America Must Decide: A Study in International Detachment

I

ON all sides, and in all sincerity, the cry is being raised by many Americans and others that the United States should ‘do something’ to help Europe. But to the question, ‘Do what?’ innumerable and contradictory answers are given, some quite uninformed and merely emotionally sympathetic, while not a few indicate a natural partisanship, in no wise improper when it is frank.

It would seem, however, that, if we are to act with any hope of using our capabilities effectively, we should endeavor to make a calm and rational estimate of some of the major overseas problems now confronting the United States, looking both East and West in a balanced way, and facing facts rather than cherishing fancies. Then we may be able to see more clearly how to act in order to maintain and develop effective ways and means for the realization of our national ideals, whether at home, in Europe, or elsewhere.

Some believe that the main purpose of the present policy of the United States toward world-affairs is to abstain as much as possible from participating in them. They characterize it as a policy of ‘isolation.’ Others believe that our present policy aims at the utmost participation in world affairs now compatible with our national characteristics — a naturally evolved policy, supported by character, rather than a less natural one superimposed by intellect. So an outline of some of the less generally recognized considerations which, several years ago, led to the formulation of our present general policy may be a helpful introduction to an attempt to estimate what action we should take toward some of our major overseas problems.

It was recognized that the very gradual evolution of the parliamentary system from the moot-hill of early England seemed to have bred a canny aversion to specific commitments, and to have resulted in that habit of mind, so deep-rooted that now it seems like a racial instinct, which finds expression in the unwritten constitution of England and in her traditional avoidance of definite alliances with their unforseeable complications.

A notable instance of this fundamental policy was that, when the principal powers of Continental Europe set up the Holy Alliance, avowedly to maintain the order of things established at the end of the Napoleonic wars, England abstained from joining the Alliance, and contented herself with sending ‘observers’ to its conferences, who gave much advice and exercised considerable influence. And when the Holy Alliance proposed to support Spain in the reconquest of her seceded Latin-American possessions, England was entirely free forthwith to make to the United States the proposals that led to the Monroe Doctrine, which ended the designs of the Holy Alliance upon Latin America.

The immediate result of England’s following this general policy of detachment was that she held the balance of power vis-à-vis the Continent until 1914. But in order properly to exert her influence, first in one way and then in another, or in different ways in simultaneous situations, — yet ever with a minimum of definite commitment, lest the subsequent conduct of others call for a change of position, — it was necessary for England to participate far more actively in the guidance of world-affairs than did any other single power. It would seem, therefore, to be quite mistaken to characterize England’s policy as one of ’isolation’ — if by that term is meant non-participation in world-affairs.

Meanwhile, the United States was having a very illuminating experience in the futility of a foreign policy that lacks public support. From 1844 on, the United States had consistently tried to develop in the Far East the policy of equal commercial opportunity for all peoples, without sequestration of territory or political impairment; and in 1899 she secured the official subscription of the principal powers to this Open-Door doctrine.

The consonance of this doctrine with the traditional feelings of the American people aroused the most enthusiastic approval of it in the United States. But at that time Asia took less than one and a half per cent of the exports of the United States; so, whether the commercial doors of the Far East were open or closed was not recognized by the mass of Americans as being of material concern. And when, beginning about 1905, it became increasingly manifest that Japan’s policy, rather than really supporting the doctrine of equal opportunity for all, aimed at obtaining virtually exclusive opportunity for the Japanese in an ever-increasing sphere, — as by their annexation of Korea, — then it became even more manifest that the American people had no intention of supporting effective steps actually to maintain the Open-Door doctrine. In fact, it is difficult to avoid taking this failure of the American people — or of their politicians — to manifest any definite intention of enforcing the Open-Door doctrine as another demonstration of that ancient and world-wide tendency not to give immediately costly and persistent support, even to the most righteous and altruistic doctrines, unless commensurate and compensating material interests promise to make such action worth while.

