A scrap of paper

Prussian logic having thus triumphantly proved that the one prospective enemy must remain quiescent, drew the obvious conclusion that the other Powers of the Entente would not move a finger to baulk Austria of her prey. And this was an all-important factor in the reckoning of the Teutonic States. Russia’s active participation in the war would perhaps entail, besides the onrush of her own countless swarms, the co-operation of France, whereas the fundamental axiom of Prussia’s war policy was to seek to try issues with each member of the Entente separately, and for this purpose to force such a quarrel, now upon one, now upon the other, as would leave the interests of that member’s allies untouched for the time being. A further device was to constrain the enemy formally to play the part of aggressor, so as to provide a convenient bridge for the allies to withdraw within the sphere of benevolent neutrality. This latter precaution was not adopted towards Russia, the reason being the aforesaid conviction that, come what might, Russia’s inactivity was a foregone conclusion. There are convincing grounds for my statement that this consideration supplied the motive for the Kaiser’s amendment to the Austrian ultimatum, limiting the time given to Servia for reflection to forty-eight hours7 and for according to the Russians only twelve hours to demobilize.

Austria-Hungary, whose quarrel with Servia was the little well-spring from which the world-stream of armies took its source, showed herself some degrees less confident than her Prussian ally. Her statesmen were swayed by an instinctive forefeeling that some great element of the Russian problem was still unaccounted for and might suddenly spring up and upset all calculations. Tabulated figures and copies of the reports of certain pessimistic Russian public men carried conviction to their minds, but failed to dispel irrational fears. This despondent frame of mind was intensified by the knowledge that if the punitive expedition against Servia were to culminate in a European war, the Dual Monarchy stood to lose more than her ally. And if fortune should prove adverse, the Habsburg Monarchy would, in all probability, go to pieces.

To the members of the Vienna and Budapest Cabinets, therefore, caution seemed more imperatively demanded than to their Berlin colleagues. No effort, however, was spared by the German Ambassador in Vienna, von Tschirschky, to bring vividly home to Counts Berchtold and Tisza the utter disorganization of the Russian finances, armies, railways, and administration, and to dissipate their ineradicable misgivings. But in spite of the Ambassador’s incessant exertions, there was ever present to the Austro-Hungarian mind a residue of doubt and disquietude which stood in jarring contrast to the insolent demands embodied in the amended ultimatum. And after that document had been presented in Belgrade, and the desired answer received from the Servian Premier, Pasitch, the anxiety of Austria’s statesmen threw a still darker cloud over the vista that opened before them.

If Russia were to remain neutral during the punishment of Servia, it was plain that France, too, would keep quiet. Her Government had no concern with the way in which the Balkan equilibrium was established; it cherished no sympathies with Bosnian assassins, and it had no spare funds for military ventures. Still less were the French people desirous of embarking on a European struggle for aims which could not be made plausible to the average bourgeois taxpayer. French money had been poured into Russia in never-ending streams, but that streams of French blood should follow it was inconceivable to the mind of the people. This line of reasoning was unanswerable. Given Russia’s neutrality, then France’s quiescence was unquestionable. But suppose the premisses turned out to be a mistake? Assuming, as during those anxious days Austrians sometimes did, that Russia, belying all calculations, rose up and girded her loins for battle, what then? The Republic would assuredly throw in its lot with the Tsardom. Of that it would be rash to doubt. Now, what this would mean to the two Central military States was the next question which it behoved them to put clearly and solve fully. And this is how they did it.

To my query on what grounds this amazing statement could be advanced and supported, I was treated to a sort of lecture on the subject which was then applied to the French railway system in the following ingenious way:

On two occasions since then these strictures and the German anticipations which were built upon them came back to my mind with painful vividness. During the first couple of weeks after the war, I heard the Belgians in Liége, Louvain, Brussels, Alost, Ghent, and Bruges anxiously inquiring, “Where are the French troops that should be here to succour us? When are they coming? It is only a few hours’ railway journey to Paris. Why are they not here? Surely they have had ample time to get to Belgium.” And when I ransacked my brain for a comforting reply, all I found there was the image of the German statesman propounding his view of French railways and the chaotic confusion which would accompany and retard mobilization.

