UNCONDITIONAL SURRENDER
October 26, 1918
When the American people speak for unconditional surrender, it means that Germany must accept whatever terms the United States and its allies think necessary in order to right the dreadful wrongs that have been committed and to safeguard the world for at least a generation to come from another attempt by Germany to secure world dominion. Unconditional surrender is the reverse of a negotiated peace. The interchange of notes, which has been going on between our Government and the Governments of Germany and Austria during the last three weeks, means, of course, if persisted in, a negotiated peace.It is the abandonment of force and the substitution of negotiation. This fact should be clearly and truthfully stated by our leaders, so that the American people may decide with their eyes open which course they will follow.
Those of us who believe in unconditional surrender regard Germany’s behavior during the last five years as having made her the outlaw among nations. In private life sensible men and women do not negotiate with an outlaw or grow sentimental about him, or ask for a peace with him on terms of equality if he will give up his booty. Still less do they propose to make a league with him for the future, and on the strength of this league to abolish the sheriff and take the constable. On the contrary, they expect the law officers to take him by force and to have him tried and punished. They do not punish him out of revenge, but because all intelligent persons know punishment to be necessary in order to stop certain kinds of criminals from wrongdoing and to save the community from such wrongdoing.
We ought to treat Germany in precisely this manner. It is a sad and dreadful thing to have to face some months or a year or so of additional bloodshed, but it is a much worse thing to quit now and have the children now growing up obliged to do the job all over again, with ten times as much bloodshed and suffering, when their turn comes. The surest way to secure a peace as lasting as that which followed the downfall of Napoleon is to overthrow the Prussianized Germany of the Hohenzollerns asNapoleon was overthrown. If we enter into a league of peace with Germany and her vassal allies, we must expect them to treat the arrangement as a scrap of paper whenever it becomes to their interest to do so.