Read Ebook: Universal peace—from a woman's standpoint by Suttner Bertha Von

Font size: 10 px 15 px 20 px 25 px 30 px 35 px

Background color: BlackWhiteGrayLight GrayDark GrayDim Gray

Text color: BlackWhiteGrayLight GrayDark GrayDim Gray

Apply/Save settings

Ebook has 618 lines and 111499 words, and 13 pages

UNIVERSAL PEACE--FROM A WOMAN'S STANDPOINT.

BY BARONESS BERTHA VON S?TTNER.

I have been requested to write a contribution to these pages with the above title. The subject of Universal Peace occupies my thoughts and actions so completely, and the opportunity of addressing myself to a circle of American readers is so welcome to me, that I was most willing to comply with the wish of the Editor, although I should certainly have chosen another title. For although it is self-evident that everything that a woman writes must be written from a woman's standpoint, it does not agree with my principles to treat the problem of peace and war exclusively, or even principally, in its relations to the feelings and lives of women. Such relations certainly exist, and it will be of great service to the progress of the peace movement if women, as such, will oppose the institution hateful to mothers, and if women's associations will place the questions of peace and arbitration on the order of the day at their meetings. But I believe that more and more women, who reflect upon this important subject, will leave the specifically feminine standpoint, to judge of this, so eminently the universal concern of humanity, from a more general point of view. It is only too natural that women should hate war, which robs them of the support and the joys of their existence, and for that very reason until to-day this hatred has done nothing towards the struggle against war; on the contrary, only such women as could triumph over their natural feelings of abhorrence, who, putting aside their own grief, could incite to war, or even themselves perform warlike deeds, only such women were brought into prominence by history; only these were praised, because, overcoming their egoism, they had performed their duty by performing brave deeds of sacrifice.

One may presuppose that among the many motives which in the future will work against militarism and war, the following powerful motive will be found: the change in women's favor. When once a higher reward of love is granted to men for the heroic deeds of peace than for those of war, when they know that they will only earn the admiration of the best women by working for the new ideals of justice; and, on the contrary, will arouse the abhorrence of noble women by supporting the system of force, then one of the strongest motives which now drive young men into the profession of arms will be overcome. The true and most important connection between the woman's question and the peace question is this: the realization of the ideals of peace presupposes that the whole of humanity should rise to a higher level than that upon which it now stands in an overwhelming majority. In order that the element of force and oppression, which governs the history of society in the past and in the present, should yield to the element of right and freedom, a higher type of man must be evolved. We are now witnessing this evolution. It is, however, not apparent only in one sphere, but in many at the same time, and especially strongly in the sphere of the women's movement. To the attainment of the ideal towards which modern endeavors are moving, the unimpeded development is necessary of all mental germs in the whole human race. None of the gifts shared by all may be suppressed by reason of supposed unsuitability to the race, or class, or even sex; and the virtues, the larger diffusion of which is to characterize the new type, must be no longer divided into two halves; gentleness and moderation on the feminine, courage and intellectual power on the masculine, side.

No; every person will have to exhibit these virtues, no matter to which sex one may belong. Just as at the present day there are many common qualities, without which neither woman nor man can lay claim to esteem, such as honesty, cleanliness, diligence, love of truth, sense of duty, in the same manner does the new ideal of perfection exact all human virtues from all human beings at the same time. With the removal of other privileges those of crime must also cease, and man shall no longer pride himself on his excesses. Courage, that model virtue, first of the lion, then of the savage, then of the hero, lastly of the soldier always ready for battle, must lose its halo, and must not be practised only by men to the point of contempt of life, but will be required in hours of danger, in life's difficult situations in a like measure from the perfectly human woman. The human race will not be left alone to the care of woman, but every perfect human being must disdain to be a slave to the pleasure of the senses without love or in treacherous disloyalty. Thus it will happen by the falling of the fetters which one sex has borne so long, that not it alone, but also the other will rise to a higher human dignity. Exactly the contrary will take place of what is dreaded by the opponents of the emancipation of women: the woman will not assume gross masculine defects, the man will not sink into womanish effeminacy, but both united, among them the best, the strongest, and the most intelligent, will form models of a nobler race.

