"... during the Great War [Smuts] stood out as the most intellectually alert, and in some respects the most distinguished figure among the array of nation-guiders with whom I talked, and I interviewed them all. I saw him as he sat in the British War Cabinet when the German hosts were sweeping across the Western Front, and when the German submarines were making a shambles of the high seas. I heard him speak with persuasive force on public occasions and he was like a beacon in the gloom. He had come to England in 1917 as the representative of General Botha, the Prime Minister of the Union of South Africa, to attend the Imperial Conference and to remain a comparatively short time. So great was the need of him that he did not go home until after the Peace had been signed. He signed the Treaty under protest because he believed it was uneconomic and it has developed into the irritant that he prophesied it would be."
Quote Details
Added by wikiquote-import-bot
Unverified quote
0 likes
Systems scientistsMilitary leaders from South AfricaPrime Ministers of South Africa‎Academics from South AfricaPhilosophers from South Africa
Original Language: English
Available Languages (1)
Sources
Isaac Frederick Marcosson in An African Adventure, Chapter I – Smuts, p. 16, The Plimpton Press (1921)
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Jan_Smuts
Revision History
No revisions have been submitted for this quote.
Categories
Jan Smuts
Jan Christiaan Smuts (24 May 1870 – 11 September 1950) was a South African statesman, general, and intellectual. Amongst the offices that he held, he was Prime Minister of South Africa and Field Marshal in the British Army.
58 quotes on TrueQuotesView all quotes by Jan Smuts →
Related Quotes
"The groans of the dying and the blanched set faces of the dead ... were enough to drive away all unwholesome feelings…"
"History writes the word 'Reconciliation' over all her quarrels."
"The war was fought throughout and ultimately won, not only by the usual military weapons in the narrower sense, but b…"
"The grand success of the British Empire depends not on its having followed any constitutional precedent of the past b…"
"At the vital moment there seems to be a failure of leadership, and also a failure of the general human spirit among t…"
"I view it as a thoroughly bad peace – impolitic and impracticable in the case of Germany, absolutely ludicrous in the…"
"It was the human spirit itself that failed at Paris. It is no use passing judgments and making scapegoats of this or …"
"If there was to be equal manhood suffrage the whites would be swamped all over South Africa by the blacks and the who…"
"The Mountain is not merely something eternally sublime. It has a great historical and spiritual meaning for us ... Fr…"
"... the Jameson Raid was the real declaration of war."