  Even at the risk of being tedious it is essential that we should sketch in outline the events which have produced the present grouping of belligerent states, and the long-drawn-out preparations which have equipped them for conflict on this colossal scale. To understand why Austria-Hungary and Germany have thrown down the glove to France and Russia, why England has intervened not only as the protector of Belgium, but also as the friend of France, we must go back to the situation created by the Franco-German War. Starting from that point, we must notice in order the formation of the Triple Alliance between Germany, Austria-Hungary, and Italy, of the Dual Alliance between France and Russia, of the Anglo-French and the Anglo-Russian understandings. The Triple Alliance has been the grand cause of the present situation; not because such a grouping of the Central European Powers was objectionable, but because it has inspired over-confidence in the two leading allies; because they have traded upon the prestige of their league to press their claims East and West with an intolerable disregard for the law of nations. Above all it was the threatening attitude of Germany towards her Western neighbours that drove England forward step by step in a policy of precautions which, she hoped, would avert a European conflagration, and which her rivals have attempted to represent as stages in a Machiavellian design to ruin Germany's well-being. These precautions, so obviously necessary that they were continued and expanded by the most pacific Government which England has seen since Mr. Gladstone's retirement, have taken two forms: that of diplomatic understandings, and that of naval preparations. Whichever form they have taken, they have been adopted in response to definite provocations, and to threats which it was impossible to overlook. They have been strictly and jealously measured by the magnitude of the peril immediately in view. In her diplomacy England has given no blank cheques; in her armaments she has cut down expenditure to the minimum that, with reasonable good fortune, might enable her to defend this country and English sea-borne trade against any probable combination of hostile Powers. Let us consider (1) the development of the diplomatic situation since 1870, (2) the so-called race of armaments since 1886. The Treaty of Frankfort (May 10, 1871), in which France submitted to the demands of the new-born German Empire, opened a fresh era of European diplomacy and international competition. The German Empire became at once, and has ever since remained, the predominant Power in Western Europe. The public opinion of this new Germany has been captured to no small extent by the views of such aggressive patriots as Treitschke, who openly avowed that 'the greatness and good of the world is to be found in the predominance there of German culture, of the German mind, in a word of the German character'. The school of Treitschke looked for the establishment of a German world-empire, and held that the essential preliminary to this scheme would be the overthrow of France and England. But until 1890, that is to say so long as Prince Bismarck remained Chancellor, no such ambitious programme was adopted by the German Government. Bismarck was content to strengthen the position of the Empire and to sow disunion among her actual or suspected enemies. In 1872 he brought about a friendly understanding with Austria and Russia, the other two great Powers of Eastern Europe, the so-called DreikaiserbÜndnis, which was designed to perpetuate the status quo. But the friendship with Russia quickly cooled; it received a sharp set-back in 1875, when the Tsar Alexander II came forward rather ostentatiously to save France from the alleged hostile designs of Germany; it was certainly not improved when Bismarck in his turn mediated between Russia and her opponents at the Congress of Berlin (1878). On the other hand, a common interest in the Eastern Question drew closer the bonds between Germany and Austria. The latter felt herself directly menaced by the Balkan policy of Russia; the former was not prepared to see her southern neighbour despoiled of territory. Hence in 1879 was initiated that closer union between Germany and Austria which has been so largely responsible for the present situation. The Treaty of 1879, which was kept secret until 1887, was purely defensive in its character; but the terms showed that Russia was the enemy whom both the contracting Powers chiefly feared. Neither was bound to active measures unless the other should be attacked by Russia, or any Power which had Russian support. In 1882 the alliance of the two great German Powers was joined by Italy—a surprising development which can only be explained on the ground of Italy's feeling that she could not hope for security at home, or for colonial expansion in the Mediterranean, so long as she remained in isolation. The Triple Alliance so constituted had a frail appearance, and it was hardly to be expected that Italy would receive strong support from partners in comparison with whose resources her own were insignificant. But the Triple Alliance has endured to the present day, the most permanent feature of the diplomatic system of the last thirty-two years. Whether the results have been commensurate with the sacrifices of sentiment and ambition which Italy has made, it is for Italy to judge. On the whole she has been a sleeping partner in the Alliance; its prestige has served almost exclusively for the promotion of Austrian and German aims; and one of its results has been to make Austria a formidable rival of Italy in the Adriatic. Meanwhile the remaining Great Powers