Hamburg, August 27, 1911
After a religious service for the army, the Emperor and Empress visited the race-course at Grossborstel. The relations between Germany and England were becoming strained. At the time of the uprising in Morocco on the twenty-first of May, 1911, the French general Moinier took measures, so he said, to protect Europeans in Morocco and later besieged certain native cities. Germany, pursuing her world-policy, immediately sent the gunboat Panther and later the cruiser Berlin to the harbor of Agadir, and assumed a threatening attitude, as she had done at Tangier and as Admiral Diedrichs had done at Manila. When the English made it plain that they would support France, in accordance with the entente reached in 1904, with regard to Morocco and Egypt, feeling between the two nations became tense and has remained so. The Emperor here, while insisting upon the place in the sun, is at the same time insisting on friendly competition. (See the discussion of the speech of March 31, 1905.)
Your Magnificence:
As often as her Majesty and I have the happy opportunity of coming to Hamburg, it becomes our duty to express our gratitude for the joyful reception and warm, heartfelt greeting which is accorded us by all classes of the Hamburg citizens. We have felt this again to-day and are constrained to express anew our thanks for the welcome on the part of the city. It is an index of how close the relations have become between the citizens of Hamburg and our house. As the highest commander of my army, I would at the same time like to express the joy I take in the fact that the Hanseatic cities are now about to express again their lively interest and their love and fondness for the regiments which bear their names. To me it is a proof that the relationship between the garrisons and their cities is a deep and a close one, and that they are proud to give some outward recognition for the service which their sons have rendered in the past and for the zeal which they showed in their work of peace.
When, yesterday, the city of Hamburg enthusiastically greeted a portion of that army which has so long maintained peace, she did a very proper thing, for she understands that under the protection of peace she can devote herself to her labors. She is a world city and is situated on one of the greatest rivers of our Fatherland, and the breath of the sea and the wave beat of the tides come to her wharves. Just as for the human body, it is necessary for a nation to breathe in order to live. The breath of the body politic gives it life and strength. This breath is commerce. Long ago the far-sighted Great Elector coined the phrase: “Trade and navigation are the two main pillars of my state.”
In the twenty-three years since I mounted the throne it has been a pleasure to me to follow the progress which the Hanseatic cities and especially Hamburg have achieved in their restless advance. If I do everything that I can on my side to help the Hanseatic cities, it is a duty that I gladly discharge.
But we need not wonder that the great increase of trade in our newly united Fatherland has disquieted many people in the world. I, nevertheless, believe that in the domain of commerce competition is healthful; it is necessary in order to spur on states and nations to new achievement. Indeed, it is the same thing with sports, as we have seen to-day at the magnificent race-course, where before the eyes of thousands of Hamburg’s men and so many of her beautiful women the officers of my army rode in competition. There we see one rider who in thought has already won first prize, and on the right and on the left the next two work up to him and it becomes an earnest contest between the three. Then he who up to this point was at the head reaches for his whip, not in order to strike his two rival riders but his own horse, and he gives him the spur. In the same way competition between nations can be fought out in peace.
The powerfully developing German fleet of war, which is distinguished by its cult of manliness and discipline, has in the last decades been created by the German people as a protection to trade and navigation. It represents the will of the German people to count for something upon the seas. This growing young fleet is particularly proud of the interest of Hamburg’s citizens. If, then, I have correctly interpreted this expression of your enthusiasm, I believe that I dare assume that it is your purpose to further strengthen our fleet in order that we may be certain that no one will dare challenge the “place in the sun” which should be rightfully ours. I, therefore, raise my glass to the health of the Hanseatic cities, and especially to Hamburg, the greatest of them all! The gentlemen know what I think about Hamburg and how I feel myself bound to her. And at the risk of repeating myself I say it again: the citizens of Hamburg and I understand each other! The city of Hamburg—Hurrah! Hurrah! Hurrah!