It is unimaginable that a more highly developed cultured humanity, in which both sexes have equal rights in the decisions of society, should uphold the institutions of war. A certain amount of compassion, of sensitive abhorrence of all that is hard and cruel, in a word--of noble humanity, must exist in the cultured community. Men console themselves with the thought that these qualities, so necessary to the existence and dignity of society, are furnished by the feminine sex, and maintain their right to hardness and roughness, a right which is most freely active in war. But when the woman rises to an equal level, must she also become a soldier, and shall she lay aside those virtues which are not compatible with the profession of arms? Shall all gentleness vanish out of the world? That is impossible. Therefore the woman must renounce equal rights. This she will never do; it is much simpler for the man to renounce the profession of arms.

And now, after protesting against my views being supposed to arise from a specifically feminine standpoint, I will say what I think about universal peace; but first, I should like to give a picture of universal war, as I see it from the war of the future, so long prophesied and so splendidly prepared.

Footnote 1:

A war in which all the great military States of Europe took part would surpass all horrors that have hitherto taken place, in the same degree as the present weapons of destruction and those still to be invented surpass the club with which Cain may have slain his brother. In such a war an amount of murder and destruction and savagery would be contained, such as was not in a hundred battles of ancient times. The progress that has been made has not only increased the power of destruction a thousandfold, but also that which is to be destroyed has become a thousand times more valuable, and therefore the injury would be proportionately greater.

But to contemplate peace and war from a general standpoint is what philosophers and politicians have done from the earliest times. To work out plans and propositions, by which the ruling state of war may be replaced by the establishment of international justice, is a labor which has been carried on systematically for the last ten years by the various groups of the League of Peace, and the inter-parliamentary union. An entire literature already exists on this subject, and by consulting Dr. Evan Darby's "International Tribunal" and Dr. Benjamin Trueblood's lately published work, "The Federation of the World," a complete knowledge of the ideal and practical aims may be gained, as also of the results already acquired.

Footnote 2:

London Peace Society, 47 New Broad Street.

Footnote 3:

Boston and New York, Houghton, Mifflin & Co., 1899.

But now, at the present moment, when the work of peace is placed in the hands of an inter-governmental conference at the Hague, furnished with powers to realize the resolutions passed, it is no longer fitting to draw up theories of the abstract idea of universal peace: now everyone sympathizing with the great cause, and especially such as are in immediate proximity to the conference, are compelled to concentrate all their interest upon it. And, therefore, I will close these lines with a few thoughts, which, quite apart from the "woman's standpoint," might bear the title: "Universal Peace and the Conference at the Hague."

It appears to me that in the criticism and discussion of this unique phenomenon, this unprecedented historical event, the importance of the fact that such a Conference is sitting is too much forgotten. One either loses oneself in the question: "What will be discussed?" and subjects every item of the programme to a minute technical criticism, or one enquires: "What will be the result?" and indulges in more or less hopeful, or more or less sceptical, conjectures and prophecies. One forgets to contemplate the overwhelming fact that such a Conference has been called together by an autocrat in our ultra-military times, and in which every State takes part.

Apart from all that will be achieved by speeches, propositions and resolutions, the significance and the effect of the event itself must be of the greatest influence, and the first official Peace Conference appears like a miracle in the history of the world.

The true significance of the Conference is contained in the following words, addressed by the President, von Staal, to the delegates at the opening of the first sitting:

"To seek the most effective means of ensuring to all nations the benefits of a real and lasting peace, that is the chief aim of our deliberations according to the text of the circular of August 24.

"The name 'Peace Conference,' which the instinct of the nations, anticipating the resolution of the Governments, has given to our Assembly, this name well describes the principal object of our labors; the Peace Conference must not be faithless to the mission laid upon it; it must bring forth a tangible result from these deliberations, which is awaited in confidence by all mankind."

