Elements
of Power
IN the World War
Germany displayed tremendous power. Restraining our emotions
as much as possible, let us endeavor to analyse that power with
mathematical dispassionateness.
Why did Germany
display more power than any other single nation? Because in
the establishment of her "ethics," her political system, and
her economic structure, Germany availed herself, in larger measure
than any other nation, of scientific achievements and scientific
methods. It is a very common, very erroneous, and very harmful
belief that war was created solely by a "war-lord." Every idea
or movement doubtless originates with somebody but back of such
"originations" or initiations there are favoring conditions,
forces and impulsions. The stage is set by life and the ages;
the actor enters and the show begins. In the instance in question,
the stage was set by our whole modern system of civilization.
The war lords were the "Deus ex machine"-the show was a real
one-a tragedy.
The true origin
of this war must be looked for in the economic field. Our economic
system is the very complicated result of all our creeds, philosophies
and social customs. It is therefore impossible to understand
the working of the economic forces without understanding the
foundation upon which this system of forces is based. A short
list of works on the subject is given at the end of this book.
A plain statement here will be enough.
Germany was committed
to a policy of indefinite industrial expansion. This artificial
expansion had reached its limits. Germany was on the verge of
bankruptcy. Only a victorious war could avoid a national catastrophe;
she played her last card, and lost despite her gigantic power,
the greatest ever displayed by any nation. The leading European
states were not able to overpower her for a long time. This
writing is not intended as an apology for Germany, much less
to praise her or her war lords. German purposes were nationally
narrow and nationally selfish to the root; her methods were
inhuman but Germany displayed power; and without the understanding
of power, Human Engineering is impossible.
It is possibly
a fault of the writer's military training, but it seems to him
that the "General Staff" point of view has as much claim to
consideration as any other among the many different interpretations
of history-perhaps it has more. It is not the primary aim of
the general staff to "fight," very far from it. Their primary
aim is "victory" and all the better if victory be possible without
a fight. Strategy, brain-work, intelligence, knowledge of facts-these
are the chief weapons; brutal fighting is only a last resort.
It is highly important to bear that in mind. Soldiers and engineers
do not argue-they act. Germany affords the first example of
a philosophy or a society having for its main purpose the generating
of power to "do things." It seems only reasonable and intelligent
to analyse the history of the war from the engineer's point
of view, which, in this case, happens to coincide with the military
point of view. It must be clearly understood that the modern
general staff, or military, point of view has very little or
nothing to do with the romance or poetry of war. War to-day
is a grim business-but "business" before all else. It has to
mobilize all the resources of a nation and generate power to
the limit of its capacity. The conduct of war to-day is a technological
affair-its methods have to be engineering methods. To crush
an obstacle, there is need of a giant hammer, and the more mass
that can be given it and the greater the force put behind it,
the more deadly will be the blow. Prior to the World War technology
had not been mobilized on so vast a scale nor confronted with
a task so gigantic. Mobilized technology has revealed and demonstrated
the fact that it is possible to generate almost unlimited power
and has shown the way to do it; at the same time it has demonstrated
the measureless potency of engineering and our utter helplessness
without it. Technology is comparatively a new science; by some
it is called a "semi-science" because it deals primarily with
the application of science to practical issues. But when it
became necessary "to do things," an engineer had to be called;
the general staff had to adopt his view, and all other practices
and traditions were bent to his ideas.
I have already
repeatedly pointed out that the progress of technology proceeds
according to a law like that of a rapidly increasing geometrical
progression, and I have stressed the danger of inattention to
any phenomena, force or movement that conforms to such a law.
We have only to recollect the story of the simple but very greedy
farmer who was very happy to make a contract with a laborer
for a month's work, paying him only one cent the first day,
twice as much the second, twice for the third, and so on to
the end. Behold! The bill for the month ran into millions of
dollars and the farmer was ruined. Such is the deadly secret
of the geometrical progression. Violent readjustments await
any society whose ethics, jurisprudence and the like do not
keep pace with the developments of engineering.
