. The Great war. to temptationand violated her obligation. The Germans claim that their invasion of Belgium wasjustified by the intrigues of the Belgians, evidence forwhich they discovered several weeks after their invasionbegan. The posteriority of the discovery destroys its effi-cacy as proof of the justice of Germanys intentions, whilethe evidence itself is trivial and unconvincing. The German government claimed that the French in-tended to steal the advantage of a march through Belgium;but this assertion has never been substantiated. Germanshave endeavored to extenuate their own transgress
. The Great war. to temptationand violated her obligation. The Germans claim that their invasion of Belgium wasjustified by the intrigues of the Belgians, evidence forwhich they discovered several weeks after their invasionbegan. The posteriority of the discovery destroys its effi-cacy as proof of the justice of Germanys intentions, whilethe evidence itself is trivial and unconvincing. The German government claimed that the French in-tended to steal the advantage of a march through Belgium;but this assertion has never been substantiated. Germanshave endeavored to extenuate their own transgression bydeclaring that Great Britain also broke her obligation, inspirit if not in fact. They assert that she would not havebeen disposed to fulfil her stipulation under the treaty byintervening to protect Belgian neutrality in all circum-stances. They forget that there is an essential distinctionbetween a direct violation of Belgian neutrality and a failureto defend that neutrality if assailed by another power. No. Forts on the Franco-German frontier. The French since iSji have expendedlarge sums in carrying out the plans of their engineers to protect their frontieradjoining that of Germany by the fortresses of Verdun, Toul, Epinal, and Belfort;while the Belgian border, because of their reliance on the observance of Belgiumsneutrality, was protected by the less powerful fortresses of Maubeuge and , the Germans, to reach Paris had the alternative of battering againstthese strong fortifications or of going around either end and violating the territoryof a neutral country. On the south vjas Switzerland, a mountainous country easilydefendedi on the north, Luxemburg and Belgium, with the roads to France barredonly by the forts at Liege and Namur. Germany, not trusting that the Frenchwould respect the neutrality of Belgium, protected her entire frontier. Moral Factors in Belgium, France, Italy 97 British sin of omission, much less a hypothetical one, canever serve as ju
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Keywords: ., boo, bookcentury1900, bookdecade1910, booksubjectworldwar19141918
