THE INTERIM

The cessation of diplomatic relations between the American and German Governments was an inevitable consequence of the latter's submarine decree abrogating the undertaking it gave in the Sussex case. The world knew it. Germany knew it. Her ambassador at Washington, Count von Bernstorff, knew it best of all, and accepted his dismissal in a fatalistic spirit. The rupture had to come. He had done his best to avert it, and his best had availed nothing.

The long-feared break having become a reality, the American people looked wide-eyed at the unexampled international situation. What now? When two parties enter into a bargain and one breaks it, there is usually a parting of the ways, a personal conflict perhaps, when there is not also a lawsuit. But no court could settle the differences between the United States and Germany. The nation squarely faced the fact that the two countries were officially not on speaking terms; they were on the dangerous ground of open enmity, when the least provocation would be as a spark to a powder magazine. Sparks there were in plenty; but the explosion waited. President Wilson guarded the magazine. He waited an "overt act" before giving up his vigil and letting events take their course.

Germany began her announced ruthless submarine warfare against neutral shipping with caution. Apparently she was loath to precipitate matters by acting in the letter and spirit of the new decree which warned that any neutral vessel found in the new danger zone "perished." On February 3, 1917, when the decree was in operation, one of her submarines encountered an American freighter, the Housatonic, off the Scilly Isles, which came within the proscribed area. It sank her, but first gave warning, permitted the crew to take to the boats, and actually towed the boats ninety miles toward land. A British patrol vessel then appeared; the submarine fired a signal to attract its attention and vanished under water, leaving the patrol vessel to rescue the Housatonic's crew. According to the new order given the submarines the Housatonic ought to have been sunk without warning.

This unwonted chivalry looked promising; but it was deemed to be merely an act of grace extended to neutral vessels on the high seas which had left their home ports before the date (February 1, 1917) when the new policy of ruthlessness went into effect. It was not repeated.

No such shrift was accorded British vessels, whether Americans were on board them or not. About the same time the merchantman Eavestone was sunk by a submarine, which also shelled the crew as they took to the boats. The captain and three seamen—one an American—were killed by the gunfire. This action was debated as an "overt act," but apparently the Administration did not regard isolated fatalities of this character as providing ground for a casus belli.

What came nearer to a flagrant violation of the Sussex agreement was the destruction by submarine torpedoes of the Anchor passenger liner California without warning off the Irish coast with 230 persons on board. The vessel sailed from New York for Glasgow on January 28, 1917, and its crew and passengers included a sprinkling of Americans. There were no American casualties; but attacks on passenger liners without warning, regardless of the menace to American life, formed the crux of the various crises between the United States and Germany, and the sinking of the California, as an "overt act," therefore brought the breaking point nearer and nearer. The loss of life was forty-one, thirteen passengers and twenty-eight of the crew being drowned. The vessel sank in nine minutes and the submarine made no effort to save the lives of its victims.

The loss of two British steamers, the Japanese Prince and the Mantola, sunk without warning, added to the growing indictment against Germany in the consequent jeopardizing of American lives. There were thirty American cattlemen on board the Japanese Prince. With the remainder of the crew they took to the boats, and after drifting about for several hours were saved by a passing ship. An American doctor on board the Mantola was among the latter's survivors.

The next attack on American shipping was the sinking of the Lyman M. Law, a sailing vessel loaded with lumber from Maine to Italy, by a submarine off the coast of Sardinia in the Mediterranean. The crew, seven of whom were American, were saved. There was no warning; the crew were ordered to debark, a bomb was placed on board, and the vessel was blown up and sank in flames.

The destruction of the Cunard liner Laconia, without warning, followed. Three American passengers were lost, two of them women, mother and daughter, who died from exposure in one of the boats. The vessel was torpedoed in the Irish Sea at 10.30 p. m. on February 25, 1917, and it was not until 4 o'clock the next morning that the survivors, scantily clad, were rescued in a heavy sea.

All these outrages were readily chargeable as overt acts, any single one of which could have constituted a cause for war, if the Administration was looking for one. But Germany's offenses, viewed singly, were passed over; it was their cumulative force that was providing the momentum to hostilities.

Two American freighters, the Orleans and the Rochester, left New York on February 9, 1917, without guns or contraband, bound for Bordeaux, France, and were the first craft to leave an American port after Germany issued her terrifying order condemning all neutral vessels found in the new danger zone.

Meantime the barometer at Washington was ominous. The California sinking, then the Laconia, proved how slender was the thread that held the sword of Damocles over the heads of the American people. Tension increased. "We are hoping for the best and preparing for the worst," came one official view early in the crisis. The President became detached and uncommunicative.