It was with this demonstration of the inadequacy and unreliability of merely emotional interest in the not remote background that the strongest of emotional appeals were made during 1919 and 1920 to the altruism of the American people to join the League of Nations.

It was realized, however, in other American quarters, and as early as January 1919, that the great tide of world-events had swept the United States into a position vis-à-vis the whole world that was potentially quite similar to that which England had occupied vis-à-vis the Continent of Europe at the close of the Napoleonic wars; a position in which England had declined to become merely one of the members of the concert of Europe, and had chosen to remain uncommitted, in order better to exercise the balance of power — the determining voice which resulted in the century of comparative peace that was characterized by the unprecedented development and expansion of the power and ideals of our civilization.

The position of the United States in North America may be likened to that of a lesser continent off the Continent of Europe and also off the Continent of Asia — which two, with Africa, form the great world-continent; for the United States is facing problems both across the Atlantic and across the Pacific — problems which, as we shall see, are portentous in both directions. The American position is analogous to that of England a hundred years ago off the Continent of Europe; but the American position is bilateral, — East and West, — whereas that of England was almost entirely unilateral — toward the powers of Continental Europe; and the worldfactors of to-day vastly transcend in magnitude and complexity those of a hundred years ago.

The call is that we ‘do something.’ What? Which way shall we turn? In which direction may the power of the United States be needed most for the welfare of our civilization?

In order to attempt even an appreciation of such a situation, we must examine our transatlantic outlook and our transpacific outlook — and then try to balance them with discrimination.

II

The major frontiers in Europe before the war may be said to have run from the North Sea to the Adriatic and from the Baltic to the Black Sea, the central region containing a group of strong buffer states between eastern and western Europe, and the whole constituting the elements of that complex balance of power which was held in more or less stable equilibrium. The rise and eruption of the German Empire upset this; and the ensuing peace — or truce — broke up one of the major powers of the central buffer region, Austria-Hungary, into many lesser units of doubtful stability, and aimed to render Germany impotent to attack France, and consequently, defenseless against Russia, except for such strength as unstable Poland may develop with the aid of France.

To-day many believe Bolshevist Russia to be impotent because of political and industrial disorganization, somewhat as Revolutionary France was believed to be at the dawn of the Napoleonic era. But the continuance of such a condition is not to be expected, especially if it is recalled that the Krupps now are managing Russia’s munition works — and that the age-old method of reorganizing a people and of riveting one’s hold on them is to lead them in a successful foreign war. Nor should it be forgotten that Russia diplomatically is prepared for such an enterprise in Europe, by alliance with Germany on her right wing and Turkey on her left; that in the centre of her European line she is opposed only by Rumania and some of the disintegrated elements of Austria-Hungary; that, furthermore, alliances exist between Turkey and Afghanistan, between Afghanistan and Russia, and that it may be impossible for Persia to be kept out of this entente.

On the edge of this Continental complex has been insular England, whose primary interest, from the days of Henry VIII, was to balance power against power, so that none could attack her in her weakness. Then, as her overseas expansion began, it continued to be to her interest to maintain this Continental balance, so that there should be a minimum of competition against her for power at sea and overseas on the part of the Continental powers. And finally, after the sea power and industrialism of England had brought her into the position of being the great entrepôt, finishing factory, and merchandiser of the world, it continued to be to her interest to maintain the balance for peace on the Continent as her greatest market; and furthermore, she became vitally interested in preventing any Continental power from coming into control of all such basic materials and facilities on the Continent as would enable such a power to set up such an industrial establishment as might tend to drive England’s products off the Continent.

This Germany threatened to do when to the coal measures of the Ruhr she added, in 1871, the iron ores of AlsaceLorraine; and her consequent industrial menace to England she further increased by her subsequent development of overseas commercial colonies, overseas trade and transport, and naval power. But the late war ended that phase of Germany’s career; and since then we have seen the amazing period in English policy wherein the Celtic opportunist, Lloyd George, handled home and Continental matters; while, after 1919, the Orientalist, Lord Curzon, tried to conduct England’s more extensive foreign relations in accordance with pundit practices.

