In commenting upon Herr von Jagow's reply to Prince Lichnowsky, Georg Bernhard, editor in chief of the Vossische Zeitung, took occasion to re-emphasize his favorite theory of a rapprochement with Russia so as to enable Germany to reduce Great Britain to the level of a second-class power. In a long article, printed on March 31, Herr Bernhard asserted that Prince Lichnowsky had been by no means alone in his policy of seeking agreement with England as Herr von Jagow himself had admitted, and that the German Foreign Office had seemed obsessed with the idea that it was a question of a choice between Austria and England, when, in reality, if the diplomats had wanted to pursue a good German policy and at the same time be of service to Austria, they should have made it a question of Russia or England and tried to establish good relations with the former under all circumstances. After quoting von Jagow's remark about the inadvisability of abandoning old alliances until new constellations were attainable, Herr Bernhard said:

"We shall not go into the question here if, during this war, which strains all the forces of the alliance to the utmost, a former German Secretary of State should have written such sentences. It is incomprehensible how they came from the pen of a sensible man—and Herr von Jagow is such a one. And it is still more incomprehensible how they were able to escape the attention of the Foreign Office. Fortunately, they can no longer do any harm now, as through our deeds we have demonstrated our loyalty to the Austrians and Hungarians better than it can be done by any amount of talk."

In an earlier editorial Herr Bernhard referred as follows to von Jagow's admission that he did not believe that England had laid all the mines leading to the world war:

"In spite of all experiences, therefore, here is another—almost official—attempt made to represent the war as merely the result of the aggressive desires of France and Russia. As if France (through whose population went a shudder of fear as it saw itself on the edge of the abyss of war) would ever have dared to go to war without knowing that England stood back of her! And were Edward's trips to Paris without any effect upon our diplomats? Has it not also finally become sufficiently well known through the reports of the Belgian Ambassador how France repeatedly tried to escape from the alliance, but was always again forced into the net by Nicolson, [former British Under Secretary for Foreign Affairs,] through Edward? The Imperial Chancellor, von Bethmann Hollweg, himself admitted in the Reichstag the harmful rÔle of King Edward. Only he, as probably did Herr von Jagow also, thought that Edward's death put an end to the policy of encircling. But this policy of encircling—and here is where the mistake entailing serious consequences is made by our diplomats—was not at all merely a personal favorite idea of Edward VII., but the continuation of the traditional English policy toward the strongest Continental power."

Thanks for Hindenburg

Herr Bernhard then asserted that England desired the publication of the proposed Anglo-German treaty regarding the division of the Portuguese colonies into spheres of economic interests so as to make Portugal's eventual support of the Entente all the surer, and continued:

"And Lichnowsky wanted to fall into this trap set by England. It was avoided by the Foreign Office more through instinct than sagacity. And these diplomats have guided Germany's destiny before and during the war! Let us give the warmest thanks to Hindenburg because his sword has now, it is to be hoped, put an end once for all to the continued spinning of plans by such and similar diplomats even during the war."

Theodor Wolff, editor in chief of the Berliner Tageblatt, probably the leading organ of the German business elements and liberal politicians who were opposed to the war from the beginning, and who still hope for a negotiated peace that will facilitate an early resumption of trade relations with Great Britain and the rest of the allies, expressed the hope that the "battle of minds will finally create a clearer atmosphere," and then remarked:

"Only quite incidentally would I like to allow myself to direct the attention of Herr von Jagow to an erroneous expression that appears twice in his reply. Herr von Jagow writes: 'We informed him [Lichnowsky] of the secret Anglo-Russian naval agreement,' and in another place: 'The secret Anglo-Russian naval agreement might also have made him a little more skeptical.' Only the day before, on Saturday, it was said in an article of the Norddeutshe Allgemeine Zeitung, also directed against Lichnowsky: 'Negotiations were pending with Russia over a naval agreement that the Prince characteristically passes over in silence.' In reality, although hasty historians also speak without further ceremony of a treaty, it is manifest that no Anglo-Russian agreement existed; there was merely a Russian proposal, and the most that can be said is that 'negotiations were pending.' * * *

"His [von Jagow's] remark, 'It is not true that the Foreign Office did not believe the reports that England would protect France under all circumstances,' is in contradiction with the well-known report of the then English Ambassador, Goschen, which describes into what surprise and consternation Herr von Bethmann and Herr von Jagow were thrown by the news of the English declaration of war."

In beginning his comment upon von Jagow, Herr Wolff threw a little more light upon the way in which Prince Lichnowsky's memorandum "for the family archives" got into more or less general secret circulation in Germany before it was printed by the Swedish Socialist paper Politiken last March, and also described the character of Captain Beerfelde, the member of the German General Staff who, according to some cabled reports, is to be tried for his part in distributing copies of the memorandum.

Herr Wolff said that Prince Lichnowsky had had five or six copies made, of which he had sent one to Wolff, one to Albert Ballin, head of the Hamburg-American line, and another to Arthur von Gwinner, head of the Deutsche Bank. All of these persons carefully hid the "dangerous gift" in the deepest recesses of their writing desks, but a fourth copy went astray and got into hands for which it had not been intended, and from these hands passed into those of still another individual. Then the editor wrote:

How Manuscript Became Public

"I made the acquaintance some years before the war of the officer who obtained the memorandum 'on loan,' and sent copies of it to State officials and politicians. He belongs to an old noble family, was treated with sympathy by General von Moltke, the Chief of the General Staff, occupied himself enthusiastically with religious philosophy or theosophy, and was a thoroughly manly but mystic person. * * * After hard war experiences, he felt the longing to serve the dictates of peace with complete devotion, and he surrendered himself to a pacifism which is absolutely incompatible with the uniform.

