The Ways of War

August 31, 1914.

Perhaps the finest thing in the whole colossal business in which we are now engaged is the frankness with which the French and British War Offices, and the Press in these countries, admit the checks and even actual reverses which the Allies are sustaining, and are bound in certain areas to sustain. It is understood that we cannot romance ourselves into victory. For the rest the censorship has been very prudently exercised, and is now much mitigated.

These circumstances make it difficult to understand the bald ambiguity of the news from Namur. Is it the town that has fallen or is it the forts? If the first, nothing; if the second, a new twist to the campaign. We are bound to assume, as all the military writers do, that the circle of forts has been captured or surrendered.

I do not want to say one word as to the military significance of the affair. And if a torrential German advance has, after enormous losses, swamped the defence, I do not want to say anything at all. But if, by chance, the defenders of Namur lacked the spirit of those of Liége; if, overwhelmed by the picture of blood, devastation, and panic which the south-east of Belgium now presents, they yielded up their position; then the question, “Are we treating Belgium decently?” has a grave and urgent meaning.

I arrived yesterday from Belgium, knowing nothing of Namur. It seemed to me a clear duty to attempt in a small way to bring home to the people of these islands the appalling price that Belgium has had to pay for holding to the path of honour and courage. Nothing said here is a criticism of the purely military aspects of the prologue now concluded. It was inevitable that in the clash of millions, Belgium and her two hundred thousand soldiers should have been treated as a mere right-wing pawn. But think what the gambit meant to a Belgium patriot. It meant, in any and all circumstances, the devastation of Liége and the country behind it. It meant the surrender not only of the capital, but of the whole country except Antwerp. And the Belgians were under no illusions as to the terrorisation of non-combatants which is an essential part of the Prussian art of war. I quote from a Belgian journal the following summary of it. It is headed—

And so on, and so on. Little Belgium—her gallant soldiers and her laborious peasants alike—has been mashed to a bloody pulp where the heel of the Prussian, shod with iron and with this damnable philosophy, has passed. And all the time the Belgians kept on asking in hope, in despair, “Where are the English? Where are the French?” Can you wonder if in the end they began to ask it in anger? Would it be a contradiction of all the laws of human nature to suppose that the panic terror which swept over the undefended land may have penetrated through the steel blinds of the forts of Namur, taken the heart out of the troops, impelled to surrender?

Let us examine our consciences. What have we done to show our appreciation of Belgium? There was the Royal message. There was Lord Sydenham’s noble letter in The Times which has been quoted everywhere. There is a subscription on foot. There is the promised loan. So far so good. But it is not enough. The stunned sense of having been delivered to Armageddon is noticeable everywhere, but especially in Flanders. The Flemish journals such as the Laatste Nieuws are full of violent anti-French, and in a less degree of anti-English articles. Germanophiles are harping on the kinship of the Flemish tongue, the Flemish stock and manners, to Germany. People sneer at the loan. My Flemish barber said to me on Sunday: “Oh! you are a fine people, you English. You look for business among the corpses. You will kindly lend us money at a good, whacking rate of interest. You philanthropists!”

What, then, is needed? War means blood and treasure. That faded phrase has been lit up suddenly, and we know what it means. The proof of blood the gallant soldiers of the two great Western Allies have already given at Mons and along the Sambre. I am convinced that the United Kingdom would be acting with fruitful generosity if Parliament were not to sanction a loan, but to vote a free grant.

Conjoined with that I hope and assume that Sir Edward Grey will renew the solemn pledges already given that, come what may, we mean to see Belgium through. The fear is general that the Germans may be allowed to get such a footing in Belgium as to have some plausible case in international law for proclaiming annexation. Let Parliament announce—and these dramatic cries and gestures of diplomacy are necessary—that so long as there is one shot left and one soldier to fire it, the Allies will never allow one foot of Belgian soil to remain under German domination.

What I have written is not inspired by even the least touch of discouragement. The breakneck advance on the German right seems to me not the stride of conquerors, but the mad hurry of columns flung forward in a frenzied gamble. Sursum corda! But let us remember that all alliances need delicate handling. Belgium is in agony. A stroke, swift and generous, such as suggested, will recall her, and all her people, to the glorious courage of Liége. Antwerp, and the field army now sheltered about it, have still a great part to play.