All mankind? Not yet. A great portion of it, that which still holds fast to the thousand-year-old institution of war, be it through personal interest or the power of imparted prejudice, hopes that the Conference will produce no result which may endanger war; a still greater portion, the dull masses, expect nothing at all. But those who really have confidence in the progress of culture, who, in agreement with the originator of the Conference and his faithful fellow-workers, are convinced of the necessity of the present ruinous system giving place to another, these latter will note these words of the President of the Conference; and in case of disappointment, in case the Conference were faithless to its mission, would raise the demand for fulfilment so loudly and continuously that at length all mankind would be carried away by it.

But such disappointment will not take place. That may be boldly said beforehand. The proposals already put before the Assembly vouch for the earnestness and sincerity of the work which has been begun. They are a proof that the following sentence from Staal's speech is no mere phrase, but the expression of noble resolve:

"Diplomacy, following a universal law, is no longer an art in which personal skill plays the principal part, but is striving to become a science, which must possess fixed rules for the settlement of international conflicts. That is to-day the ideal aim that it must bear in view, and great progress will indubitably be made, if diplomacy succeeds in laying down some of these rules at this Conference. We shall also particularly endeavor to codify the practice of arbitration and mediation. These ideas form, so to speak, the essence of our task, the chief aim of our exertions; 'to prevent conflicts by peaceful means.'"

These words faithfully echo the instructions given by the Tsar to his ambassador. And already much has been done in the specified direction. It is clear that other powers had come to the Conference with plans equally far-reaching if not more so, and the subject of an "International Permanent Tribunal of Arbitration"--this wildest dream of the Utopians--has already been discussed and even in many points unanimously accepted.

The propositions offered by the representatives of Russia, England, Italy and the United States are known through the newspapers. To the opponents of the peace movement that have lately pointed out with special satisfaction that America, that stronghold of efforts for peace, has lately entered military channels, to these the plan sent by the American Government must have caused remarkable stupefaction. With these proposals, with this energetic and open participation in the work of peace, the American will again fill that position in the history of civilization with which the friends of peace in the whole world have always credited him: the Pioneer of peace and freedom.

BERTHA VON S?TTNER.

The Hague, June, 1899.

TRANSCRIBER'S NOTES

These wars show us, as do all wars in which navies have engaged, that the function of a navy is not only to defend the coast in the sense of preventing an enemy from landing on it, but also to exert force far distant from the coast. The study of war has taught its students for many centuries that a merely passive defense will finally be broken down, and that the most effective defense is the "offensive-defensive."

Perhaps the clearest case of a correct offensive-defensive is Nelson's defense of England, which he carried on in the Mediterranean, in the West Indies, and wherever the enemy fleet might be, finally defeating Napoleon's plan for invading England--not by waiting off the coast of England, but by attacking and crippling Napoleon's fleet off the Spanish coast near Trafalgar.

The idea held by many people that the defense of a country can be effected by simply preventing the invasion of its coasts, is a little like the notion of uneducated people that a disease can be cured by suppressing its symptoms. For even a successful defense of a coast against invasion by a hostile force cannot remove the inimical influence to a country's commerce and welfare which that hostile force exerts, any more than palliatives can cure dyspepsia. Every intelligent physician knows that the only way to cure a disease is to remove its cause; and every intelligent military or naval man knows that history teaches that the only way in which a country can defend itself successfully against an enemy is to defeat the armed force of that enemy--be it a force of soldiers on the land, or a force of war-ships on the sea. In naval parlance, "our objective is the enemy's fleet."

If the duty of a navy be merely to prevent the actual invasion of its country's coasts, a great mistake has been made by Great Britain, France, and other countries in spending so much money on their navies, and in giving so much attention to the education and training of their officers and enlisted men. To prevent actual invasion would be comparatively an easy task, one that could be performed by rows of forts along the coast, supplemented by mines and submarines. If that is the only kind of defense required, navies are hardly needed. The army in each country could man the forts and operate the mines, and a special corps of the army could even operate the submarines, which need hardly leave the "three-mile limit" that skirts the coasts. If the people of any country do not care to have dealings outside; if the nation is willing to be in the position of a man who is safe so long as he stays in the house, but is afraid to go outdoors, the problem of national defense is easy.

