Part 10 (1/2)

As such consequences of British neutrality were as sure as the daily rising of the sun, was I not right when I drew the conclusion that if a s.h.i.+eld there was, it was rather that of Great Britain covering France, all her allies and even the neutral nations, with the protection of her mighty sea power. With such a conviction, the soundness of which I felt sure, I told my French Canadian countrymen that, for one, I would, to my last day, be heartily grateful to England to have saved France from the crus.h.i.+ng defeat which once more would have been her lot, had she been left alone to fight the Central Empires. Heroic, without doubt France would have been. But with deficient supplies, with much curtailed resources, with no helpful friends, heroism alone, however admirable and prolonged, was sure to be of no avail against an unmatched materially organized power, used to its most efficiency by the severest military discipline, by national fanaticism worked to fury, and by soldierly enthusiasm carried to wildness.

In a single handed struggle with Germany, in 1914, France would have been in a far worse position than in 1870. The extraordinary development of the new German Empire--the outcome of the great war so disastrous to France--in population, in commerce, in manufacturing industry, in financial resources, in military organization, made her fighting power still more disproportionate. To her wonderful territorial army, she added her recently built military fleet, then much superior, in the number of vessels carrying thousands and thousands of skilled seamen, to the French one. Moreover Austria, with another fifty millions of people, Bulgaria and Turkey, with more than thirty millions, were backing Germany, whilst, in 1870, France had only Prussia to contend with.

All those facts staring him like any one else, how could Mr. Boura.s.sa reasonably charge Great Britain with using France merely as a tool for her own safety. Under the circ.u.mstances of the case, such a preposterous a.s.sertion is beyond human comprehension. I, for one, cannot understand how he failed to see that, had England been actuated by the selfish and unworthy motives to which he ascribes her intervention in the war, she could have then, and at least for several years, wrought from Germany almost all the concessions she would have wished for. Could it not, by an alliance with the Central Empires, have attained the goal of that dominating ambition which the ”Nationalist” leader a.s.serts to be her most cherished aim.

But such a dishonourable policy England would not consider for a single moment. She indignantly refused Germany's outrageous proposals, stood by her treaty obligations, and resolutely threw all the immense resources of her power in the conflict which, at the very beginning, developed into a struggle for life and death between human freedom and absolutist tyranny.

I am sure, and I do not hesitate to vouch for them, all the truly loyal French-Canadians--they are almost unanimously so--are like myself profoundly grateful to Great Britain for her n.o.ble decision to rush to the defense of Belgium and France in their hour of need. Comparing what took place with what might have been, moved by all the ties of affection that will ever bind them to the great and ill.u.s.trious nation from which they sprung, they fully appreciate the inestimable value of the support given by their second mother-country to that of their national origin.

They ardently pray that both of them will emerge victorious from the great conflict to remain, for the good of Mankind, indissolubly united in peace as they are in war.

A ”NATIONALIST” ILLOGICAL CHARGE AGAINST ENGLAND.

Our Nationalists, after charging England with using France merely as a s.h.i.+eld against Germany, have been illogical to the point of reproaching her for not having intervened in favour of her close neighbour, in 1870.

It is most likely that, had she done so, they would have pretended that she would have been actuated by the same selfish sentiment that prompted her, for the only sake of her own protection, to enter into the present conflict.

How is it that Mr. Boura.s.sa, so fond of charging England with ambitious views of constant self-agrandizement, of worldly domination, can suddenly turn about and accuse her of having shamefully sacrificed France, in 1870, to the overpowering German blow?

The circ.u.mstances of the two cases--1870 and 1914--were very different.

The conflict of 1870 had, apparently at least, a dynastic cause. The House of Hohenzollern had been intriguing to have a Prussian prince of her own elevated to the Spanish Throne. The Imperial Government of Napoleon III strongly objected to such a policy. The diplomatic correspondence which ensued did not settle the difficulty. France declared war against Prussia. Many years later it was discovered that by a falsified diplomatic despatch, Bismark had succeeded in his satanic design to bring the government of Napoleon III to attack Prussia, thus shamefully throwing upon France the responsibility of the war.