of Europe had continued, as Prince Bismarck hoped, to pursue their separate paths, though England was on friendly terms with France and had, equally with Russia, laboured to avert a second Franco-German War in 1875. After 1882 the English occupation of Egypt constituted for some years a standing grievance in the eyes of France. The persistent advance of Russia in Asia had in like manner been a source of growing apprehension to England since 1868; and, for a long time after the Treaty of Berlin, English statesmen were on the watch to check the growth of Russian influence in the Balkans. But common interests of very different kinds were tending to unite these three Powers, not in any stable alliance, even for mutual defence, but in a string of compacts concluded for particular objects. One of these interests was connected with a feeling that the policy of the principal partners in the Triple Alliance, particularly that of Germany, had become incalculable and was only consistent in periodic outbursts of self-assertiveness, behind which could be discerned a steady determination to accumulate armaments which should be strong enough to intimidate any possible competitor. The growth of this feeling dates from the dismissal of Prince Bismarck by the present Kaiser. Bismarck had sedulously courted the friendship of Russia, even after 1882. He entered in fact into a defensive agreement with Russia against Austria. While he increased the war strength of the army, he openly announced that Germany would always stand on the defensive; and he addressed a warning to the Reichstag against the 'offensive-defensive' policy which was even then in the air, though it was still far from its triumph:— 'If I were to say to you, "We are threatened by France and Russia; it is better for us to fight at once; an offensive war is more advantageous to us," and ask for a credit of a hundred millions, I do not know whether you would grant it—I hope not.'[10] But Bismarck's retirement (1890) left the conduct of German policy in less cautious hands. The defensive alliance with Russia was allowed to lapse; friction between the two Powers increased, and as the result Germany found herself confronted with the Dual Alliance of France and Russia, which gradually developed, during the years 1891-6, from a friendly understanding into a formal contract for mutual defence. There is no doubt that this alliance afforded France a protection against that unprovoked attack upon her eastern frontier which she has never ceased to dread since 1875; and it has yet to be proved that she ever abused the new strength which this alliance gave her. It is only in the field of colonial expansion that she has shown aggressive tendencies since 1896; and even here the members of the Triple Alliance have never shown serious cause for a belief that France has invaded their lawful spheres of interest. Her advance in Morocco was permitted by Italy and Spain; her vast dominion in French West Africa has been recognized by treaties with Germany and England; in East Africa she has Madagascar, of which her possession has never been disputed by any European Power; her growing interests in Indo-China have impinged only upon an English sphere of interest and were peacefully defined by an Anglo-French Agreement of 1896. France has been the competitor, to some extent the successful competitor, of Germany in West Africa, where she partially envelops the Cameroons and Togoland. But the German Government has never ventured to state the French colonial methods as a casus belli. That the German people have viewed with jealousy the growth of French power in Africa is a notorious fact. Quite recently, on the eve of the present war, we were formally given to understand that Germany, in any war with France, might annex French colonies[11]; and it is easy to see how such an object would reconcile the divergent policies of the German military and naval experts. Up to the eve of the present war Great Britain has consistently refused to believe that Germany would be mad enough or dishonest enough to enter on a war of aggression for the dismemberment of colonial empires. German diplomacy in the past few weeks has rudely shattered this conviction. But up to the year 1914 the worst which was generally anticipated was that she would pursue in the future on a great scale the policy, which she has hitherto pursued on a small scale, of claiming so-called 'compensations' when other Powers succeeded in developing their colonial spheres, and of invoking imaginary 'interests' as a reason why the efforts of explorers and diplomatists should not be allowed to yield to France their natural fruits of increased colonial trade. It is not our business to impugn or to defend the partition of Africa, or the methods by which it has been brought about. But it is vital to our subject that we should describe the methods by which Germany has endeavoured to intimidate France at various stages of the African question. The trouble arose out of a Moroccan Agreement between England and France, which was the first definite proof that these two Powers were drifting into relations closer than that of ordinary friendship. In 1904 England and France settled their old quarrel about Egypt. France recognized the English occupation of Egypt; England, on her side, promised not to impede the extension of French influence in Morocco. It was agreed that neither in Egypt nor in Morocco should there be a political revolution; and that in both countries the customs tariff should make no distinction between one nation and another. This compact was accompanied by a settlement of the old disputes about French fishing rights in Newfoundland, and of more recent difficulties concerning the frontiers between French and English possessions in West Africa.