THE SOLDIER'S DUTY.
ONE aspect of the intense excitement which has been caused by General Maurice's letter is the perplexity. of the public as to the right, or otherwise, of a soldier to take such a grave course as General Maurice has taken. If a soldier on the active list, it is asked, is to step outside his proper military functions and challenge the Civil Executive of the country, where do we stand ? What will such action lead to ? Will not the inevitable result be chaos ? On all sides one hears these questions ; and it is very salutary that they should be asked, even when, as in the present case, they are frequently asked in genuine doubt by men who have a deep admiration for General Maurice, and believe that he was guided by a most honourable sense of duty to the higher interests of his country. The question whether a soldier, actively employed, is bound to keep silence in the face of what he sincerely believes to be Mismanagement-, deceit, or the misdirection of the national effort, is indeed a very diffi- cult one. It must be said at once that no final and absolute answer can be given. Burke once declared that "nothing absolute can be affirmed on any moral or political issue." Of course that was an overstatement, and just because it is an overstatement it paradoxically denies its own conclusion. The statement is itself an absolute statement on a moral issue. Burke would have been wiser to say that an absolute statement can seldom be made on a moral or a political issue. The thought behind the statement, however, is perfectly sound. Although it is right and necessary that a soldier should be bound by the rules of his profession, and though it is true that the vast majority of soldiers can pass through honourable and useful careers without ever coming into conscientious conflict with those rules, there are nevertheless exceptions.
Consider this case of General Maurice. We must not of course prejudge the question whether his statements are right or wrong. That question, at the time when we write, remains to be decided. But for the purpose of our argument we can fairly assume that he had no doubt whatever that every word of what he wrote in his letter was true, and that —with the fate of the Empire and of the future course of the world in the balance —it was necessary for him to speak out. What did General Maurice believe when he wrote the letter ? He believed, we suppose, that the British Army had been brought perilously near to ruin by the extension of the British line at the front. He believed that this extension was due to the intervention of the Brifsh Cabinet, and not to the advice of the military experts. He believed that when the Govern- ment were challenged as to where the responsibility lay, they said what was not true. He believed that the Cabinet had reduced the Army by cutting down Divisions of twelve battalions to nine battalions in spite of the protests of the Staff. Finally, he believed that when the Cabinet were challenged on this point they again said what was not true— they allowed the nation to believe that there had been no reduction of the Army. Now if a General in a position where he has access to all the necessary information has no doubt whatever that such things as these have happened, and that the country is being wilfully misled by the Government, and congquently being brought into extreme danger of defeat, what is he to do ? Surely in deciding to go to all lengths, to sacrifice if necessary his own career, to save the country at. his own expense, to open the eyes of the people by a startling and highly irregular act, he is only doing what a man of honour, wisdom, and courage ought to do. The terrible danger is at once his motive and his justification. In our opinion, a General in the position we have described would be utterly false to all codes of honour and duty if he let falsehood go without protest. He would be postponing truth and duty to an empty formality. It is very easy— only too easy—for a soldier to say : "These things have got nothing whatever to do with me. I am only -a soldier. I have merely to carry out my orders, and if the Government are leading the country to the dogs, that is the fault of the people who have chosen the Government. In no circumstances whatever is it necessary for me to speak. On the contrary, the King's Regulations impose upon me the duty of silence---- and silent I shall be." What should we say of a man who had argued in that way when it had been discovered that through his easy compliance the nation had been brought to disaster ? Should we not say that he had behaved as a formalist of the most cold-blooded type, as a pedant, a hopeless precisian, and a coward ? It is always the easiest course for a soldier to soothe the prickings of conscience by tying the Military Regulations, like frontlets, across his brow ; but there are extreme cases in which this cannot be done by brave men and men of honour.
The argument for the exceptional behaviour of a soldier in exceptional circumstances may be summed up in the old phrase about the sacred right of rebellion. Of course a man who rebels before his right to rebel has become clear to the people, or before his rebellion is justified by success, must expect hard knocks. The fact that this must be so in an imperfectly managed world is embodied in the saying that there is no such thing as successful treason. We call to mind an amusing story told by Mr. G. W. E. Russell about a question asked of Lord John Russell by Queen Victoria. "Is it true, Lord John," asked the Queen, " that you hold that a subject is justified in certain circumstances in disobeying his Sover- eign ? " "Well," he replied, "speaking to a Sovereign of the House of Hanover, I can only say that I suppose it is." The dynastic revolution which had brought the House of Hanover to the British Throne was, of course, not treason ; it was a just revolution because, besides being beneficial in aim, it had succeeded. Similarly, nothing more definite can be said of the duty of a soldier when it comes into conflict with his duty as a citizen than that each case must be decided on its merits. It is essential to remember that, according to all ideas of British liberty and law, the soldier does not cease to be a citizen because he is a soldier. This fact is proved in a curious incidental manner by the law that if anybody is killed when soldiers are ordered to fire on a mob during a riot, the soldiers who have fired the shots have to answer the charge of murder. In the circumstances they will be acquitted ; but the principle is never lost sight of that every man is a citizen before he is a soldier. In all supreme instances of divided duty, the duty of the citizen prevails over that of the soldier. Such a conflict hardly ever occurs, but when it does occur the decision need not be in doubt. General Maurice, who has the reputation of being a careful thinker, and whose honesty is one of his most notable qualities, must have decided in his mind that a supreme conflict between his civil and his military duty called for a decision. Of course, if he is wrong, if he cannot justify the extraordinarily serious step he has taken, he must abide by the consequences. The soldier must never allow the civilian side of him to act lightly. He must take the supreme decision only on very sure grounds indeed, where his act is calculated to produce good results and justify some tremendous principle. A soldier cannot possibly be too discreet in criticizing his chiefs or in disobeying the rules of his profession. But if ever the time comes when he feels that he must make use of his professional knowledge in the public interest, he must disregard all forms in the conviction that the crisis transcends them. Genbral Maurice no doubt satisfied himself —whether rightly or wrongly—that the Complaisance of soldiers was being used by the Government for wrong and dangerous purposes. He must have said to himself : "The politicians know that the soldier will never answer back, and, feeling therefore quite safe to do as they please, they are neglecting the interests of the Army while they deceive the public into believing that they are acting on military advice." In peace the conflict of duties provoked by such a situation in any soldier's breast would be trying enough. In time of war and crisis it is terrible. It may be thought that our discussion of the subject provides no definite rule for guidance, and this is only too true. 'Under the conditions no rule is possible. "Deceit lies in generalities." In moral issues it is, as a matter of fact, frequently better to act by instinct than on logic. Nothing is more misleading than logic if the premiss has not been accurately stated. Unless your premiss is accurate, the closer your reasoning is the worse your conclusions will be. But no one need be discouraged by the absence of a definite rule. Probably all men are agreed that there are times when the sacred right of rebellion cannot be gainsaid. Certainly Mr. Bonar Law himself admitted this during the debate on the Curragh incident in April, 1914. He then declared that there were occasions on which the duty of a soldier must become subservient to his duty as a citizen. We come then to the conclusion that in the agony of doubt a man's conscience must he his guide. Though no one has ever been able to frame a definition of duty, it is a merciful and consoling fact that when a critical decision on a moral issue has to be made, there is very seldom much difficulty. In the face of actual facts all the old paradoxes which justify caution to those who culpably wish to be cautious wither away into nothingness.
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