lytics been doing? They had, in time of peace, prepared for any war on any scale that British statesmanship had ever contemplated. We were and we remained throughout the war perfectly secure, not only in these islands, but throughout our world-wide Empire, against any risk of invasion. No foreign soldier ever set his foot on one square yard of British ground. Our Expeditionary Force was ready to start fully equipped and with the necessary transport at a moment's notice · as it did literally at a moment's notice to wherever it was most required. It soon became apparent that this war was going to dwarf all previous experience. What did we do? We recruited, we raised, we equipped, we dispatched vast new armies, we transported to the field of action the splendid contingents which were sent to our aid from all parts of our Empire all over the globe. We cleared the seas in those months effectually and finally of every German cruiser and every German merchant vessel. We carried through the long and delicate negotiations which secured for the Allies the coöperation and the active support of gallant Italy. These were some of the things not an exhaustive catalogue these were some of the things which were actually done in the course of six months, and I say again the record is not a record of apathy or of lethargy.

But to come back to Lord French. I can honestly say for myself that with all my other preoccupations, manifold and distracting as they were, this matter of the supply of munitions was rarely out of my thoughts. I used to see Lord Kitchener daily even two or three times a day, and I believe hardly a day passed but I did not press him- not that he needed my pressure -but hardly a day passed when I did not press him to hurry on and to

increase production by every possible means. So dissatisfied and so apprehensive did I become at the relatively slow rate of progress as compared with our expectations and hopes that I resolved to make a direct and personal appeal, both to masters and to men. That was the object and motive of my visit to Newcastle in the month of April. But observe, gentlemen, it was a very delicate business. I had to think, not only of our own people, but I had to think of our allies and still more of the enemy. Operations of the greatest possible moment were, as I knew though I could not disclose it - then impending, and it was of the utmost importance not to expose our own weakness or to give encouragement to the Germans to let them think that we could not and were not able to do more than hold our own. I determined, therefore, to make very sure of my ground, and I instructed Lord Kitchener to send for Sir John French, to have him over here, to interrogate him, and to get from him a precise report, a precise survey of the then military situation, and to make his report to me before I spoke. Sir John French came over. He was seen by Lord Kitchener at the War Office, and they discussed the matter. I have here it is an interesting historical document, or it will become so letter in Lord Kitchener's own handwriting which he wrote to me immediately after he had seen Sir John French:

a

My dear Prime Minister: I have had a talk with French. He told me I could let you know that with the present supply of ammunition he will have as much as his troops will be able to use on the next forward movement.

That letter is dated April 14, 1915. It is a few days before I went to Newcastle. That is what I wanted. I was determined to make assurance doubly sure.

What more is to be said about that except that Lord Kitchener in subsequent conversations before I went to Newcastle confirmed what he has put down in that letter? I, therefore, felt I was sure I had got what I wanted. I thought I could be able to speak without giving encouragement to the enemy in regard to these delicate and dangerous operations which were about to be launched. I felt, in fact, bound to say at Newcastle what I did about that point. Lord French says he read my speech. I wonder if he did. At any rate, if he had read it with anything like decent care he would not have given a most complete travesty of everything I said. I quote my exact words: 'I saw a statement the other day that the operations, not only of our own army but of our allies, were being crippled, or at any rate hampered, owing to our failure to provide the necessary munitions. I say there is no truth in that statement.'

Was

I or was I not justified in making that statement? And then I went on to my main theme the extreme and perilous urgency of the situation as regarded the future. That was the point I was on. I may point out in passing that the very next night in his speech in the House of Commons Mr. Lloyd George said exactly the same thing- namely, that up to that moment when I was speaking and he was speaking I won't say we were all right, but we were in a position of security, and the real point of danger and difficulty was the future. What did I say about the future? I summed up the case in these words: 'There is not a single naval or military authority among us who, in view of the approximate and prospective requirements, does not declare that a large and rapid increase in the output of munitions has become one of the first necessities of the State. Lord Kitchener says so,

Lord Fisher (he was then First Sea Lord) I know would say so, and Sir John French has said so. This then is what, in the name of your King and country, we ask you to do—to deliver the goods.' That is the speech the reading of which Lord French says caused him to lose all hope of receiving help from the Government as then constituted. All hope! All hope! And which set him to work, as I have said, to go behind the back of his official chief to secure, in concert with outsiders, the overthrow of the Government. There was a time in the decadent days of the Roman Empire when the Prætorians, as they were called, and sometimes the armies in distant parts of the Empire used to change. Emperors.