[12] The whole group formed a step in a general policy, on both sides, of healing local controversies which had little meaning except as instruments of diplomatic warfare. The agreement regarding Egypt and Morocco is distinguished from that concerning West Africa and Newfoundland in so far as it recognizes the possibility of objections on the part of other Powers. It promised mutual support in the case of such objections; but not the support of armed force, only that of diplomatic influence. At the moment of these agreements Count BÜlow told the Reichstag that Germany had no objection, as her interests were in no way imperilled by them. Later, however, Germany chose to regard the Moroccan settlement as an injury or an insult or both. In the following year the Kaiser made a speech at Tangier (March, 1905) in which he asserted that he would uphold the important commercial and industrial interests of Germany in Morocco, and that he would never allow any other Power to step between him and the free sovereign of a free country. It was subsequently announced in the German Press that Germany had no objection to the Anglo-French Agreement in itself, but objected to not having been consulted before it was arranged. This complaint was met, on the part of France, by the retirement of M. DelcassÉ, her Minister of Foreign Affairs, and by her assent to an International Conference regarding Morocco. The Conference met at Algeciras, and German pretensions were satisfied by an international Agreement.[13] It is to be observed that in this Conference the original claims of Germany were opposed, not only by Russia, from whom she could hardly expect sympathy, but even by Italy, her own ally. When Germany had finally assented to the Agreement, her Chancellor, in flat contradiction with his previous utterance 'that German interests were in no way imperilled by it', announced that Germany had been compelled to intervene by her economic interests, by the prestige of German policy, and by the dignity of the German Empire. The plain fact was that Germany, soon after the conclusion of the Anglo-French agreements, had found herself suddenly delivered from her preoccupations on the side of Russia, and had seized the opportunity to assert herself in the West while Russia was involved in the most critical stage of her struggle with Japan. But this war came to an end before the Convention of Algeciras had begun; and Russia, even in the hour of defeat and internal revolutions, was still too formidable to be overridden, when she ranged herself beside her Western ally. Of the part which England played in the Moroccan dispute there are different versions. What is certain is that she gave France her diplomatic support. But the German Chancellor officially acknowledged, when all was over, that England's share in the Anglo-French Agreement had been perfectly correct, and that Germany bore England no ill-will for effecting a rapprochement with France. Still there remained a strong impression, not only in England and France, that there had been on Germany's part a deliberate intention to test the strength of the Anglo-French understanding and, if possible, to show France that England was a broken reed. It is not surprising that under these circumstances England has taken, since 1906, the precaution of freeing herself from any embarrassments in which she had previously been involved with other Powers. In 1905 she had shown her goodwill to Russia by exercising her influence to moderate the terms of the settlement with Japan. This was a wise step, consonant alike with English treaty-obligations to Japan and with the interests of European civilization. It led naturally to an amicable agreement with Russia (1907) concerning Persia, Afghanistan, and Tibet, the three countries which touch the northern borders of our Indian Empire. It cannot be too strongly emphasized that this agreement was of a local character, exactly as was that with France; that our friendly understandings with France and with Russia were entirely separate; and that neither related to the prosecution of a common policy in Europe; unless indeed the name of a policy could be given to the precaution, which was from time to time adopted, of permitting consultations between the French and English military experts. It was understood that these consultations committed neither country to a policy of common action.[14] England was drifting from her old attitude of 'splendid isolation'; but she had as yet no desire to involve herself, even for defensive purposes, in such a formal and permanent alliance as that which had been contracted by Germany, Austria, and Italy. But her hand was forced by Germany in 1911. Again the question of Morocco was made to supply a pretext for attacking our friendship with France. The German occupation of Agadir had, and could have, only one meaning. It was 'fastening a quarrel on France on a question that was the subject of a special agreement between France and us'.[15] The attack failed in its object. War was averted by the prompt action of the British Government. Mr. Asquith[16] announced that Great Britain, in discussing the Moroccan question, would have regard to British interests, which might be more directly involved than had hitherto been the case, and also to our treaty obligations with France. Somewhat later Mr. Asquith announced that if the negotiations between France and Germany did not reach a satisfactory settlement, Great Britain would become an active party to the discussion.