King Albert of Belgium.
Photo, Newspaper Illustrations Limited.
During this interview with King Albert the Kaiser and von Moltke threw off the mask. They told the King that the time had come to "finish" with France, and they assured him that the German army was bound to win. The object of this conversation was to show the King of the Belgians that he would be wise not to resist if war with France should arise. We shall see later on that King Albert was not moved from the path of honour either by threats or promises.
Meanwhile Germany was busy asking her ambassadors to find out what the other Powers would be likely to do if Austria and Germany were to join together to fight Serbia. Germany's agents at St. Petersburg[156] said that Russia would not stir; there were serious labour troubles in that country, and the Czar would be afraid to call his troops together for fear they would join with the strikers. From France came the news that the French army was not fit to fight. On the 13th of July a speaker in the French Parliament declared that the forts were weak; that there was not sufficient ammunition for the guns; and that the soldiers were without a sufficient supply of boots. If war broke out the men would have to take the field with one pair of boots, and only one reserve boot in their knapsacks, and that one would be thirty years old. Thus the Kaiser believed that Russia dared not fight, and that France could not fight, because, as in 1870, she was unprepared.
But what of Britain? The Kaiser had flooded the British Isles with spies, who kept him informed of every movement of our fleet and troops, and gave him full information about all our political affairs. These spies told him that civil war was about to break out in Ireland, and that the Government would have its hands so full at home that it could not possibly spare troops to fight on the Continent. The German ambassador in London did not believe all this talk about civil war, and he advised his Government not to rely upon it. The German Government, however, would not listen to him. The Kaiser knew better; he believed his spies.
Feeling sure, then, that Russia would not fight, that France could not resist, and that Great Britain would not interfere in what seemed to be a far-off quarrel, the Kaiser decided that "The Day," so long hoped for and prepared for, had come. In July of the present year he was ready to "let slip the dogs of war."