The World War gave the clearest answer to the opinion that one can achieve political success by preserving a careful neutrality as a third power. What have the neutrals of the World War achieved practically? Were they the laughing third one, for instance? Or does one believe that, in a similar event, Germany would play another role?
And let no one think that the reason for this lies only in the magnitude of the World War. No, in the future, all wars, insofar as they involve great nations, will be Folk’s wars of the most gigantic dimensions. As a neutral State in any other European conflict, Germany, however, would possess no more importance than Holland or Switzerland or Denmark, and so on, in the World War. Does one really think that after the event we would get out of nowhere the strength to play the role against the remaining victor which we did not venture to play in a union with one of the two combatants?
At any rate, the World War has proven one thing explicitly: whoever conducts himself as a neutral in great world historical conflicts, may perhaps at first make a little business, but, in terms of power politics, he will thereby ultimately also be excluded from a codetermination of the world’s fate.
Thus, had the American Union preserved her neutrality in the World War, today she would be regarded as a power of the second rank, regardless of whether England or Germany had emerged as a victor. By entering the War, she raised herself to England’s naval strength, but in international political terms marked herself as a power of decisive importance. Since her entry into the World War the American Union is appraised in a completely different way. It lies in the nature of mankind’s forgetfulness no longer to know [to forget], after only a short time, what the general judgement of a situation had been only a few years before. Just as today we detect a complete disregard of Germany’s former greatness in the speeches of many foreign statesmen, just as little, conversely, can we appraise the extent of the increase in value that the American Union has experienced in our judgement since her entry into the World War.
This is also the most compelling statesmanlike justification for Italy’s entry into the War against her former allies. Had Italy not taken this step, she would now share the role of Spain, no matter how the dice had rolled.
The fact that she carried out the much criticised step to an active participation in the World War brought a rise in her position and a strengthening of the same which has found its ultimate crowning expression in Fascism.
Without her entry into the War, the latter would have been a completely unthinkable phenomenon.
The German can ponder this with or without bitterness. It is important to learn from history, especially if its teachings speak to us in such a compelling way.
Thus the belief that through a prudent, reserved neutrality vis-à-vis the developing conflicts in Europe and elsewhere, one can some day reap the benefits thereof as a laughing third one, is false and idiotic. In general, freedom is preserved neither by begging nor by cheating. And also not by work and industry, but exclusively by struggle, and indeed by one’s own struggle. Thus it is very easily possible that more weight is attached to the will than to the deed. Not seldom, in the framework of a wise alliance policy, nations have achieved successes unrelated to the success of their arms. But fate does not always measure a nation which boldly stakes its life according to the dimensions of its deeds, but rather, very frequently, according to the dimensions of its will. The history of Italian unification in the nineteenth century is noteworthy for this. But the World War also shows how a whole number of States can achieve extraordinary political successes less through their military accomplishments [successes] than through the foolhardy boldness with which they take sides and the doggedness with which they hold out.
If Germany wants to put an end to her period of enslavement by all, she must under all circumstances actively try to enter into a combination of powers in order to participate in the future shaping of European life in terms of power politics.
The objection that such participation contains a grievous risk is correct. But, after all, does one really believe that we will achieve freedom without taking a risk? Or does one think that there has ever been a deed of world history which was not linked with a risk? Was Frederick The Great’s decision, for instance, to participate in the first Silesian War, not linked with a risk? Or did Germany’s unification by Bismarck entail no dangers? No, a thousand times no! Beginning with man’s birth up to his death, everything is questionable. Only death seems certain. But for this very reason the ultimate commitment is not the worst for the reason that one day, in one way or another, it will be demanded.
Naturally it is a matter of political sagacity to choose the stake in such a way that it yields the highest possible gain. But not to stake anything at all for fear, perhaps, of picking the wrong horse means to renounce a Folk’s future. The objection that such an action may have the character of a risky gamble can most easily be refuted by simple reference to previous historical experience. By a risky gamble we understand a game in which from the outset the chances of winning are subject to the fate of chance. This will never be the case in politics. For the more the ultimate decision lies in the darkness of the future, the more is the conviction of the possibility or impossibility of a success erected on humanly perceptible factors. The task of a nation’s political leadership is to weigh these factors. The result of this examination, then, must also lead to a decision. Thus this decision is consonant with one’s own insight, and is sustained by faith in possible success on the basis of this insight. Hence I can just as little call a politically decisive deed a risky gamble, just because its outcome is not one hundred percent certain, as an operation undertaken by a surgeon the outcome of which likewise will not necessarily be successful. From time immemorial it has always been in keeping with the nature of great men to execute deeds whose success is even doubtful and indefinite with the utmost energy, if the necessity thereof as such lay before them, and if after a mature examination of all conditions this very action alone could be considered.
The joy of responsibility in the framing of great decisions in the struggles of nations will, of course, be all the greater the more the actors, by observation of their Folk, can conclude that even a miscarriage will not be able to destroy the nation’s vital strength. For in the long run a Folk, inwardly healthy at its core, can never be effaced through defeats on the battlefield. Thus insofar as a Folk possesses this inner health, with the prerequisite of a sufficient racial importance, the courage for difficult undertakings can be the greater since even the failure of the same would not, by far, signify the downfall of such a Folk. And here Clausewitz is right, when in his principles he asserts that, with a healthy Folk, such a defeat may repeatedly lead to a later resurgence, and that, conversely, only cowardly subjection, that is, a supine surrender to fate, can lead to ultimate destruction. The neutrality, however, which is today recommended to our Folk as the only action possible, is really nothing but a volitionless surrender to a fate determined by foreign powers. And only therein lies the symptom and the possibility of our decline. If, on the contrary, our Folk itself had undertaken abortive attempts to achieve freedom, a factor that could be beneficial to our Folk’s strength would lie in the very manifestation of this attitude. For let it not be said that it is political sagacity which holds us back from such steps. No, it is a wretched cowardice and a lack of principle which in this case, as so often in history, one tries to confuse with intelligence. Obviously a Folk under the duress of foreign powers can be forced by circumstances to endure years of foreign oppression. But the less a Folk can seriously do outwardly against overpowering forces, the more, however, will its internal life press toward freedom and leave nothing untried that could be suitable for changing the momentarily given condition one day by staking such a Folk’s entire strength. One will then endure the yoke of a foreign conqueror, but with clenched fists and gritted teeth, waiting for the hour which offers the first opportunity of shaking off the tyrant.