question, and that Great Britain could not afford to hold aloof from the problems it involved. Two factors of a general character contributed to prevent the Government in power before the outbreak of war from paying the necessary attention to the subject: (1) the practice of living diplomatically from hand to mouth, and (2) the conviction that there was nothing incompatible between the aims of Germany and British interests, and that consequently the two Powers could be brought together into a friendly rapprochement without any serious sacrifice of the ambitions of the one or the principles of the other. The ingenuousness of our diplomatic record, which has consisted in the main of a series of efforts to cope with each fresh situation as it has arisen, is as much a proof of the absence of all sinister designs as our unpreparedness for this war is proof of the absence of any desire to provoke a quarrel with Germany. But ingenuousness can be carried too far, when the existence of a nation is at stake. The trumpet call of Germany's designs upon the Near East has been too loud and insistent to go unmarked; and the fact that the British Government could ignore it can only be explained by the second of the contributory causes mentioned above, its belief that by preaching peace in Berlin often enough it would finally divert German ambitions into innocuous and praiseworthy channels. How strong was this belief and how powerfully it was allowed to influence British policy may be gauged from Sir E. Grey's enunciation of his desires and hopes on July 30, 1914, four days before the declaration of war between Germany and Britain. In a telegram despatched that day to the British Ambassador in Berlin he said: *

'If the peace of Europe can be preserved, and the present crisis safely passed, my own endeavours will be to promote some arrangement to which Germany could be a party, by which she could be assured that no aggressive or hostile policy would be pursued against her or her allies by France, Russia and ourselves, jointly or separately. I have desired this and worked for it, as far as I could, through the last Balkan crisis; and, Germany having a corresponding object, our relations sensibly improved. The idea has hitherto been

* White Paper, Miscellaneous, No. 6 (1914), [Cd. 7467], No. 101.

too utopian to form the subject of definite proposals, but if this present crisis, so much more acute than any that Europe has gone through for generations, be safely passed, I am hopeful that the relief and reaction which will follow may make possible some more definite rapprochement between the Powers than has been possible hitherto.'

In the light of our present knowledge it would be difficult to pen a statement that would do more credit to the British Government's good intentions, or more clearly emphasise its failure to understand Germany's policy or to fathom German designs.

If there had been reason to suppose that Germany had no political ambitions in Europe, there would have been some excuse, in the interests of European peace, for keeping an open mind on her activities in the Near East and finding in them, as we affected to find in the Baghdad Railway scheme, merely a legitimate outlet for commercial enterprise. But the Germany with whom Sir Edward Grey on July 30, 1914, still hoped to be able to conclude 'some more definite rapprochement' was the Germany who in 1905 had coerced France and in 1909 had coerced Russia, by threats of war, and in 1911 had sent the 'Panther' to Agadir. It was the same Germany who had rejected every overture of the British Government 'to promote cordial friendship as the only alternative to constant liability to friction'; had added to her navy while Great Britain moderated her naval construction; and, when Lord Haldane tried his persuasive powers in Berlin (February 1912), had replied by an addition to the peace strength of her army, following it up the next year with a further increase of sixty per cent. Lord Haldane's mission, as he has since told the country, made him 'painfully conscious that there was at least the chance of a terrible war.' He had come away from Berlin, he told an American correspondent, 'feeling uneasy. Germany was piling up armaments. She showed no disposition to restrict her naval development.'†

* Address, Hampstead Garden Suburb Institute, Nov. 17, 1915.

It is of interest to note that a few weeks after Lord Haldane had returned, feeling uneasy' over the chance of a terrible war, and had done 'all that in him lay, all that seemed to him to be possible to bring home that information to the minds of his colleagues,' one of the latter, Mr

If now we examine the Drang nach Osten in the light of the attitude which Germany had taken up in regard to European politics in general, we shall find little in it to confirm the comfortable theory that German intentions were limited to legitimate enterprise of an economic character. The first warning note was sounded in the spring of 1898 on the occasion of the Emperor William's visit to Palestine-his second visit to the East, including Constantinople, and undertaken at a time when European feeling had been outraged by the systematic massacre of Abdul Hamid's Armenian subjects. Speaking at Damascus, the German Emperor, who could not count a single Moslem among his subjects, declared that the 300,000,000 Mohammedans, who, dwelling dispersed throughout the East, reverence in his Majesty the Sultan Abdul Hamid their Khalif, may rest assured that at all times the German Emperor will be their friend.' A clearer enunciation of a resolve to use Turkey and the East for the purposes of a German world-policy could hardly have been given. It was followed by the sedulous cultivation of close relationship between Abdul Hamid and Germany, with the constant intensifying of Turkey's economic dependence upon Berlin as a result.

