A Scandinavian View of the War

IN this unforeseen world-war the three Scandinavian countries are not in similar positions, but they are alike neutral because they cannot be anything else, since participation in this war would imperil their existence, and nobody has offered them any compensation whatever for the risk they would run.

Norway, where sympathy for England and France has always been strong, feels herself even now, perhaps more than the other two countries, drawn toward these powers. Many of her intellectual people whose books appear in German have, however, expressed most passionately their sympathies for Germany.

Denmark, which I know best, is strictly neutral, for most obvious reasons. The distance between Kiel and Danish territory is only two hours, and thus we Danes would have the German fleet outside Copenhagen two hours after a declaration of war. It goes without saying that, if Denmark with her two and a half millions of inhabitants were to challenge a great power like Germany, it would mean nothing less than suicide. Half a century ago Denmark took up the fight against the two powers which were allied then, as they are now, — Prussia and Austria. She fought for half a year without any assistance from other European powers. It was an astonishing proof of the lack of foresight in the diplomats, that England and France allowed Germany to seize the harbor of Kiel and to tear away from Denmark three duchies which constituted one fifth of the whole country, without lifting a finger to prevent it.

The loss of each duchy affected the Danes differently. Holstein and Lauenburg were German-speaking and German-feeling; but the population of North Schleswig, which was pure Danish, suffered bitterly from being torn away from the mother country. The peace treaty of Prague, ending the war between Prussia and Austria in 1866 (only two years after the cession of North Schleswig), contained, however, a clause to the effect that the inhabitants had the right to return to Denmark, if, when a general vote was taken, they expressed such a wish. North Schleswig, therefore, cherished the hope of a speedy reunion with Denmark. She was bitterly disappointed when the vote was postponed, and still more bitterly disappointed when, in February, 1879, after an agreement between Prussia and Austria, the clause containing the promise to the Danes was obliterated altogether, in accordance with Bismarck’s wish.

Since then North Schleswig has been governed as the Prussians govern foreign nationalities: the use of the Danish language by church and school being against the law; the Danish colors, even in women’s dresses, being forbidden; the inhabitants being insulted in various ways. Matters went so far that parents were to be deprived of their children, if suspected of bringing them up in a pro-Danish atmosphere.

If the Prussians had had sufficient sense to permit the people of North Schleswig to use their own language, and if they had granted those Danes full citizenship, they could, perhaps, in half a century, have brought the population to submission. If they had possessed the pliability they always have lacked, and if they had understood that 150,000 Danes under German rule could not be dangerous to the German Empire; if they had made the Danes their pet children, they might, perhaps, have converted their hearts and made them speak German.

Instead of that the German government granted large sums of money to buy Danish land, just as they did to buy Polish land in Posen; and the inhabitants were embittered and worried by the sending into exile of numerous Danish-born persons and German-born persons whose fathers had, after 1864, spoken for Denmark. The Germans are known to have exiled Danish concertsingers because they wanted to sing some songs by the Norwegian Grieg. They exiled Danish actors who proposed to play some old vaudevilles of 1830. These people were even forbidden to land.

And now the young Schleswigians have to fight and bleed in the Prussian ranks, for a country that treats them like idle weeds!

Very strong reasons these, that keep the feeling of Denmark from becoming pro-German. Nevertheless the admiration for German capability is exceedingly great. And, on the other hand, intellectual Danes cannot be called proAllies either, because the Allies must, somehow, be considered a unity, though the inner differences be ever so marked; and it is absolutely impossible for any one who knows more than the newspapers contain, absolutely impossible for any one who has lived, learned, traveled, and who knows European circumstances, to sympathize at the same time with England and France and with Russia. The very reasons that he feels sympathy for England and France make it impossible for him to sympathize with Russia, and vice versa. It is quite natural that the many conservative and reactionary elements that hate freedom and dream about autocracy— not enlightened but obscurant autocracy — should hope for Russian victory. It is also just as natural that those who admire constitutional freedom, a humane government, and education should feel sympathy for England and France.

But only a fanatic whose nationalism makes him blind can at the same time sympathize both with the East and with the West, as he will find in the East, to a much higher degree, everything he hates in Germany, whereas in Germany many of the things are to be found which he admires in the western countries.

There exists now certainly a conspiracy between ignorance and untruthfulness, aiming at the whitewashing of the Russian government. For its most horrible acts excuses are invented, and the outrages of the German government are accentuated as something unheard of, something that the so-called civilized nations never committed.

