Political warfare

“ Shall national power be at once conferred on those who have striven, by all means open to them, to destroy the nation's life? Shall our enemies and the enemies of the Government, as soon as they have been defeated in war, help to direct and to control the public policy of the Government—and that, too, while those men, hostile themselves, keep from all exercise of political power the only true and loyal friends whom we have had, during these four years of war, within these Southern States? ”

“ But the contest has at no time assumed the conditions which amount to a war in the sense of international law, or which would show the existence of a de facto political organization of the insurgents sufficient to justify a recognition of belligerency. ”

“ Or will the horrors of the war force political reforms and the search for assurance in more democratic institutions against any repetition of those horrors? And is popular government an assurance against useless war while men remain warlike even when not military? ”

“ Everywhere, at the close of the war, military and official autocracy will be enthroned in the seats of power, and the spirit of political authority will be stoking the fires of fevered nationalism which war evokes. ”

“ Use the amorphous united front to attack opposition political forces too large or too powerful for you to take over; then fragment their leadership, using terror if necessary, and drown their followers in the front organization. ”

“ An unrelenting war against the individual presumed to be the favourite of the nation! a war waged by an army of unprincipled and unscrupulous politicians, leagued with a power which could not be exerted on their side without disgracing itself and disgracing the nation. ”

“ This same irreconcilable opposition which appears in moral principles, shows itself again in the political foundation of the assizes. Originating in the clash of arms, grown up in the contests and necessities of war, on a soil where nothing but constant war could save it from annihilation, the system is purely martial—made for conflict and strife. ”

“ It is a law and requisite of civilized existence that men live in political continuous societies, forming organized units called states or nations, whose constituents bear, enjoy and suffer, advance and retrograde together, in peace and in war. The citizen or native of hostile country is thus an enemy, as one of the constituents of the hostile state or nation, and as such is subjected to the hardships of war. ”

“ The aim of such activity is to break down the prestige of Governmental power, to furnish continuous proof of the possibility of carrying on a contest against the Government, to raise in that way the revolutionary spirit of the people, and inspire belief in the practicability of revolution, and, finally, to form a body suited and accustomed to warfare. ”

“ Indeed, most of America's difficulties are political. The trouble about making war upon purely democratic lines is that so many people have to be consulted; and not only Congress, but the 40-odd State Legislatures of the country, are all most jealous of their privileges in this respect. ”

“ Old-time wars aimed simply at the small antagonist army and at the antagonist Government, but in these democratic days the will for peace or war has descended among the people and diffused itself among them, and it is the state of mind of the whole enemy population that has become the objective in war. The old idea of an invading army marching on a capital, gives place, therefore, to a new conception of an attack through propaganda, through operations designed to produce acute economic distress, and through the air, upon the enemy population. ”

“ As events turned out, it has proved a blessing, for it stands as a beacon, warning all leaders of party factions of their fate, who, in national distress, cripple the government, and, by their hostility, help the enemy to inflict sorer evils and deeper disgrace upon a common country. ”

“ I sum up this discussion by asserting that, without being a utopian philanthropist, or a condottieri, a person may desire that wars of extermination may be banished from the code of nations, and that the defenses of nations by disciplined militia, with the aid of good political alliances, may be sufficient to insure their independence. ”

“ All our immense resources must be called into play, the lethargy of the rural districts shaken into activity, partisan warfare spread in all directions. Let us, therefore, rise as one man, and suffer death rather than submit to the disgrace of a partition of our country. ”

“ Moreover, as latter-day campaigns are waged with all the resources of the warring peoples, and as the possession of certain of these resources is often both the cause of the conflict and the objective of the aggressor, it follows that no mere political enactments will meet contemporary requirements. ”

“ The question of political interference with the general in the field naturally arises under these conditions. The two sages point out, that to unite the nation under firm and just government is the business of the ruler and necessary to victory; but that the general is the best judge of the questions that arise on a distant field, and that all interference with him causes delay and disaster.
War meaning ravage, it was essential that the operations should be conducted in the enemy’s territory. Once there, however, a vigorous offensive is no longer advised. ”

“ And painful as the reflection is, this duty is particularly enforced by the spirit and manner in which the war continues to be waged by the enemy, who, uninfluenced by the unvaried examples of humanity set them, are adding to the savage fury of it on one frontier a system of plunder and conflagration on the other, equally forbidden by respect for national character and by the established rules of civilized warfare. ”

“ The war is growing at every point more sanguinary, as well as more desultory, and the individual passions of men are becoming more sternly and desperately exasperated against each other, converting the whole territory into a scene of outrage and bloodshed. We have in this war batch such a spectacle as the mother country, exhibited during the invasion of Napoleon,—a country occupied by the enemy in his capital and in most of its important points, but with the authority of the occupying power obeyed or respected only where an armed force is present to uphold it. ”

“ Is democratic government capable of looking ahead, making adequate and timely preparation, calling for and obtaining from its people the sacrifices which are necessary in order to preserve their own existence? Can it recover ground which has been lost, and maintain a long, costly, and arduous struggle, until, by victory, it has placed national security beyond the reach of danger?
Defeat in the present war would shake popular institutions to their foundations in England as well as France ”

“ The policy now proclaimed to the world introduces into her modes of warfare a system equally distinguished by the deformity of its features and the depravity of its character, having for its object to dissolve the ties of allegiance and the sentiments of loyalty in the adversary nation, and to seduce and separate its component parts the one from the other. ”

