Appendix C.

National Service.

Lord Milner's Definition.

Much controversy has been aroused in 1915 on the exact meaning of the National Service advocated by many politicians. Lord Milner has stated with lucidity what he considers National Service means:—

"It is true that some of those who now advocate compulsory military service for the duration of the war—I speak of the members of the National Service League, to which I have myself belonged almost since its foundation—have for a number of years past been trying to convert the country to the principle of the "nation in arms." What they preached, and preached quite openly, in season and out of season, was that the defence of the country should rest as an equal obligation on all its citizens, that there should be a national militia—on the Swiss, not the Prussian, model—every able-bodied man being required in his youth to pass through a period of military training and being liable, while of military age, to be called out for home defence But this propaganda, I regret to say, never achieved any great measure of success. It was cold-shouldered by both the great political parties, while the bulk of the nation, if not hostile, yet remained quite indifferent to our warnings, and regarded the whole movement as a fad. When the war broke out, and all their warnings were justified, these old advocates of National Service, so far from trying to make capital out of the war for the furtherance of their own scheme, deliberately put their whole propaganda on the shelf, and have contributed little, if anything, to the demand which has now arisen from many and wholly new quarters for compulsory recruiting That movement is, indeed, quite distinct from anything that they ever contemplated or worked for. The essence of their proposal was the deliberate adoption of universal military training in time of peace, as the best means of preparing the nation to stand the shock of war, or haply to avert that calamity altogether.

"But there is no question, and indeed no possibility, of using the present emergency to set up National Service as a permanent system. What we are now dismissing is a temporary measure to meet art immediate need. The very last way in which those who believe in universal service at all times as the fairest and most efficient basis of national defence could have wished to see that system put to the test is by its hasty adoption in the middle of a great war. If, nevertheless, they support, as most of them no doubt do the demand for a temporary measure of compulsion at the present time, it simply because they believe in its absolute necessity if we are to avert defeat, and because, no doubt also, they agree with its underlying principle—equality of sacrifice."