The revolution of July 1908 offered an opportunity for a watchful diplomacy to checkmate German designs in the Ottoman Empire. It was not taken. The Liberal element in Constantinople did not receive the support it required to maintain the revolutionary movement on sound lines. Young Turkey surrendered the direction of its affairs to a clique which proceeded to govern in the interests of the Committee of Union and Progress rather than in those of the country itself. Germany, momentarily put out of her stride by Abdul Hamid's fall, lost no time in regaining her place at the side of Turkey's rulers. That the new régime entailed neither new principles nor new methods was quickly shown by the 'Turkification' of Macedonia. When the Great Powers were compelled to take note of this process, Germany intervened to prevent direct pressure being put upon the

J. A. Pease, speaking at the annual meeting of the Peace Society at the Mansion House, stated that Lord Haldane's visit to Germany had proved 'a real asset towards permanent good relations with the German Government and the German people.' 'Talibus insidiis . . . credita res.'

Turks. But her championship of the oppression of the peoples of Macedonia overreached itself. The Balkan States realised that with Germany's support the Turkish Government would be able so to modify the form of administration, without removing in any way the disabilities under which their kinsfolk suffered, that the possibility of effecting real reforms would become more remote than ever. They agreed, accordingly, to take the question of Macedonian reform out of the hands of the Great Powers and to deal with it themselves.

*

The result of the First Balkan War was wholly disconcerting to the plans of Germany and Austria-Hungary, who proceeded, in a manner entirely in keeping with the tactics adopted in regard to Morocco and the Bosnian annexation, to break up the Balkan League. By vetoing Serbian expansion to the Adriatic, Austria-Hungary compelled Serbia to seek an economic outlet down the valley of the Vardar towards the Ægean Sea. Dissensions at once began between Sofia and Belgrade, and these are known to have been actively encouraged from Vienna, while Magyar influences were brought to bear upon King Ferdinand, and war material was sent down the Danube from Hungary to Bulgaria. The result of the Second Balkan War proved even more annoying to the Central Powers than the First. For the moment the German Emperor sought to make a virtue of a necessity, and ranged himself on the side of the victors by taking credit for the Treaty of Bucarest. The real view of the German and Austro-Hungarian Governments, however, was revealed by the latter's resolve to readjust conditions in the Near East to its own liking by an unprovoked attack on Serbia. Peace was signed at Bucarest on Aug. 9, 1913; but on the previous day the Vienna Government had approached Italy and Germany with a view to bring into operation the Triple Alliance for action against Serbia.† The Italian Government refused to recognise the existence of a casus fœderis ; and AustriaHungary was dissuaded from her purpose-for eleven months only, as subsequent events proved. The murder

* The War and Democracy,' p. 148.

+ Speech of Signor Giolitti before the Italian Chamber of Deputies, Dec. 5, 1914.

of the Archduke Francis Ferdinand, at Serajevo, on June 28, 1914, provided the necessary pretext for aggression against Serbia. The events connected with the outbreak of the present war not only confirmed the solidarity of the alliance between Germany and Austria-Hungary," but proved both Powers ready to risk everything for the success of the Drang nach Osten.

From this necessarily incomplete review of events in recent years two points would seem to be established: first, that Germany had deliberately embarked on a policy aiming at the hegemony of Europe, and, secondly, that she was using Austria-Hungary and the Near East to further or to round off her designs.

If the line of reasoning followed in these pages be correct, Germany's activities in the Near East-quite apart from any ulterior designs in the direction of Egypt or the Persian Gulf, which could only serve to put Great Britain doubly on her guard-required just as close watching as, say, the attempted coup in connexion with Morocco. This, however, was not the view of the British Government. Reference has already been made to Sir George Buchanan's dictum that direct British interests in Serbia were nil. The Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs had insisted upon this point in 1908 at the time of the crisis which originated in the annexation of Bosnia-Herzegovina. M. Iswolski, the Russian Foreign Minister, was in London at that time.

'I told him definitely then,' Sir E. Grey informed the House of Commons on Aug. 3, 1914, this being a Balkan crisis, a Balkan affair, I did not consider that public opinion in this country would justify us in promising to give anything more than diplomatic support.'

Sir E. Grey's aloofness from this Balkan affair' may be contrasted with King Edward's attitude as described by Lord Redesdale in his recent Memories':

'It was the 8th of October that the King received the news at Balmoral, and no one who was there can forget how

*The German White Book states: We permitted Austria a completely free hand in her action towards Serbia.'