War Crisis

Geopolitics And The World

New and Terrifying Background of World War II

r THIS> condensation of a notable article in the April issue of Pacific Affairs” (an American magazine), by R. S.

Nathan, presents the newer and truer viewpoint on World War 11.

It is now well known that the world conquest plan which Hitler is following actually is the plan formulated in the Geopolitical Institute in Munich, and modified according to changing circum stances by Professor Haushofer and his huge staff.

Part of the article is reproduced here to show the new and somewhat terrify ing background of this war, as compared with World War I.

But the comment must at once be made that Mr. Nathan, in his survey, does not take sufficiently into account the rapid, far-reaching and epochal devel opment of air-transport and air warfare.

The point must soon be reached when air-power will alter both the naval and the military set-up.

Mr. Nathan considers the situation only in relation to sea-power and land power. But the third, air-power, before another year is gone, will be just as important as either. And it is obvious that air-power may upset all these fine, scientific, far-reaching calculations relat ing to sea' and land power. rE discovery that the whole of the globe is a single unity and that there are no Seven Seas but one single ocean, was made by early geopoli ticians a century ago. It was a revolu tionary discovery because it meant that any action, taken anywhere, is liable to produce reactions at the antipodes. It was so revolutionary, indeed, that many nations and men persevered in isolation ist superstitions up to our time.

The so-called Second World War actu ally is the first deserving of this name.

This is the reason why it is so difficult to realise its scope. In the geopolitics of war, the present struggle takes precisely the place which the discovery of the New World occupied in the geopolitics of peace. While then the whole world became an integral entity, now the whole war must be seen as an indivisible occur rence.

The application of geographical know ledge on politics and strategy is called geopolitics. Geopolitics does not claim, as many seem to believe, that everything that happens within the sphere of poli tics, is determined by geography alone; there is no science on earth that could dare to eliminate the unpredictable human factor. It is the human factor that makes for offensive or defensive spirit and for clear geopolitical insight or isolationist superstitions two aspects which alone can determine the outcome of wars.

Geopolitics claims, however, that geo graphy, the face of the earth, is the least variable of all factors determining his tory, and that geopolitical conclusions, therefore, are considerably safer than others.

Geopolitical considerations dominate Axis strategy. To Hitler, this war is a straight duel between land-power and sea-power wherein he himself represents the land-power. Certain that the time of the supremacy of sea-power over land power is over and that Mahan’s theories have ceased to be applicable in the pre

sent stage of technology, his victory appears to him a foregone conclusion.

THIS conclusion is wrong, because Hit ler’s premises are but three-quarters correct. It is true that the suprem acy of sea-power over land-power is past history. To-day the command of the firm ground, of deep hinterlands, again has become the condition of victory. The successful landing manoeuvres of the Japanese do not contradict this theory, because they take advantage of a Grand World Strategy based on land-power, that compels the Western sea-powers to disperse their forces and to be locally inferior everywhere as long as they insist on fighting in precepts of sea-power.

It is also true that Germany is a land power; but it is untrue that she is the land-power. She is the land-power only as long as the Western nations persevere in their untenable position as sea-powers.

GERMANY is a land-power partly because she cannot ever hope to become a sea-power. The British Isles bar her only access to the oceans.

England, on the other hand, is ideally located to rule the waves. Kaiser Wil helm II once thought of trying to out fight England on her terms. Hitler never even considered this possibility. He is opposing sea-power by land-power. His attention is focussed on the only point where the British Empire can be severed by land action—the Suez Canal. Ger many must capture the Near and Middle East.

Germany’s rise to world-power depends on her conquest of what the Nazis call Lehensraum (living space). This living space is no indefinite dream, but a very definite, clearlv outlined area that stretches from Hamburg to Basra, from the North Sea to the Persian Gulf.

Only the complete subjugation of Rus sia, a physical impossibility, could give to Germany access to the Pacific. An expansion, however, that would follow the tracks of the late Kaiser’s Bagdad Rail road. can do this and more: a German Empire, stretching from Hamburg to Basra, would not only dominate the Mediterranean, the Suez Canal, the Persian Gulf and thus have access to the Pacific via the Indian Ocean, it would also gain the freedom of the Atlantic.

For the conquest of the Near East would seal the fate of the British Emnire by severing its life-line, and degrade Eng land to a third-rate Power limited to the British Isles. It is hard to see how these tiny isles could continue to bar the Neo- German Reich from the Atlantic—par ticularly if we consider the decline of sea-power and the necessity of depth to defence.

The establishment of German-world power within the boundaries of German “living space” is an ambitious programme but it is also a logical and, at least in theory, a feasible programme. Compared with it. any plan envisioning the con quest of Russia appears nonsensical.

Hitler may well have considered its successful execution a foregone conclu sion. depending only on the destruction of French and Russian offensive power.

Therefore, his eyes are already focussed on measures that would enable him to control the world.

The very moment the United States

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recognised the danger menacing it, Hitler knew that he would not be able to rest on the laurels of the conquered living-space. He knew that the USA would have to fight for something that might be called their “breathing space” unless they chose to surrender unconditionally to the New Order to maintain the markets on which the American living standard depends. He knew that the United States would have to try preventing him from gaining a secure foothold on the world’s bridge, the Near East.

The only other way to stop him would be by direct invasion of Germany via France or Russia, and Hitler probably doubts that USA will be able to do that in the course of 1942—the year that to him is the year of decision. The logical strategy, to forestall or to cut off strong American intervention at the Suez Canal, is an attempt to isolate the United States within the Western Hemisphere until the time will come when the master of the European-Asian World-Island can deal with the American satellite continent at leisure.

It is here where Japan enters the picture. Close our doors to the Indian Ocean, add a Hitler-dominated Europe and North Africa, and America is isolated indeed. India and China are at the mercy of the Axis. England is doomed.

The Lebensraum Empire is secure.

ALLEGEDLY, the Fuehrer would have preferred the Japanese to strike against Russia instead of the USA.

Yet what would have been the result of a Japanese attack on Russia? Granted for a moment that Stalin has depleted his Far-Eastern armies to reinforce Mar-

shal Timoshenko, for which there is no definite evidence, General Stern could withdraw into the interior of Siberia where the Japanese have not much to gain and everything to lose. While Japan was preoccupied with Siberia, the United States could have made the Malayan barrier impenetrable. Stalin, obviously one of the coolest political thinkers and strategists of our time, would rather take on the Japanese deep in Siberia than close to their bases.

It appears much more logical that the Japanese struck against the United States, toward the East and the South, because that was part and parcel of Axis Grand Strategy. This means only that they recognise the Axis Grand Strategy as more promising than any independent action—to obtain their very own goals as well as those of their partners. They work withTn the framework of a global strategy designed to establish the world supremacy of the Axis partners.

The practical goal of this Axis Grand Strategy is primarily the closing of the Indian Ocean which by itself suffices to cut off Russia, China, India and the Americas.

The next step, the encirclement of India, foreshadows the juncture of Germany and Japan and the establishment of that true and final axis which the German-Russian pact failed to create; the Eurasian axis, from the Atlantic to the Pacific, from Brest (and Lisbon) to New Guinea and New Zealand. It would cut the world in two.

From the geopolitical point of view, this strategy has certain chances of suecess. We must but realise the true picture of the world at this time in order

to recognise the incredible delusions under which we suffer.

We believe in the teeming millions of stubborn Chinese, but we are unable to help and to use them effectively; we do not even realise yet that the Japanese are wholly sincere when speaking of the Chinese Incident rather than of the war against China. To Japan the fight against China is only an incident, to be settled in time by the overthrow of the present Chinese Government and genu ine Japanese-Chinese collaboration. Rome conquered the ancient world with the effective assistance of her former enemies.

Nor do the Japanese mean to joke if they speak of their hope to dictate the peace in Washington. Once they have finished the first stage of their campaign, they are more than likely to turn against Alaska and to attempt an invasion of North America. They must make this attempt for geopolitical reasons, as well as military ones; they must reduce the threat of a direct offensive against the Japanese Archipelago via Alaska, and of the opening of an avenue into China via Alaska, the Aleutian Islands and Man churia, and they know that one must strike at the heart of the enemy in order to win a war.

Strange as it seems, the Axis geopoli tical set-up is completed by the one power that America so long insisted on considering neutral —Vichy-France. Vichy holds several key positions in this war.

Indo-China is the base for the Japanese position in South-East Asia; French North Africa remains one of the Medi terranean keys, though French Syria has been eliminated. Dakar is the spring board of the Axis against the Americas: and the French Navy can turn the Axis inferiority on the ocean.

This is the geopolitical aspect of the

war which Hitler wants to see continue: the Axis fighting on interior lines—the United Nations fighting under Anglo- Saxon leadership, i.e., in terms of out moded sea-power concepts, on exterior lines; the Axis dominating enough land power to isolate the great land-powers aligned with the Allies —the United Nations trying to storm its land-power bastions from without, the seas; the Axis attempting to cut their lines of com munications and supplies by submarine and aerial warfare.

