356 



The Review of Reviews. 



from, and which all would desire in some respects 

 lo modify. These limitations, however, are for the 

 l)resent so lirmly lixed about us that it would Ix- 

 I'oolish to ignore them, and hopeless to contend 

 against them. 



"The limitations I refer to are these: — First, 

 that our s\stem of government is based upon the 

 reju-esentation of the people's will, and carries with 

 it, by tradition, the custom of explaining fully, and 

 in public, the reasons justifying expenditure of 

 money, and the necessity of obtaining thereto the 

 assent of Parliament. Second, that the great 

 Dominions over.sea are not, except so far as senti- 

 ment is concerned, integral jx^rtions of the British 

 Empire, but are in reality self-governing States, in 

 alliance with Great Britain. 



" And likewise, if any strategic plan is formu- 

 lated by those whose duty it is to make preparation 

 for war involving united Imperial effort, the first 

 question they have to ask themselves is whether 

 such a plan is likely to commend itself to the self- 

 i:o\'erning Dominions. 



" These are the conditions and limitations which 

 ha\e to be borne in mind, and from the trammels of 

 which we cannot at present escape. 



WHAT IS, AND WHAT MIGHT BE. 



" We shall, so far as we can see, for many years 

 to come ha\e to be content with a scheme of co- 

 ordination that leaves financial control in peace sub- 

 ject to Ministerial responsibility, as devised under 

 our Parliamentary system of government, and leaves 

 to the Dominions a degree of freedom from naval 

 and military control that is unquestionably incom- 

 patible with the higliest naval and military effioiency. 



" Decentralisation rather than the converse, 

 spreading of responsibility, especially financial re- 

 Nponsibility, rather than its concentration, have in 

 modern times been the main characteristics of change 

 in oin- institutions. The result has been a gradual 

 increa.se in the numWr of public offices and public 

 bodies. 



THE EVOLUTION OF A PRIME MINISTER. 



" Another consideration, impossible to disregard, 

 is the evolution of the office of Prime M'inister. 

 He is now in a ]X)sition resembling rather what on 

 ihe (.'ontinent is called an Imperial Chancellor than 

 a First Lord of the '["reasury of the early Victorian 

 lyp'. J think it is obvious that every modern Prime 

 Minister must perceive that he, and he alone, is the 

 Minister wliose function it is to co-ordinate and to 

 prepare all the forces of the Empire in time of 

 |H;ace and to launch them at the enemy in timeof war. 



" No one who has read the reports of what oc- 

 rin-red at the Imperial Conference, and has watched 

 the attitude of the Dominion Parliaments, can be 

 under any illusion alx)ut the nature of the ties be- 

 tween the mother country and the great self-govern- 

 ing communities that form part of the British Em- 

 pire. 



THE TIES OF EMPIRE. 



" These ties are in the main sentimental, and, 

 although quite recently there are indications that the 

 Dominions are not unwilling to take part in defend- 

 ing the Empire against attack, any attempt to for- 

 mulate strategic plans, ba.sed on common action, 

 would be premature, and might not impossibly prove 

 to be disastrous. 



" There is no imnieiliate prospect of the British 

 Executive Go\ernment being able to impose its ideas 

 of naval or military strategy upon the Defence 

 Ministers of the Dominions, and still less of the 

 British Parliament l>eing able to control or e\en to 

 influence the action of the Dominion Parliaments. 

 For purposes of Imperial defence the Empire is not 

 a federation, but an alliance between greater ai;d 

 lesser .States upon terms not so clearly defined as 

 those which subsist between some of the States of 

 Europe. 



" It is by no means a satisfactory state of things, 

 but there is no help for it, until the Dominions 

 reali.se more fully that their security from attack, 

 during the long period which is bound to elapse 

 before they attain to maturity in population and 

 wealth, is inextricabK bound up with the security 

 of Great Britain. 



THE DOMINIONS IN WAR TIME. 



' ' That any- of the Dominions would, in the event 

 of a great war, leave the mother country in the lurch 

 is highly improbable; but they are not prepared at 

 the present time to bind themseh'es to any specific 

 joint plan of action under circumstances over which 

 they have no control, in spite of the obvious Im- 

 perial difficulty and danger of leaving the principles 

 of common action to be determined at Ihe last 

 moment, on the e\'e of war. 



" 'J'his is the second exam])le I desire to give of 

 the kind of difficulties which a statesman has to 

 face who is anxious to perfect a system of war-pre- 

 paration in a eountr\ like ours, governed under a 

 constitution which phices individual liberty, and its 

 full <'xpression, before all other considerations, anu 

 in an Empire like ours, of which the comjionent 

 parts are bound together by lii's of sontiment and 

 not by material guarantees. 



MR. BALFOUR'S IMMAllVE. 



" These matters only engage the attention of P.ir- 

 liamenl and of the country by fits and starts. 



" Up to the year igo4, even statesmen shrawk 

 from applying their minds consistently to problems 

 of defence. A distinct change for the better then 

 cxxurred. Mr. Balfour's Administration mu.st al- 

 ways be memorable in the history of national defence 

 for two reforms pregnant of far-reaching results. 

 Mr. Balfour created a' General Staff for the Army, 

 .and ho gave body and substance to the Committee of 

 Imperial Defence. 



THE GENESI.S OF THE COMMITTEE. 



" What is the Committee of Imperial Defence? 

 It is often referred to. Sometimes with a kind of 



