THE NEMESIS OF 
 ARMAMENTS 
 
 By 
 
 CHARLES EDWARD JEFFERSON, D. D. 
 
 Reprint from The Independent 
 New York, August 17, 1914 
 
 CHURCH PEACE UNION 
 70 FIFTH AVENUE 
 NEW YORK 
 
NEMESIS OF ARMAMENTS 
 
Digitized by the Internet Archive 
 in 2014 
 
 https://archive.org/details/nemesisofarmamenOOjeff 
 
The Nemesis of Armaments 
 
 By CHARLES EDWARD JEFFERSON, D.D. 
 
 Reprint from 
 The Independent, New York, August 17. 1914 
 
 From the awful spectacle of Europe plunged into war 
 two clashing conclusions are certain to be drawn. 
 
 The first and most obvious conclusion is that the 
 Pacifists are in a hole. They have been mistaken all 
 along, and now their delusion is exposed. They have long 
 been suspected of being visionaries and dreamers, but now 
 the last doubt of it has vanished. 
 
 In the glare of the huge conflagration the peacemakers 
 cut a sorry figure. A metropolitan newspaper editor 
 scoffs at them as an "absurd group" on whom little 
 sympathy need be wasted. He notes that they are not 
 saying anything just at present and intimates that they 
 should forever hold their peace. Such men — to quote one 
 of our most distinguished fellow-citizens — are not only 
 useless but mischievous. 
 
 The militarists, on the other hand, have been right 
 from the beginning. All that they have said is true. 
 Man is a fighting animal. Human nature cannot be 
 changed. Nations have always fought, and therefore 
 they always will fight. War soon or late is inevitable. 
 The only sensible thing is to get ready for it. 
 
 The present predicament of the peace-workers is put 
 graphically by a journal whose name the reader is left 
 to guess. "It is in no gloating spirit that we call the 
 
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attention of the Andrew Carnegies, the David Starr 
 Jordans and other misguided peace enthusiasts to the 
 vindication of the position of this journal which is fur- 
 nished by this war array on the Danube. What has 
 become of that army of bogies with which Mr. Carnegie, 
 Dr. Jordan and others had peopled the imaginations of 
 the unthinking? The roar of the guns in southeastern 
 Europe has awakened those peace gentlemen from their 
 foolish dream, and their phantom host of spooks has 
 vanished into air." 
 
 This is so good that it is sure to be quoted all over the 
 country, and many trustful persons will repeat it, sup- 
 posing that it is an accurate statement of facts. Let us 
 look into it a little, and find out, if we can, more about 
 the character and fate of these spooks. 
 
 It should never be forgotten that there are two kinds 
 of dreamers, and that there are two different species of 
 spooks. 
 
 It is in no gloating spirit that we call the attention of 
 the editor of the aforementioned journal, and other mis- 
 guided armament enthusiasts, to the vindication of the 
 position of the peace-workers which is furnished by this 
 European war array. 
 
 What has become of that army of bogies with which 
 the editors of Sunday papers have peopled the imagina- 
 tions of the unthinking? 
 
 It would be saying too much to assert that the roar 
 of the European guns has awakened these armament- 
 loving gentlemen from their foolish dreams, for some 
 men will probably never be awakened from their foolish- 
 ness till the final blast of the Judgment Day, but we ven- 
 ture to call the attention of all men who are awake to the 
 dramatic vanishing of the phantom host of spooks with 
 
 6 
 
which the militarists have peopled the imagination of the 
 world. 
 
 It will be profitable for us to consider these spooks one 
 by one. 
 
 Spook Number One 
 
 "Armaments are the only sure guarantee of peace." 
 We have heard it a thousand times from men who seemed 
 to know. It has been published in a thousand volumes 
 and in ten thousand papers, and so men came to accept 
 it as the truth. When now and then war seemed to 
 threaten, we were assured that all would be well if the 
 armament could be somewhat increased. 
 
 Thru thirty years the work of increasing armaments 
 has gone merrily on. It was in this way that sensible 
 men worked for peace. The experts in these high matters 
 were confident that a nation by making itself formidable 
 insured itself against attack. Safety, they said, depends 
 on thickness of armor, and the only way to conserve the 
 peace is to so load nations down with weapons that no 
 one of them will dare to fight. 
 
 This doctrine was especially convincing to Russia and 
 Germany, and so they have gone on adding new battalions 
 until the dimensions of their armies have astonished the 
 world. In these two empires the militarist ideal had been 
 well-nigh reached. The armament on both sides was so 
 enormous that peace was guaranteed ! 
 
 Armament is, of course, expensive, and statesmen have 
 long been at their wits' end to finance these vast military 
 preparations. Parliaments have at times grown obstrep- 
 erous, but they have always succumbed to the plea that 
 the increased budgets were necessary to safeguard the 
 interests of peace. 
 
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The people have been growing increasingly restless, but 
 their murmuring* have been quieted by assurances that 
 all this increased taxation would secure for them the 
 blessings of peace. 
 