I confess I never knew until I read Lord French's article that it was to him, the Commander-in-Chief of our armies in France, that we owe the blessings of the Coalition Government. But he says so. And he sent over, to bring about this beneficent revolution in the conduct of our affairs, a versatile gentleman well known to many of us

Captain Guest. Providence works, as you know, by mysterious agencies, and the combination of Lord French in his Headquarters in France and Captain Guest manipulating the press and the politicians here had the desired result, and, as Lord French tells you, the Government fell. Well, I don't know which Lord French thinks was the chief villain of the old piece — Lord Kitchener or myself. As it happened, we both retained our old offices in the reconstructed Government. And while I should be the last, and will always be the last, to belittle the splendid work which was subsequently done by the Ministry of Munitions, to the formation of which I was a party, and a principal party, and which in the early days of its life, when there

was a good deal of friction with the War Office, I strenuously backed with all the authority that I possessed, yet Lord French appears to have forgotten that during the whole of the time that he remained in command in France, and for months afterwards, the British in France and in Flanders lived army and fought with great determination and with many successes entirely on the ammunition ordered, before the Ministry of Munitions came into existence, by the old régime. Lord French's ridiculous suggestion that his action in this matter had something to do with his subsequent removal from the command is hardly worthy of serious notice. He remained in full command for more than six months, and, though I heard strange rumors which appear to have had more foundation in fact than I then believed, I never took the pains to inquire what part he had played, or whether he had played any part, in the newspaper campaign which he now claims to have inspired. When his retirement came I took, myself, the full and the sole responsibility for it. His retirement was for reasons which had no more to do with the supply of shells than with the next eclipse of the

moon.

Before I part from Lord French I have one word more to say. His whole case is that he was obliged to do what he did because in the highest interests of the Empire it was essential to get rid of an apathetic Government, negli

The Morning Post, June 4

gent of its first duty to the army, and presided over, as I have said, by a supine and lethargic head. I will refresh Lord French's memory on this point. I have here in my hand a letter in his writing addressed to me from the Headquarters of the British army in France, and dated observe the date May 20, 1915. I say observe the date. The Coalition Ministry, for which Lord French now claims a sort of parental responsibility was formed exactly three days earlier, on May 17. It is a private letter, this, to which I should certainly not have referred, had not Lord French, who himself makes the freest use of secret and confidential documents, compelled me by his last article to do so. What I am about to read is only an extract, but I can assure you and the world that there is no qualifying context. So far as I am concerned the letter may be published in extenso to-morrow:

For two days I have been hesitating to add one iota to the troubles and anxieties which must weigh upon you just now. [I was forming the Coalition Government.] You have, however, shown me so much true, generous kindness throughout this trying campaign that I venture at this critical juncture to convey to you what is in my inmost thoughts. [Now comes the important part.] I am sure in the whole history of war no General in the field has ever been helped in a difficult task by the Head of his Government as I have been supported and strengthened by your unfailing sympathy and encouragement.

FOR a long time the people of German-Austria have been waiting in distress for this day to come, which will relieve the tension caused by the uncertainty as to its future fate. We were longing for the hour of decision. because it was to render peace at last to our hard-tried country and to offer us an opportunity to proclaim before this illustrious tribunal-the world's highest authority- what our country is and what the conditions are under which we may hope to organize the possibilities for the existence of an independent Commonwealth. The Danube Monarchy, against which the Allied and Associated Powers have waged war, and with which they have concluded an armistice, has ceased to exist; the 12th of November, 1918, may be considered the day of its death. From this day on there was no Monarch any more nor a big Power over which he could hold his sway. There was no more the fatal dualism, neither an Austrian nor a Hungarian Government, no army, and no other recognized institution vested with public power. There only remained eight nationalities deprived of any public organization, and overnight they created their own Parliaments, their own Governments, and their own armies, in short, their own independent States. In the same way as the other National States, our new Republic, too, has sprung into life; consequently, she can, no more than the other States, be considered the successor of the late Monarchy. From this very point arises the fundamental and hardest contradiction