England’s need for increased markets wherewith to end her post-war industrial depression and unemployment produced a popular demand for the reconstruction of Germany’s economic power, so that again Germany could buy English goods. But this policy of politico-economic opportunism overlooked the further prospect that a Germany economically rebuilt might be expected, ipso facto, again to be a great economic rival to England. Furthermore, the English argument, that only a reconstructed Germany could be expected to pay reparations, seemed to make disappointingly little impression in France, where the conclusion prevailed that an economically reconstructed Germany would be also a rebuilt German military menace to France. So the English moves to rehabilitate Germany started schism between France and England, and gave color to the claim that it was all the more necessary for France to maintain a great army, and to be able to mobilize her African Colonials at the Rhine frontier — avowedly only for defense.

While these views and policies seem to be generally appreciated, it does not appear to be as widely realized that, even before the Peace Conference adjourned, France set out to develop her political prestige and control in an amazingly extensive way — from Poland through the Ukraine (whence she was ejected), through the so-called Little Entente, into Asia Minor, down into Central Africa, and westward to Morocco. And in these adventures in what it is difficult not to call politicomilitary imperialism, England does not appear to have lagged one step behind France, paying more attention, however. to economic opportunities,— particularly of an oily nature, — and concentrating her efforts on obtaining control over that strategic focus, the Near East.

It was as if two business concerns, heavily indebted, and having barely escaped bankruptcy because of assaults by a rival, should rush forthwith, upon the latter’s failure, into extensive new adventures of a speculative nature in competition with each other, to recoup their losses, instead of first setting their home affairs in order and balancing their budgets. But it should be remembered that large parts of Europe and Africa and most of Asia Minor were in political flux, with preponderant power to whoso might secure the greater measure of control over them.

The anxiety of France over England’s policy as to the reconstruction of the German market to a certainty has been increased immeasurably by the realization that a reconstituted Germany would furnish England with an effective counterpoise to French preponderance on the Continent and to French adventures across the Mediterranean. And, until recently, the utter insincerity of Germany toward every phase of the reparations question undoubtedly added greatly to the precariousness of the French position; this because the receipt of reparations in volume was necessary to France, not only to meet the costs of French reconstruction and pensions, but also to meet the costs of French extraterritorial adventures not very dissimilar from those of England in the Near East.

Paradoxical as it seems, Germany’s dishonest evasions of reparations payments appear to have furnished France with the solution of her situation — if her daring adventure with Belgium into the Ruhr and other industrial sections of Germany can be kept isolated from external interference, and entirely as a matter between France and Belgium on the one hand and Germany on the other.

While the reason given by France for seizing these all-important industrial regions is that she may hold them as collateral and work them to her profit until Germany pays her reparations, — a matter of decades, — it is feared in informed English circles that the French purpose is to evolve a permanent industrial combination between the ores of Alsace-Lorraine and the coking coals and metallic and chemical industries of the Ruhr and Rhineland, under French fiscal control, aided, in all probability, by German executive operation. And it is pointed out that whether this colossal plan would lead to separating these regions politically from the German Reich, and setting them up as a federation under the shadow of France, is a secondary matter.

The main point is that, if France can acquire and hold the fiscal control of this principal source of German wealth, she will divert its flow to herself. Then, it is believed, the rest of Germany will be reduced to an agrarian state of relatively little industrial power or military menace to France; this reduced Germany will be of relatively little value to England as a counterpoise to France in the political balance; France will have under her own control sufficient volumes of substantially all the supplies and facilities necessary to displace most English products from the Continental market and, perhaps, to enter into overseas competition with England for the wider markets of the world, as Germany did from the same source; consequent economic depressions in England and Germany will reduce their populations, while economic prosperity in France will result in her population overtopping theirs; and the French Government, having made it impossible for reduced Germany to pay reparations, can take countervailing excises from France’s multiplied business.