The second time I recalled that conversation on reading the newspaper accounts of the fall of Namur. The Namur forts were to have held out for weeks or months, we had been told, because they were the most powerful in Europe, and also because the triangle between the Sambre and the Meuse was held by French army corps in great force. But it turned out that the French troops which were believed to be there had not yet arrived, owing to difficulties that had been encountered in the mobilization. These were the difficulties that had been foretold me, that were confidently counted upon by the German War Ministry, and of which I warned the French Government over two years ago.

Those statements were volunteered to me in order that I should make them known in Great Britain as arguments to be taken into account when the attitude of our own Government came up for discussion. As a matter of course, I never brought them forward, my own conviction having been uttered in season and out of season for twenty years—that all Germany’s energies, military, naval, financial, commercial, diplomatic, and journalistic, had been focussed upon exhaustive preparations for a tremendous struggle to establish Teutonic supremacy in Europe, that that struggle was unavoidable, and that the German war-machine was in all respects worthy of the money, time, and energies that had been spent on creating and perfecting it, and that no European army could compete with it. Over and over again I expressed my regret at finding the people of Great Britain irrationally hopeful and unsuspecting, utterly ignorant of Germany’s systematic strivings and subversive machinations, yet unwilling to learn from those who were conversant with these matters. A considerable section of the French people was equally trustful and supine. They were the blind of the class that will not see. They pointed to the honest Chancellor, to the peace-loving Kaiser, to the fair-minded professors and journalists who had assured the British people that it had nothing to fear, and to the treaties which they considered binding. They laughed to scorn the notion that these instruments would be treated as scraps of paper.

In October, 1911, I wrote:

Three months later I wrote:

Those statements, forecasts, and warnings were clear and emphatic. I had been urging them on the attention of the British nation for twenty years. But the bulk of the British nation refused to think evil of their German cousins, whom I was believed to be calumniating.

But I continued to set the facts as I knew them before the public, and the line of action which our rivals would, and we should, follow under those difficult conditions I sketched briefly in the following words:

But the faith of the easy-going British people and Government in Germany’s honour and in the sincerity of her peace professions was unshaken. They seemed possessed by the demons of credulity and pacificism. Like the Russian Tsar who on the eve of the Manchurian campaign exclaimed, “There cannot be war because I am in favour of peace,” they fancied that because Great Britain was satiated with territory and only demanded to be left in the undisturbed enjoyment of what she possessed, therefore Germany, who yearned for territorial expansion, would suppress her longings, relinquish her costly plans, and likewise work for peace. That, too, was the belief of our own Government, with the exception of a few permanent officials who, having travelled, heard, and seen what was going on, yielded to the evidence of their senses and bore witness to what they knew.

Accordingly the British Foreign Office set its hand to the work of establishing peace, animated by a spirit of compromise which, sooth to say, is rare in these days of national egotism and narrow patriotic endeavour. Lord Haldane visited Berlin. An exchange of views took place between that capital and London. Hopes of arriving at an understanding on all points were entertained and expressed. And I, as a friend of peace and a citizen of my country, felt bound to second those endeavours to the best of my limited means. But I took care to accompany my support with a warning. For I regarded Prussia’s attitude as a snare. Acquainted with the methods of her diplomacy, I recognized the trail of the serpent in the movements of the dove. This is what I wrote:

But I made it clear that we could “look for no abiding results” from any settlement of our differences to which we might come, because we were dealing with a Government and a nation whose assurances are worthless, and whose promises are no more than a scrap of paper. Since then the Imperial Chancellor has borne out what I then advanced in words and acts that have branded his nation with the stigma of infamy.

