Great Britain -- Defenses; Great Britain -- Foreign relations; War
Our consideration of the question of might showed that if Great Britain
is to be strong enough to meet her responsibilities her people must
nationalise themselves, while our reflections on the question of right
showed that only from such nationalisation is a sound policy to be
expected. In short, only in so far as her people have the unity of
spirit and of will that mark a nation can Great Britain be either strong
or just. The idea of the nation implies a work to be done by the British
State, which has to be on the watch against challenge from a continental
rival to Great Britain's right to the headship of her empire, and which
at the same time has to give to that empire the direction without which
it cannot remain united. Great Britain cannot do the work thus imposed
upon her by her position and her history unless she has the co-operation
of all her people. Thus the conception of the nation reveals itself in
the twofold shape of duties laid upon England and of duties consequently
laid upon every Englishman. It means that England must either decline
and fall or do a certain work in the world which is impossible for her
unless she constrains all her people to devote themselves to her
service. It thus appears that England and her people can expect no
future worth having except on the principle of duty made the mainspring
both of public and of private life.
We attempted to apply the principles involved in the word nation to the
obvious and urgent needs of the British State at the present time.
Victory at sea being indispensable for Great Britain in case of
conflict, we inquired into the conditions of victory, and found in the
parallel instances of Nelson and Napoleon that both by sea and land the
result of the nationalisation of war is to produce a leader who is the
personification of a theory or system of operations. The history of the
rise of the German nation shows how the effort to make a nation produced
the necessary statesman, Bismarck. Nationalisation creates the right
leadership--that of the man who is master of his work.
Reviewing the needs of the naval administration, we saw that what is
wanted at the present time is rather proper organisation at the
Admiralty than an increase in mere material strength; while turning to
the army, we discovered that the only system on which can be produced
the army that Great Britain requires is that which makes every
able-bodied citizen a soldier.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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