Has Mr. Beck really not noticed in this promise the omission of the word neutrality?  By the Treaty of 1839 Belgium enjoyed not only independence and integrity, but also perpetual neutrality.  Does Great Britain offer to fight Germany for the enforcement of the Treaty of 1839?  No!  Because hereafter the word neutrality is dropped from her guarantee, and since she alone of all the great powers has not ratified the articles of The Hague Convention concerning neutrals she alone will be able to disregard the inviolability of Belgian soil, even though Belgium kept strictly neutral in a future war.

And what, finally, does she guarantee her?  Independence and integrity!  That is exactly the same that Germany had promised her.  For this Belgium had to be dragged through the horrors of war, and the good name of Germany as that of an honest nation had to be dragged through the mire, and hatred and murder had to be started, that Belgium might get on the battlefield, from the insufficient support of Russia and France and England, what Germany had freely offered her—­independence and integrity.

Casual readers would not miss the word neutrality from Sir Edward Grey’s guarantee, because they do not differentiate between the words integrity, independence, and neutrality.  Great Britain and her ally Japan, marching through China into Kiao-Chau, may be said to have violated China’s neutrality, but not her independence, nor, so long as they refrain from annexing any Chinese territory, her integrity.

Fixing the Blame.

Nobody familiar with the careful work of Sir Edward Grey can for one moment believe that Sir Edward inadvertently dropped the word, just as little as J. Ramsay Macdonald and other British leaders believe that he inadvertently dropped one of the two remaining words, integrity and independence, when he told Parliament of Germany’s guarantee, and why Great Britain should not accept it, but go to war.

When the blame for the horrors committed in Belgium are assessed these facts must be remembered: 

1.  Belgium was by treaty bound to maintain fortresses.

2.  France tempted her to commit “acts friendly” to herself, by which Belgium forfeited her rights to the protection of The Hague articles governing the rights and duties of neutrals.

3.  England urged her to take up arms, when she had only asked to have her integrity guaranteed by diplomatic intervention. (Nos. 153, 155.)

4.  Germany promised her independence and integrity and peace, while England, quietly dropping her guarantee of neutrality “in future years,” promised her independence and integrity and war.

5.  And Sir Edward Grey was able to sway Parliament, according to one of the leaders of Parliament himself, only because he misrepresented Germany’s guarantee, and, having dropped, in his note to Belgium, the word “neutrality,” dropped yet another of the two remaining words, integrity and independence.