But the well-meaning pacifists of all shades and degrees, from the wordy interpreters of Prussian philosophies in high places down to the credulous man in the street, who pinned his faith to the business instincts of our German customers, clung tenaciously to their comfortable faith. At last, five months ago, I uttered a further warning:

In that same article I gave Germany’s plea for a preventive war, which I felt was then in the air. And I quoted the pregnant remark of my German colleague of the Berliner Tageblatt, who deliberately wrote: “It cannot be gainsaid that the growth of Russia is in itself a peril.” This chosen people, these apostles of culture and humanity, could not brook the natural growth of a gifted neighbour. Russia must be exterminated that Germany might thrive.

The Governments of Germany and Austria-Hungary then considered that the odds against Russia’s participation in a war to shield Servia were, under the existing conditions, almost tantamount to certainty. The German Ambassador in Vienna stated this positively to our Ambassador there and to his other colleagues. It was an axiom which admitted of no question. It followed that France and Great Britain would also hold aloof, and a duel with a foregone conclusion could, under these propitious conditions, be fought by Austria against Servia. And this was the state of things for which the Central European Powers had been making ready from the conclusion of the Bucharest Treaty down to the assassination of the Archduke Franz Ferdinand. This monstrous crime, for which there are neither excuse nor extenuating circumstances, wholly changed the aspect of affairs, and provided the Teutonic allies with a most welcome war-cry which was sure to rally their friends, while immobilizing their enemies. It was not, therefore, to be wondered at that they took such a long time to study the ways and means of utilizing it to the fullest. And in this they succeeded so well that France, Great Britain, Italy, and even Russia freely admitted Austria’s right not merely to punish Servia for her aggressive agitation, but also to take effective guarantees for her future good behaviour.

Never before was European public sentiment so universally and whole-heartedly on the side of Austria-Hungary. Every nation and political party sympathized with her aged monarch and supported the legitimate claims of her Government. If the grievances ostensibly put forward in Vienna and Budapest, and recognized by all civilized peoples, had really represented the full extent of what Austria desired to see redressed once for all, there would have been no war. And left to herself, Austria would probably have contented herself with this measure of amends for the past and guarantees for the future. But she was not a free agent. In all fundamental issues she is the vassal of Prussia. And the development of this crisis brought out their inseparability in sharp outline and relief. Every act of the Austro-Hungarian Government, from the moment when the Archduke fell in Sarajevo to the declaration of war against Servia, was conceived with the knowledge and collaboration of Berlin, and performed sometimes at its instigation and always with its approval.

Germany herself is commonly said to have been bent upon war from the outset of the crisis. Conscious of her readiness for the struggle, she is supposed to have been eager to seize on the puissant war-cry afforded her by the crime of Sarajevo to profit by the military unpreparedness of France, Russia, and Great Britain, and the internal strife in these countries, which had seemingly struck their diplomacy with paralysis and disqualified their Governments from taking part in a European conflict.

That this theory is erroneous I know on the highest authority. Having watched, sometimes at close quarters, the birth, growth, cultivation, and ripening of the scheme which has now borne fruit in the bitterest and most tremendous war on record, and having had more than once some of the decisive State papers under my eyes, I can affirm that Germany’s hope and desire and striving were on the opposite side. She deprecated a European war sincerely. She sought to ward it off by every means compatible with the realization of her main scheme, and she was disappointed beyond words at her failure. Her main scheme was to deal with each of the Entente Powers separately, and to reserve Great Britain for the last. And it was presumably in furtherance of this programme that Admiral von Tirpitz tendered his advice to the Kaiser—as we are told he did—not to break with England yet, but to conciliate her by every available means, and thus to gain time for the German navy to reach the standard which would enable it to cope with ours.