But if the people desire to prevent interference with what our Constitution calls "the general welfare," the problem becomes exceedingly complex and exceedingly grave--more complex and grave than any other problem that they have. If they desire that their ships shall be free to sail the seas, and their citizens to carry on business and to travel in other lands; and if they desire that their merchants shall be able to export their wares and their farmers their grain, also that the people shall be able to import the things they wish from foreign countries, then they must be able to exert actual physical force on the ocean at any point where vessels carrying their exports and imports may be threatened. Naval ships are the only means for doing this.

The possibility that an armed force sent to a given point at sea might have to fight an enemy force, brought about first the sending of more than one vessel, and later--as the mechanic arts progressed--the increasing of the size of individual vessels, and later still the development of novel types.

There are two main reasons for building a small number of large ships rather than a large number of small ships. The first reason is that large ships are much more steady, reliable, safe, and fast than small ships. The second reason is that, when designed for any given speed, the large ships have more space available for whatever is to be carried; one 15-knot ship of 20,000 tons normal displacement, for instance, has about one and a half times as much space available for cargo, guns, and what-not, as four 15-knot ships of 5,000 tons each. These two reasons apply to merchant ships as well as naval ships. A third reason applies to naval vessels only, and is that a few large ships can be handled much better together than a large number of small ships, and embody that "concentration of force" which it is the endeavor of strategy and tactics to secure. A fourth reason is the obvious one that large ships can carry larger guns than small ships.

The distinctly military purpose for which a war-ship is designed necessitates, first, that in addition to her ability to go rapidly and surely from place to place, she be able to exert physical force against an enemy ship or fort, and, second, that she have protection against the fire of guns and torpedoes from enemy ships and forts, against bombs dropped from aircraft, and against mines.

This means that a man-of-war, intended to exert the maximum of physical force against an enemy and to be able to withstand the maximum of punishment, must have guns and torpedoes for offense, and must have armor and cellular division of the hull for defense; the armor to keep out the enemy's shells, and the cellular division of the hull to prevent the admission of more water than can fill one water-tight compartment in case the ship is hit.

It must be admitted here that, at the present moment, torpedoes hold such large charges of explosive that the cellular division of ships does not adequately protect them. This means that a contest has been going on between torpedo-makers and naval constructors like the contest between armor-makers and gunmakers, and that just now the torpedo-makers are in the lead. For this reason a battleship needs other protection than that imparted by its cellular subdivision. This is given by its "torpedo defense battery" of minor guns of about 5-inch calibre.

Most torpedoes are to be found in destroyers--long, fast, frail vessels, averaging about 700 tons displacement, that are intended to dash at enemy ships at night, or under other favorable conditions, launch their torpedoes, and hurry away. The torpedo is "a weapon of opportunity." It has had a long, slow fight for its existence; but its success during the present war has established it firmly in naval warfare.

The submarine has followed the destroyer, and some people think will supplant it; though its relatively slow speed prevents those dashes that are the destroyer's r?le. The submarine is, however, a kind of destroyer that is submersible, in which the necessities of submersibility preclude great speed. The submarine was designed to accomplish a clear and definite purpose--a secret under-water attack on an enemy's ship in the vicinity. It has succeeded so well in its limited mission that some intelligent people declare that we need submarines only--ignoring the fact that, even if submarines could successfully prevent actual invasion, they could not carry on operations at a distance from their base of supplies. It is true that submarines may be made so large that they can steam at great speed from place to place, as capital ships steam now, carry large supplies of fuel and food, house their crews hygienically, and need no "mother ship" or tender. But if submarines achieve such size, they will be more expensive to build and run than battleships--and will be, in fact, submersible battleships. In other words, the submarine cannot displace the battleship, but may be developed and evolved into a new and highly specialized type of battleship.

