Many people who were not in the habit of concerning themselves with party politics endeavoured, during the autumn of 1911, and from that time forward, to straighten out their ideas on the twin problems of Foreign Policy and Defence. They were moved thereto mainly by the Agadir incident. Moreover, a year later, the Balkan war provided an object lesson in the success of sudden onset against an unprepared enemy. Gradually also, more and more attention was focussed upon the large annual increases in preparation of the warlike sort, which successive budgets, presented to the Reichstag, had been unable to hide away. In addition to these, came, early in 1913, the sensational expansion of the German military establishment and the French reply to it, which have already been considered.

Private enquirers of course knew nothing of Lord Haldane's rebuff at Berlin in 1912, for that was a Government secret. Nor had they any means of understanding more than a portion of what was actually afoot on the Continent of Europe in the matter of armaments and military preparations. Their sole sources of information were official papers and public discussions. Many additional facts beyond {310} these are brought to the notice of governments through their secret intelligence departments. All continental powers are more or less uncandid, both as regards the direction and the amount of their expenditure on armaments. In the case of Germany concealment is practised on a greater scale and more methodically than with any other. Ministers obviously knew a great deal more than the British public; but what was known to the man-in-the-street was sufficiently disquieting, when he set himself to puzzle out its meanings.

At this time (during 1912, and in the first half of 1913, until anxiety with regard to Ireland began to absorb public attention) there was a very widely-spread and rapidly-growing concern as to the security of the country. For nearly seven years Lord Roberts, with quiet constancy, had been addressing thin and, for the most part, inanimate gatherings on the subject of National Service. Suddenly he found himself being listened to with attention and respect by crowded audiences.

Lord Roberts had ceased to be Commander-in-Chief in 1904. After his retirement, and in the same year, he revisited the South African battlefields. During this trip, very reluctantly—for he was no lover of change—he came to the conclusion that in existing circumstances 'national service' was a necessity. On his return to England he endeavoured to persuade Mr. Balfour's Government to accept his views and give effect to them. Failing in this, he resigned his seat upon the Committee of Imperial Defence in 1905, in order that he might be able to advocate his opinion freely. He was then in his seventy-fourth year. It was not, however, {311} until seven years later[1] that his words can be said to have arrested general attention.

NATIONAL ANXIETY

The truth was that the nation was beginning to be dissatisfied with what it had been told by the party speakers and newspapers, on the one side and the other, regarding the state of the national defences. It had not even the consolation of feeling that what the one said might be set against the other, and truth arrived at by striking a balance between them. This method of the party system, which was supposed to have served fairly well in other matters, failed to reassure the nation with regard to its military preparations. The whole of this subject was highly complicated, lent itself readily to political mystery, and produced in existing circumstances the same apprehensions among ordinary men as those of a nervous pedestrian, lost in a fog by the wharf side, who finds himself beset by officious and quarrelsome touts, each claiming permission to set him on his way.

The nation was disquieted because it knew that it had not been told the whole truth by either set of politicians. It suspected the reason of this to be that neither set had ever taken pains to understand where the truth lay. It had a notion, moreover, that the few who really knew, were afraid—for party reasons—to speak out, to state their conclusions, and to propose the proper remedies, lest such a course might drive them from office, or prevent them from ever holding it. Beyond any doubt it was true that at this time many people were seriously disturbed by the unsatisfactory character of recent Parliamentary discussions, and earnestly desired to know {312} the real nature of the dangers to be apprehended, and the adequacy of our preparations for meeting them.

There had always been a difficulty in keeping the Army question from being used as a weapon in party warfare. As to this—looking back over a long period of years—there was not much to choose between the Radicals, Liberals, or Whigs upon the one hand, and the unionists, Conservatives, or Tories on the other. Military affairs are complicated and technical; and the very fact that the line of country is so puzzling to the ordinary man had preserved it as the happy hunting-ground of the politician. When an opportunity presented itself of attacking the Government on its army policy, the opposition—whether in the reign of Queen Victoria or in that of Queen Anne—rarely flinched out of any regard for the national interest. And when Parliamentary considerations and ingrained prejudices made it seem a risky matter to undertake reforms which were important, or even essential, the Government of the day just as rarely showed any disposition to discharge this unpopular duty.

While at times naval policy, and even foreign policy, had for years together been removed out of the region of purely party criticism, army policy had ever remained embarrassed by an evil tradition. From the time of John Churchill, Duke of Marlborough, to the time of Field-Marshal Sir John French—from a date, that is, only a few years after our modern Parliamentary system was inaugurated by the 'Glorious Revolution,' down to the present day—the characteristic of almost every opposition with regard to this matter, had been factiousness, and that of {313} almost every Government evasion. Neither the one side nor the other had ever seemed able to approach this ill-fated topic with courage or sincerity, or to view it with steady constancy from the standpoint of the national interest.

THE BLOOD TAXES

For several years past the country had been watching a conspicuous example of this ingrained habit of manoeuvring round the Army in order to obtain party advantage. From 1912 onwards, until more interesting perplexities provided a distraction, a great part of the ............