That the German scheme of separating the Entente Powers and crushing them one by one was feasible will hardly be denied. One has only to read the recent diplomatic correspondence on the crisis in the light of certain other data to realize how lucky the Entente Powers may account themselves at having been provoked one and all by Germany. Each Power felt strongly tempted to circumscribe its own interests to the narrowest limits, and to keep its powder dry until these were manifestly assailed. That was the temper of the Entente States. “In the present case,” Sir Edward Grey explained to the German Ambassador, “the dispute between Austria and Servia was not one in which we felt called to take a hand. Even if the question became one between Austria and Russia, we should not feel called upon to take a hand in it.”

Clearly, then, Germany might tackle Russia without drawing Great Britain to the side of her enemy. But even “if Germany were involved,” the Foreign Secretary went on to say, “and France became involved, we had not made up our minds what we should do.” Consequently it might well seem no great feat of diplomacy for Germany to set inducements and deterrents before us sufficiently powerful to keep us neutral. In no case was the Prussian scheme of dealing separately with each Power chimerical.

The invasion of Servia as the first step had a twofold object for Germany, who encouraged it from the outset: first, to gratify her Austrian ally, on whom Servia had in truth inflicted terrific losses during the past four years, thus enabling the Habsburgs to cripple the independent Slavs of the South, and obtain guarantees against the recurrence of the evil; and then to compel the principal Balkan States to form a block against Russia, so that they could be relied upon as a new Great Power in the coming struggle against that Empire. On this subject I write with knowledge, having myself taken a hand more than once in the international negociations which had the Balkan equilibrium for their object. The first phase in the Teutonic advance towards supreme world-power, then, was the tossing aside of the Bucharest Treaty as a worthless scrap of paper, and the formation of this Balkan League. And the first serious obstacle to it was raised by myself in a series of negociations which may be made public elsewhere.

Germany, therefore, was not anxious to bring about a European war just yet. On the contrary, her efforts to postpone it were sincere and strenuous. And to her thinking she had reduced the chances of a clash of nations to a faint possibility. Consequently it would be much nearer the mark to say that, convinced that she would succeed in “localizing the war,” she was bent on carrying out her policy in every event, but that this policy being ultimately found incompatible with the vital interests of Russia, the limits of whose forbearance she had miscalculated, led necessarily to the present conflict. But for this emergency, too, she had been extensively preparing and deemed herself quite ready. Into Germany’s calculations and expectations I have more than once had an insight, and I can affirm that she was twice out in her reckoning of the probabilities. I ought, however, emphatically to add that even for one of these miscalculations she made due allowance. When the latent crisis became acute the opinion prevailed in Berlin that the stability of the Tsar’s dynasty, as well as the solvency and the integrity of his Empire, were bound up with the maintenance of peace, and that Russia, being thus fettered, Austria would be allowed, with certain formal reserves, to have a free hand against Servia. And Germany’s initial efforts were directed to enlisting the co-operation of Great Britain and of France in the task of securing this advantage for her ally. That is why she was credited with a praiseworthy desire to restrict the war-area as much as possible.

As we have seen, the grounds for Germany’s optimistic forecast were reinforced by the opinions of certain Russian authorities. These experts strongly held that a war with Germany would open the sluice-gates of disaster for their country. There are always such Calchases in every land, but Russia possesses an abnormally large number of them. Some of these views were committed to paper, laid before the highest authorities, and also reported simultaneously to the Foreign Office in Berlin. The financial, military, and political considerations adduced in support of these conclusions were also fully set forth in the communications on the subject which Germany’s agents in St. Petersburg supplied to the Wilhelmstrasse. Much of interest might be written on this aspect of the preliminaries to the war—much that is striking, instructive, and in a way sensational—but this is hardly the moment for anything in the nature of startling disclosures.