 Not an appropriation for the increase of army or navy 
 has been past within the last twenty years in any parlia- 
 ment in the world, which has not been secured by men 
 who were pleading for peace. That armaments guar- 
 antee peace was a dogma which it was blasphemy to 
 dispute. 
 
 When holes were punched in the doctrine by the Russo- 
 Japanese war, and by the Spanish- American war, and by 
 the Balkan war, the holes were covered over by the broad 
 facts that Germany had not used her army for a genera- 
 tion, and that England's fleet had never fired a gun. 
 The peace of Europe — so all the wise men said — was due 
 to armaments. 
 
 It was a lie, and the lie is now being shot to pieces 
 before our eyes. 
 
 It speaks well for the peaceful temper of the peoples 
 of Europe that they stood the strain so long. Armaments 
 are provocative of war. You may increase them for a 
 season, but at last you receive the retribution which you 
 invited. 
 
 The least surprised men in the world today are the 
 men who for many years have been protesting against 
 armaments. They may be dreamers, but the silly dream 
 that armaments are guarantees of peace never entered 
 their mind. 
 
 For a generation they have been crying out against the 
 waste and wickedness of the policy of "Armed Peace." 
 They have said in season and out of season: "This can- 
 not go on. This must not go on. It is a crime against 
 
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humanity. It will drag the world back into barbarism. 
 It will end in a tragedy which will darken the heart of 
 mankind." 
 
 The peace-workers are not so guileless, and ignorant, 
 and impractical as they are painted. They know history, 
 and they understand human nature, and they are 
 acquainted with the laws of the world they are living in. 
 Their grip on the facts and laws of life is not the grip 
 of men who are asleep. They are familiar with every 
 move that has been made in the last thirty years. The 
 man who imagines that they are soft and green is dream- 
 ing. He is in the grip of a spook. What the peace- 
 workers have said from the beginning is now being 
 confirmed. 
 
 In the fierce light of the European conflagration even 
 blind men ought to be able to see that armaments are not 
 guarantees of peace. 
 
 Spook Number Two 
 
 "Armaments are a form of national insurance." The 
 doctrine has been promulgated thruout the world. The 
 insurance comes high, but we must have it. A man in- 
 sures his house; a nation must insure itself. Compare 
 the annual cost of an army and navy with the aggregate 
 wealth of a country, and any one can see that military 
 and naval expenses are a mere bagatelle. 
 
 This has been taught by men who had the air of Sir 
 Oracle. When they opened their lips, not a dog dared 
 to bark. 
 
 Six nations of Europe went into this scheme of insur- 
 ance. Within the last thirty years they have paid in 
 
premiums six billion five hundred and ninety-two millions 
 of dollars, and now they find they are not insured at all. 
 
 Some fool in southeastern Europe threw a lighted 
 match, and instantly all Europe was in flames. Why? 
 The whole house had been saturated with kerosene. 
 
 Military and naval budgets are not insurance, they are 
 kerosene. Their function is to render a nation inflam- 
 mable. Europe had been so repeatedly drenched with 
 kerosene that one match was sufficient to start an instan- 
 taneous and continent-wide conflagration: Russians, Ger- 
 mans, Frenchmen, Englishmen, all heard at once the roar 
 of the blazing rafters above their heads. The house is 
 burning, and now other billions of dollars must be ex- 
 pended in putting out a fire which was made possible by 
 the very means which were devised to prevent it. Another 
 spook has vanished into air. 
 
 If one-tenth of the treasure spent by Europe in the last 
 thirty years upon her armaments had been devoted to 
 building rational safeguards against war, the present 
 catastrophe would never have blighted the world. 
 
 Spook Number Theee 
 
 "Only by armaments can liberty be safeguarded and 
 justice secured." The advanced nations must protect 
 themselves from the insults and assaults of the backward 
 nations, and weak nations when attacked must be defended 
 by the strong. Tyranny must not be permitted to rage 
 unchecked, and cruelty must not be allowed to work its 
 infamies unpunished. Armaments are the natural pro- 
 tection of righteousness and truth. 
 
 It sounds plausible, but it is false. For years Abdul 
 the Damned allowed his Christian subjects to be butch- 
 
ered, and altho Christian nations stood round and watched 
 the streams of flowing blood, they did not lift a hand in 
 defense of the helpless. They could not. They were 
 bound hand and foot by their armaments. 
 
 The other day the Balkan states were fighting each 
 other with a ferocity surpassing that of savages, commit- 
 ting atrocities which in devilish cruelty have never been 
 exceeded, and the great Christian Powers — like so many 
 huge and unwieldly brutes — stood in armor, impotent, 
 watching the frightful carnage go on, all of them so 
 weighted down with steel that not one of them could move. 
 
 That mighty armies are an efficient instrument for the 
 establishing of justice or the rescue of the oppressed is 
 another of the spooks. In the light of recent experience 
 it has vanished into air. No doubt certain dreamers will 
 go on dreaming. All men who are awake know that 
 swollen armaments block the way of justice and 
 jeopardize the liberties of mankind. 
 