In 1870, England was at peace with all the European Powers, as she had ever been since 1815, with the only exception of the Crimean War. During the diplomatic correspondence that led to the hostilities, what reason would have justified England to break her neutrality? What would the present critics of her course have said if she had sided with Prussia?

Would they have pretended that she would have used Prussia as a s.h.i.+eld against France?

I personally remember very well the tragic events of the terrible year, 1870. The crus.h.i.+ng military power of Prussia as proved by the triumphant march of her victorious armies, was a revelation for all, for France still more than for others. True Prussia had beaten Austria in the short campaign ended at Sadowa. The Prussia France was then fighting was not the giant Empire against which she is battling with such heroism for the last four years. France was at the time the leading continental Power.

The general opinion was, when war was suddenly declared, that France would easily triumph over her enemy.

It must not be forgotten that, in 1870, England was even less ready than in 1914 to engage in a continental conflict. Her standing army was not large, and then partly garrisoned in the colonies. Some of her best regiments were stationed in Canada. She could have been a really important ally of France only as a strong support of another continental power joining with her against Prussia, for instance Russia or Austria, or both of them.

If England had been able to send 500,000 men in a few days to the very heart of France, incessantly followed by another half million, it is almost certain that the Prussian army would not have entered Paris. But England had not that million of trained men. It would have taken at least a year to organize such a large army.

I will speak my mind openly. After Sedan, any attempt at saving France by force would have been vain and useless. Even Russia and Austria were unprepared for such a task. Their intervention, coming too late, would most likely have given Prussia a chance to win a much greater victory.

France out of the struggle, Prussia would then have had the opportunity to achieve, as early as 1870, what she has ever since prepared for, and tried to accomplish by the war she has brought on in 1914.

What then becomes of the ”Nationalist” pretention that Great Britain has ever been aiming at dominating the world, when it is so easy to understand that without a very large territorial army, which she persistingly refused to organize, she was unable to take an important part in any continental war. The days were pa.s.sed, after the extraordinary development of Prussian militarism, when she could brilliantly hold her own on the continent with a small standing army backed by generous subsidies to the European powers. The present war is surely proof evident of it, since England, instead of the two hundred thousand men she was expected to send over to France, as her man-power contribution, has had to raise a total army, with all the auxiliary services, of 6,000,000 officers and men, exclusive of the 2,000,000 contributed by the whole British Colonial Empire.

The Nationalists accusing England to have abandoned France to her sad fate, in 1870, was only another instance of their campaign to arouse the feelings of the French Canadians against Great Britain.

OTHER ”NATIONALIST” ERRONEOUS a.s.sERTIONS.

Mr. Boura.s.sa has had his own peculiar way of explaining the real determining cause of the war. Some men are--by nature it is to be supposed--always disposed to judge great historical events from considerations inspired by the lowest sentiments of the human heart. In the ”Nationalist” leader's view, the great war was brought about by the treacherous alliance of British and German capitalists speculating together, in actual partners.h.i.+p or otherwise, in the production of war material: cannons, rifles, munitions, war s.h.i.+pbuilding, &c.

In my humble opinion, such views are lowering to a very vulgar and lamentably repulsive cause--if it could be true--events of immense significance, the result, on the one side, of criminal aspirations which, however guilty they may be, have not yet been degraded to the profound depth of abjection they suppose; on the other, by the most n.o.ble sentiments which can inspire nations to make the greatest sacrifices to avenge outraged Justice and Right.

Autocratic German ambition, such as it has proved to be, is bad enough.

Still the cause of the war, such as a.s.serted by Mr. Boura.s.sa, would have been far worse. National aspirations, however wrongly diverted from their legitimate conception, will never be as contemptible as the nasty greed of individual speculators treacherously sucking the very life blood of their countrymen for the sake of squeezing millions of dollars at the cost of their country's honour and future.