But all this talk deceives no one who is not as ignorant as a new-born baby — whereby I do not mean to deny that such ignorance is in all countries characteristic of the majority. The common sense of the masses and their sharp eye for right and wrong have never been anything but a democratic legend. The masses believe, as a rule, any lie that is given to them in an agreeable form. Thus, for instance, the newspapers, not only in Russia, but in the other Allied countries, dare unblushingly to maintain that the Russian defeats in Galicia, in Hungary, in Poland, are only strategic manœuvres and a retreat of the same kind as in 1812-13. The public does not yet understand that between those two phenomena there is not an atom of resemblance.

The European newspapers have one excuse: it is absolutely impossible in Europe now to tell the truth about the political situation, even when it is known, — which is by no means always the case. None of the belligerent countries can allow the truth to be told. A half-awake censor is on the lookout, and every time Truth tries to emerge from the slough, he quickly ducks her down again. She is drowned, as you drown a kitten. It is the censor’s business to prevent the publication of everything that could throw a favorable light on the enemy, and of everything that could give the enemy useful information. Besides, the censor has to see that every accusation against the government or against the army, be it ever so true, is suppressed, and their acts presented in a rose-colored light.

Even in the small neutral countries there were recently enacted laws that see to it that nothing may be said publicly that may imperil their neutrality by hurting the feelings of any of the belligerent powers. Only in the United States of America, which stand outside the scuffle and whose position as a great power prevents every danger of attack, — only there is it possible for a writer from a neutral country to voice what he believes to be the truth.

I have lived through the war of 187071. I stayed then in France and in Italy, and read the French papers every day. They were, of course, far from truthful, because the truth was too sad to be told. The newspapers considered it their duty to cheer up the people during the adversities, and to inspire them with courage. By and by, however, they had to admit some defeats and fears. A conspicuous feature, any way, in all the articles, was the neverfailing refrain: It is a comfort that this war will be the last.

Since then a dozen bloody wars have taken place, and, last of all, the present war, the greatest of all, which has now lasted over a year. And again we hear the same refrain in article after article, in country after country: There is the comfort that this war will be the last! That is to say, counting from the beginning of next year, mankind will altogether change its nature. The immeasurable human stupidity will turn into calm reason. Man’s terrible savagery will become a tame, a peaceful mutual goodwill!

The Germans deny that they have committed atrocities in Belgium; the Russians deny having committed atrocities in East Prussia; the Austrians deny having committed atrocities in Serbia.

Even if many of the horrors are pure inventions, or much exaggerated, — and that is proved to be the case, — there remain quite enough for all concerned. As for myself, I believe in the bestial cruelty of each party. I know that the Germans are civilized, the Russians good-natured, the Austrians elegant, — the war brutalizes all. When you once make murder and devastation of the so-called enemy’s villages and fields a laudable, nay, even a sacred deed, you have given free course to bestiality. Under the polish of civilization a savage appears who in all main features displays the characteristics of the Stone Age.

The other day a pessimist in my presence called mankind a horrible lot. He was not right. Mankind consists of many different lots, fighting against each other, each man trying to the best of his ability to defend himself. Then the strongest will achieve dominance by force. As this motive never can be admitted, all the countries are fighting for high ideals. Every one of the belligerent nations is fighting for justice, for truth, for order and freedom. Even a despotic country like Russia fights for freedom, nay, even for the freedom of Poland, which Russia has tried to uproot during the last half century by the most ingenious torture.

As I said, every country appeals to the highest ideals which they all are serving. And each one, without exception, is fighting for her right. It is not, however, absolutely necessary to vindicate justice. ‘ Right or wrong, my country!’ Each nation is fighting for the fatherland, and that justifies everything. In this naturalistic age of ours we have succeeded in proclaiming patriotism and nationalism the highest virtues, compared with which the cosmopolitanism of olden times can only be regarded with deepest contempt.

In the intervals between the wars people imagine that the world has gone to rest and that wars from now on are impossible. Because optimism is considered necessary in order to make life endurable, we think it is the chief virtue which gives us courage and strength. People do not like to look truth in the face. If war breaks out in spite of all our earlier denials of its possibility or its probability, optimism comforts the fighting parties by assurances that this war will bring in the rule of righteousness on earth and thus be the last of wars.