TOPICS OF THE DAY.
PRINCE BISMARCK'S SPEECH.
" IAM not going to hit you, but I know you are going to hit me ; and if you do, I will break every bone in your skin !" That would not be accounted in ordinary life a pacific utterance, especially if delivered by one soldier to another ; nor can we see that Prince Bismarck's speeches on the Army Bill tend to peace. The naked brutality of the Chancellor's threats to France, and the crafty caution of his allusions to Russia, alike signify to our minds that he believes thoroughly in the case he puts forward ; that he honestly expects a second war with France, which will be a war of life and death ; and that, while careless in consequence whether he irritates France or not, he is consumed with anxiety lest Germany should be attacked by Russia at the same time. His language towards the great Eastern Power is of the most conciliatory and even seductive kind. He admits that as between Russia and Austria there are conflicts of interest of a grave sort, conflicts that may lead to war ; but as for Germany," her friendship with Russia, which suffered no interruption during her wars, is to-day placed beyond doubt." We " anticipate from Russia neither hostile attack nor hostile policy." The Czar is honest, as all who know him know, and would tell us if he were hostile. " As for Bulgaria, what is Bulgaria to us? It is a matter of perfect indifference to us who rules in Bulgaria, or what becomes of it altogether." " For us, indeed, the whole Eastern Question is not a question of war." " The views of our proposals in this Military Bill which have been drawn from the presumption that we should have to meet a coalition of France and Russia, I, for my part, do not recognise ; and our strength must not be calculated with regard to such a contingency." Let our readers recollect that the whole of these statements, which amount to the con- cession of a free hand to Russia in the East so long as she leaves Austria a Great Power—there is a special sentence about the necessity of that—are directly opposed to Prince Bismarck's immediate and urgent interest, and they will comprehend the full gravity of his menaces to France. If the Chancellor had been able to say, or had been willing to say, that he feared a coalition of Russia and France, he would have carried the Army Bill without a division, for even the Clericals cannot bear the idea of a Slav irruption ; but he studiously and plainly said the exact contrary in such terms, that the majority have determined to risk a dissolu- tion rather than grant his demands. To use such language at such a moment, to throw away so powerful a weapon, Prince Bismarck, who is even to narrowness of mind a patriot, must have felt very sure that no Russian attack would come ; that, in fact, some offer he has made to St. Petersburg was accepted, and that the conflict between Germany and France would be a duel. It is this conviction which gives to his language about France its exceptional gravity. He assumes that the duel must be fought, and that it must be a entrance. He does not speak only of France as growing strong, and therefore of precaution as necessary ; he speaks of France as a Power at least as strong as Germany, and fixedly determined to invade whenever she feels strong enough. He admits that the people of France may be peaceful, though they vote, he pointedly remarked, without demur or even discussion, any sum whatever demanded for the Army ; but France has always been governed by energetic minorities, and as the Chan- cellor believes, those who govern her—he means the Generals, and in his second speech almost said so—intend a war of revenge, which may come in ten weeks or ten years, but must come. He expects this war quickly, too, or at all events he knows it may come quickly, for in his second speech, directed against Herr Windthorst, he not only repeated his words about ten weeks, but said that he meant them, and that war might come in that short time, and the French Army be pouring "through the gap of Belfort." Can anybody imagine that the most experienced diplomatist in Europe, if he really desired peace or expected peace, would use language like that, even if it were necessary to carry an important Bill,—would, that is, describe war as a mere matter of time and opportunity I Such words must create in Germany the apprehensive expectation which is as bad as war itself, and in France induce a belief, that the great diplomatist who is so confidently prophesying, intends his prophecies to be fulfilled. Prince Bismarck went, however, much further than this. He not only described at length the ruin which would fall upon Germany if she were defeated, which was, of course, natural,
as such a picture really helped his Bill, but he stated in the most needless fashion what he would do if Germany won. He
would bleed France to death. After describing the oppressions of France in Prussia from 1810 to 1813, he says:—" We should also similarly act if we again came to enter Paris as victors. We should endeavour to make it impossible for France to attack us again for thirty years, and to secure ourselves completely against France for at least a generation. In comparison with the war of 1890, or I know not what other year, the war of 1870 would be as mere child's play in its effects on France, so that on one side, as on the other, there would be the same endeavour,— namely, de saigner a blanc."
Napoleon L on one or two occasions uttered menaces like this in private ; but such a sentence has never been uttered in public in modern times, and we cannot but believe that it will, in its frank brutality of menace, sink deeply into the minds of the French people. Possibly it may cow them, by bringing before their minds the awful magnitude of the stake at issue ; but unless Continental sentiment has radically changed, such a thundering threat must be received by the French Army as a challenge, and so increase that danger of a military dictatorship which Prince Bismarck either dreads or affects to dread for France. Such language is accepted in all armies all over the Continent as insulting, insulting as blows ; and though France may bear it and wait her opportunity, her readiness to risk war can only be increased. The preparations will grow larger and larger, the demands for the Army will be more and more peremptory, until at last the strain can be borne no longer, and the war will come almost of itself. The patience of the French Press under the provocation is most remarkable ; but to us it seems rather ominous of silent resolve than suggestive of a gasp of dismay. A dismayed Frenchman sputters ; but the journalists of Paris waited a day before they even spoke.
It may be said, that as Germany is not desirous of invading France, and France is afraid to invade Germany, there will, in spite of all these loud words, be no war. That is possible, of course, and if there were no standing armies, we should think it even probable. Both the peoples dread war, its slaughter of their own children, its endless expenditure, its frightful risks, at a time when the combatants announce before the battle is set, that if victors, they will bleed the vanquished to death. The two countries, moreover, are so armoured in fortresses, that a rush is hardly possible, and if time is necessary, time leaves opportunity for fully weighing consequences. Bat, unfortunately, the armies are ready ; they exercise a pre- ponderant influence on action, and they will not listen for years on end to opinions like Prince Bismarck's without demanding at last that the situation shall close. Continental soldiers do not flourish their weapons at each other without coming to sword- cuts at last. Moreover, though both peoples may be peaceful, there are limits to their power of enduring suspense. Prince Bismarck publicly proclaims that war must come ; all the known facts, such as the vast preparations of both States, back up his view ; and the inevitable conclusion, even among peaceful peoples, weary with conscriptions, burdened with taxes, unable to commence any far-reaching enterprise, is that war itself is preferable to such a long-continued strain. A cer- tainty of war, such as the German Chancellor expresses, of itself dissolves those hopes of peace which are the strongest barriers against war ; and we cannot but believe that Prince Bismarck knew this, and that, but for his master's age, he would have spoken in even more menacing tones. It is not with equanimity, we may be sure, that he views a situation in which a defeat that he affirms to be quite possible would give France the power to recover Alsace, to refound Hanover, to restore Schleswig to Denmark, and to break up, pro- bably for ever, the whole fabric of empire on which his reputation rests. If he has resolved to wait patiently for an attack which may have consequences like that, the world has been greatly mistaken in its estimate of the "Iron Chancellor." He may not intend war, or be ready to declare war, but he sees the obstacles to war dissolve with no dis- satisfaction.
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