Political Leanings of Russia towards Germany
But besides that, as concerns Russia, it will never be possible to tell in which direction she will turn. At the beginning of the last century, allied to Prussia and Austria, she fought against France, and became the inspirer of the Holy Alliance which was directed, in full accord with the character of Russia’s home-policy, against all the rights of peoples. In the middle of the last century, she fought against England, France, and Sardinia, after having secured the neutrality of Austria and Prussia. In 1870, her friendly neutrality gave Prussia the opportunity to crush France. There is something fateful in her traditional friendship with Germany. Behind the back of France, though allied to her, it was towards Germany that Nicholas II. felt himself attracted (see his correspondence with William II., published in Bourtzeff’s paper L’Avenir, 1917), as well as his ministers Sturmer and Protopopoff, unmasked in the speech of P. Miliukoff in the Imperial Douma, in February, 1917; M. Miliukoff himself (Pages Modernes, April number, 1919, page 6); and the Tzar’s General Skoropadsky; and Lenin and Trotsky who signed peace with Germany of the Kaiser and wanted an alliance with Germany of Scheidemann at any cost. At heart, M. Mandelstam also is not too remote from this fatal leaning. He threatens war if the Paris Conference shows itself disposed to recognise the independence of the States detached from Russia (Some Reflections on the Question of a Great Poland and the Shores of the Baltic, p. 10; Memorandum on the Delimitation of the Rights of States and Nations, p. 81). With what war and in alliance with whom does M. Mandelstam threaten us?
It is evident that the Russian Political Conference is not free from that fatal inclination. Its representative, M. Sazonoff, former Minister, is revealed by Prince Lichnovsky as ready to abandon France, “Russia’s cherished ally,” to Germany for plunder, on condition that the latter consents to give Russia a free hand in regard to Austria-Hungary.
It is also very interesting to notice that the crusade against the independent States of the Baltic, preached by M. Mandelstam in Paris, is put into execution in Latvia by the armies of General von der Goltz which have upset the legal Government of Latvia recognised by England and Japan. The hand of M. Mandelstam, seeking allies for the crusade against Latvia, has not remained in the air; von der Goltz has grasped it enthusiastically. Future Russia and bygone Germany have met in a common intrigue against independent Latvia. Finland, Esthonia, Lithuania, Ukraine and independent Poland are specks in the eyes of both; and who can guarantee that the points of contact will not increase with the lapse of time?