The Spectator at war: Commercial interference

From ‘The British Reply and American Comments’, The Spectator, 16 January 1915:

We have not the slightest desire to punish American commerce or any neutral commerce. Our whole object is to destroy our enemies, and it is only so far as American commerce interferes with that object that we interfere with American commerce. That the interference may have to be greater if the Germans continue to violate the rules of humanity and civilization ought to be sufficiently obvious to any outside critic. It was, indeed, particularly with a view to such contingency that all the nations of the world twice assembled at the Hague to consider how far the opera- tions of war might be mitigated, for they all realized that “methods of frightfulness” not only recoil on those who practise them, but also involve additional suffering for the whole of the world.

Unfortunately the American Government, which took such an exceptionally prominent part in the Hague Conferences, have since taken no part at all in upholding the humane decisions there unanimously arrived at.