to exploit the
weak. Such a combination is being attempted as the outcome of
Washington; but it can only diminish, in the long run, the little
freedom now enjoyed by the weaker nations. The essential evil of the
present system, as Socialists have pointed out over and over again, is
production for profit instead of for use. A man or a company or a nation
produces goods, not in order to consume them, but in order to sell them.
Hence arise competition and exploitation and all the evils, both in
internal labour problems and in international relations. The development
of Chinese commerce by capitalistic methods means an increase, for the
Chinese, in the prices of the things they export, which are also the
things they chiefly consume, and the artificial stimulation of new needs
for foreign goods, which places China at the mercy of those who supply
these goods, destroys the existing contentment, and generates a feverish
pursuit of purely material ends. In a socialistic world, production will
be regulated by the same authority which represents the needs of the
consumers, and the whole business of competitive buying and selling will
cease. Until then, it is possible to have peace by submission to
exploitation, or some degree of freedom by continual war, but it is not
possible to have both peace and freedom. The success of the present
American policy may, for a time, secure peace, but will certainly not
secure freedom for the weaker nations, such as Chinese. Only
international Socialism can secure both; and owing to the stimulation of
revolt by capitalist oppression, even peace alone can never be secure
until international Socialism is established throughout the world.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 86: The interests of England, apart from the question of
India, are roughly the same as those of America. Broadly speaking,
British interests are allied with American finance, as against the
pacifistic and agrarian tendencies of the Middle West.]

[Footnote 87: It is interesting to observe that, since the Washington
Conference, the American Administration has used the naval ratio there
agreed upon to induce Congress to consent to a larger expenditure on the
navy than would otherwise have been sanctioned. Expenditure on the navy
is unpopular in America, but by its parade of pacifism the Government
has been enabled to extract the necessary money out of the pockets of
reluctant taxpayers. See _The Times'_ New York Correspondent's telegram
in