sabotage of the League of Nations. It is not an accident that the most intelligent member
of the Group was the first member to break publicly with the policy of appeasement.
The Milner Group thus regarded the Treaty of Versailles as too severe, as purely
temporary, and as subject to revision almost at once. When The Round Table examined
the treaty in its issue of June 1919, it said, in substance: "The punishment of Germany
was just, for no one can believe in any sudden change of heart in that country, but the
treaty is too severe. The spirit of the Pre-Armistice Commitments was violated, and, in
detail after detail, Germany was treated unjustly, although there is broad justice in the
settlement as a whole. Specifically the reparations are too severe, and Germany's
neighbors should have been forced to disarm also, as promised in Wilson's Fourth Point.
No demand should have been made for William II as a war criminal. If he is a menace, he
should be put on an island without trial, like Napoleon. Our policy must be
magnanimous, for our war was with the German government, not with the German
people." Even earlier, in December 1918, The Round Table said: "It would seem
desirable that the treaties should not be long term, still less perpetual, instruments.
Perpetual treaties are indeed a lien upon national sovereignty and a standing contradiction
of the principle of the democratic control of foreign policy. . . . It would establish a
salutary precedent if the network of treaties signed as a result of the war were valid for a
period of ten years only." In March 1920, The Round Table said: "Like the Peace
Conference, the Covenant of the League of Nations aimed too high and too far. Six
months ago w e looked to it to furnish the means for peaceful revision of the terms of the
peace, where revision might be required. Now we have to realize that national sentiment
sets closer limits to international action than we were willing then to recognize." The
same article then goes on to speak of the rejection of the treaty by the United States
Senate. It defends this action and criticizes Wilson severely, saying: "The truth of the
matter is that the American Senate has expressed the real sentiment of all nations with
hard-headed truthfulness.... The Senate has put into words what has already been
demonstrated in Europe by the logic of events—namely that the Peace of Versailles
attempted too much, and the Covenant which guarantees it implies a capacity for united
action between the Allies which the facts do not warrant. The whole Treaty was, in fact,
framed to meet the same impractical desire which we have already noted in the reparation
terms—the desire to mete out ideal justice and to build an ideal world."
Nowhere is the whole point of view of the Milner Group better stated than in a speech
of General Smuts to the South African Luncheon Club in London, 23 October 1923.
After violent criticism of the reparations as too large and an attack on the French efforts
to enforce these clauses, he called for a meeting "of principals" to settle the problem. He
then pointed out that a continuation of existing methods would lead to the danger of
German disintegration, "a first-class and irreparable disaster.... It would mean immediate
economic chaos, and it would open up the possibility of future political dangers to which
I need not here refer. Germany is both economically and politically necessary to Central
Europe." He advocated applying to Germany "the benevolent policy which this country
adopted toward France after the Napoleonic War.... And if, as I hope she will do,
Germany makes a last appeal . . . I trust this great Empire will not hesitate for a moment
to respond to that appeal and to use all its diplomatic power and influence to support her,
and to prevent a calamity which would be infinitely more dangerous to Europe and the
world than was the downfall of Russia six or seven years ago." Having thus lined Britain
up in diplomatic opposition to France, Smuts continued with advice against applying
generosity to the latter country on the question of French war debts, warning that this
would only encourage "French militarism."
“Do not let us from mistaken motives of generosity lend our aid to the further
militarization of the European continent. People here are already beginning to be
seriously alarmed about French armaments on land and in the air. In addition to these
armaments, the French government have also lent large sums to the smaller European
States around Germany, mainly with a view to feeding their ravenous military appetites.
There is a serious danger lest a policy of excessive generosity on our part, or on the part
of America, may simply have the effect of enabling France still more effectively to
subsidize and foster militarism on the Continent.... If things continue on the present lines,
this country may soon have to start rearming herself in sheer self-defence.”
This speech of Smuts covers so adequately the point of view of the Milner Group in
the early period of appeasement that no further quotations are necessary. No real change
occurred in the point of view of the Group from 1920 to 1938, not even as a result of the
death of democratic hopes in Germany at the hands of the Nazis. From Smuts's speech of
October 1923 before the South African Luncheon Club to Smuts's speech of November
1934 before the RIIA, much water flowed in the river of international affairs, but the
ideas of the Milner Group remained rigid and, it may be added, erroneous. Just as the
speech of 1923 may be taken as the culmination of the revisionist sentiment of the Group
in the first five years of peace, so the speech of 1934 may be taken as the initiation of the
appeasement sentiment of the Group in the last five years of peace. The speeches could
almost be interchanged. We may call one revisionist and the other appeasing, but the
point of view, the purpose, the method is the same. These speeches will be mentioned
again later.
The aim of the Milner Group through the period from 1920 to 1938 was the same: to
maintain the balance of power in Europe by building up Germany against France and
Russia; to increase Britain's weight in that balance by aligning with her the Dominions
and the United States; to refuse any commitments (especially any commitments through
the League of Nations, and above all any commitments to aid France) beyond those
existing in 1919; to keep British freedom of action; to drive Germany eastward against
Russia if either or both of these two powers became a threat to the peace of Western
Europe.
The sabotage of the peace settlement by the Milner Group can be seen best in respect
to reparations and the League of Nations. In regard to the former, their argument
appeared on two fronts: in the first place, the reparations were too large because they
were a dishonorable violation of the Pre-Armistice Agreement; and, in the second place,
any demand for immediate or heavy payments in reparation would ruin Germany's
international credit and her domestic economic system, to the jeopardy of all reparation
payments immediately and of all social order in Central Europe in the long run.
The argument against reparations as a violation of the Pre-Armistice Agreement can
be found in the volumes of Zimmern and Brand already mentioned. Both concentrated
their objections on the inclusion of pension payments by the victors to their own soldiers
in the total reparation bill given to the Germans. This was, of course, an obvious violation