 Spook Number Four 
 
 "Only by great armies and navies can we have inter- 
 national law and order." The Hague Conferences at- 
 tended to various important matters, but they left arma- 
 ments untouched. By establishing certain rules of pro- 
 cedure, and laying sundry restrictions on combatants, it 
 was thought by some that the nations would gradually 
 turn their feet into the paths of peace. It was a delusive 
 expectation. 
 
 The militarists are willing that all sorts of conventions 
 shall be agreed to, if only the big armies and navies are 
 left intact. They have no objection to Red Cross Socie- 
 ties, and to arbitration treaties, and to the neutralization 
 
 11 
 
of certain territories, but they insist that the armaments 
 shall not be reduced. 
 
 After each of The Hague Conferences all armaments 
 were increased. This is because Christendom is in the 
 hands of the militarists, and for a generation they have 
 worked their will. 
 
 It is idle to talk of the observance of conventions and 
 treaties so long as nations rely on their armies and navies 
 for the accomplishment of their purpose. Italy stole 
 Tripoli because she had an army. Austria stole Bosnia 
 because she had an army. Armies enable nations to steal. 
 Armies make it easier to steal. Navies combined with 
 armies make it easier still. 
 
 Germany bound herself by a treaty to respect the neu- 
 trality of Luxemburg, but when the hour arrived, Ger- 
 many sent her army thundering thru Luxemburg defying 
 the treaty, for mighty armies are not to be halted in 
 their courses by the gossamer threads of treaties. 
 
 No wonder the House of Commons laughed at Ger- 
 many's promise not to keep any of Belgium at the end of 
 the war. In the act of trampling on one promise, she 
 could hardly expect to be trusted in making another. 
 No nation can be expected in time of excitement, with a 
 huge sword in her hand, to be scrupulous about promises 
 made long ago. 
 
 If nations dress like brigands, they will come at last 
 to act like brigands. 
 
 Conscience atrophies under armorplate. European 
 diplomacy has been frightfully debauched and degraded 
 by the frenzied piling up of guns. 
 
 Men are not likely to rely on reason when they have at 
 their elbow a mass of steel on which they can lean. They 
 are not inclined to wait patiently for the slow processes 
 
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of diplomacy, when they can do things much quicker with 
 the sword. The notion that nations can be trusted to 
 keep their word and are more certain to work for the 
 higher interests of mankind when they expend a large 
 part of their revenues on instruments of destruction is 
 another spook which lias vanished into air. 
 
 Europe is uttering a solemn warning to America. The 
 old world is speaking to the new. Ancient monarchies are 
 offering counsel to our young Republic. 
 
 For a generation we have been aping Europe. The 
 ideal of Washington and the other founders of our nation 
 has been fading from many eyes. To not a few Germany 
 has become a model. We have adopted many of the old 
 world customs. 
 
 We have a Navy League, and we launch our Dread- 
 noughts with the playing of bands, and the hurrahs of 
 high state officials. We have our annual war-scares and 
 our annual naval reviews — all just like Europe! 
 
 We have our swelling naval budgets, and our niggardly 
 appropriations for the causes of social betterment, after 
 the European fashion. 
 
 We have our interminable chatter about hypothetical 
 attacks and conjectural perils, and the incessant speech- 
 making and magazine-writing and book-making of 
 Colonels and Commodores, Admirals and Generals, active 
 and retired, just as it is all done in Europe. 
 
 We have squandered millions of dollars on fortifications 
 in the Philippines and other millions in Hawaii and we 
 are about to squander other millions in Panama. 
 
 We have spent in a few years over two billion dollars 
 on our navy, and this is but a trifle compared with what 
 we are going to spend, if the naval oligarchy, intrenched 
 in Washington city, has its way. 
 
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We have learned to talk glibly about naval tonnage, 
 and naval prestige, and to admire fourteen-inch guns, 
 and to publish pictures of battleships even in religious 
 papers. They do it that way in Europe! 
 
 We have even begun to send our boys to summer mili- 
 tary camps, and are considering the advisability of intro- 
 ducing military instructors into our colleges and making 
 target practice a part of the high school curriculum. 
 We have caught the fever. We are in the race. 
 
 And now Europe, being in torment, calls to us : "0 
 Republic of the West, do not follow my example! There 
 are ways which seem right to a nation, but they lead down 
 at last to the chambers of death. Do not believe the 
 creed which we have long accepted. Armaments are not 
 guarantees of peace. They are not insurance. They are 
 not instruments of reason or righteousness. They create 
 first suspicion, then hatred, and at last lead young men 
 by the million to the fields of blood. Do not choose the 
 path which we have followed. Work out your destiny 
 along a different line. Make the new world different 
 from the old. Beware of guns. Banish the implements 
 of hate from your eyes. Take your mind off the machin- 
 ery of slaughter. Cease to delight in the engines of 
 destruction. Trust in reason. Have faith in brother- 
 hood. Believe in love. Build your civilization on the 
 principle of good will. Bind all the nations of the West- 
 ern Hemisphere into a federation which by its fidelity to 
 the law of kindness and its devotion to the Prince of Peace 
 shall become at once the inspiration and hope of the 
 world !" 
 
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