In short, and except for untoward complications, the prospect suggested is that the France of, say, twenty years hence may be as was the Germany of ten years ago in the industrial world, and in the politics of Western and Central Europe, debarring England from political power and economic profit there.

Be all of this as it may, it is apparent that there is more to England’s problem than industrial revival to give work to a million and a half unemployed; there is more to the French situation than the collection of reparations from a dishonest and delinquent debtor; and the American fancy to rehabilitate Europe economically, in order to reëstablish her capacity to buy American goods and to pay American claims, would involve much more than counsel and the most open-handed financing. England’s recent effort at the economic rehabilitation of Germany for similar ends, and all its consequences, raise a grave question as to whether the United States could succeed toward Europe as a whole (with Russia in the background) where England has failed toward Germany merely, and failed because of Continental rivalry and in spite of England’s centuries of intimate experience in balancing just such Continental matters. But for the immediate cause of England’s present failure toward the Continent we must look to her over-extension in the Near East.

III

Though France, Italy and Greece were to have shared in the dismemberment of the Turkish Empire proposed by the Treaty of Sèvres, and though the United States had been urged to participate in this dismemberment, and thereby to commit herself to supporting it, by accepting a humanitarian mandate over Armenia and even over Constantinople, nevertheless, by far the major part of the undertaking, from Baku to Suez and from Constantinople to Aden, was to be British. Consequently, when the Turkish Nationalists of Angora displaced the ancient Osmanlian rule of Constantinople, refused to ratify the Sèvres treaty, and announced their purpose to reconstitute the late Turkish realm as a sovereign power in every respect, — except for Syria, Mesopotamia, Arabia, Palestine, and Egypt, — they entered upon a career that was certain to bring them ultimately face to face with Britain.

That France, after fighting the Turks, virtually joined hands with them in 1921, and that the Turks overwhelmed the Greeks in September, 1922, left the issue actually as between London and Angora — with Paris as the equivocal factor. So when, after the burning of Smyrna, the Turks turned to recapture Constantinople and the British forces alone stood firm, it must have been supremely cheering to the Turks to have Lloyd George’s ultimatum to them greeted in England by an outcry which stated in no uncertain terms that the English public would not support any policy that might lead to a war. And in view of this, the fact that the truce of Mudania was made in October, preparatory to the tenweeks’ conference at Lausanne, indicates appreciation by the Turks that the trend of events between England, France, and Germany promised more to them, if skillfully used, than could be expected from immediate combat.

The outstanding hazard to the British Empire from an Anglo-Turkish clash is that the Turkish Caliphate is the spiritual head of the two hundred and thirty million Mohammedans, over one third of whom are British subjects; and as prestige, supported by the potentiality of force, is of prime importance in governing Mohammedans, it is of the utmost importance to British rule not to lose face before the Mohammedan world, and to keep clear the sea-ways for the transportation of British forces. On the other hand, most of France’s Colonials are Mohammedans, and friendliness to the Turks on her part would strengthen her in almost all her colonies.

Another complication is that the Mediterranean is like a grade-crossing; for the assured naval command of the line of communication from England by Gibraltar to Suez is vital to the stability of all British interests east of Suez; but the French claim that certainty of naval command over the line from Algiers to Marseilles is vital to the safety of France, because over it she must be able to mobilize the manpower of French Africa on her Rhine frontier — which suggests why the French positively refused, at the Washington Conference, to agree to the limitation of their submarines, useful both as guards to the French line from Algiers to Marseilles, and as a menace to the main artery of the British Empire. But in order adequately to appreciate the bearing of this balance in world-politics, we should have to consider Mediterranean strategy and policy at least since Louis XIV was advised to capture Egypt and thence attack the Far-Eastern trade of the Dutch, in order to reduce the Netherlands.