In what the policy consisted which Germany and Austria pursued under the mask of indignation against the Servian abettors of murder is well known by now even to the general public. Over and over again I unfolded it in the columns of the Daily Telegraph; and from the day on which ominous rumours about Austria’s expected Note to Servia began to disquiet Europe, I announced that the assassination of the Archduke Franz Ferdinand was but the flimsiest of pretexts, that Austria was minded to take the initiative in the struggle of the Teutons against the Slavs, and that the European press was making a strange mistake in accepting the theory that her aim was the condign punishment of the accomplices of the assassins. I added that this was no dispute, in the ordinary sense of the term, between Austria and Servia; it was only a question of which of the two could impose its will on the other. In a word, it was a trial of strength—eine Machtfrage.

Germany’s aim, I repeat, was, and had long been, to sever the bonds that linked France with Russia, so as to be able to tackle each one separately. The methods to which her statesmen had recourse in order to effect a severance between the two allies were of a piece with the expedients now being resorted to for the purpose of egging on Turkey to a breach of her neutrality—such as the forging of Mr. Burns’ alleged oration and the speech of the Lord Mayor of London against the war. But some of them which have never yet been even hinted at are far more sensational even than this. One of the Kaiser’s own little schemes which has never been mentioned even in well-informed diplomatic circles outdid in breeziness the episode of the scrap of paper.

The Entente was to be dealt with like an artichoke—to have leaf after leaf torn off. To attain this Germany employed fair means and foul—first flattered and cajoled the French—and when blandishments failed passed abruptly to brutal threats. But her diplomacy in its obsequious as well as its menacing mood had failed of its purpose. And now war was to be essayed as a means to the end, but a war with Servia only. Its objects, as we saw, were materially to weaken Slavdom, humiliate Russia, create a Balkan League against that Empire, and supply an object-lesson to those politicians in France who were opposed to the alliance with the Tsardom, on the ground that it might at any moment involve the Republic in a sanguinary struggle for obscure Slav interests. The duel contemplated was to be confined to Austria-Hungary and Servia. Every lever was to be moved to keep it restricted to that narrow compass. As an Austrian victory would ensure a partial dismemberment of Servia, to be followed by a new grouping of the Balkan States—this time under the ægis of the Habsburgs—the Central European Powers would have won a most useful ally in the shape of a new and compact Balkan League.

A partnership of Turkey, Bulgaria, Roumania, and Greece, under the lead of Austria and Germany, Servia being constrained to keep the step with these, would have constituted a stout bulwark against the tide of Slavdom flowing towards the Adriatic, and a puissant ally in the event of a European war. That this was a real scheme, and is not merely an inference or an assumption, may be taken as certain. I became acquainted with the details of it at its inception. Bulgaria knows it and Turkey knows it. Bulgaria’s pressing offer, made to Turkey at the very moment when I was successfully endeavouring to obtain the assent of the Porte and of the King of Greece to a treaty which I had drawn up for the settlement of all their differences, was brought to my cognizance. Happily, the suggested deal was scrutinized and rejected by the Porte. Turkey, as represented by Talaat Bey, had brought an open mind to the matter, allowing herself to be swayed only by her own interests; and as it appeared that these would fare best by the treaty which I proposed, she assented to this. Greece, needing permanent peace as a condition of internal development, showed herself amenable to reason and ready to compromise. And she, too, agreed to the treaty. Roumania, animated by a like broad and liberal spirit, was steadfastly opposed to every move, by whomsoever contemplated, which was likely to jeopardize public tranquillity or modify the Treaty of Bucharest, and favoured every arrangement capable of imparting stability to the status quo.

But perseverance and importunity are characteristic traits of German methods in diplomacy as in commerce. And on this occasion they stamped her Balkan policy with the well-known cachet of the Hohenzollerns. The moment it was decided that the Austrian demands should be so drafted as to ensure their rejection by Servia, the two Central European Powers set to work anew to stir up opposition to the Treaty of Bucharest, realize the scheme for a Balkan League with its sharp point turned against Russia, and have a large part of King Peter’s realm carved up by the Balkan States themselves without the ostensible intervention of Austria or Germany. This is an important point in the march of events which preceded the war—a point, too, which, so far as I am aware, has not been noticed by any publicist or statesman.

