Page:Masterpieces of German literature volume 10.djvu/408

 government continued the war through four more months, to the detriment of the country.

I am glad to acknowledge that your manual, with its clear and short sentences, does greater justice than former attempts to what is needed in war. But even the acceptance of your regulations by the governments would not ensure their observance. It has long been a universally accepted rule of warfare that no messenger of peace should be shot at. But in the last campaign we frequently saw this done.

No paragraph learned by heart will convince the soldier that the unorganized natives who spontanément (that is, of their own free will) take up arms and threaten his life every moment of the day and night should be recognized as lawful opponents.

Certain requests of the manual, I fear, cannot be put in force. The identification, for instance, of the dead after a big battle. Others are subject to doubt, unless you insert "lorsque les circonstances le permettent, s'il se peut, si possible, s'il-y-a nécessité," or the like. This will give them that elasticity without which the bitter severity of actual warfare will break through all restrictions.

In war, where everything must be treated individually, only those regulations will work well which are primarily addressed to the leaders. This includes everything that your manual has to say concerning the wounded and the sick, the physicians and their medicines. The general recognition of these principles, and also of those which have to do with the prisoners of war, would mark a notable step in advance and bring us nearer the end which the Institute of International Law is pursuing with such admirable perseverance.