While Continental, Mediterranean, and Turko-Mohammedan policies tended to break up the Anglo-French front vis-à-vis the Turks at Lausanne, parallel interests solidified the RussoTurkish front there. For Bolshevist Russia has shown her adherence to the Tsarist purpose to secure the right to issue through the Dardanelles, — as her fleet did in 1798, — and to obtain an outlet on the Persian Gulf. It is to her interest, therefore, to aid in securing for Turkey absolute military command and closure of the Dardanelles against entrance into the Black Sea by any of the naval powers of the world; while Russia, expecting to be the dominant partner in the Russo-Turkish alliance, might look to obtaining from Turkey the use of the desired exit to the Mediterranean for a future fleet if need be — a situation and move of great strategic importance in the event of Russia’s pushing toward the Persian Gulf or India.

As the safety of India is the pivot of Lord Curzon’s policy, such considerations may have led him to the conviction that the consolidation of British control over Asia Minor against the day of Russia’s return to strength was of paramount importance. But in embarking England on this enterprise, he not only diverted her attention and resources from the critical Franco-German balance, but he gave to France the chance she used to aid the Turks to defeat the English in Asia Minor, while the supreme importance of that situation to the English prevented them from acting arbitrarily against the French adventure into the Ruhr. And furthermore, when Lord Curzon committed England to an anti-Turkish policy, he undertook a task which, if not carried through to success with a minimum of irritation to Moslem susceptibilities, would seriously impair, not only British prestige but the prestige of the entire white civilization in the eyes of the whole colored world.

The Lausanne Conference broke down early in February, when Lord Curzon tendered the Turks a treaty of peace which yielded to them substantially every territorial claim, but which did not acquiesce to the Turkish views on such important matters as the capitulations—matters wherein the United States is vitally interested and wherein the American representatives at Lausanne had supported the English against the Turks. Even without the Angora Government’s subsequent refusal to ratify this treaty, and insistence on virtually complete acquiescence in the Turkish stipulations, the mere tendering of it connoted the overthrow of England’s Near-Eastern policy; and it connoted an unprecedented loss of prestige before the whole Asiatic world — a loss of prestige which attaches in a lesser measure also to the United States, because American support of English policy at Lausanne was unavailing.

If England decides to accept at the hands of the Turks such an unprecedented humiliation, she will lose the strategic position in Asia Minor which is so important to her against the day when Russia is ready to move southward, and, in all probability, a series, or group, of uprisings will take place in British Mohammedan possessions, which will either succeed, or require more force for their suppression than would have been necessary to overcome the really slender forces, and meagre facilities at the command of the Turks last autumn, when the English public refused to fight — and when the American Government did not respond to American demands that we insist on all our rights in Turkey, by force if need be.

If England withdraws from Turkey alone, and without fighting, the United States will not be in a position to retain anything more than a semblance of our present rights there. But it should be realized that substantially all the mandates and other arrangements for the dismemberment of Turkey under the Treaty of Sevres have been approved by the League of Nations. Consequently, in defying the Treaty of Sevres, and in attempting to reconstitute the Turkish realm in Europe and northern Asia Minor, the Turkish Nationalists are defying the mandates of the League of Nations. The prospect of the United States losing much, if not all, of her traditional rights in reconstituted Turkey therefore brings the interests of the United States in this region into substantial parallelism to those of England there under the League of Nations.

The obvious answer to the Turkish use of force in defiance of the mandates of the League would be to confront the Turks with the prospect of being overwhelmed by superior force if they do not forthwith submit to these mandates. But seemingly a controlling element of the British public has said that it will not fight alone; and forces from the other larger European members of the League of Nations apparently are elsewhere engaged, or not to be counted on. Therefore, without the United States being committed in the League, the parallelism of her interests in Turkey to those of England there seems to confront the United States with the question whether she is prepared to stand beside England in force, to defend her own humanitarian undertakings and to support her own economic interests in Turkey, — and incidentally those of England, — and to enforce the mandates of the League of Nations as to Turkey.

Of naval forces and transport facilities England has a superabundance wherewith to handle the Turkish situation alone. But an expeditionary force of from one to two hundred thousand more men seems to be the sine qua non essential to bringing the Turks to terms; and beyond a reasonable doubt, the mere mobilization of such an expeditionary force in England and America would do this without actual conflict.

