BRUSSELS CONFERENCE, the current name of two abortive international conferences — one on the usages of war, July-August 1874; the second on bimetallism, in the autumn of 1892.
1. The harsh treatment of prisoners and non combatants in the Franco-German War aroused a humane feeling in protest. At the Congress of Universal Alliance in Paris, June 1872, a Society for the Improvement of the Condition of Prisoners of War was formed, which sent a circular to the chief European powers asking them to appoint delegates to a congress on this subject at Paris. England and France declined, because the request came from no official source, but Russia substituted a project of her own, and Gortchakoff invited the powers to a con ference at Brussels, ostensibly to lay before them a proposal for °a code to determine the laws and usages of warfare, and to limit the consequences and diminish the calamities conse quent upon war, as far as it may be possible or desirable.' The pronunciamento accompany ing the call set forth that war is a conflict between the armed and organized forces of the belligerents and operations of war must be directed exclusively against such armed forces and not against the non-combatant subjects of either belligerent state. However, by a fur ther stipulation, the occupying army was to be allowed to levy taxes for its benefit, to seize not only all public property of the conquered government, but also all private property use ful in carrying on the war or which interfered with the success of the military operations. A declaration that volunteers and militia were non-military inhabitants was also included, and it was claimed that they were liable to °mili tary punishment" if they took arms. Further, it was declared that an army may exact °pro visions, clothing, etc.," necessary for its main tenance and levy money contributions either in case of need or as a penalty. The Russian project was characterized in England as an imposture and only one English delegate was sent — to register the dissent of his government. The United States sent none, and the South American states were refused any share. To the dismay of the promoters, the meeting was at once turned into an engine for the exact re verse of their intentions. The dominating force throughout was that of Germany and Russia, whose views and purposes were identical; and it soon became clear that the real object of the call was to strengthen their hands as militant states by throwing overboard the entire fabric of international law on the obligations of hu manity and substituting the boldest assertion of the naked rights of irresponsible force. The foremost contention was that enemy goods in neutral ships were exempt from capture. This England construed as an attack upon her naval power. The original topic of prisoners of war, when brought up, was refused discussion by the Russian delegate, Jomini, on the ground that the governments did not wish to hamper them selves. The question of revising the articles of the Geneva Convention (q.v.) on the treatment of the sick and wounded, and the neutrality of clergymen, physicians, etc., attending them, was also thrown out by him, on the ground that for military reasons it was necessary to. revise the
whole convention and that the states "most apt in the initiative of war" should have the right to °insist on their necessities." The question of what constitutes °effective occupation" was still more vital. The obvious interest of aggres sive states was to insist, as did Germany, that it °need not manifest itself by visible signs," so that a town once occupied should still be considered so even if the troops were removed and any rising of the inhabitants be punishable as treason, and that it was sufficiently estab lished by °flying columns," or, as defined by a satiric German, °three Uhlans and a trumpet." This denial of all rights of self-defense against invasion was almost unanimously rejected by the other delegates, however, and the principle substituted that there must be actual occupation by adequate force and lines of communication kept open; that it °exists only when the terri tory is placed actually under authority of the hostile army, extends only to the territory where such authority is established and exists only so long as the belligerent is able to exer cise it." The right of levee en masse, or armed insurrection of the body of a people, is linked with this; and naturally the states itching for conquest wished to confine belligerent rights to regularly enrolled armies and oblige the rest of the people to submit when these are defeated. Of course no such rule adopted by the belliger ents themselves would ever bind a people who wanted to rise, but it would form a plea for much political murder before it was repealed. Jomini said that war had so changed its nature in modern times that it was necessary to "reg ulate the inspirations of patriotism,* for fear they might be °more disastrous to the country itself than to the oppressor," and that °those grand explosions of patriotism which took place in the beginning of the century cannot continue to occur in our day, at least not in the same form" On this head it was proposed that any inhabitant of a country under occupation who should give information to the °enemy" (his own people) should be handed over to °justice.° But this philanthropic repression of self-defense in its own interest and outlawry of the means by which Prussia gained her own independence was not agreed to. All these assaults on nat ural right were opposed by the British dele gate. An attempt was made to discuss reprisals or retaliation, but it was refused. Restriction of bombardment of the interior of towns with out harming the fortifications was sought but flatly refused by Germany and Russia, on the ground that °experience had shown it (the bom bardment) to be one of the most efficient means of securing the objects of a war," which is true of sack, massacre and other things banned by civilization. Finally a proposal was made that, at the option of the belligerent, neutrals should be obliged to receive and care for (at the bel ligerent's expense) the wounded; in other words, that a strong power could make its neu tral neighbors depots to keep its armies in condition.