The neutral merchant: in relation to the law of contraband of war and blockade under the order in Council of 11th March, 1915 — John Shaqi
The neutral merchant: in relation to the law of contraband of war and blockade under the order in Council of 11th March, 1915Piggott, Francis Taylor
History
The neutral merchant: in relation to the law of contraband of war and blockade under the order in Council of 11th March, 1915
Piggott, Francis Taylor
Blockade; Contraband of war; Neutrality; World War, 1914-1918
Whether it be possible for the same end to be achieved by different
means, the one lawful, the other unlawful, is a problem in casuistry
which I shall not attempt to solve; but as a rough-and-ready rule of
practical life we may take it that when two people seek to achieve
equal ends they are equal to one another. Now the offensive Herr
Dernburg--I use the term in no offensive sense, for I would not exclude
myself from his Kirkwall compliment[29]--desires to forbid the sea to
English cruisers in order that American vessels may not be let or
hindered when they carry harmless ‘raw material’ to German ports. He
asserts that any domination exercised beyond territorial waters which
interferes with them ‘is a breach and an infringement of the rights
of others.’ The _Emden’s_ raids on our commerce, carefully prepared
and charted, ‘if my gossip Report be an honest woman of her word,’ two
years before the War, are sufficient to show that this new opinion has
sprung from the emergencies of the present moment. And the unoffensive
Mr. Norman Angell also desires that the English cruisers should cease
their vigil, in order that American vessels may help to complete ‘vast
commercial arrangements’ entered into by some ‘Chicago or New York
magnate’ with the German Government.
Applying then my rough-and-ready rule, Mr. Norman Angell and Herr
Dernburg, desiring to achieve the same end, cannot be on opposite
sides of the fray. Mr. Norman Angell has been beguiled by the sad
picture which the Germans have drawn of starving Germany. Starvation,
alas! is one of the weapons of war. The Germans have made full use of
it in the past; and had their plans not miscarried Paris would again
have lived on the vermin of the sewers, as it did in 1870. Mr. Norman
Angell’s memory does not run to that period; but he lives in a time
when what he conceives to be the possible result of British war policy
has become the actual policy of the invader of Belgium: almost a whole
nation ‘reduced to absolute starvation, including the women and the
children,’ by the direct action of the German Government in preventing
the distribution of American food. His vision is clouded by the pathos
of imaginary pictures; he does not see what is going on before his
eyes, and he allows himself to be blinded to the real object of all
the German manœuvring diplomacy, to which the ‘Foodstuffs’ cry is but
a convenient screen. An embargo on the export of munitions of war
from the United States to the Allies Germany will secure if she can,
by hook or crook, by fair means or foul, by argument or threat, by
cajolery or intimidation, for necessity is driving her. Her one hope of
salvation lies in getting the United States to break its neutrality,
and the accomplishment of this ignoble task has been confided to the
Bernstorffs, the Dernburgs, the Ballins, κ.τ.λ. These passionately
exhort the Government of the States to control by domestic legislation
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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