Germany indirectly sought to avert the consequences of her conduct. A week after the rupture in diplomatic relations Dr. Paul Ritter, the Swiss Minister, to whom she had delegated the charge of her interests in the United States, approached the State Department with an informal proposal to reopen negotiations. Secretary Lansing required him to put his request in writing, and the following memorandum was thereupon presented by Dr. Ritter on February 11, 1917:

"The Swiss Government has been requested by the German Government to say that the latter is now, as before, willing to negotiate, formally or informally, with the United States, provided that the commercial blockade against England will not be broken thereby."

Secretary Lansing's answer, made the next day, was short and to the point. He notified Dr. Ritter, under instructions from the President, that "the Government of the United States would gladly discuss with the German Government any questions it might propose for discussion were it to withdraw its proclamation of the 31st of January [1917], in which, suddenly and without previous intimation of any kind, it canceled the assurances which it had given this Government on the 4th of May last [1916], but that it does not feel that it can enter into any discussion with the German Government concerning the policy of submarine warfare against neutrals which it is now pursuing unless and until the German Government renews its assurances of the 4th of May and acts upon the assurance."

No further interchanges took place on the subject. The answer clarified the situation and disposed of doubts caused by the veil the President had thrown about the workings of his mind. It told the country that its Executive was not wavering and would brook no compromise.

Little hope prevailed in Berlin that war with the United States could be avoided, since the bait offered with a view to formulating a modus vivendi for reconciling the divergent attitudes of the two governments had failed. It was said that behind Dr. Ritter's overtures was a proposal that American vessels would be spared in order to avoid actual war if the United States assented to the continuance of the extended blockade against England. This implied that all other vessels, neutral or belligerent, were marked for destruction. However that might be, Berlin, finding its approaches repulsed, boldly denied that the German Government had been a party to initiating any overtures at all. No recession of the submarine program was thought of or proposed; no change of policy was possible In fact, this denial brought with it tidings that the periods of grace Germany granted to neutral ships entering the prohibited zones had expired and that all immunity from attack and destruction had therefore ceased. Then it developed that Dr. Ritter's overtures had been traced to pacific elements in the United States, represented by William J. Bryan, who was said to have been in league with the ex-ambassador, Count von Bernstorff, and the Washington correspondent of a Cologne newspaper, in a plan to avert hostilities. Part of this propaganda was the transmission of dispatches from Washington to the German press stating that the President's message to Congress must not be construed literally, and that there was no desire for war with Germany. The purpose of these dispatches was to prevail on Germany to abate her submarine warfare by way of convincing the United States that her new policy was not so ruthless as had been described. The pacifists knew very well that the President had no intention of yielding to half measures, and that the only course Germany could take to obtain a resumption of negotiations was the absolute withdrawal of her order revoking the Sussex pledge. The Administration resented the pacifists' activities as an attempt to undermine the uncompromising position it had taken. Their dealings with a foreign government were actually unlawful; but no action was taken.

A subsequent announcement from Berlin stated that Dr. Ritter (inspired by American pacifists) had telegraphed the German Government offering to mediate, whereupon he was told that Germany was agreeable on the terms named in the interchanges Dr. Ritter had with the State Department. As to a belief which had arisen from Dr. Ritter's action that the marine barrier maintained against Great Britain by submarines and mines had been or would be weakened out of regard for the United States or for other reasons, official Berlin (February 14, 1917) had this to say:

"Regard for neutrals prompts the clearest declaration that unrestricted war against all sea traffic in the announced barred zones is now in full effect and will under no circumstances be restricted."

The United States had spoken: "Withdraw your new submarine decree before making any proposal," it had demanded of Berlin. Germany had spoken: "Our course cannot be changed."

The situation in Washington drifted along without any definite program of future action being disclosed; but the President was not idle. He decided—though he held the power himself—to ask Congress for authority to protect American shipping on the high seas by providing merchantmen with naval guns and gunners. There was a freight congestion in Atlantic ports, due to the reluctance of American shipowners to sail their vessels without defensive armament. The President's decision was a step nearer war, for armed American vessels, on encountering German submarines, would be bound to cause hostilities, and war would be a reality. Berlin took this view. If the United States armed its merchant ships, German opinion was that the considerate submarines would be unable to save passengers and crews of the vessels they sank. Were the vessels unarmed the submarines could perform this kindly service. This sardonic hint was construed as an official warning from Germany that the arming of American vessels meant war. The Administration, however, was no longer concerned with Germany's viewpoint. It realized that so long as it permitted American ships to be held in port in fear of attack by submarines if they ventured out, its inaction would in effect be viewed as acquiescing in the German policy. Such a state of affairs, it was decided, could not be allowed to continue indefinitely.[Back to Contents]