[17] The nature of British interests were appropriately defined by Mr. Lloyd George in a Guildhall speech as consisting in the peace of the world, the maintenance of national honour, and the security of international trade.[18] The last phrase was a significant reference to the fact that Agadir, though valueless for commercial purposes, might be invaluable to any Power which desired to molest the South Atlantic trade routes. No one doubted then, or doubts to-day, that England stood in 1911 on the brink of a war which she had done nothing to provoke. The situation was saved in 1911 by the solidarity of England and France. Two Powers, which in the past had been separated by a multitude of prejudices and conflicting ambitions, felt at last that both were exposed to a common danger of the most serious character. Hence a new phase in the Anglo-French entente, which was cemented, not by a treaty, but by the interchange of letters between the English Secretary for Foreign Affairs (Sir Edward Grey) and the French Ambassador in London (M. Paul Cambon). On November 22, 1912, Sir Edward Grey[19] reminded M. Cambon of a remark which the latter had made, 'that if either Government had grave reason to expect an unprovoked attack by a third Power, it might become essential to know whether it could in that event depend on the armed assistance of the other.' Sir Edward Grey continued:—'I agree that if either Government had grave reason to expect an unprovoked attack by a third Power, or something that threatened the general peace, it should immediately discuss with the other whether both Governments should act together to prevent aggression and to preserve peace, and, if so, what measures they would be prepared to take in common. If these measures involved action, the plans of the General Staffs would at once be taken into consideration, and the Governments would then decide what effect should be given to them.' M. Cambon replied on the following day that he was authorized to accept the arrangement which Sir E. Grey had offered.[20] The agreement, it will be seen, was of an elastic nature. Neither party was bound to co-operate, even diplomatically, with the other. The undertaking was to discuss any threatening situation, and to take common measures if both agreed to the necessity; there was an admission that the agreement might result in the conduct of a joint defensive war upon a common plan. Such an understanding between two sovereign states could be resented only by a Power which designed to attack one of them without clear provocation. The date at which these notes were interchanged is certainly significant. In November, 1912, the Balkan Allies were advancing on Constantinople, and already the spoils of the Balkan War were in dispute. Servia incurred the hostility of Austria-Hungary by demanding Albania and Adriatic ports; and the Dual Monarchy announced that it could never accept this arrangement. Behind Servia Austrian statesmen suspected the influence of Russia; it was, they said, a scheme for bringing Russia down to a sea which Austria regarded as her own preserve. Austria mobilized her army, and a war could hardly have been avoided but for the mediation of Germany and England. If England had entertained the malignant designs with which she is credited in some German circles, nothing would have been easier for her than to fan the flames, and to bring Russia down upon the Triple Alliance. The notes show how different from this were the aims of Sir Edward Grey. He evidently foresaw that a war between Austria and Russia would result in a German attack upon France. Not content with giving France assurance of support, he laboured to remove the root of the evil. A congress to settle the Balkan disputes was held at London in December, 1912; and it persuaded Servia to accept a reasonable compromise, by which she obtained commercial access to the Adriatic, but no port. This for the moment pacified Austria and averted the world-war. To whom the solution was due we know from the lips of German statesmen. The German Chancellor subsequently (April 7, 1913) told the Reichstag:— 'A state of tension had for months existed between Austria-Hungary and Russia which was only prevented from developing into war by the moderation of the Powers.... Europe will feel grateful to the English Minister of Foreign Affairs for the extraordinary ability and spirit of conciliation with which he conducted the discussion of the Ambassadors in London, and which constantly enabled him to bridge over differences.' The Chancellor concluded by saying: 'We at any rate shall never stir up such a war'—a promise or a prophecy which has been singularly falsified. It is no easy matter to understand the line of conduct which Germany has adopted towards the great Slavonic Power on her flank. Since Bismarck left the helm, she has sometimes steered in the direction of subservience, and sometimes has displayed the most audacious insolence. Periodically, it is to be supposed, her rulers have felt that in the long run the momentum of a Russian attack would be irresistible; at other times, particularly after the Russo-Japanese War, they have treated Russia, as the Elizabethans treated Spain, as 'a colossus stuffed with clouts.' But rightly or wrongly they appear to have assumed that sooner or later there must come a general Armageddon, in which the central feature would be a duel of the Teuton with the Slav; and in German military circles there was undoubtedly a conviction that the epic conflict had best come sooner and not later. How long this idea has influenced German policy we do not pretend to say. But it has certainly contributed to her unenviable prominence in the 'race of armaments' which all thinking men have condemned as an insupportable, tax upon Western civilization, and which has aggravated all the evils that it was intended to avert. The beginning of the evil was perhaps due to France; but, if so, it was to a France which viewed with just alarm the enormous strides in population and wealth made by Germany since 1871. The 'Boulanger Law' of 1886 raised the peace footing of the French army above 500,000 men, at a time when that of Germany was 427,000, and that of Russia 550,000. Bismarck replied by the comparatively moderate measure of adding 41,000 to the German peace establishment for seven years; and it is significant of the difference between then and now that he only carried his Bill after a dissolution of one Reichstag and a forcible appeal to its successor. France must soon have repented of the indiscretion to which she had been tempted by a military adventurer. With a population comparatively small and rapidly approaching the stationary phase it was impossible that she could long maintain such a race. In 1893 Count Caprivi's law, carried like that of Bismarck after a stiff struggle with the Reichstag, raised the peace establishment to 479,000 men. Count Caprivi at the same time reduced the period of compulsory service from three years to two; but while this reform lightened the burden on the individual conscript, it meant a great increase in the number of those who passed through military training, and an enormous increase of the war strength. The Franco-Russian entente of 1896 was a sign that France began to feel herself beaten in the race for supremacy and reduced to the defensive. In 1899 the German peace strength was raised to 495,000 for the next six years; in 1905 to 505,000. On the second of these occasions the German Government justified its policy by pointing out that the French war strength was still superior to that of Germany, and would become still stronger if France should change the period of service from three years to two. The German law was announced in 1904; it had the natural effect. The French Senate not only passed the new law early in 1905, but also swept away the changes which the Lower House had introduced to lighten the burden of annual training upon territorial reserves. France found her justification in the Moroccan episode of the previous year. This was not unreasonable; but since that date France has been heavily punished for a step which might be taken to indicate that Revanche was still a feature of her foreign policy. Since 1886 her utmost efforts have only succeeded in raising her peace establishment to 545,000 (including a body of 28,000 colonial troops stationed in France), and her total war strength to 4,000,000. In the same period the peace establishment of Germany was raised to over 800,000, and her total war strength of fully trained men to something like 5,400,000. It is obvious from these figures that a policy of isolation has long ceased to be possible to France; and that an alliance with Russia has been her only possible method of counterbalancing the numerical superiority of the German army, which is certainly not less well equipped or organized than that of France. This Russian alliance of France has been the only step in her continental policy which could be challenged as tending to overthrow the European balance. Undoubtedly it is France's prime offence in German eyes; and her colonial policy has only been attacked as a pretext for picking a quarrel and forcing on a decisive trial of strength before the growth of Russian resources should have made her ally impregnable. Let us now look at the German military preparations from a German point of view. The increases of the last twenty years in military expenditure and in fighting strength have been openly discussed in the Reichstag; and the debates have usually run on the same lines, because the Government up to 1912 pursued a consistent policy, framed for some years ahead and embodied in an Army Act. The underlying principle of these Army Acts (1893, 1899, 1905, 1911) was to maintain a fairly constant ratio between the peace strength and the population. But the war strength was disproportionately increased by the Caprivi Army Act of 1893, which reduced the period of compulsory service from three years to two. The hardly-veiled intention of the German War Staff was to increase its war resources as rapidly as was consistent with the long-sufferance of those who served and those who paid the bill. It was taken as axiomatic that an increasing population ought to be protected by an increasing army. National defence was of course alleged as the prime consideration; and if these preparations were really required by growing danger on the two main frontiers of Germany, no German could do otherwise than approve the policy, no foreign Power could feel itself legitimately aggrieved. Unfortunately it has been a maxim of German policy in recent years that national independence means the power of taking the aggressive in any case where national interests or amour-propre may prompt it. The increase of the German army, either in numbers or in technical efficiency, seems to be regularly followed by masterful strokes of diplomacy in which the 'mailed fist' is plainly shown to other continental Powers. Thus in 1909, at the close of a quinquennium of military re-equipment, which had raised her annual army budget from £27,000,000 to £41,000,000, Germany countenanced the Austrian annexation of Bosnia and the Herzegovina, and plainly told the authorities at St. Petersburg that any military action against Austria would bring Russia into a state of war with Germany. It was a startling step; radix