THE MORAL SIDE OF AN INDEMNITY.
WE. need. not, apologize for returning. to the moral, question involved in demanding an indemnity. from Germany, because we agree with those. who, say that if in our dealing with- Germany we went • back, upon,. our word or conunitted any act of -prevarication we should, have fought the war in vain. We think it a duty, therefore,. to make some- comments upon an article entitled " Finance, and Reparation " which- appears in. the. current. number of the Round Table. The writer of that article says 'that,. since Germany and the Allies agreed to make peace,om the. basis of President . Wilson's Fourteen, Pointii the Allies are in honour bound. to -the undcrtakinge :they .then. gave. to Germany—in other words, to, the Fourteen. Points .plus, the reservations which.were made by the, Allies when;the. Armistice negotiations. were taking. place_ So. far, we absolutely agree. But the writer in the Round Table, in bringing a very grave accusation against the Allies of having exceeded the understanding with Germany, and therefore of having acted dishonourably, has apparently overlooked one of the clauses of the Armistice. The terms of the Armistice were a kind of gathering together and an inter- pretation, all at the same time, of the mir,ary situation, of the Fourteen Points, and of the triangular discussions which had taken place between Germany and Mr. Wilson and the Allies during the negotiations for the Armistice. It was open to the Germans to refuse to sign the Aimistice. Presumably they read every word which it contained. They did sign it ; and they therefore committed themselves to the clause in which the Allies reserved to themselves the right to make further financial demands not specified in the Armistice terms. This is an important matter, for the Round Table has prestige, and an article of this kind is likely to he quoted against the Allies.
,,The Writer in the Round. Table reminds his readers that the Allies made two reservations in agreeing to adopt the Fourteen Points as the basis of peace. One referred to the so-called Freedom of the Seas, and the other was worded as follows On January 8th, 1918, the President declared that the invaded territories most he restored as well as evacuated and made free. The Allied Governments feel that no doubt ought to he allowed to exist as to what this provision implies. By it they understand that compensation will be made by Germany for all damage done to the civilian population of the Allies and to their property by the aggression of Germany by land, by sea, met from the air.'
The writer then goes on to say :-
" These terms govern the question of reparation. All demands on Germany must clearly in honour fall within them. Argu- ments are used even in responsible quarters to the effect that, since the Fourteen Points did not mention either Reparation or Indemnity, the Allies are at liberty to make what claims they like in respect of either. We do not share this view. From the moral, if not the legal, point of view, it is excluded in our view by tho subsequent correspondence quoted above. Else whet reliance could be placed by the Germans on the terms to which they had agreed, if a matter of the vital nature of an unlimited indemnity could be imported later. Whether the Allied authori- ties were wise or unwise when in the first days of November they agreed at Versailles to peace on these terms, whether, had they known of the full extent of the German libtfc/e, they would have framed their demands otherwise, all these questions are beside the mark. It was on these terms and in reliance on their
fulfilment that the German nation laid down its arms. . Germany was therefore to pay compensation for all damage done to the civilian population of the Allies and their property by tile aggression of Germany by land, by sea, or from the air. Clearly Germany must pay for physical damage to life or property inflicted on civilians ; clearly she can be called on to pay for the damage direct and indirect to civilians and their property due to the illegitimate submarine campaign, or in other words, for muds more in certain directions than as it appears is actually demanded of her. But can we ask her to pay compensation arising out of her soldiers killing or wounding our soldiers ? How does that come within the terms ? Can see demand from her, as it appears we do, from the published Summary of the Treaty of Peace, the coat of pensions to widows and orphans and to the wounded and crippled soldiers and sailers themselves ? How is that ' damage done to the civilian population of the Allies and their property' ? Is it on the ground that some of the men who earned the war pensions are no longer soldiers or sailors ? That argument seems to us groundless, for in that case the word ' has no meaning, and would exclude no ono. If the soldier's pension is damage, why not the soldier's pay ? And if that, why not the cost of shells and guns, and, in fact, every expense arising out of the cost of the war ? It might be urged that we were entitled to say that Ger- many should pay all such expenses, Certainly we were. But we did not say it. . . It is imperative in our view that the Government should make public the grounds on which these claims are based and the reasons why they were made in this form, and so convince the nation that in making them it has justice and honour on its side."
All this ignores the following words which appeared in the terms of the Armistice and were signed by Germany " Financial clauses :—With the reservation that any future claims and demands of the Allies and the United States remain unaffected , the following financial conditions are required," &c.
We are particularly interested in this question because we fell into a misunderstanding ourselves. When Minis- ters, at the time of the General Election, were freely demanding the " whole coat of the war " from Germany, we had some difficulty in reconciling their demand with the provision quoted by the Round Table about " damage done to the civilian population of the Allies." The larger demand did not seem to us to come easily within tire four corners of that provision. At first we came to the conclu- sion that, as it was incredible that Ministers would be guilty of so obvious a breach of faith, the words about " damage done to the civilian population " had really been intended to cover an indemnity for the cost of the war, and that, after the manner of official documents, it had been clumsily expressed. Later, however, we made the dis- covery that there was a misprint in the American official Bulletin containing the Armistice terms which we had used for reference. In that Bulletin the few words beginning Financial Clauses," which we have just quoted, were printed, not as part of Article 19, to which they properly belong, but as part of Article 18, which refers to repatria- tion and has nothing to do with finance. When we became aware of this misprint there was no longer any difficulty in justifying the demands of Ministers at the General Election.
We are not, of course, arguing here on the question whether the Allies ought or ought not to demand the whole cost of the war. In our opinion, such a demand would be futile, and would damage us as much as Germany. We are concerned only with the question whether we have a moral right to make financial demands on Germany that were not expressly defined when the Armistice was signed. That right, it seems to us, is as clear as anything can be. It is true that the Allies' Delegates in Paris have rather fogged the issue by referring, in their answer to German criticism of the Peace Treaty, to the words quoted by the Round Table about " damage clone to the civilian popula- tion." But the true defence of the Allies is on record, even though the nation has been unnecessarily puzzled about the whole subject.
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