IV

At this point it seems appropriate to submit some of the major conclusions from an estimate of the situation which was made immediately after the Turkish victories of last September — an estimate the conclusions of which do not seem to have been vitiated by developments since then.

The assumption was that England decides to fight the Turks. Apart from the bellicose Balkans, what alignment of the principal powers would then be likely? And by what line of action can the United States best serve her own interests and those of civilization?

So far as the principal European powers are concerned, —

France would not support England to any material extent, but would confine her attention substantially to improving her own position vis-à-vis Germany, to consolidating her hegemony of western and central Continental Europe, and to improving her situation in Africa, all of which would be quite likely to lead her to policies the reverse of helpful — except under one contingency.

Italy’s ultimate interests probably would be best served by aiding England, within such limitations as might be imposed by Continental considerations — with the result that any aid she might give would not be considerable.

Russia, beyond a reasonable doubt, would come to the aid of Turkey; but she might hold off until the first phase of the Anglo-Turkish contest had been worked out; for, while it is to Russia’s interest to have Turkey victorious, it is also to her interest to have Turkey as weak as possible after the victory. Russia might act also against Poland, with the object of making contact with Germany, with whom she is in alliance; and this is the contingency that might cement anew the Entente between England and France.

There seems to be no doubt that Britain could concentrate promptly on Turkey sufficient forces to do very serious damage to the Turks. During this phase, the latter hardly could be expected to make any serious offensive move. On the contrary, their principal object at first would be to avoid being seriously cut up by the aerial bombing expeditions of the British, who, undoubtedly, could bring the Turks to terms if the British forces could be kept concentrated on that objective. But, for that very reason, the Turks may be expected to do everything within the power of Mohammedanism to create diversions, from Cairo to India, which will necessitate a dispersion of the British forces concentrated against the Turks. The British problem then will be to maintain a concentration of force in the critical area—Asia Minor — sufficient to effect a crushing defeat of the Turks there within the shortest possible time, and before really serious trouble can be developed in the dispersed areas.

In short, if the English were to decide to fight the Turks practically single-handed rather than submit to the humiliation now confronting them, in all probability it would result in a European war. But if the Turks were to be confronted, beyond a reasonable doubt, with the prospect of being crushed promptly by overwhelming forces, they probably would yield, there would be no war, and white prestige would be enhanced in Asiatic esteem.

Surprising as it may seem, further consideration of this situation leads to the conclusion that it would present the United States with a much more serious problem even than has been suggested. For evidently such an Anglo-Turkish clash, and its immediate consequences, would immobilize in Europe and in the Near and Middle East substantially all the army and navy forces of the European powers&emash somewhat as they were immobilized upon the outbreak of war with Germany in 1914.

It will be recalled that then Japan set out to advantage herself as much as possible in the Far East, under the guise of helping the Entente Allies. Her first actions were to seize for herself all the defenseless German islands in the North Pacific, to capture the German base at Tsingtao, and to occupy the Chinese province of Shantung behind it. But within six months after the outbreak of war, Japan presented her notorious Twenty-one Demands to neutral and defenseless China — demands which were in flagrant violation of the Open-Door doctrine to which Japan herself had subscribed; demands which would have turned China virtually into a Japanese dependency, had all of them been carried out. And in spite of the ‘new spirit’ which some allege to be animating Japan since the Washington Conference, it was only last March that Japan curtly refused China’s request that the treaty whereby she acceded under compulsion to most of the Japanese demands be abrogated by mutual agreement.

In 1914 and 1915 no power, including the United States, was in such a naval position as to put any material obstacle in the course upon which Japan then embarked. But it is noteworthy that in 1916 the United States undertook the building of a great fleet of capital ships, useless against German submarines, but of the utmost use to call a halt to Japan’s career of conquest in the Far East — a fleet the completion of which was halted by the Washington Conference.¹

Of late there has been some evidence that Japan has changed her policies and practices to conform more nearly to present conditions; but convincing proof that she has abandoned her main purpose of obtaining the exclusive hegemony of the Far East has not yet appeared.

