Calendar: 1927-1928 Page 490

ON THE USES OF THE STUDY OF WAR direction Our Field Service Regulations the soldiers' bible say War is the ultimate resort of policy whereby nation when every peaceful means of settling an international dispute has failed seeks to impose its will on its enemies in defence of its honour its interests or its existence For generations it has been the practice of British statesmen to regard war not as continuation or even as the last resort but rather as an interruption of policy But neither the possible effects of the clash of this theory of war with the opposing political theory nor the possible effects of difference between our military and political theories were ever sufficiently examined with the results that too often our policy has outstripped our preparation we have been unable to keep the peace when we wished to do so and during the last hundred years we have almost invariably entered upon war not only militarily but politically unready Yet it would not be difficult for the expert in history or in political science to prove that Clausewitz's theory is fundamentally untrue that those who have used the sword deliberately as an instrument of aggressive policy have in the end perished by the sword It would not be difficult for either expert to show that when statesmen have neglected the study of the application of their craft to war their people have suffered After all the processes which am here recommending are those which have long been applied to other social evils Young men who come to our great universities with the ambition to take part in public life have been amply provided with the means of studying the philo- sophy of statecraft the causes of and remedies for most of the diseases of the State No one has ever suggested that epidemic disease or pauperism or any other such evil could be abolished or reduced without an examination of the causes an application of the remedies by experts and the education of public opinion Only in regard to one of the greatest social evils of all-war-have these processes been but very partially applied But there may be some who would say "All this is of the past you are flogging dead horse To-day the peoples of Europe at any rate know what war means and are earnestly determined to seek peace and ensue it We have established the League of Nations for the specific purpose of preventing war and we have learned what your preparation for war really means On the other side there are those who say that we cannot afford to be the guardian of Europe that we have had enough of pledges to other nations should mind our own business and return to the policy of splendid isolation would answer the adherents of the latter policy first and would answer them in the words of John Ruskin spoken in 1865 Make your national conscience clear and your eyes will soon be clear No man who is truly ready to take part in noble quarrel will ever stand long in doubt by whom or in what cause his aid is needed tell Field Service Regulation 1923 vol Π 17