The New York Times Current History of the European War, Vol. 1, January 9, 1915: What Americans Say to EuropeVarious
Philosophy
The New York Times Current History of the European War, Vol. 1, January 9, 1915: What Americans Say to Europe
Various
World War, 1914-1918
"There is the probability of some dislocation of territory and some
shiftings of sovereignty after the war ends, but these will be of
comparatively minor importance. The important result of this great war
will be the stimulation of international organization along some such
lines as I have suggested.
"Dislocation of territory and the shifting of sovereigns as the result
of international disagreements are mediaeval practices. After this war
the world will want to solve its problems in terms of the future, not in
those of the outgrown past.
"Conventional diplomacy and conventional statesmanship have very
evidently broken down in Europe. They have made a disastrous failure of
the work with which they were intrusted. They did not and could not
prevent the war because they knew and used only the old formulas. They
had no tools for a job like this.
"A new type of international statesman is certain to arise, who will
have a grasp of new tendencies, a new outlook upon life. Bismarck used
to say that it would pay any nation to wear the clean linen of a
civilized State. The truth of this must be taught to those nations of
the world which are weakest in morale, and it can only be done, I
suppose, as similar work is accomplished with individuals. Courts, not
killings, have accomplished it with individuals.
"One more point ought to be remembered. We sometimes hear it said that
nationalism, the desire for national expression by each individual
nation, makes the permanent peace and good order of the world
impossible.
"To me it seems absurd to believe that this is any truer of nations than
it is of individuals. It is not each nation's desire for national
oppression which makes peace impossible; it is the fact that thus far in
the world's history such desire has been bound up with militarism.
"The nation whose frontier bristles with bayonets and with forts is like
the individual with a magazine pistol in his pocket. Both make for
murder. Both in their hearts really mean murder.
"The world will be better when the nations invite the judgment of their
neighbors and are influenced by it.
"When John Hay said that the Golden Rule and the open door should guide
our new diplomacy he said something which should be applicable to the
new diplomacy of the whole world. The Golden Rule and a free chance are
all that any man ought to want or ought to have, and they are all that
any nation ought to want or ought to have.
"One of the controlling principles of a democratic State is that its
military and naval establishments must be completely subservient to the
civil power. They should form the police, and not be the dominant factor
of any national life.
"As soon as they go beyond this simple function in any nation, then that
nation is afflicted with militarism.
"It is difficult to make predictions of the war's effect on us. As I see
it, our position will depend a good deal upon the outcome of the
conflict, and what that will be no one at present knows.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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