In view of this, and of the probable immobilization of substantially all European forces around the NearEastern theatre in the event of an Anglo-Turkish clash, it was estimated last September that, in all likelihood, Japan would seize such an opportunity to repeat the procedure she had followed in 1914 and 1915, in modified form but on a scale more commensurate to her present increased facilities; and that in doing this she probably would go through the form of helping her ally, England, against Russia in Siberia, but with the ultimate purpose of extending her own exclusive control over China and other parts of the Far East — unless she were to be dissuaded from such a course by being confronted by at least the potentiality of sufficiently forceful opposition.

Evidently, with the forces of Europe immobilized around the Near-Eastern theatre, the United States navy would be the only force approximating competency to express such dissuasive arguments with any hope of success. And if the United States navy were not free to do this, because committed to transatlantic operations, then the efforts of eighty years of American diplomacy to secure equal opportunity for all in the Far East would be destroyed, all the Far East would be at the mercy of imperialism, and an exceedingly great ultimate menace would be free to develop there — matters of much greater and more direct concern to the United States than to Europe.

As geography has ordained that the United States is in the front rank of our civilization on the Pacific, and is its only great power vis-a-vis the rising power of the Far East, the particular duty of the United States to herself and to her civilization would seem to be there. But if, without impairing her power to act there, she can help also in other regions, to do so is a secondary duty.

In any event, it should be for the United States to make a circumferential and balanced estimate of the several situations surrounding her and, on that basis, to make such discriminating distributions and concentrations of her powers as would seem proper from the American point of view.

Such considerations lead to the conclusion that, in the event of an AngloTurkish clash, it might be well to send an expeditionary force to the Near East, provided that it could be furnished and transported without in any way using the United States navy or the transports the navy might need. But, on the other hand, the United States navy should be held entirely free from commitments and operations on the Atlantic, and fully ready to act with all its power on the Pacific.

V

Several developments quite beyond the control of the United States are likely to precede our necessity for a definite decision as to action or inaction in the overseas situations we have been considering.

The bright outlook is that Germany will turn honest, and pay such reparations as she can to the maximum of her capacity; that France then will settle down and apply her wonderful abilities to her own internal rehabilitation, made necessary by the ghastly ordeal through which she has passed.

Perhaps Bolshevist Russia will come out of her present condition by some path quite different from that along which Napoleon led Revolutionary France.

It may be that the Turkish Nationalists will have a complete change of heart and, instead of carrying out the natural design now within their reach, to reconstitute much of the former Turkish Empire on a new level, will confine themselves to the more strictly Turkish parts of Asia Minor, thereby saving British prestige and ours.

Possibly Japan will grasp the occasion now before her to convince the world that, though predatory in the past, she enters voluntarily upon a more righteous course, agreeing to China’s petition for the abrogation of the compulsory treaty relative to the Twenty-one Demands, withdrawing from northern Sakhalin, freeing Korea, and joining without reservations in disseminating the doctrine of equal opportunity for all throughout the Far East.

But if the problems we have been considering do not evolve such happy solutions, then, sooner or later, we shall have to face the decision as to whether we will act or not. It may be that we are so imbued with certain convictions — which we mistake for ideals — that we shall not act. But if we are true to our deepest inheritances, then, while avoiding indeterminable entanglements, we shall prove that we are the reverse of ‘isolationists.’

To suggest discriminating courses of action in such an event has been the purpose of this consideration of our more apparent overseas problems. They may necessitate the use of our forces, potentially or actually. Force may be used aggressively for ruthless and selfish subjugation — which is wholly reprehensible. Or force may be used defensively, and only for self-defense — which is wholly self-interested, if not selfish. Or force may be used aggressively to help others and to curb powerful unrighteousness.