Although, moreover, it was by these methods that Bismarck accomplished the unification of Germany, his later policy was, by common consent, a policy of peace. War had done its part, and the new Germany required all its energies to build up its internal prosperity and strength. In 1875, it is true, Bismarck was credited with the intention to fall once more upon France. The fact does not seem to be clearly established. At any rate, if such was his intention, it was frustrated by the intervention of Russia and of Great Britain. During the thirty-nine years that followed Germany kept the peace.
While France, England, and Russia waged wars on a great scale, and while the former Powers acquired enormous extensions of territory, the only military operations undertaken by Germany were against African natives in her dependencies and against China in 1900. The conduct of the German troops appears, it is true, to have been distinguished, in this latter expedition, by a brutality which stood out in relief even in that orgy of slaughter and loot. But we must remember that they were specially ordered by their Imperial master, in the name of Jesus Christ, to show no mercy and give no quarter. Apart from this, it will not be disputed, by any one who knows the facts, that during the first twenty years or so after 1875 Germany was the Power whose diplomacy was the least disturbing to Europe. The chief friction during that period was between Russia and France and Great Britain, and it was one or other of these Powers, according to the angle of vision, which was regarded as offering the menace of aggression. If there has been a German plot against the peace of the world, it does not date from before the decade 1890-1900. The close of that decade marks, in fact, a new epoch in German policy. The years of peace had been distinguished by the development of industry and trade and internal organization. The population increased from forty millions in 1870 to over sixty-five millions at the present date. Foreign trade increased more than ten-fold. National pride and ambition grew with the growth of prosperity and force, and sentiment as well as need impelled German policy to claim a share of influence outside Europe in that greater world for the control of which the other nations were struggling. Already Bismarck, though with reluctance and scepticism, had acquired for his country by negotiation large areas in Africa. But that did not satisfy the ambitions of the colonial party. The new Kaiser put himself at the head of the new movement, and announced that henceforth nothing must be done in any part of the world without the cognizance and acquiescence of Germany.
Thus there entered a new competitor upon the stage of the world, and his advent of necessity was disconcerting and annoying to the earlier comers. But is there reason to suppose that, from that moment, German policy was definitely aiming at empire, and was prepared to provoke war to achieve it? Strictly, no answer can be given to this question. The remoter intentions of statesmen are rarely avowed to others, and, perhaps, rarely to themselves. Their policy is, indeed, less continuous, less definite, and more at the mercy of events than observers or critics are apt to suppose. It is not probable that Germany, any more than any other country in Europe, was pursuing during those years a definite plan, thought out and predetermined in every point.
In Germany, as elsewhere, both in home and foreign affairs, there was an intense and unceasing conflict of competing forces and ideas. In Germany, as elsewhere, policy must have adapted itself to circumstances, different personalities must have given it different directions at different times. We have not the information at our disposal which would enable us to trace in detail the devious course of diplomacy in any of the countries of Europe. What we know something about is the general situation, and the action, in fact, taken at certain moments. The rest must be, for the present, mainly matter of conjecture. With this word of caution, let us now proceed to examine the policy of Germany.
The general situation we have already indicated. We have shown how the armed peace, which is the chronic malady of Europe, had assumed during the ten years from 1904 to 1914 that specially dangerous form which grouped the Great Powers in two opposite camps—the Triple Alliance and the Triple Entente. We have seen, in the case of Great Britain, France, Russia, and Austria-Hungary, how they came to take their places in that constellation. We have now to put Germany in its setting in the picture.
Germany, then, in the first place, like the other Powers, had occasion to anticipate war. It might be made from the West, on the question of Alsace-Lorraine; it might be made from the East, on the question of the Balkans. In either case, the system of alliances was likely to bring into play other States than those immediately involved, and the German Powers might find themselves attacked on all fronts, while they knew in the latter years that they could not count upon the support of Italy.
A reasonable prudence, if nothing else, must keep Germany armed and apprehensive. But besides the maintenance of what she had, Germany was now ambitious to secure her share of "world-power." Let us examine in what spirit and by what acts she endeavoured to make her claim good.
First, what was the tone of public opinion in Germany during these critical years?
[Footnote 1: Emile Ollivier, "L'Empire Libéral.">[
8. Opinion in Germany.