under which we are laboring, which is waiting to be cleared up before this high Assembly. On the one hand, no one could, from the standpoint of international law, contradict the judicious statement recently made by the Chairman of this Conference, according to which it would be contrary to all principles of international law and to reason to maintain that a modification of the political form of government or a change in its leading personages would suffice to release a nation from the obligations it had assumed.

This leads to the conclusion that all the territories of the former Monarchy and their peoples could be made responsible for the consequences of the war which was forced upon them all by their former Governments. There is weighing upon us, like upon all the other nationalities established upon the territory of the former AustroHungarian Monarchy, a portion of the dreadful inheritance left us by the fallen Empire, the inheritance of war, the inheritance of exhaustion, the inheritance of the most cumbersome economic obligations. But our new Republic has freed herself from all those imperialistic aspirations which had become so fatal to the existence of the ancient Monarchy. She has rid herself once and forever of all those reactionary traditions which had turned the former Monarchy into a prison for its people. She is, alas! the unfortunate victim of that horrible crime of 1914. a crime committed by the former Governments, however, and not by the people. On the other hand, all the

States which have succeeded the Monarchy have, in the light of international law, come into existence only after the cessation of hostilities. The German-Austrian Republic in its present shape has never declared war, never carried on a war, and, in relation with the Western Powers, never had the position of a warring Power from an international point of view. There could, moreover, be no doubt as to the fact that our Republic never was at war with the new national States. On the contrary, in Vienna various Commissions appointed by the new States have met to settle the Crown property left by the late Empire, and to divide in mutual agreement among themselves all the rights and assets of this property. Between them and us it is not a question of making peace, but of liquidating the former partnership and of settling the future relations under the intervention and guaranty of the Powers for which we pray.

Nevertheless, these new States meeting face to face in Paris are playing quite a different rôle in regard to their obligations assumed in the past. We expect to eliminate this contradiction at the Peace Conference. I reserve to myself the opportunity of drawing my conclusions from these contradictions later on. We are before you as one of the parts of the vanquished and fallen Empire. Ready to assume our portion of the liabilities grown out of these our relations to the Allied Powers, we are well aware of the fact that our fate is resting in your hands We hope and believe that the conscience of the world will not deny to our people nor curtail the inalienable right of self-determination which the associated Powers have always proclaimed to be the very aim of their war waged against the Hapsburg and Hohenzollern Monarchies, a right which has been realized by our neighbors with our ready consent and

a right which our people, confiding in the principles recognized by the Allied Powers, have adopted as the fundamental basis of their new constitution.

We trust that the world's common sense does not have in view and will not permit our economic ruin. The destruction of the economic unit of the Monarchy, the separation of our mountainous country from all its natural resources has condemned us these last six months to privations which exceed by far the sufferings we endured in wartime. It was only due to the generous relief action organized by Mr. Hoover, based on resolutions passed by the Allied Powers, that we have been saved from downright starvation. But in all these times of distress our people has, in a measure which called for admiration, displayed discipline, patient endurance, and good judgment. Our new Republic did not stain with blood her revolution, and, having faith in the decisions of this Conference, she even has abstained from any military action against her neighbors, although the latter have occupied two fifths of her territory. She has proved to be a mainstay of peaceful and organized social development in Central Europe. This attitude our new Republic will continue to maintain, provided that a just and democratic peace shall render to our country the possibility of an economic existence. We know that we have to receive peace from your hands, from the hands of victors. We are firmly resolved conscientiously to weigh each and any proposition laid before us, each and any advice offered by you to us. We shall, above all, make it a point thoroughly to inform you of the conditions prevailing in our country and to enlighten you as to the primary exigencies of our existence. If, heretofore, you had the opportunity to hear nothing, with few exceptions, but the voice of our neighbors, we pray you,