries to the detriment of the German name.
IF You do not take that view, but place
yourself, as we'll as foreigner can with no
other sources of information than those ac-
cessible to all men, "in the skin of a German"
to use the expression employed by Marcel SOM
bat. the leader of the French Socialists and a
member of the French War Cabinet, in the
famous treatise "Faites la PaiX: simon faites
un Roi," which he addressed to his country
men few months before the war, you will
discover manifold reasons why Germany
should be willing 20 make peace on some such
terms as those indicated. If fear, as contend,
has been at the bottom Of the great catastro-
phe-fear' common to all the powers which
plunged into the war last August-an ar
rangement' to which Germany would be a
party "by which she could be assured that no
aggressive or hostile policy would be pursued
against her and her allies" by France, Russia
and Great Britain jointly or separately, such
an arrangement would remove those fears
from the future And if the British govern
ment realized the practical impossibility and,
from the point of view of the British national
interest, the undesrability Of excluding Ger
MANY from a place in the sun commensurate
with her legitimate requirements cannot con-
ceive that single German possessed Of COM
mon sense would desire the retention Of either
Belgium or Northern France, and | do con-
ceive it likely that tens of thousands of Ger
mans, smtten with remorse attendant upon
the saner vision ensuing from the advent Of
peace, would eagerly cooperate in healing the
wounds of that unhappy land.
For the rest Germanys supreme interest is
peace. and when you have said all there is to
be said of her national faults and Of her con-
duct of the war the solid fact remains that
this powerful nation had for forty and four
wears kept the peace when war broke out last
August. Attention has, Of course, been drawn
to this many times; but, considered in the light
of international reconstruction and Germany's
attitude thereto, it is a fact of cardinal impor-
lance. No other great power can boast such
a record With the sole exception Of the
guerilla campaign with a Hottentot tribe in
Southwest Africa and sundry skrmishes with
primitive tribes in German East Africa,
against which we can set dozen far more
comprehensive campaigns of a similar kind,
Germany had kept her sword in the scabbard,
while her neighbors had been drawing theirs
ana laying about them with great energy. She
had ratified it loudly and Extensively often
enough, especially when she became nervous
at her position in the balance Of power" as
the man who is apprehensive of his neighbor's
intent puffs out his chest and assumes fierce
expression. But she had not drawn it. She
could have drawn it with every chance of sue
cess again and again had the desire Of her
rulers been the "subjugation" of Europe or
even of part of Europe in the years when her
military strength was incomparably superior
to every possible combination against her. She
could have drawn it on a Balkan issue when
Russia crippled by her war with Japan, was
helpless; she did no more than support her one
real ally in Europe in an offence, but techni-
cal one against the sovereignty OF the Porte,
whose sovereignty, guaranteed by all the pow
ers, has been fouted by each in turn with abb