"Late one evening he visited me in a state of great excitement, and told me that he had manifolded a memorandum by Prince Lichnowsky which had been lent to him, and that, without asking the author, he had sent it to the 'leading men.' It was impossible to convince him by any logic or on any grounds of reason that his action was wrong, senseless, and harmful. He was a Marquis Posa, or, still more, a Horatius Cocles, who, out of love for Rome or for mankind, sprang into the abyss."

The Berlin VorwÄrts, the leading organ of the pro-Government Socialists, began its editorial on the von Jagow reply by remarking that the article of the former State Secretary for Foreign Affairs was hardly calculated to convince the reader that Prince Lichnowsky's self-esteem was the only thing that had had a "painful effect" upon the German people in July, 1914, and since that time. It then said that "Herr von Jagow agrees with Lichnowsky upon the decisive point!" quoted what von Jagow had said about his desire for an Anglo-German rapprochement, and continued:

"These words show that, in 1913, the Wilhelmstrasse and the London Embassy were in the complete harmony of common beliefs and intentions. Herr von Jagow, exactly like Lichnowsky, exactly like Bethmann, and exactly like Wilhelm II., believed in the possibility of creating 'an atmosphere of confidence,' as Jagow says, between Germany and England, through a series of agreements, of which those regarding the Bagdad Railroad and Africa were to have been the first."

VorwÄrts then proceeded to point out that the Albanian crisis had strengthened this faith instead of weakening it, took up von Jagow's reasons for Germany's refusal to have the proposed Anglo-German agreement on the Portuguese African colonies published, and exclaimed:

"What a fear of Tirpitz! A disturbing of the new relations through his intrigues and the howling of his jingo press was to be avoided through an affectation of secrecy. But three weeks later the war with England was here and the Pan-German sheets welcomed 'the longed-for day!' What had happened in the meantime? Of course, 'perfidious Albion' (even Jagow puts quotation marks on these words) had in the meantime thrown off the mask and revealed her perfidy! Let's hear what—after Lichnowsky—Herr von Jagow, Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs in July, 1914, has to say about it!"

Then VorwÄrts quoted Jagow's description of how the war began, and went on:

"All that remains of the accusations against the English Government is that it did not prevent the world war, 'although it could have done so.' Now Herr von Jagow also did not prevent the world war, but he must certainly be acquitted of the charge that he could have prevented it. He really could not, and so an emphatic statement of inability is the best excuse for him and his fellow-disputants.

"Let us establish the facts. England did not desire the war; she merely did not prevent it. The war was not popular in England; it also was not popular in Russia and France. But it has become popular. The whole world—right away across the Atlantic and the Pacific—is united in hatred against us. We, however, have for almost four years been inoculated with the view that 'England laid all the mines which caused the war'—a view which the Secretary of State, in accordance with the evidence of the Ambassador, has now declared to be false! It is, however, by this false view that the whole war policy of the German Empire has been directed—from the declaration of unrestricted submarine warfare, which brought us war with America, down to those Chancellor speeches which say that Belgium must not again become England's area of military concentration.

"If all the parties concerned were convinced that the belief in England's guilt is a fiction, why did they feed this belief, and why did they pursue a policy which was based upon it? They ought rather to have appointed to the Chancellorship Tirpitz, who, perhaps, believes what he says. Instead of that, a policy of fear of Tirpitz has been pursued. Sometimes a policy against Tirpitz has been attempted, but it has always been reversed at decisive moments, out of fear of the nationalistic terror.

"This fear was, perhaps, not entirely unfounded, for agitation is unscrupulous. The older ones among us still remember very well 'an Englishwoman' who was very unpopular in many circles, but this Englishwoman was the mother of the German Kaiser. No doubt there was no more convenient method for the Government to guard the dynasty than for it to take part in, or at least to tolerate, the agitation against the English. This was the only way of preventing the agitation from turning ultimately against the wearer of the German imperial crown. But ought such intimate considerations to have been permitted to play a part when the fate of the nations was at stake?

"Let us put an end to this! At this moment we are in a battle which may be decisive and which is going in favor of the empire. But even after this battle we shall possess neither the possibility nor the moral right to treat our opponent according to the principle of 'With thumbs in his eyes and knee on his breast.' Even after the greatest military successes there exists the necessity for political negotiation. It will be easier for us to enter into this negotiation after the poisonous fog of the war lies shall have lifted. Now that Herr von Jagow has cleared up the rÔle played by England at the beginning of the war, there is nothing in the way of the fulfillment of the promise made by Bethmann to 'make good the wrong committed against Belgium'!

"If it is perhaps true that everything Wilhelm II., Bethmann, von Jagow, and Lichnowsky thought was true up to three weeks before the outbreak of the war was false, then let the mistake be acknowledged and the conservative Pan-Germans be put openly in the Government, so that they, both within and without, may complete the work of a peace by force. But if this is neither desirable nor possible, then there is nothing left to do but to take a decided step ahead. For the German people cannot be satisfied with the methods of governing exercised before and during the war. * * * The German people can only endure after the war as a peace-loving nation that governs itself."