§ 28 Militarism

The rule of financial capital, of the bank barons and the trust magnates, finds expression in another phenomenon of the utmost importance, namely, in the unprecedented growth of expenditure on armaments - upon army, navy, and air force. The reason for this is obvious. In earlier days no brigand ever dreamed of world dominion. Now, however, the thoughts of the imperialists are seriously turned in this direction. Never before was there a contest between such monstrously strong State trusts. It is as an outcome of this new situation that the States have armed to the teeth. The Great Powers, professional robbers, kept their eyes on one another, for each dreaded lest his neighbour should attack him in W e rear. Every Great Power finds it necessary to maintain an army, not only for colonial service, not only for the repression of the workers, but in addition for the fight with fellow brigands. If any of the Powers introduces some new system of armaments, the other Powers eagerly endeavour to outdo the advance, for they fear to be left behind in the race. Thus ensues a mad rivalry in armaments, each State trying to outdo the rest. Gigantic enterprises are formed, the trusts of the cannon kings - Putilov, Krupp, Armstrong, Vickers, etc. The armament trusts make enormous profits; they are in league with the general staffs of the armies; they endeavour to throw fuel on the flames, to promote opportunities for conflict, seeing that the size of their profits depends upon war.

Such was the crazy picture presented by capitalist society just before the great war. The State trusts were bristling with bayonets; on land, at sea, and in the air, everything had been made ready for the world struggle; in the various national budgets, the military and naval estimates assumed an ever larger place. In Britain, for example, in 1875 the expenditure for war purposes comprised 386 per cent of the annual estimates for all purposes, this being not much more than one-third; by 1907-8, the proportion had risen to 486 per cent, nearly half. In the USA, the proportion of national expenditure upon war purposes for the year 1908 was 569 per cent, this being considerably more than half. It was the same in other lands. ' Prussian militarism' flourished in all the great State trusts. The armament kings were filling their treasuries. The whole world was hastening at an accelerating pace towards the bloodiest of all wars, towards the world war of imperialism.

Of exceptional interest was the armament rivalry between the British and the German bourgeoisies. In the year 1912 England decided to lay down three superdreadnoughts for every two laid down by Germany. In 1913, according to the naval estimates, the German North Sea fleet was to contain 17 dreadnoughts as against 21 British dreadnoughts; in 1916 the number was to be 26 German and 36 British; and so on.

The expenditure upon army and navy increased as follows:

In the course of 20 years the expenditure had been doubled; in the case of Japan it had been multiplied by 13. The armament dance became even more lively shortly before the war. France expended for war purposes £450,000,000 in 1910, and £74,000,000 in 1914. Germany spent £47,800,000 in 1906, and £94,300,000 in 1914; that is to say, the expenditure was doubled in eight years. Even more extraordinary was the British expenditure. In 1900 this amounted to £49,900,000 ; in 1910 it was already £69,400,000 ; in 1914, the figures were £80,000,000. In the year 1913 the naval expenditure of Britain alone amounted to a larger sum than the total of what all the Powers had spent upon their fleets in 1886. As regards tsarist Russia, in the year 1892 the country spent upon armaments £29,300,000; in 1902, £42,100,000; in 1906, £52,900,000. In the year 1914 the Russian war budget amounted to £97,500,000.

Expenditure upon war purposes swallowed an enormous proportion of the national revenue. In the case of Russia, for example, one-third of the budgeted sum was devoted to armaments indeed, if we take loans into account, the proportion was even greater. Here are the figures. For every £100 spent in tsarist Russia, there were spent:

The budgets of other States were of the same character. Look at 'democratic' Britain, for instance. In the year 1904, for every £100 spent, there were spent: