Thus the British Premier explicitly declares that the treaty of Versailles is based upon the theory of Germany's sole responsibility.

Now, as against this theory, the main facts may be summarized as follows: (1) The British and French General Staffs had been in active collaboration for war with Germany ever since January 1906. (2) The British and French Admiralty had been in similar collaboration. (3) The late Lord Fisher [First Sea Lord of the British Admiralty], twice in the course of these preparations, proposed an attack upon the German fleet and a landing upon the coast of Pomerania, without a declaration of war. (4) Russia had been preparing for war ever since 1909, and the Russian and French General Staffs had come to a formal understanding that Russian mobilization should be held equivalent to a declaration of war. (5) Russian mobilization was begun in the spring of 1914, under the guise of "tests," and these tests were carried on continuously to the outbreak of the war. (6) In April, 1914, four months before the war, the Russian and French naval authorities initiated joint plans for maritime operations against Germany. (7) Up to the outbreak of the war, Germany was selling grain in considerable quantities to both France and Russia. (8) It can not be shown that the German Government ever in a single instance, throughout all its dealings with foreign Governments, demanded or intimated for Germany anything more than a position of economic equality with other nations.

These facts, among others to which reference will hereafter be made, have come to light only since the outbreak of the war. They effectively dispose of the theory of an unprepared and unsuspecting Europe; and a historical survey of them excludes absolutely, and stamps as utterly untenable and preposterous, the theory of a deliberate German plot against the peace of the world.

III

Let us now consider the idea so generally held in America, though not in Europe, that in 1914, England and the Continental nations were not expecting war and not prepared for war. The fact is that Europe was as thoroughly organized for war as it could possibly be. The point to which that organization was carried by England, France and Russia, as compared with Germany and Austria, may to some extent be indicated by statistics. In 1913, Russia carried a military establishment (on a peace footing) of 1,284,000 men; France, by an addition of 183,000 men, proposed to raise her peace-establishment to a total of 741,572. Germany, by an addition of 174,373 men, proposed to raise her total to 821,964; and Austria, by additions of 58,505 already made, brought her total up to 473,643. These are the figures of the British War Office, as furnished to the House of Commons in 1913.

Here is a set of figures that is even more interesting and significant. From 1909 to 1914, the amount spent on new naval construction by England, France and Russia, as compared with Germany, was as follows:

EnglandFranceRussiaGermany
1909£11,076,551£ 4,517,766£ 1,758,487£10,177,062
1910£14,755,289£ 4,977,682£ 1,424,013£11,392,856
1911£15,148,171£ 5,876,659£ 3,216,396£11,710,859
1912£16,132,558£ 7,114,876£ 6,897,580£11,491,187
1913£16,883,875£ 8,893,064£12,082,516£11,010,883
1914£18,676,080£11,772,862£13,098,613£10,316,264

These figures can not be too carefully studied by those who have been led to think that Germany pounced upon a defenceless and unsuspecting Europe like a cat upon a mouse. If it be thought worth while to consider also the period of a few years preceding 1909, one finds that England's superiority in battleships alone was 112 per cent in 1901, and her superiority rose to nearly 200 per cent in 1904; in which year England spent £42,431,000 on her navy, and Germany £11,659,000. Taking the comparative statistics of naval expenditure from 1900, in which year England spent £32,055,000 on her navy, and Germany spent £7,472,000, down to 1914 it is absolutely impossible to make the figures show that Germany enforced upon the other nations of Europe an unwilling competition in naval armament.