The numerous war-mutilated accepted it with much
enthusiasm, and the people listened, open-mouthed, to the endless
series of promises.
Hughes, who was at bottom in good faith, developed the thesis which he
afterwards upheld at Paris with logical precision. It was Germany's
duty to reimburse, without any limitation, the entire cost of the
War: damage to property, damage to persons, and war-cost. He who has
committed the wrong must make reparation for it to the extreme limits
of his resources, and this principle, recognized by the jurists,
requires that the total of the whole cost of the War fall upon the
enemy nations. Later on, Hughes, who was a sincere man, recognized
that it was not possible to go beyond asking for reparation of the
damages.
Lloyd George was dragged along by the necessity of not drawing away
the mass of the electors from the candidates of his party. Thus he was
obliged on December 11, in his final manifesto, to announce not only
the Kaiser's trial and that of all those responsible for atrocities,
but to promise the most extensive kind of indemnity from Germany and
the compensation of all who had suffered by the War.
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