LAND AND W A T E R 
December 4, 1915. 
important, nevertheless, to impress upon our side, 
is secrecy. Tlie French Aery- properly refuse to 
publish their casualties — so do the Italians — and 
there is nothing that annoys the enemy more, as 
one can see by the tone of his military criticism. 
It is the same with the rate of equipment 
of the Russian forces. It is the same witii the rate 
of munilionment of our own. On the top of all 
this a number of patriotic men have thought it 
advisable, and a much larger number of un- 
patriotic men have though it entertaining or lucra- 
tive, to proclaim to the whole world an\- defi- 
ciencies apparent in the Allied scheme. The 
patriotic men thought that their doing so would 
spur their fellow subjects to greater efforts. The 
others ha\e partlv reflected their own fears and 
ignorance and partly discovered that the spreading 
of panic, being always sensational, was usually a 
money-making affair. 
A first-rate example of this was of course, the 
loud shout for more shells and for a ministry of 
munitions, undertaken just when the plant was 
all ready and months after the need had been dis- 
covered, and its satisfaction urgently prosecuted-: 
Part of the Press in this country was allowed 
on that occasion to print stuff which gave the 
neutral world the idea that we were short of 
munitions at a moment when we had a better 
supply than any one of the AlUes in proportion to 
our front. To-day, when we have an over^ 
whelming superiority over the enemy in this depart- 
ment the effect of these falsehoods" is still allowed 
to linger. 
It has been the same with recruitment. It is 
the same even in the shameful matter of the 
pushing of newspapers by the exaggeration of 
casualties and of their gravity. 
All these things together have formed the 
basis, a purely civilian basis, for the unfortunately 
very wide-spread publications of the enemy and 
for his propaganda in its first element. 
Its second element we have seen to be the 
essay to bring in on the enemy's side new factors, 
particularly in the East. 
The active defection of the King of Bulgaria 
and the repudiation by the Greek Government of 
its treaty obhgations have given a powerful 
impetus to this portion of the enemy's plan. They 
have made all neutral and much of belligerent 
opinion doubtful upon what accessions to the 
enemy's man-power the immediate future must 
show in the Near East. They have helped these 
fooHsh exaggerations of reserves in Turkey— 
as though the mere training and equipment of, sav 
an extra half million Levantines, were an imme- 
diate matter— and they have led to corres- 
ponding hopes within the enemy's own territories 
and among his own civilians. They form at this 
moment the strongest and the most real part of the 
enemy's case. When he says (through the mouths 
of those whom he has either paid, suggestioned 
or taken mto his service) " Let us make peace on 
the basis of ' a draw ' ! I am in occupation of 
much invaded territory and I can hold it indefi- 
nitely," he is talking nonsense, dangerous as the 
nonsense is, for in truth he has his powers at the 
utmost stretch and knows that his time is short 
But when he says, " Make peace because there are 
still _ other factors that may come in against 
you," he is nearer to talking sense. 
One can conceive, at the worst, a situation in 
the Last which Mould put the enemy's man power 
uito a better posture by something like 25 per cent 
which would carrv him not only through the 
winter, but right on into the summer, before' this 
vastlv extended front of his would show signs of 
cracking : but it is only at the very worst that one 
can concei\-e this, if we take things merely as 
they now are, presuming ' Roumanian neutrality 
to hamper Russia, but at the same time to refuse 
all aid to the enemy, to blockade the way to 
Bulgaria, but at the same time to remain a 
menace upon the flank of the Austro-German 
empire, and if we presume the power of the 
Allies (as we may surely presume it) to be strong 
enough to check the Greek court, then the addi- 
tional power obtained by the enemy in the East 
is almost insignificant. It certainly does not 
give him the strength to hold undiminished fronts 
on into this summer by any addition of forces. If 
anything, it ]ea\-es his new ally, Bulgaria, stronger 
than it does himself upon the road to Asia, and 
holding the door in complete security and still 
free to bargain with whoever they may choose. 
THE FINANCIAL ARGUMENT. 
The last argument, the argument from finance, 
needs a close examination. One part of it is 
sound. That part which pre-supposes, if the war 
be continued many months more, a partial re- 
pudiation of national pledges. But the other, and 
the main part of that financial argument, the 
conception that war and victory are physically 
impossible because national pledges in finance 
cannot be wholly observed, is nonsense. V.'ar is 
not fought with money, it is fought with men 
and needs the shelter and the food required to 
keep those men in activity. It is further fought 
with certain chemical products and certain metals. 
And for the manufacture of those materials, 
explosi\'es, weapons and means of transport, you 
need further men, which also means more food, 
clothing and shelter. Now the materials neces- 
sary to this process exist in the Allied countries 
and in neutral countries in an amount sufficient 
to maintain the campaign till long after, years 
after, the complete defeat of the enemy has been 
achieved. They exist within the territories of the 
Allies alone in sufficient quantities. In so far as we 
choose for the sake of rapidity to obtain them from 
neutral countries there exists for exchange against 
such materials a mass of material wealth in the 
Allied territories sufficient to obtain them for years 
to come. 
It is a point which ought to be self-evident 
vet upon which people often get confused. A mar 
w.ll say, for instance, "This houssin which I an 
living is wealth, yet to what use can it be pu' 
for the prosecution of a war?" The answer ii 
that you may make over that house with the 
income represented by its rental to one in a neutral 
country possessed of the copper, or the coal tar 
or the cotton of which you stand in need. 
There is no form of w^ealth whatsoever 
save a few luxurious forms such as pictures and 
jewellery, which is not wholly available for this 
process, and even those luxurious forms are prac- 
tically available. You cannot fight with a 
Vandyke picture, but you can give that Vandyke 
picture to someone in the Argentine, and vou car 
get against it so much wheat. The financia 
crux lies simply in this, not how long will tlu 
material hold out, but how long will the few whc 
possess the material consent, or, when thev ceas( 
to consent, how far can they be compellcd'^ to sec 
their wealth leaving their hands and taken fron 
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