“ And is it to that ministry, is it to those agents of the executive power, that you would entrust the conduct of the war? Is it thus you would abandon the safety of the country to those who wish to destroy you?
"The thing which you have most cause to fear, is war. War is the greatest scourge which can, in our present circumstances, menace liberty! For it is in no wise a war kindled by the enmity of peoples. It is a war concerted by the enemies of our Revolution. ”

“ The constant fear of armed aggression has brought about political alliances of a purely transitory character, which assure nothing and, in truth, mean nothing but the mutual imputation of violence and outrage, unhappily but too well demonstrated as justifiable motives for apprehension, by reason of the ominous antecedents of an international régime founded on the supremacy of power. ”

“ The process by which a scattered democracy decided its own will, in a matter so serious as a great and perhaps fatal war, was new to the world; bystanders were surprised and amused at the simplicity with which the people disputed plans of war and peace, giving many months of warning and exact information to the enemy, while they showed no sign of leadership, discipline, or union, or even a consciousness that such qualities were needed. ”

“ In this way wars are far more dangerous to democracies than to monarchies, for the reason that by the agencies of public demoralization democracies are far more mischievously attacked in the vital conditions of their being. ”

“ The political party which shall refuse to allow the people to determine for themselves at the ballot-box the issue between revolution and war on the one side, and obstinate adherence to a party platform on the other, will assume a fearful responsibility. A war upon a political issue, waged by the people of eighteen States against the people and domestic institutions of fifteen sister-States, is a fearful and revolting thought. ”

“ Let the lovers of Freedom and Right repudiate all standing armies, all military conquests, under any conceivable circumstances—all aggressive interference in the domestic concerns of other nations; but let each People be essentially prepared to resist tyranny at home and repel invasion from abroad, each with its own chosen weapons when others shall have proved ineffective. ”

“ Congress marching the troops of one State into the bosom of another; this State collecting auxiliaries and forming, perhaps, a majority against its federal head. Here is a nation at war with itself. Can any reasonable man be well disposed toward a government which makes war and carnage the only means of supporting itself—a government that can exist only by the sword? Every such war must involve the innocent with the guilty. This single consideration should be sufficient to dispose every peaceable citizen against such a government. ”

“ The rule which declares that war makes all the citizens or subjects of one belligerent enemies of the Government and of all the citizens or subjects of the other, applies equally to civil and to international wars. ”

“ For a few days, these misguided elements waged war against our people, employing a terrifying fear strategy that unmasked all their pretensions to ideological inclinations. Before our people, they attempted to display brute force, hoping to create an aura of armed victory. ”

“ But all governments which have ever existed, including our own, make war upon those who forcibly question their authority, undermine their power, violate their laws, outrage the persons or property of their citizens. These are acts of hostility against a state, and are prevented or redressed by force—the element of war. Therefore, in principle, the daily operations of a government in time of peace are not to be distinguished from its movements in war; and in war as well as in peace each government is responsible for the manner in which it exercises its authority. ”

“ So it is with a democracy at war. Burn their houses, plunder their property, block up their harbours, and destroy their shipping in a few places; and before you have time to proceed to the rest, you will be stopped by entreaties for peace. ”

“ If you had a Government desirous of concluding a peace [Pg 311] different from that desired by the majority of the population, if you had a Government seeking to prolong the war for purposes of conquest, one might understand a conflict between the Government and the country. But since the Government desires precisely the same as the majority of the people—that is to say, the speedy settlement of an honourable peace without annexationist aims—then it is madness to attack that Government from behind, to interfere with its freedom of action and hamper its movements. ”

“ The war found us an unintegrated miscellany, and our Government a creature strangely and even desirably aloof from the thoughts and aspirations of our daily lives. And now, almost overnight, sacrifice in France and at home has welded us into one people. Shall we remain one, or shall we revert to factions, to factions either at loggerheads with one another, or else indifferent one to the other? Assuredly we shall soon re-degenerate into warring factions unless our still largely inchoate strivings for national unity can discover vehicles to carry them forward. ”

“ But, before we had invoked this foreign despotism, we would arm every man and boy that we have in the land, and we would meet you in a death-struggle, to overthrow together such an oppression and our oppressors. ”

“ The politicians and their fermentations are, in France, the bugbears of the army officers. This feeling of aversion and contempt extends, so far as I could make out, down through the rank and file. They feel that when a nation is at death-grips with its enemy even the most beautiful of democratic theories should be safely locked away with other luxuries; that the politicians should confine their activities to voting the funds necessary for the successful prosecution of the war, and should leave the conduct of the war severely alone. ”

“ An enemy has got a footing in the heart of the Empire, and is causing this disturbance. He has evaded our fleet and our forts, and he has the power to destroy our power. The nation, like a dreamer awakening, is shaking itself as it becomes conscious of another danger than that of foreign fleets and armies. ”

“ And so, taught by the crowd, the politicians continue to settle matters first, and to manufacture the causes of war in private, knowing that the people will be willing to fight when the enemy is on the march. What is the alternative it may still be asked. How can we do other than defeat the Germans by helping our government, even though we may know that the latter is composed of the politicians who, tomorrow will send the army to shoot us? ”

“ If the greedy, ambitious and unscrupulous politicians who draw the people into war were forced to shoulder the rifle and take position in the front line of battle, then we would have a truly humane war, because they would then find a way to settle all differences without resorting to force of arms. ”