THE UNIVERSE OF INFORMATION.pdf - ideals

who gives from the very first without bothering to determine whether
his generosity will constitute effective aid. This it is, on the contrary,
which is the principal concern of men of action and politics, who desire
social reform capable of reducing suffering at its source.
Internationalism itself is waiting for a lasting peace, for a better
organisation of relations between peoples, of which it would be the
mature fruit. Peace at any price, peace without justice, peace today
without surety that it will persist tomorrow, cannot concern it.
These different points of view, involve quite difficult consequences.
The evil which should be done away with is international insecurity,,
an evil that made its ravages felt long before the war itself, for the
armed peace, with its continual alerts, was really latent war, and
permitted the foundation of nothing stable. Internationalists consider
that, in the future, security should be demanded for the organisation
of a Society of Nations after the same fashion in which national
security has been organised. There should be a common power
to decide what it is necessary to do in this domain, a Justice to
which all conflicts are compulsorily submitted, an executive body enforcing
sanctions, worldwide and economic in the first stage, military
in the last stage (an international allied army). But the Society of
Nations should be founded on liberty and equality, repudiating any
hegemony, any domination by one state of other states. It will directly
oppose the German concept of Universal Empire, or a European'
federation under the sway of Prussia. This is why we must continueto
fight «Until Victory» (Briand). But clearly understanding what
must follow it — that is to say, a victory which will represent the
triumph of «public law of Europe» (King George) ...
I sojourned several months in Holland and Switzerland, there lookingup
again old friends with whom I have worked. I was able toascertain
there the real state of mind of neutrals belonging to some
select groups, and observed how insufficient was our propaganda to
our allies. In their eyes the allies do not form the block that they
do for us. Of France, which has always fought for liberty and progress,
they are confident. The evidence is the same for Belgium. But
they already have reservations about England. The Boer War is
not forgotten, nor the methods of conquest which prevailed in former
times in England, the mistress of the seas and of her dominions.
As for Russia, the neutrals are not only sceptical, but extremely indignant
about what happened after Galicia and about the «render
barren* policy which sacrifices whole nations in the face of the German
invasion. These recent affirmations of an autocratic mysticism
are hardly calculated to sustain the world's enthusiasm ... Now, what
interests the neutrals is not so much the war itself as what will come
afterwards. That is to say, the objectives of the war and the future
plan for Europe and therefore for the world. If we, the Allies, hadsaid
very clearly and exactly what our program was, instead of
keeping to generalities, if we had made out a part for the neutrals
in this program our position with respect to them would have been
strong. Instead of this, we have said to whomever wanted to listen,
that at the end of the war the neutrals would be treated as negligible
quantities, and our Press, speaking out beyond its frontiers, has
declared that «no one has the right at the present time to fix by
formal demands ... the political results which will be obtained by themilitary
effort of the Allies...» (The Times). When they read this,
the neutrals drew from it that the Allies will by no means content
themselves with the restoration of violated rights, with punishing;
the German aggressor... but that they intend to gain the maximum
profit for themselves from their victory, in other words, to continue
the game of old-fashioned politics. And so we do not have the means-
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