Fehruary 14, 1918 
Land Si Water 
LAND & WATER 
5 CHANCERY LANE, LONDON, W.C.2 
Telephone : HOLBORN 2828. 
THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 14, 1918 
I 
Contents 
Austria and America. By Louis Raemaeker^ 
Where the British Army Fights. (Photographs) 
The Outlook 
Enemy Reinforcement. Bv Hilaire Belloc 
The After War Blockade. By Arthur Pollen 
American Locomoti\-es in France. (Photograph) 
Lea\'es from a German Note Book 
John Rathom's Revelations. — Part I. 
At Sea. By Etienne 
New Secret Diplomacy. By G. K. Chesterton 
Rural Reformation. (Illustrated). By John Ruan 
Women's Village Councils. By Mrs. Hamilton 
Mr. Shaw's Critics. By J. C. Squire 
Books of the Week 
Domestic Economy 
Notes on Kit. 
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II 
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ix. 
The Outlook 
THE signing of a separate peace between the 
Ukraine and the enemy and the consequent 
isolation of Roumania marks a very important 
point in the war. It is the first separate peace 
the enemy has been able to negotiate. It will 
have the effect of relieving Austria-Hungarv' at once, of 
raising civiHan opinion throughout the German Empire, and of 
confirming the German Government in its certainty that it 
will in future dominate the- East of Europe. 
There are other aspects of the matter which should be 
noted. One is that the Germans and Austrians are both 
concerned to strengthen the separatism of South Russia 
l)ecause it makes the resurrection of the Russian power more 
difficult and also because it is a check against the spread of 
anarchy from the Northern towns. Another point is that the 
enemy has no guarantee of permanence in the State of the 
Ukraine. The doctrines which have ruined Northern Russia 
are permeating the South and may have a much larger effect 
in the near future. Lastly, of course, there is the food question. 
The Ukraine is the great granary which used to help to feed 
us and will now help to feed the Central Empires. 
The great strikes in Germany have ended, as they were ex- 
pected to end, in a thorough military suppression. Two 
extreme views, widely expressed about them in this country, 
were equally erroneous : The view that the^ were engineered 
by the German authorities to deceive Allied opinion and the 
view that they were the beginning of some sucli break-up of 
German society as has taken place in Russia. Neither of 
these things was possible. No belligerent Government would 
play with such dangerous fire as the deliberate fomenting 
of national strikes in the present phase of exhaustion. G€rman 
society, like that of the Western nations, is organised far more 
strongly than Russian society. 
The really significant thing about the strikes for us in this 
country is that they have come after the great success against 
Russia, the tremendous victor>' in Italy, and after what we 
can now see to be the successful German defence of 1917 
in the West. If the economic pressure upon Germany and 
the growing strain of the war can lead to such a thing at such 
a moment it is a good augury upon what will happen when 
pressure can be brpught to bear upon Germans on German 
soil. We do not know whether defeat in the field or internal 
disintegration will take place first. But at the first sign of 
the former the latter must certainly appear in full force. 
It is equally certain that if an inconclusive peace can be 
engineered by the enemy before there has been either internal 
colla^Kie or external defeat, his social system from the 
Hohenzollern Crown downwards is secure for the future. 
Two members of the Royal Flying Corps have been con- 
demned to a long term of penal S( rvitudc in the enemy's 
country for dropping propaganda leaflets behind the German 
lines. A good deal of ink has been wasted upon this subject 
by worthy people who want to show the Germans that they 
are neither logical nor just in acting thus, and who are at the 
pains to tell us that the Germans themselves not only have 
largely/ used this method of propaganda from the air, but 
began it. At this time of day one might just as well argue 
about the bombardment of open towns or the murder of 
Captain Fryatt. 
Ihere is no canon of European morals, however sacred, 
that the enemy will not break if he believes the crime to be 
conducive to his national success. Those who have not learnt 
that lesson by this time must be incapable of appreciating the 
ordinary occurrences of daily life. What is of practical use is 
to consider what form reprisals could take in the present 
phase of the war. Liter on we shall have to consider formal 
punishment. But for the moment we have notliing to rely 
upon but reprisals. 
Here the situation is that the enemy holds Allied towns and 
large numbers of allied civihans as hostages, while the Allies 
hold no towns an^ very few civilians of his. Further, the 
enemy has taken from the Western Allies combined more 
than they have taken from him (though in the particular case 
of the British this state of affairs is reversed). The enemy 
could, therefore, if this matter be estimated by mere numbers, 
do us worse harm than we could do him, were a sort of auction 
in reprisals to be started. Moreover, he has the advantage of 
feeling less horror than would the society of the Allies at the 
necessity for such extremes. 
On the other hand, the enemy has one very vulnerable 
point, which is the exceptional position occupied in his society 
by the wealthier classes, and especially by the titular nobility. 
The French have taken advantage of this weakness with great 
effect. Make things really uncomfortable for a man highly 
placed in German society (we have many such among our 
prisoners) and those who govern Germany are touched to the 
quick. Unfortunately, the constitution "of our own society 
in England has in the past made it more difficult for us to use 
this weapon than for the French. At any rate, that is the 
Hne along which practical reprisals can be made fniitful, 
pending the solution of the whole affair when (unless we accept 
defeat beforehand) theindividual agents of these abominations 
can be brought to book. 
The appointment of Lord Beaverbrook to be at the head of 
the Propaganda means nothing more than that Lord Bea\ er- 
brook thought that such work would interest and amuse him. 
Neither Parhament nor the country has anything to say in 
the matter nowadays. Moreover, what concerns us prac- 
tically is not so much the motives and causes of this sort of 
appointment as its results. 
Propaganda work in the past has been shockingly done. It 
has three branches : Propaganda among Neutrals "(of no very 
great importance since the entry of America) ; the support 
of opinion at home ; and the proper representation of British 
effort ainong the Allies. Lord Beaverbrook has not himself 
any qualification in any one of these three departments, but 
that is no reason why he should not use men who have. The 
value of the head of a State Department at this moment does 
not lie in his personal acquaintance with the work, but in his 
power of choosing agents and especially in his integrity in 
serving the national interests alone, neglecting private motives, 
and choosing men only because they will do the work well. 
For some few weeks to come by far the most important work 
of the department will be the confirming of public opinion at 
home, and if the new head of the Propaganda can succeed in 
this hitherto almost neglected piece of duty, he will have 
proved his fitness for the post. 
It is a curious thing in connection with Propaganda that 
no one has properly put before the British public the strength 
of American opinion in favour of war and the excellent writing 
in which it is expressed. We get generalities about the 
unanimity of American opinion, which generalities are both 
exaggerated and foolish. Now and then we get anecdotes 
that are either sensational or ludicrous or both. What we 
want is reprints from the American daily press and weekly 
and monthly reviews, showing how firmly the best minds in 
America are supporting the common cause of civilisation. 
After all the nonsense, for instance, that has been talked 
over licre about Alsace Lorraine as though these provinces 
were the subject of a debating game instead of the vital 
symbol of the whole war, it is refreshing to read the mass of 
American comment upon this point. The historical argu- 
ment is clearly understood and as clearly stated. The present 
political argument is still better understood. Prussia is a great 
military power through the i)restige of 1870, and the name 'of 
1N70 to the people whom she rules is Alsace Lorraine. The 
