BLOCKADE AND SEA POWER. By Maurice Parmelee. (London : Hutchinson
and Co. 15s. net.) TnosE who remember Mr. Parmelee's work in London in 1917 and 1918 as One of the United States delegation, and chairman of the Rationing, and Statistical Committee which advised the Allied -13Ioekade Committee 'on the supplies apportfoned to neutrals when niateriali and tonnage were so short, will be disappointed in the views that-he has formed. He is welcome to decry the horrors of war generally and itl'inhumanity or bestiality, but he writes with a grating tone of blame upon the Allies and his own country for breaches-- of international law and for 'Or- trAtineid,Of neiAtitt- War =that h" knew. Yet he knows perfectly well that we did our utmost to observe the. law andrto eonAider„lhe,neecls,of.neutrals ;• that the early voluble protests of the United States turned in 1917 into deprecatioii of our squeamishness and incitements to tighten up the Blockade in every poisible way ; and he helped to dO it. Though we put pressure on neutrals that we were loth to put, no one can blame us for-doing- so when we were fighting on land with our backs to the wall, and when the submarines threatened us with Starve.' thin. He 'knows that we never exercised force against them ; everything was done by agree- ments with them in which we gave some valuable considera- tion, which we could have withheld, for what we demanded. His facts arc generally correct, though a reader might be misled here and there, e.g., upon the Statutory List which was a piece of British law properly controlling British subjects.' The second part of the book is a plea for a World State instead of the League of Nations. Mr. Parmelee is at liberty to aim at this, as his fellow-countryman, Mr. Newfing, did in a book which we reviewed lately, but here again he disappoints' Us by the tone he uses towards the League. • He blames the Powers for their predominance and for refusinggreater restric-: tions on their national sovereignty. He has no sense of the, immense step forward which they did take. As an example, of his confusion, he objects to the inclusion of the Covenant in' the Treaty. Of course that was not ideal. But did M.: Clemenceau want it ? Did Mr. Lloyd George go deeply into that matter ? Every mind in Europe was concentrated on the Treaty ; the Treaty was going to be carried out. If the: Covenant, a novelty with lukewarm support, did not'stand as, Part of the Treaty, it would probably have been forgotten by' now. Mr. Parmelee seems entirely ignorant of Dr. Wilson's purpose in insisting and in sacrificing other desires to secure' the inclusion.
Previous page