Engineers are
the wizards who, using the results of scientific research, can
subjugate or release the concealed powers of nature. The supreme
factor is the use of the mind-the exponential function of time-the
time-binding energy of man. From that we have to take our start
because that is the source of human power.
The German philosophy,
as a whole, has its definite place in the history of philosophy;
and the first thing to consider are those philosophic writers
who directly and indirectly have contributed to the building
up of German power. Hegel greatly affected the building up of
the German mind-strange as it may seem; but Hegel was greatly
under the influence of the work of Fichte, and Fichte in turn
under that of Spinoza. All of them were, in a way, mathematicians
in their methods and philosophy, as much as they could be in
their time. I said "strange," because it is significant that
the mathematical part of their philosophy was just the part
which built up the German power. But if we look into it, it
is not strange.
It had to be so,
because mathematical and mechanical methods are the only ones
by which power can be understood and built. Hegel in 1805 lectured
on history of philosophy, pure mathematics and natural law.
It would be hard to find a better combination for a philosophy
of power. That is precisely what this philosophy was. It influenced
not only German philosophy but even German theology, and through
these channels it sank deep into the national consciousness.
It affected every phase of life. An immense cult of disciples
arose. Each one added something to that philosophy of power.
One of the most brilliant representatives of this movement is
Professor Oswald, who in his Monist Sermons gave the
famous advice: "Do not waste energy but give it value." The
German understanding of the great value of technology directly
applied that principle to their philosophy, law, ethics, politics,
and so on.
With increase
of population, the problem of the State becomes more and more
pressing. There are many theories about the state. For the purpose
of the moment it is important to realize that a state is the
governing center of an accumulation of human beings-of time-binding
powers-increasing exponential functions of time. These powers,
though the same in kind, differ in degree and in respect of
individuality. If they are to be united so as to constitute
a whole, they must be given a common aim; they must, so to speak,
be reduced to a common base; if they be respectively Xm,
Yn, Zp, and so on, we can
not unite them and compute the whole by adding the exponents;
but if we give them a common base-a common aim or purpose-then
we can readily represent the magnitudes of the whole constituted
by them; if we take X to be their common aim or base,
then, if Y=aX, Z=bX, and so on, we shall have:
Xm.Yn.Zp
. . . = Xm.an.Xn.bp.Xp
. . . = (an. bp . . .)Xm+n+p
. . .
The
last expression, where the parenthetical coefficient is
the product of individualities, serves to represent the
united powers of all in terms of X, the common base,
purpose or aim.
Let us look at
the matter in another way. One mechanical "horse-power" is less
than the power of one living horse. One living horse can do
more work than one mechanical horse-power, but in using more
than one living horse at one time we get less work than by using
the same number of mechanical horse-powers; the reason is very
obvious. The mechanical horse-powers are the same in kind, equal,
and constant, but living horses differ in character, they are
not equal, and each one is a variable. Hence mechanical horse-powers
can be added or multiplied arithmetically, but the powers of
living horses can not, except very roughly; the living horses
of a team interfere with each other; they do not pull together,
as we say, and energy is lost.
The German mathematical
philosophy or theory of the state did not express itself in
just this way, but the foregoing gives a clue to it. Germany
united the powers of living men and women and children: it gave
them a common base; It gave them one common "social" mood and
aim; they all became consolidated in service of that which is
called the State; they studied and taught for the State; they
worked, lived and died for the State: the State was their idol,
King and God.
Such was the aim
of German philosophy, theology, law and science. The establishment
of ONE AIM for all was the decisive factor. It is obvious that
if we want to inspire 60 Millions of individuals with one aim,
this aim can not be private or personal. It must be a higher
aim, collective, general, impersonal, in some way uniting and
including all personal aims. I shall call it simply a collective
aim. But collective aims may differ profoundly in kind;
out of personal or egoistic aims there grows a series of collective
aims, increasing in generality, such as: (1) Family aims; (2)
association, congregation, club aims; (3) class or professional
aims; (4) national or race aims; and finally (5) HUMAN AIMS-the
natural aims for the time-binding class of life. The fatal error
of German political philosophy was an error of aim- her aim
was too low-too narrow-the welfare of a state instead of the
welfare of Humanity.
