"What does Serbia matter to Russia?" this statesman said to me after eight years in office at Petrograd. The whole thing was a British trick that I had not noticed. At the Foreign Office they told me that war would in any case have come in 1916. Then Russia would have been ready; therefore it was better now.
The Question of Responsibility
As is evident from all official publications—and this is not refuted by our White Book, which, owing to the poverty of its contents and to its omissions, is a gravely self-accusing document—
1. We encouraged Count Berchtold to attack Serbia, although German interests were not involved and the danger of a world-war must have been known to us. Whether we were aware of the wording of the Ultimatum is completely immaterial.
2. During the time between the 23rd and 30th July, 1914, when M. Sazonow emphatically declared that he would not tolerate any attack on Serbia, we rejected the British proposals of mediation, although Serbia, under[Pg 41] Russian and British pressure, had accepted almost the whole of the Ultimatum, and although an agreement about the two points at issue could easily have been reached, and Count Berchtold was even prepared to content himself with the Serbian reply.
3. On the 30th July, when Count Berchtold wanted to come to terms, we sent an ultimatum to Petrograd merely because of the Russian mobilisation, although Austria had not been attacked; and on the 31st July we declared war on Russia, although the Czar pledged his word that he would not order a man to march as long as negotiations were proceeding—thus deliberately destroying the possibility of a peaceful settlement.
In view of the above undeniable facts it is no wonder that the whole of the civilised world outside Germany places the entire responsibility for the world-war upon our shoulders.
The Enemy Point of View
Is it not intelligible that our enemies should declare that they will not rest before a system is destroyed which is a constant menace to our neighbours? Must they not otherwise fear that in a few years' time they will again have to take up arms and again see their provinces overrun and their towns and villages destroyed? Have not they proved to be right who declared that the spirit of Treitschke and Bernhardi governed the German people, that spirit which glorified war as such, and did not loathe it as an evil, that with us the feudal knight and Junker, the warrior caste, still rule and form ideals and values, not the civilian gentleman; that the love of the duel which animates our academic youth still persists in those who control the destinies of the people? Did not the Zabern incident and the parliamentary discussions about it clearly demonstrate to foreign countries the value we place on the rights and liberties of the citizen if these collide with questions of military power?
That intelligent historian Cramb, who has since died, an admirer of Germany, clothed the German conception in the words of Euphorion: