This war is due to the vile character of Turkish rule, and the Turk's rule is vile because it is based on the sword. Like Mr. Chesterton (and our pirate), the Turk believes in the right of conquest, "the ultimate test of how they fight." "The history of the Turks," says Sir Charles Elliott, "is almost exclusively a catalogue of battles." He has lived (for the most gloriously uneconomic person has to live, to follow a trade of some sort, even if it be that of theft) on tribute exacted from the Christian populations, and extorted, not in return for any work of administration, but simply because he was the stronger. And that has made his rule intolerable, and is the cause of this war. Now, my whole thesis is that understanding, work, co-operation, adjustment, must be the basis of human society; that conquest as a means of achieving national advantage must fail; that to base your prosperity or means of livelihood, your economic system, in short, upon having more force than someone else, and exercising it against him, is an impossible form of human relationship that is bound to break down. And Mr. Chesterton says that the war in the Balkans demolishes this thesis. I do not agree with him. The present war in the Balkans is an attempt--and happily a successful one--to bring this reign of force and conquest to an end, and that is why those of us who do not believe in military force rejoice. The debater, more concerned with verbal consistency than realities and the establishment of sound principles, will say that this means the approval of war. It does not; it merely means the choice of the less evil of two forms of war. War has been going on in the Balkans, not for a month, but has been waged by the Turks daily against these populations for 400 years.