malorum we may call it, so far as the later development of the continental situation is concerned. Russia withdrew from the impending conflict in 1909, but it is improbable that she has ever forgiven the matter or the manner of the German ultimatum. In 1911 followed the episode of Agadir, which was clearly an attempt to 'force a quarrel on France.' But in 1911 Germany realized that her military calculations had been insufficient, if she wished to continue these unamiable diplomatic manners. It was not a question of self-preservation; it was a question, as the German Chancellor told the Reichstag, of showing the world that 'Germany was firmly resolved not to be pushed aside.' Hence the sensational Army Bill of 1912, necessitated, as the Government told the Reichstag, by the events of 1911. The Russian peril could hardly be described as imminent. The Prussian Minister of War said publicly in 1911 that 'there was no Government which either desired or was seeking to bring about a war with Germany.' Russia had recently taken steps which, at Berlin, perhaps, were read as signs of weakness, but elsewhere were hailed as proofs of her desire for general peace. M. Isvolsky, the supposed champion of Balkan ideals, had retired from office; his successor, M. Sazonof, had accompanied the Czar to the Potsdam interview (1910); the outstanding disputes of Germany and Russia over their Persian interests had been settled by agreement in 1911. But the German Army Bill of 1912 was followed by Russia's intervention in the Balkans to secure for Servia at least commercial access to the Adriatic. This compromise, ostensibly promoted and belauded by German statesmanship, only increased the determination of the German Government to 'hold the ring' in the Balkans, to claim for Austria the right of settling her own differences with Servia as she would, and to deny Russia any interest in the matter. In 1913 came the supreme effort of the German General Staff: an Army Act for raising the peace strength by instalments until it reached 870,000, and for the eventual provision of a war strength of 5,400,000 men. This enormous increase was recommended 'by the unanimous judgement of the military authorities' as being 'necessary to secure the future of Germany.' The Chancellor warned the Reichstag that, although relations were friendly with Russia, they had to face the possibilities involved in the Pan-Slavist movement; while in Russia itself they had to reckon with a marvellous economic development and an unprecedented reorganization of the army. There was also a reference to the new law for a return to three years' service which France was introducing to improve the efficiency of her peace establishment. But it was obvious that Russia was the main preoccupation. Germany had forced the pace both in the aggrandizement of her military strength and in the methods of her diplomatic intercourse. Suddenly she found herself on the brink of an abyss. She had gone too far; she had provoked into the competition of armaments a Power as far superior to Germany in her reserves of men as Germany thought herself superior to France. It was not too late for Germany to pause. On her future behaviour towards other Powers it depended whether the Bill of 1913 should be taken as an insurance against risks, or as a challenge to all possible opponents. The other Powers shaped their policy in accordance with Germany's example. In France, on March 4, the Supreme Council of War, having learned the outline of the German programme, decided to increase the effective fighting force by a return to the rule of three years' service. Before the German Bill had passed (June 30), the French Prime Minister announced (May 15) that he would of his own authority keep with the colours those who were completing their second year's service in the autumn. The French Army Bill, when finally passed (July 16), lowered the age limit for commencing service from twenty-one to twenty, and brought the new rule into force at once. A few weeks earlier (June 20) Belgium introduced universal military service in place of her former lenient system. In Russia a secret session of the Duma was held (July 8) to pass a new Army Budget, and the term of service was raised from three to three and a quarter years. Austria alone provided for no great increase in the numerical strength of her army; but budgeted (October 30) for extraordinary naval and military expenditure, to the extent of £28,000,000, to be incurred in the first six months of 1914. Thus on all sides the alarm was raised, and special preparations were put in hand, long before the crisis of 1914 actually arrived. It was Germany that had sounded the tocsin; and it is difficult to believe that some startling coup was not even then being planned by the leaders of her military party. We have been told that, whatever the appearance of things might be, it was Russia who drove Germany to the extraordinary preparations of 1913; that Germany was arming simply in self-defence against a Slavonic Crusade. What are the facts? Economically Russia, as a state, is in a stronger position than the German Empire. In 1912 we were told that for the past five years the revenue of Russia had exceeded expenditure by an average sum of £20,000,000 per annum. The revenue of Russia in 1913 was over £324,000,000; she has budgeted for £78,000,000 of military expenditure in 1914, of which some £15,000,000 is emergency expenditure. The total revenue of the German Empire in 1913 was £184,000,000; she has budgeted for a military expenditure in 1914 of £60,000,000. To adopt the usual German tests of comparison, Russia has a population of 173 millions to be defended on