IT is an aspect that would look dark indeed if the geopolitical world, as pictured in Hitler’s mind, could not be reversed by a simple mental process.

The question whether this mental process will take place, and take place now, spells the difference between victory and defeat. The answer to the Nazi applica tion of geopolitical facts is land-power.

A glance at the map of the world reveals the amazing phenomenon that the land-power par excellence and prin ciple disposes of far less land-power than the sea-power par excellence and prin ciple. The United Nations include China, India and Russia —the largest contigu ous land area of the globe settled by the greater part of all mankind. Germany’s advantages derive less from the actual

land-power which she holds than from the conscious application of land-power strategy.

Here lies the answer to Hitler’s geo political concept: continental Asia. To remove the centre of gravity of Allied strategy from the seas into Asia, means to jump into the circle of interior lines against which the Axis is still battering, instead of battering on exterior lines against the marginal positions which the Axis is already holding.

If the Allies take this decisive step, the geopolitical aspect of the war changes as by a miracle. They will have land power; they will have to apply land power principles instead of outmoded sea-power precepts; they will have the advantage of fighting on interior lines which the Axis holds now; and they will have bases with a depth sufficient to sus tain any offensive. They will have every thing that makes for victory. rE consequences of ,such a basic change in strategy will be particu larly evident in the Pacific area.

While the Allies, for all practical pur poses cut off from India and China, are now facing Japan from the American West Coast and from Australia, they would then face the Pacific Ocean from both sides. Japan is immediately trans formed into a narrow marginal area that must give in to concentric pressure.

Not Australia, but India and China, would serve as springboards for the recapture of the Malayan Peninsula, of the Dutch East Indies and of the Philip pines.

The picture of the Atlantic front would also undergo important changes. The establishment of a new centre of gravity in Allied war geopolitics suggests a change in plans to strike at the heart of Ger many.

While the discussion of plans to take the offensive in Europe and to relieve Russia by the establishment of a second front has been limited so far to weigh ing whether an invasion via Africa or Norway, or else a direct attack on Italy or France, appears more desirable, the accent will then be on the reinforcement of the Red Army proper, rather than on second fronts. The Russian armies, backed up by the tremendous hinterland

depth of all Asia, organised and mobi lised by the Allies, and reinforced not only by Allied war material but also by Allied troops, ought to have a better chance to strike at the heart of Ger many than any armies dependent on maritime supply lines.

IT is self-evident that such a gigantic change in Allied strategy calls for gigantic efforts. Yet it appears some how as if all the great headaches of this war rather shrink once one considers thoroughly the implications of sound geopolitical strategy.

There is, for instance, the crucial problem of shipping space, that seems to jeopardise the best intentions. To-day, the United Nations must not only supply England proper but dispatch great num bers of men and material to far-off places: to Russia and to Australia, to the Near East and to India; and as soon as they succeed in opening a second front on the European Continent, they must send literally millions of men and unheard-of quantities of material to the invasion base. Then these men must be kept supplied.

But this problem would diminish once the United Nations decide to concen trate on the heart of Asia only, tem porarily relinquishing all areas that are not vital to the offensive effort radiating from Asia.

Most important is the fact that China and India possess an abundance of man power and productive potential that needs but organisation. A great num ber of troop transports can be replaced by transports of war material.

It is true that such reorganisation takes time and that time is of the essence. But then, it may not call for so much time as it appears at first sight. China disposes of millions of trained or semi-trained men who are prevented from fighting efficiently for lack of equipment. There are also a million first-rate warriors in India. It ought to be possible to increase this force considerably.

The defeats sustained by the Allies have at least resulted in one great advan tage : the possibility of concentrating forces where they are most needed. The areas lost already would be reconquered more easily within the framework of a land-based Allied Grand Strategy than by separate action. The defeat of Ger man and Japanese power would restitute them automatically.

The one real difficulty in the way of the necessary reorientation of Allied Grand Strategy, is psychological—the Western nations must forget about those sea-power precepts that built their empires and that now appear liable to destroy them. They must learn that Asia is more than mere background in this war. They must learn that colonies and third-rate Powers have become the key to victory. This calls for a complete change in the map of the world, as depicted in the minds of two great nations. A great mental effort is imperative.

The consequences for the Pacific hemi sphere are obvious. Under the old strategy, only the most difficult of actions can result in the recapture of the posi tions that have been lost already. In the new approach, these positions will fall back to the Allies almost automatic ally after the continental defeat of Japan.

In the one case, the Allies emerge from the Pacific Ocean battering, perhaps hopelessly, at strong Japanese coastal bastions. In the other case, the Allies will press the Japanese into the very waters which they may rule up to the last moment.