not of wars of aggression, but of wars of defence and unification.
Since it was welded by blood and iron into the great human organism of
the last forty years it has not been employed beyond the frontiers of
Germany until last year.

Can the same be said of Russian militarism or of French militarism or
of British navalism?

We are told the things differ in quality. The answer is what about the
intent and the uses made. German militarism has kept peace and has
not emerged beyond its own frontier until threatened with universal
attack. Russian militarism has waged wars abroad, far beyond the
confines of Russian territory; French militarism, since it was
overthrown at Sedan, has carried fire and sword across all Northern
Africa, has penetrated from the Atlantic to the Nile, has raided
Tonquin, Siam, Madagascar, Morocco, while English navalism in the last
forty years has bombarded the coast lines, battered the ports, and
landed raiding parties throughout Asia and Africa, to say nothing of
the well nigh continuous campaigns of annexation of the British army
in India, Burma, South Africa, Egypt, Tibet, or Afghanistan, within
the same period.

As to the quality of the materialism of the great Continental Powers
there is nothing to prefer in the French and Russian systems to
the German system. Each involved enormous sacrifices on the people
sustaining it. We are asked, however, to believe that French
militarism is maintained by a "democracy" and German militarism by an
"autocracy." Without appealing to the captive Queen of Madagascar for
an opinion on the authenticity of French democracy we may confine the
question to the elected representatives of the two peoples.