three land-frontiers, while Germany has a population of 65 millions to be defended on only two. The military efforts of Russia, therefore, have been made on a scale relatively smaller than those of Germany. We must, however, add some further considerations which have been urged by German military critics; the alleged facts we cannot test, but we state them for what they may be worth. The reorganization of the Russian army in recent years has resulted, so we are told, in the grouping of enormously increased forces upon the western frontier. The western fortresses also have been equipped on an unparalleled scale. New roads and railways have been constructed to accelerate the mobilization of the war strength; and, above all, strategic railways have been pushed towards the western frontier. Thus, it is argued, Russia has in effect gone behind the Potsdam Agreement of 1910, by which she withdrew her armies to a fixed distance behind the Russo-German frontier. We confess that, in all this, while there may have been cause for watchfulness on the part of Germany, we can see no valid cause for war, nothing that of necessity implies more than an intention, on the part of Russia, not to be brow-beaten in the future as she was in 1909 and 1912. These military developments did not escape English notice. They excited endless speculation about the great war of the future, and the part which this country might be asked to bear in it. Few, however, seriously supposed that we should commit ourselves to a share in the fighting upon land. The problem most usually discussed in this connexion was that of preparation to resist a sudden invasion from abroad. Was it possible to avoid compulsory service? Was the Territorial Force large enough and efficient enough to defend the country if the Expeditionary Force had gone abroad? Great Britain was infinitely better equipped for land warfare in August, 1914, than she had ever been in the nineteenth century. But her Expeditionary Force was a recent creation, and had been planned for the defence of India and the Colonies. In practice the country had clung to the 'Blue Water' policy, of trusting the national fortunes entirely to the Navy. The orthodox theory was that so long as the Navy was kept at the 'Two Power' standard, no considerable invasion of the British Isles was possible. But from 1898 the programmes of the German Navy Laws constituted a growing menace to the 'Two Power' standard, which had been laid down as our official principle in 1889, when France and Russia were our chief European rivals at sea. That France or Russia would combine with Germany to challenge our naval supremacy was improbable; but other states were beginning to build on a larger scale, and this multiplied the possible number of hostile combinations. That Germany should wish for a strong fleet was only natural. It was needed to defend her foreign trade, her colonial interests, and her own seaports. That Germany should lay down a definite programme for six years ahead, and that the programme should become more extensive at each revision, was no necessary proof of malice. But this country received a shock in 1900, when the programme of 1898 was unexpectedly and drastically revised, so that the German Navy was practically doubled. England was at that moment involved in the South African War, and it was hard to see against whom the new fleet could be used, if not against England. This was pointed out from time to time by the Socialist opposition in the Reichstag. The orthodox official reply was that Germany must be so strong at sea that the strongest naval Power should not be able to challenge her with any confidence. But the feeling of the semi-official Navy League was known to be violently hostile to England; and it was obvious that the German navy owed its popularity to the alarmist propaganda of that league. It was impossible for English statesmen to avoid the suspicion that, on the sea as on land, the Germans meant by liberty the right to unlimited self-assertion. Common prudence dictated close attention to the German Navy Laws; especially as they proved capable of unexpected acceleration. The 'Two Power' standard, under the stress of German competition, became increasingly difficult to maintain, and English Liberals were inclined to denounce it as wasteful of money. But, when a Liberal Government tried the experiment of economizing on the Navy (1906-8), there was no corresponding reduction in the German programme. The German Naval Law of 1906 raised the amount of the naval estimates by one-third; and German ministers blandly waved aside as impracticable a proposal for a mutual limitation of armaments. In 1909 this country discovered that in capital ships—which now began to be considered the decisive factor in naval warfare—Germany would actually be the superior by 1914 unless special measures were taken. The British Government was awakened to the new situation (it arose from the German Naval Law of 1908), and returned unwillingly to the path of increasing expenditure. The Prime Minister said that we regretted the race in naval expenditure and were not animated by anti-German feeling; but we could not afford to let our supremacy at sea be imperilled, since our national security depended on it (March 16, 1909). The 'Two Power' standard was dropped, and the Triple Alliance became the object of special attention at the Admiralty. The First Lord said on March 13, 1911, that we should make our navy superior to any foreign navy and to any probable combination which we might have to meet single-handed. In practice this meant a policy of developing, in the matter of Dreadnoughts, a superiority of sixty per