I.
The dodge of the “Drawn Game” will be based on the following train of reasoning, which unquestionably prevails in Berlin:
“The Allied diplomats have grasped neither our plan, nor our Pangerman organization, although that has required a preparation lasting twenty years. The Allied diplomats have understood neither the true position of the Balkans after the treaty of Bukarest (though that position was so favourable to themselves), nor the importance of the Balkan forces for the issue of the war. Still less do the Allied diplomats and the public of their respective countries know about the real state of affairs in Austria-Hungary. In France, and above all in England, a considerable proportion of the public continue to believe that Austria-Hungary is chiefly a German country, and that its more or less formal union with the Empire is a natural and almost inevitable event. Therefore, if we are compelled to give way in the East and in the West we may still, if we are clever, have a chance of achieving the third part of our Pangerman plan. The Allies will not understand the future danger in store for them if we carry out that part which is, indeed, the principal part of our scheme, namely, our designs on the South and South-East, symbolized by the formula: From Hamburg to the Persian Gulf.”
Indeed, the dodge of the “Drawn Game” aims at nothing less than at that result. We must own that the German argument which has just been summarized is not devoid of foundation; for up to now the Press of the Allies has published articles on Austria-Hungary revealing a total misconception of the facts, and they have thus unconsciously encouraged the Pangerman project as regards the Hapsburg Monarchy.
THE CONSEQUENCES OF THE DODGE CALLED THE “DRAWN GAME.”
In the Allied Press, also, the expression: “Drawn Game” is currently employed to mean that Germany might be considered as vanquished if she evacuates the now occupied territories in the East and in the West; but nobody has yet pointed out with the necessary precision that the so-called “Drawn Game” would not be a draw at all, since it would allow Germany to effect enormous acquisitions, which would make her much more powerful than before the war.
And yet the Allies ought not to be again the dupes of a German stratagem; which, if it succeeded, would involve consequences infinitely more serious than all the former errors of the Allies. To ward off that danger it suffices to look it full in the face and thoroughly to fathom what would be the outcome of a peace negotiated on the so-called principle of a “Drawn Game.”
The term “Drawn Game” evidently denotes that each country would keep the frontiers which existed before the war; also that each country would bear the burden of the outlays it has made during the struggle. But we will argue on a hypothesis infinitely more favourable for the Western Allies than that of the so-called “Drawn Game” in order to demonstrate super-abundantly and as decisively as possible what would be concealed behind this apparent and partial German capitulation.
Let us suppose (see map, p. 79) that, in consequence of victorious offensives of the Allies, Germany should declare herself disposed, not only to evacuate totally Poland, the French Departments, Belgium, and Luxemburg, but also to restore Alsace-Lorraine to France, and even to give, as an indemnity all the rest of the left bank of the Rhine, under the sole and tacit condition that Germany should keep her preponderant influence, direct or indirect, over Austria-Hungary, the Balkans and Turkey.
There are surely in the Allied Western countries many worthy people who, at present, no more see the result of such a peace, than a year ago they understood the enormous influences which the Balkans would exert on the course of the war. These good creatures, weary of the prolonged strife, would at once say: “After all, these are most acceptable terms: Alsace-Lorraine, the left bank of the Rhine!... let us make peace.”
If matters are probed to the bottom it will be easily seen that, should the Allies negotiate peace with Germany on such a basis, the restitution of Alsace-Lorraine could only be temporary; for with such a peace as that, Germany would secure all the elements of power which might enable her, after a very short respite, to retake Alsace-Lorraine, and in the end to overcome all the Allies and to achieve in its entirety the Pangerman plan, not only in Europe, but in Asia, nay in the whole world.
To relinquish the left bank of the Rhine, according to our hypothesis, would mean for Germany that she would lose:
| Provinces. | Square Kilometres. | Population. |
|---|---|---|
| Rhenish-Prussia | 27,000 | 7,000,000 |
| Rhenish-Bavaria | 5,928 | 1,000,000 |
| Alsace-Lorraine | 14,522 | 2,000,000 |
| Total | 47,450 | 10,000,000 |
The present German Empire would therefore be reduced to 493,408 square kilometres and 58 million inhabitants. But this loss in the West would be far more than counterbalanced by that close union of Austria-Hungary to the German Empire, which would be none the less real because it would be disguised. On this reckoning Berlin’s influence would be exercised directly and absolutely over:
| Square Kilometres. | Population. | |
|---|---|---|
| German Empire curtailed in the West | 493,408 | 58,000,000 |
| Austria-Hungary | 676,616 | 50,000,000 |
| Total | 1,170,024 | 108,000,000 |
It is evident that a solid block of States, established in Central Europe under the direction of Berlin, would exercise, simply by contiguity an absolutely preponderant pressure on:
| Square Kilometres. | Population. | |
|---|---|---|
| The Balkans | 499,275 | 22,000,000 |
| Turkey | 1,792,900 | 20,000,000 |
| Total | 2,292,175 | 42,000,000 |
Therefore Berlin’s preponderant influence would be wielded, directly or indirectly, over 3,462,199 square kilometres and over 150 million inhabitants.
We now see clearly that in the end the dodge of the “Drawn Game” would lead in reality to an enormous increase of the German Empire, and to the achievement of the principal part of the Pangerman plan summarized in the formula “from Hamburg to the Persian Gulf” (p. 109 of original). What then would be the general position of Great Germany thus constituted?
“Having cut Europe in two, mistress of the Adriatic as well as of the North Sea, secure in her fleets and in her armies, Great Germany would be an incubus on the world. Trieste, the Hamburg of the South, would feed her in peace and revictual her in war. Her industry, equipped with plant of incomparable power, would flood with her wares those very countries which she now schemes so artfully to monopolize:—Holland and Belgium, which are already penetrated; Hungary, her client; Roumania, her satellite; Bulgaria, a broken barrier; Bosnia and Herzegovina, the portals of the East. And, beyond the Bosphorus, Germany would reach Asia-Minor, that immense quarry of wealth. The huge German railroad projected to run from Hamburg to the Persian Gulf without a break, would link Berlin to the Far East. Then would the Emperor William’s Brobdingnagian dream be fulfilled. Germany would rule the world by her might and by her commercial wealth. The state of things which then would exist might be described by slightly modifying what Metternich wrote of Napoleonic France: ‘The German system which to-day is triumphant is directed against all the great states in their entirety, against every power able to maintain its own independence.’”
Such are the words which I published fifteen years ago in my book, L’Europe et la Question d’Autriche au seuil du XXᵉ siècle, p. 353 (Plon, Nourrit, editeurs, Paris). A careful study of the Pangerman plan of 1895 had then convinced me that the whole future policy of Berlin would tend to carry out the plan laid down in the formula “from Hamburg to the Persian Gulf.” In what I then wrote a few minute discrepancies may now be detected, but, unfortunately, the facts of to-day show that still on the whole my words correspond exactly with events. The dodge of the “Drawn Game,” which the Germans keep up their sleeve, hoping still to profit by the ignorance or the weariness of some of the Allies, would indeed have for its indisputable object the achievement of that huge plan.
The terrible danger which this would bring upon the Allies will be better perceived (supposing they fall into the trap laid for them) when we shall have demonstrated with precision, what would be the consequences for them if the scheme “from Hamburg to the Persian Gulf” were to succeed.