ARMS AND THE MEN

And although the conviction began later to grow among Europe's more enlightened statesmen that something had to be done about the De Wendels, the Schneiders, and their breed, governments were puzzled to know what it could be. A nation that suppresses or confiscates its private armament industry is faced with these alternatives; (a) it must disarm; (b) it must become exclusively an IMPORTER of arms; (c) it must make arms manufacturing a function of the state, which means, in effect, that the state must become (or inevitably THINKS it must) a vast arsenal--since, having no opportunity to keep plants large and active by supplying an export trade, it must manufacture in quantities sufficiently large so that it could step, overnight, from a peace-time to a war-time production schedule.

Therein lay one difficulty. But why could concerted action toward disarmament make so little progress? One important reason was first laid bare by Lord Robert Cecil. "There is a very sinister feature," he said, "to all the disarmament discussions. I refer to the tremendous power wielded against all the proposals by armament firms . . . . We must aim at getting rid of this immense instrument in the maintenance of suspicion." Yet in 1932 the Disarmament Conference was enriched by the presence of M. Charles Dumont of Schneider-Creusot, President of the Schneider-controlled Banque Franco-Japonaise, on the French delegation. The British delegation was similarly benefited by the advice of Colonel A. G. C. Dawnay, the brother of a director of Vickers-Armstrongs, and now the political supervisor of the British Broadcasting Corporation.

If the armament business were conducted by an outlawed band of international gangsters, the problem would be simple to define. The difficulty is that precisely the opposite is the case. The armament business is a part of the most essential industries of industrialized nations--steel and chemicals. But even so the problem does not become acute until you have a nation in which the biggest part of a very, very large part of these essential industries is the manufacture of the actual munitions of war. Such is the case in France, and also in Czechoslovakia. And, potentially, in Germany.

No American would be shocked to hear that the steel business and the coal business of Pennsylvania, owners and workers together, exercised big political influence in Pennsylvania, and, through Pennsylvania, upon the nation. Now put Detroit also in Pennsylvania. And then suppose that by far the most profitable part of the combined Steel-Coal-Motorcar Industry were the manufacture of munitions. And then try to imagine a Senator from Pennsylvania convincing himself that there is no possible chance of war with Japan and that therefore both the American navy and the American army are much too big.

While this may make it easy to understand why Messrs, de Wendel and Schneider should be so influential in France, it brings us no nearer a solution. To deal with the general problem of disarmament in all its phases would be impossible within the limits of this article. Suffice it to say, the simplest solution is to have the state take over all the manufacturing of munitions. But to do that, the state would have to take over most of the essential industries of modern life. And for anyone but a 100 per cent Socialist, that is not simple at all. Russia is today the only country in which there is no "private" manufacture and sale of armaments.

Then is there no hope? Is Europe caught so tight in the steely grip of the armament makers that it can only do their bidding?

Well, the grip is pretty tight, yet there is some hope. Perhaps there is a war coming, but first there is a fight coming.