It is worth a moment’s consideration. The world has not forgotten the assurance which Austria gave to Russia as an inducement to hold her hand and allow Servia to be punished. It took the shape of an undertaking that the Dual Monarchy would not annex any portion of Servian territory. Now, on the face of it, this was a concession the worth of which, from Russia’s point of view, might well be reckoned considerable. And in truth it had great weight with the St. Petersburg Foreign Office. For it seemed to imply that at the close of Austria’s campaign against Servia the vanquished Slav State would at any rate lose none of the land of which it was possessed before the war. That was the obvious meaning of the official Austro-Hungarian assurance, and it was construed in this sense by all the Chancelleries of the Entente Powers without exception. It worked as a motive to lure Russia to the far-reaching concessions she offered to Austria-Hungary in the hope of “localizing the war.” Sir M. de Bunsen wrote to Sir Edward Grey that the Austrian Minister of Foreign Affairs thought “that Russia would have no right to intervene after receiving his assurance that Austria sought no territorial aggrandisement.”

But in reality the phrasing of this self-denying promise was deceptive. Austria undertook that she would not incorporate Servian territory in her own Empire, but in reading this declaration the accent should be laid on the word she. She would refrain from cutting off slices of Servian territory for herself. But it was resolved, none the less, that Servian territory should be carved up and partitioned among Servia’s neighbours—Bulgaria, Turkey, and Albania. The three Greek islands—Samos, Chios, and Mytilene—were to revert to their late owner. Russia never suspected this curious wile. Otherwise she would not have fallen into the trap as she did. That it was part of a deliberate plan which Germany and Austria set about realizing is established beyond question. Neither can it be gainsaid that the form of words chosen later on by Germany for the assurance she offered to Sir Edward Grey respecting the integrity of France left room, and was meant to leave room, for a similar subterfuge. To my knowledge, and to that of at least one European Chancellery, Germany decided on making an offer to Italy of Tunis, Nice, and Savoy, all which she might claim and receive as a recompense for active co-operation during the war. And this by-compact was deemed perfectly consistent with her promise to Sir Edward Grey. Whether that bid for co-operation was actually made to Italy, I am unable to say. That it was one of the inducements to be held out to the Consulta, I know.

Meanwhile Turkey was exhorted to throw aside the Treaty which I had drafted, and which was to have been signed by the Grand Vizier and M. Venizelos at my house during the week ending on August 3rd. She was further urged to close with Bulgaria’s offer of a treaty of partition without delay, and to make common cause with her. At the same time M. Venizelos was advised to treat with King Ferdinand’s representatives, and come to an arrangement by which Bulgaria should retake from the Serbs “the territory which by right belongs to them,” and a certain lesser slice from Greece, who would receive in turn partial compensation and perpetual guarantees. Moreover, all Bulgaria’s territory, new and old, should be insured by Turkey and Greece. A draft of this treaty actually existed. In case of refusal, Greece was menaced with the loss of everything she had acquired by her Balkan victories. How these suggestions were received I had no means of learning. But the final upshot is disclosed by recent events. Turkey, eager to regain some part of what she lost, and believing the present moment propitious, lent herself readily to Germany’s designs. It was only after the infraction of her neutrality by the warships Goeben and Breslau, and moved by fear of the consequences to which her connivance had exposed her, and by the proofs adduced that neutrality would pay better than a fresh Balkan campaign, that she reined back. She now apparently takes a modified view of the situation, and the more statesmanlike of her leaders recognize that, after all, her interests may turn out to be dependent upon the goodwill of the Entente Powers. But Enver Pasha, a Pole by extraction and a German by sympathy, still seems bent on exposing the Ottoman Empire to the risks of a single cast of the die.