In the case of
Germany, the national aim was equivalent to the state aim. German
philosophy made the "state" equivalent to the "good" and equivalent
to "power." Or course such philosophy influenced the whole national
life in every detail; in consequence Germany proclaimed herself
the first nation of the world, and this soon evolved into a
plan for the conquest of the world. The German General Staff
as an institution had, par excellence, as its aim and first
object, "power," "concentration of power" and "efficiency."
It took the leadership in all branches of life and industry.
Militarism and industrialism are almost synonymous from the
mechanical point of view; they are both of them power. They
both have to use the same scientific methods and in the present
conditions of the world they are dependent upon each other,
for war cannot be waged without strong industries. Here we have
to face the fact that geometrically progressing industry can
not live without new markets, which under present conditions
have been largely acquired, directly or indirectly, by the power
of the army; and this has been the case with Germany. If we
curse Germany for being a "military nation" we can, with no
less justice, curse her for being a completely "industrialized
nation." If we add to that her nationally selfish and narrow
national aim, we will readily understand this "world peach."
Those who have tasted it know something of its sweetness.
There is no need
to go into further details. Special books give us all the data.
That which is of interest is the impersonal fact that what was
the strength and power of Germany is the best
possible illustration we have had of what science and a sort
of mathematical philosophy are able to accomplish, even when
directed, not to the welfare of Humanity, but to that of a relatively
small group of people. The above-cited political philosophies
had a very pronounced effect upon Marx. One of the branches
of socialism is the so-called state socialism. State socialists,
as the name indicates, believe that the state should assume
the most important functions in society. It is obvious that
in monarchical countries where "god-given" rulers represent
the state, such a theory is not unwelcome, as it gives the rulers
an opportunity to show a sort of "advanced liberalism," which
serves to strengthen their power. The astute Bismarck can not
be suspected of being a progressionist in the modern sense but,
being a product of German culture and philosophy, all his ideals
were those of a strong state. He was a proclaimed advocate of
state socialism. Since 1879 at least, Bismarck was considered
almost the leading spirit of paternal state socialism. He was
a believer and promoter of the close relation of the state and
the railways, keeping always in view a thorough nationalization
which he finally accomplished. This fact eliminated from German
public life all that phase of corruption which private ownership
of railroads brings in any country, the railroad being the very
life of any country.
To sum up: Germany
applied the most scientific methods to build up her national
power; she understood the elements of "power," for they were
disclosed to her by her science and her philosophy. She applied
technological methods in every part of her civil life, and thus
built her gigantic power. Her industrial life followed the military
way; her military strength was built on industrial power. And
so the vicious circle. Germany adopted a collective aim
instead of a personal individualistic aim, and because of this
broader aim, she was able to mobilize and to keep mobilized
all her moral, political and industrial forces for long years
before the war. The direct effect of this system of continuous
mobilization was over-production. For this she desperately needed
new markets. The cheapest and quickest way to acquire them,
if they were not to be grabbed otherwise, was to conquer them
by a victorious war. Her plans progressed according to the program,
all except the victory in the battle fields.
This war was a
calamity of unprecedented magnitude for the world and it is
our duty to study it dispassionately and learn the lesson of
it, if we do not want to be moral accomplices of this great
modern crime, by letting the world drift into an even worse
catastrophe. We have to arouse ourselves from our inertia and
go to the bottom of this problem and analyse it ruthlessly,
no matter whether the analysis be pleasant or not. We must value
everyone of our "ten sacred dead" at least as much as we value
one rabbit killed in scientific laboratories, and take the lesson
to heart or be prepared for a repetition of world slaughter.
If Human Engineering
had been established long ago our social system would have been
different, our civilization would have been much higher, this
war would have been avoided. We do not need to delude ourselves.
The World War was the result of badly balanced social and economic
forces. The world needs other "balances of power" than such
as are devised by lawyers and politicians, by single-selfish
or group-selfish interests. Humanity is reaching out for a science
and art of human guidance based upon a right understanding of
human nature.
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