cent, over the German navy; this, it was officially explained in 1912, had been for some years past the actual Admiralty standard of new construction (Mr. Winston Churchill, March 18, 1912). But even this programme had to be stiffened when the year 1912 saw a new German Navy Bill which involved an increased expenditure of £1,000,000 annually for six years, and had the effect of putting nearly four-fifths of the German navy in a position of immediate readiness for war. Earlier in the year the British Government had announced that, if the German policy of construction were accelerated, we should add to our programme double the number which Germany put in hand; but if Germany relaxed her preparations we should make a fully proportionate reduction. The German Bill came as an answer to this declaration; and it was followed in this country by supplementary estimates on naval account, amounting to nearly a million pounds; and this was announced to be 'the first and smallest instalment of the extra expenditure entailed by the new German law.' The new British policy was maintained in 1913 and in 1914, though in 1913 the First Lord of the Admiralty made a public offer of a 'naval holiday,' a suspension of new construction by mutual consent. The Imperial Chancellor responded only by suggesting that the proposal was entirely unofficial, by asking for concrete proposals, and by saying that the idea constituted a great progress; and his naval estimates in 1913 were half a million higher than those of 1912. From these facts, viewed in their chronological order, it is clear that on sea as on land Germany has set the pace. Thirty years ago the German navy did not enter into England's naval calculations. For the last six years, if not for a longer period, it has been the one navy which our Admiralty felt the necessity of watching from year to year, and indeed from month to month. It is the first time for more than a hundred years that we have had to face the problem of 'a powerful homogeneous navy under one government and concentrated within easy distance of our shores.' On German principles we should long ago have adopted the 'offensive-defensive.' We have been at least as seriously menaced by Germany at sea as Germany has been menaced by Russia upon land. But we can confidently say that in the period of rivalry our fleet has never been used as a threat, or turned to the purposes of an aggressive colonial policy. Rightly or wrongly, we have refused to make possible intentions a case for an ultimatum. We have held by the position that only a breach of public law would justify us in abandoning our efforts for the peace of Europe. NOTEAbstract of Anglo-French Agreement on Morocco. In April, 1904, England and France concluded an agreement for the delimitation of their interests on the Mediterranean littoral of North Africa. The agreement included five secret Articles which were not published until November, 1911. The purport of the Articles which were published at the time was as follows. By the first Article England stated that she had not the intention of changing the political state of Egypt; and France declared that she would not impede the action of England in Egypt by demanding that a term should be fixed for the British occupation or in any other way. By the second Article France declared that she had not the intention of changing the political state of Morocco; and England recognized that it appertained to France, as the Power conterminous with Morocco, to watch the tranquillity of this country and to assist it in all administrative, economic, financial, and military reforms which it required, France promised to respect the customary and treaty rights of England in Morocco; and by the third Article England made a corresponding promise to France in respect of Egypt. By the fourth Article the two Governments undertook to maintain 'the principle of commercial liberty' in Egypt and Morocco, by not lending themselves in either country to inequality in the establishment of Customs-duties or of other taxes or of railway rates. The sixth and seventh Articles were inserted to ensure the free passage of the Suez Canal and of the Straits of Gibraltar. The eighth declared that both Governments took into friendly consideration the interests of Spain in Morocco, and that France would make some arrangements with the Spanish Monarchy. The ninth Article declared that each Government would lend its diplomatic support to the other in executing the clauses relative to Egypt and Morocco.[21] Of the secret Articles two (Nos. 3 and 4) related to Spain, defining the territory which she was to receive 'whenever the Sultan ceases to exercise authority over it,' and providing that the Anglo-French agreement would hold good even if Spain declined this arrangement. Article 1 stipulated that, if either Government found itself constrained, by the force of circumstances, to modify its policy in respect to Egypt or Morocco, nevertheless the fourth, sixth, and seventh Articles of the public declaration would remain intact; that is, each would under all circumstances maintain the principle of 'commercial liberty,' and would permit the free passage of the Suez Canal and the Straits of Gibraltar. In Article 2 England, while disclaiming any intention to alter the system of Capitulations or the judicial organization of Egypt, reserved the right to reform the Egyptian legislative system on the model of other civilized countries; and France agreed on condition that she should not be impeded from making similar reforms in Morocco. The fifth Article related to the Egyptian national debt. Notes: |
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