The necessity for operating at long distances from a base carries with it the necessity for supplying more fuel than even a battleship can carry; and this means that colliers must be provided. In most countries, the merchant service is so large that colliers can be taken from it, but in the United States no adequate merchant marine exists, and so it is found necessary to build navy colliers and have them in the fleet. The necessity for continuously supplying food and ammunition to the fleet necessitates supply ships and ammunition ships; but the problem of supplying food and ammunition is not so difficult as that of supplying fuel, for the reason that they are consumed more slowly.

In order to take care of the sick and wounded, and prevent them from hampering the activities of the well, hospital ships are needed. Hospital ships should, of course, be designed for that purpose before being constructed; but usually hospital ships were originally passenger ships, and were adapted to hospital uses later.

The menace of the destroyer--owing to the sea-worthiness which this type has now achieved, and to the great range which the torpedo has acquired--has brought about the necessity of providing external protection to the battleships; and this is supplied by a "screen" of cruisers and destroyers, whose duty is to keep enemy destroyers and the submarines at a safe distance.

We now see why a fleet must be composed of various types of vessels. At the present moment, the battleship is the primary, or paramount type, the others secondary, because the battleship is the type that can exert the most force, stand the hardest punishment, steam the farthest in all kinds of weather, and in general, serve her country the best.

Of course, "battleship" is merely a name, and some think not a very good name, to indicate a ship that can take the part in battle that used to be taken by the "ship of the line." The reason for its primacy is fundamental: its displacement or total weight--the same reason that assured the primacy of the ship of the line. For displacement rules the waves; if "Britannia rules the waves," it is simply because Britannia has more displacement than any other Power.

The fleet needs to have a means of knowing where the enemy is, how many ships he has, what is their character, the direction in which they are steaming, and their speed. To accomplish this purpose, "scouts" are needed--fast ships, that can steam far in all kinds of weather and send wireless messages across great distances. So far as their scout duties go, such vessels need no guns whatever, and no torpedoes; but because the enemy will see the scout as soon as the scout sees the enemy, and because the enemy will try to drive away the scout by gun and torpedo fire, the scouts must be armed. And this necessity is reinforced by the necessity of driving off an enemy's scouts.

In foreign navies the need for getting information in defiance of an enemy's attempts to prevent it, and to drive off the armed scouts of an enemy, has been one of the prime reasons for developing "battle cruisers," that combine the speed of the destroyer with the long steaming radius of the battleship, a battery almost as strong, and a very considerable protection by armor.

The aeroplane and the air-ship are recent accessions to the list of fighting craft. Their r?le in naval warfare cannot yet be defined, because the machines themselves have not yet reached an advanced stage of development, and their probable performance cannot be forecast. There is no doubt, however, in the minds of naval men that the r?le of aircraft is to be important and distinguished.

NAVAL POWER

Mahan proved that sea power has exercised a determining influence on history. He proved that sea power has been necessary for commercial success in peace and military success in war. He proved that, while many wars have culminated with the victory of some army, the victory of some navy had been the previous essential. He proved that the immediate cause of success had often resulted inevitably from another cause, less apparent because more profound; that the operations of the navy had previously brought affairs up to the "mate in four moves," and that the final victory of the army was the resulting "checkmate."

Before Mahan proved his doctrine, it was felt in a general way that sea power was necessary to the prosperity and security of a nation. Mahan was not the first to have this idea, for it had been in the minds of some men, and in the policy of one nation, for more than a century. Neither was Mahan the first to put forth the idea in writing; but he was the first to make an absolute demonstration of the truth. Newton was not the first man to know, or to say, that things near the earth tend to fall to the earth; but he was the first to formulate and prove the doctrine of universal gravitation. In the same way, all through history, we find that a few master minds have been able to group what had theretofore seemed unrelated phenomena, and deduce from them certain laws. In this way they substituted reasoning for speculation, fact for fancy, wisdom for opportunism, and became the guides of the human race.

Share on: WhatsApp @Hash Facebook Tweet