The right to serve made conditional on a good cause To the actual defence of the realm Extension of the notion of allegiance The connection of the military oath with the first Mutiny Act Recognised limits to the claims on a soldier's obedience. The falsity of the common doctrine of duty Illustrated by the devastation of the Palatinate by the French . The military claim to exemption from moral responsibility souvent pour venir au bout de son ennemi; Dieu doit estre bien miséricordieux en nostre endroict, qui faisons tant de maux.— MARSHAL MONTLUC. The prohibition of explosive bullets in war-The importance of the Declaration of St. Petersburg of 1868-The ultimate triumph of more destructive methods-Illustrated by history of the cross-bow or the musket; or of cannons, torpedoes, red-hot shot, or the bayonet-Numbers slain in modern and earlier warfare-The laws of war at the Brussels Conference of 1874-Do the laws of war tend to improve?—A negative answer suggested from reference: (1) to the use of poison in war; (2) to the bombardment of towns; (3) to the destruction of public buildings; (4) to the destruction of crops and fruit trees; (5) to the murder of prisoners or the wounded; (6) to the murder of surrendered garrisons; (7) to the destruction of fishing boats; (8) to the disuse of the declaration of war; (9) to the torture and mutilation of combatants and non-combatants; (10) to the custom of contributions ---The futile attempts of Grotius and Vattel to humanise warfareThe rights of war in the time of Grotius-The futility of international law with regard to laws of war-The employment of barbarian troops-The taking of towns by assault—The laws of war contrasted with the practice-War easier to abolish than to humanise. It is impossible to head a chapter 'The Laws of War' without thinking of that famous chapter on Iceland B headed 'The Snakes of Iceland,' wherein the writer simply informed his readers that there were none in the country. The laws of war' make one think of the snakes of Iceland. Nevertheless, a summary denial of their existence would deprive the history of the battle-field of one of its most interesting features; for there is surely nothing more surprising to an impartial observer of military manners and customs than to find that even in so just a cause as the defence of your own country limitations should be set to the right of injuring your aggressor in any manner you can. What, for instance, can be more obvious in such a case than that no suffering you can inflict is needless which is most likely permanently to disable your adversary? Yet, by virtue of the International Declaration of St. Petersburg, in 1868, you may not use explosive bullets against him, because it is held. that they would cause him needless suffering. By the logic of war, what can be clearer than that, if the explosive bullet deals worse wounds, and therefore inflicts death more readily than other destructive agencies, it should be used? or else that those too should be excluded from the rules of the gamewhich might end in putting a stop to the game altogether? The history of the explosive bullet is worth recalling, for its prohibition is a straw to clutch at in these days of military revival. Like the plague, and perhaps gunpowder, it had an Eastern origin. It was used originally in India against elephants and tigers. In 1863 it was introduced into the Russian army, and subsequently into other European armies, for use against ammunition-waggons. But it was not till 1867 that a slight modification in its construction rendered it available for the destruction of mankind. The world owes it to the humanity of the Russian Minister of War, General Milutine, that at this point a pause was made; and as the Czar, Alexander II., was no less humane than his minister, the result was the famous Declaration, signed in 1868 by all the chief Powers (save the United States), mutually foregoing in their future wars by land or sea the use of projectiles weighing less than 400 grammes (to save their use for artillery), either explosive or filled with inflammable substances. The Court of Berlin wished at the time for some other destructive contrivances to be equally excluded, but the English Government was afraid to go further; as if requiring breathing time after so immense an effort to diminish human suffering, before proceeding in so perilous a direction. The Declaration of St. Petersburg, inasmuch as it is capable of indefinite expansion, is a somewhat awkward precedent for those who in their hearts love war and shield its continuance with apologetic platitudes. How, they ask, can you enforce agreements between nations? But this argument begins to totter when we remember that there is absolutely no superior power or tribunal in existence which can enforce the observance of the St. Petersburg Declaration beyond the conscience of the signatory Powers. It follows, therefore, that if international agreements are of value, there is no need to stop short at this or that bullet: which makes the arbitration-tribunal loom in the distance perceptibly nearer than it did before. At first sight, this agreement excluding the use of explosive bullets would seem to favour the theory of those who see in every increase in the peril of war the best hope of its ultimate cessation. A famous American statesman is reported to have said, and actually to have appealed to the invention of gunpowder in support of his statement, that every discovery in the art of war has, from this point of view, a life-saving and peace-promoting influence. But it is difficult to conceive a greater delusion. The whole history of war is against it; for what has that history been but the steady increase of the pains and perils of war, as more effective weapons of destruction have succeeded one another? The delusion cannot be better dispelled than by consideration of the facts that follow. art. It has often seemed as if humanity were about to get the better of the logical tendency of the military The Lateran Council of 1139 (a sort of European congress in its day) not only condemned Arnold of Brescia to be burnt for heresy, but anathematised the cross-bow for its inhumanity. It forbade its use in Christian warfare as alike hateful to God and destructive of mankind. Several brave princes disdained to employ cross-bow shooters, and Innocent III. con Halleck's International Law, ii. 21. Yet within three weeks of the beginning of the war with France 60,000 Prussians were hors de combat. 2 Artem illam mortiferam et Deo odibilem balistrariorum et sagittariorum adversus Christianos et Catholicos exerceri de cætero sub anathemate prohibemus.' |