Note 53 — Chapter IV · MILITARY PREDOMINANCE—AND INSECURITY

And Russo-German co-operation is of course precisely what French policy must create. Says an American critic:—

‘France certainly carries a big stick, but she does not speak softly; she takes her own part, but she seems to fear neither God nor the revulsion of man. Yet she has reason to fear. Suppose she succeeds for a while in reducing Germany to servitude and Russia to a dictatorship of the Right, in securing her own dominion on the Continent as overlord by the petty States of Europe. What then? What can be the consequence of a common hostility of the Teutonic and Slavonic peoples, except in the end common action on their part to throw off an intolerable yoke? The nightmare of a militant Russo-German alliance becomes daily a more sinister prophecy, as France teaches the people of Europe that force alone is the solvent. France has only to convince all of Germany that the Treaty of Versailles will be enforced in all its rigour, which means occupation of the Ruhr and the loss of Silesia, to destroy the final resistance of those Germans who look to the West rather than to the East for salvation. Let it be known that the barrier of the Rhine is all bayonet and threat, and western-minded Germany must go down before the easterners, Communist or Junker. It will not matter greatly which.’ (New Republic, Sept. 15th, 1920).