THE PRIME MINISTER'S ALTERNATIVES.
Iour first article we have dealt mainly with the past 1 history of the controversy about the Higher Command. We can now turn to the debate in the House of Commons on Tuesday. The Government once more owed an explanation to the House of Commons, for the general result of the recent Conference at Versailles seemed to be that Mr. Lloyd George's assurance of last November that the Versailles Council should not have executive powers had been withdrawn. The general opinion that such a withdrawal had taken place—that the " extension of power " granted to the Council =meant nothing less—turned out to be well founded. We have summarized the main facts of the debate elsewhere and need not repeat them here. It is enough to say that, according to the informa- tion at present in the possession of the nation, while General Foch, the Chief of the French Staff, will apparently sit on the Council, the British Empire will be represented, not by the Chief of the Imperial General Staff, Sir William Robertson, but by Sir Henry Wilson, who is of inferior standing to Sir William Robertson and, in the general opinion, of inferior experience. It is regrettable that the Prime Minister did not take the opportunity to express his full confidence in Sir William Robertson, or to declare alternatively that he had good reasons for transferring his confidence to somebody else. As we have said already, Mr. Lloyd George by taking this course would once and for all have ended the storm of rumours that is doing so much harm, and incidentally would have established himself much more firmly in his high position. We want to see Mr. Lloyd George's popularity employed to the greatest possible advantage for the good of our great Cause. No one who questions his wisdom doubts that he passionately desires to win the war. 'Mr. Lloyd George has only to raise a finger, or rather to utter only a single sentence, to put the nation in possession of all the information it wants. But he has not yet taken that course. He used words on Tuesday which left people still in doubt, still wondering, still puzzled. In, the House of. Lords Lord Curzon was mom explicit in acknowledging the debt owed to Sir William Robert- son and. Sir Douglas Haig ; but unhappily we have to judge: more by the facts than by words. The facts seem to be— though of course the whole prospect may change before these words are published—that France is to be represented on the Versailles Council by her Chief of Staff, while the British Empire is not to be represented by its Chief. of Staff. This arrangement is surelynot "co-ordination "—the word used by Mr. Lloyd George when explaining his Paris speech in the House of Commons in November—but " subordination," as Mr. Asquith truly suggested. It may be said, and we believe has been said, by our Government that there is to be no Generalissimo ; but if the British representative is to occupy a position of formal inferiority in the Council of Versailles, the principle of having a Generalissimo might in effect be reached by a roundabout route. Here it must be said that we should have implicit confidence in General Foch's great abilities. He has a brilliant record, and if our interests are in any respect to be committed to a strategist who is not British, we would as readily commit them to the keeping of General Foch as to that of any man living. But unfortunately we feel sure that the principle of subordination is dangerous in itself as between democracies. You cannot stifle the criticism of free peoples, and the risk is very great that there would be friction, heart-burnings, and mischievous discontent if anything went wrong.
From. Lord Curzon's statement we gather that Sir William Robertson and Sir Douglas Haig were present at all the meetings of the Versailles Conference and consented to the extension of the Council's powers. This must mean, so far as we can judge from the superficial signs, that Sir William Robertson consents to a considerable diminution of his own authority. And yet the whole position is still so obscure that we cannot feel certain that what has happened has Sir William Robertson's willing consent. If Sir William Robertson's proved capacities were to be of less service to his country than in the past, we should deeply regret it, for we believe that there is no military thinker who is more trusted and admired from the top to the bottom of the Army than he is. He is, moreover, the very type of man whom Lord Northcliffe's newspapers have long professed their desire to see in positions of authority, for he has worked his way up from the ranks and has had personal experience of every part of the military machine.
In refusing to give more information than he did, Mr. Lloyd George• pleaded that it was impossible to make known facts that would be useful to the enemy. With that excuse, as such, we of course heartily agree. The entire responsibility for the new arrangements rests rightly with the Government, . and they are perfectly justified in saying that they do not, and cannot, share the responsibility with others. What we cannot understand, however, is that the Government should suppose that in declaring their unabated confidence in Sir William Robertson and Sir Douglas Haig, or, in the alternative, in withdrawing that confidence, they would be conveying information to the enemy. The nation has not, and we think never has had, any prying propensities of a dangerous kind ; the Government are not asked to reveal secrets, but they are asked—at least that was the case most plainly in the House of Commons on Tuesday—to remove all causes of misunderstanding and misgiving about the position of the Higher Command. The facts are known to Germany just as well as they are known to ourselves. To resolve public suspicion once and for all would be to give the enemy just the sort of information he does not want to receive—the information that we are a people with a single mind and without hesitations of any kind. It was a remark- able anomaly, indeed, that the defence of the military chiefs should have come from the Opposition side of the House, and that the Prime Minister should have been, as it were, defending himself for not defending them. In our opinion, Mr. Asquith's speech was precisely the speech required by the circumstances. Both in describing our war aims, and in insisting upon the necessity of creating and confirming public confidence in the military chiefs, he showed that steadiness and clearness of vision which have marked his utterances throughout the war. When Mr. Asquith was Prime Minister we were frequently accused by our readers, who could find in him nothing but a general inertness, of praising him too mach for the perfect balance, the good sense, the steadiness, and the loyalty to his colleagues which he always displayed. We know well enough that Mr. Asquith never impressed the country with having the brilliant driving-power, the ability magnetically to inspire others, and so on, which are found in Mr. Lloyd George ; but, after all, steadiness is a supreme quality'—it may be the only winning quality—in a long war, and it was- never more required in our statesmen than it is now. It is impossible to condemn too strongly the pretence made in some of Lord Northcliffe's newspapers that Mr. Asquith in the debate put himself at the head of the Pacificists, and that he tried to bring about the downfall of Mr. Lloyd George in the interests of Pacificism. It is safe to say that Mr. Asquith has never once wavered in his statement of our necessary and minimum war aims. If he had wished to play the game of the Pacificists, he would have spoken very differently on Tuesday, certainly not with the moderation, circumspection, and transparent consideration for the Government's difficulties which informed all his remarks. Of Mr. Lloyd George's attempt to silence Mr. Asquith by saying that Mr. Asquith was asking for the publication of information that the enemy would give great sums of money to obtain, we need say nothing, for Mr. Lloyd George himself admitted when he was challenged that he had been misunderstood, and that no such complaint of Mr. Asquith's motives was justified.
At this point we may mention another of Mr. Lloyd George's interjected statements—the one in which he told Lord Hugh Cecil that he had had no communication with the Press in connexion with the recent Northcliffe campaign. We accept that disclaimer absolutely. It is a relief to have the rumours about the Prime Minister in this respect officially disposed of. As regards Mr. Lloyd George's attitude towards Sir William Robertson in particular, and Sir Douglas Haig in a secondary degree, almost everything remains, nevertheless, to be made clear. We sincerely hope that Mr. Lloyd George, in his own interests and in those of the Army and of all the Allies, will put an end to the public bewilderment. It is solely on this question of his relations to the Chief of the Imperial General Staff and the Commander-in-Chief that information is wanted. Let us repeat that there is, and ought to be, no demand for informa- tion as to future war plans of any kind whatever. Those secrets are rightly shared between the War Cabinet and a very few officers and officials. We fear that if Mr. Lloyd George does not perceive that a general clearing up of the present situation is necessary, he will gradually lose both the trust and respect he still enjoys, instead of adding to them. This seems to us inevitable. One course leads to safety for the Army, for the cause of the Allies, and for Mr. Lloyd George himself ; the other leads to disaster for the Government within a measurable distance of time. The choice lies with Mr. Lloyd George himself, and we earnestly hope he will choose wisely. After the reception of his speech in the Commons on Tuesday, he cannot seriously doubt that he is trying the patience of many of those who genuinely wish to follow him. We desire to add a few words in conclusion with special reference to the position of Sir William Robertson. Tho Lobby Correspondent of the Daily News, " A. P. N.," stated on Wednesday that Sir William Robertson had actually been asked to resign and had refused to do so. We can well believe that if Sir William Robertson disapproves of what has happened at Versailles, and if he felt himself free to act in accordance with his private feelings, he would be quite content to resign. If while disapproving he decides to continue in his position till he is removed from it, the proof will be plain that he considers an issue of primary importance is at stake and must be definitely cleared up, even though he suffers a personal humiliation in the process. We are writing hypo- thetically, of course ; but if Sir William Robertson should behave in this way, he would be doing only what we should expect of a very clear-sighted and courageous man. 'We read in the National News of Sunday last the following strange paragraph :- " It is quite true that, as Mr. Bonar Law stated on Tuesday, no Generalissimo was appointed by the War Council at Versailles for the supreme command of the Allied forces, but Mr. Lloyd George has never shown himself to be concerned over the label so long as he gets the substance itself. And at Versailles he succeeded, by sheer force of his dominant personality, in carrying through a
ri project which he has for some time cheshed."
If there be any truth in this paragraph, Sir William Robertson is not likely to be in danger of confusing the substance with the label, or the roundabout route with the direct course. But even if he strongly disapproves of the present policy of the Government, we sincerely hope that he will not resign. If he refuses to meet trouble half-way and stays on at his post, he may well find himself established there more firmly than ever. If, on the other hand, events require him to be removed from it, he will at least have brought matters to the stage at which the clearing up of all the present ambiguities will be inevitable.
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