The Cost Of Peace.

New York Times 100 years ago today, July 3, 1913:
    The change in the tax bill, just passed by the Imperial Parliament, by which Germany is to meet its $250,000,000 increase in the military establishment of the Empire, is a significant one. The minimum taxed under the original bill was $2,500; it is now reduced to $1,250. That brings within the tax all incomes between $1,250 and $2,500, which must be a very large number. It will include some of the higher grade of skilled artisans, a very large proportion of professional incomes, a considerable portion of the small traders, and probably a still larger part of the moderate landowners. Nearly all these belong to the great middle class, and some of them — the landowners in particular — have been the stanch supporters of the Government.
    It is the avowed policy of the Emperor to preserve peace through the utmost practicable preparation for war. His late silver jubilee was largely given up to unstinted acknowledgment, at home and abroad, of his Majesty's success in this policy. It must he remembered that it has its bearing quite as much on the internal affairs of the Empire as on its exterior relations. The development of the army and navy acts, and is intended to act, as an outlet for the warlike spirit of the nation, for not only the legitimate and sober military sentiment, but for the Chauvinism which inevitably springs up among powerful, advancing, and energetic people. The Emperor has watched the military establishment absorb the great body of adventurous and restless young men in the ruling class, and has encouraged them to be as martial, even as bellicose, as they choose, reserving to himself the task of seeing to it that the army did not fight, though always ready to do so.
    Dr. David Starr Jordan in a paper contributed to the World Peace Foundation, has called attention to the immense cost of this policy and has ventured the opinion that, so far as our own country is concerned, "the large nations in Europe or Asia, overloaded with debt and therefore short of funds, must first borrow money in New York before any of them could make war on the United States." That is a somewhat extreme view, but the present situation of Germany clearly shows that the Emperor's policy is inevitably tremendously burdensome and that some day the limit of endurable burden will be reached. To the burden itself no one can fix a certain term. The Emperor's "non-recurring" taxes were hardly announced when France replied by strenuous measures for the increase of her army. When they are completed the relative strength of Germany will hardly he changed, and it will again be necessary to impose great sacrifices on Germany. So far from such efforts being "non-recurring," each one leads to another. When the strain becomes too great, the Government will lose its control of the Reichstag and radical changes in policy will ensue.