My Three Years in America

by Graf von Johann Heinrich Bernstorff

"I have spoken upon these great matters without reserve and with the utmost explicitness because it has seemed to me to be necessary if the world's yearning desire for peace was anywhere to find free voice and utterance. Perhaps I am the only person in high authority amongst all the peoples of the world who is at liberty to speak and hold nothing back. I am speaking as an individual, and yet I am speaking also, of course, as the responsible head of a great government, and I feel confident that I have said what the people of the United States would wish me to say. May I not add, that I hope and believe that I am in effect speaking for liberals and friends of humanity in every nation and of every programme of liberty? I would fain believe that I am speaking for the silent mass of mankind everywhere who have as yet had no place or opportunity to speak their real hearts out concerning the death and ruin they see to have come already upon the persons and the homes they hold most dear.

"And in holding out the expectation that the people and Government of the United States will join the other civilized nations of the world in guaranteeing the permanence of peace upon such terms as I have named I speak with the greater boldness and confidence because it is clear to every man who can think that there is in this promise no breach in either our traditions or our policy as a nation, but a fulfilment, rather, of all that we have professed or striven for.

"I am proposing, as it were, that the nations should with one accord adopt the doctrine of President Monroe as the doctrine of the world: that no nation should seek to extend its polity over any other nation or people, but that every people should be left free to determine its own polity, its own way of development, unhindered, unthreatened, unafraid, the little along with the great and powerful.

"I am proposing that all nations henceforth avoid entangling alliances which would draw them into competitions of power, catch them in a net of intrigue and selfish rivalry, and disturb their own affairs with influences intruded from without. There is no entangling alliance in a concert of power. When all unite to act in the same sense and with the same purpose all act in the common interest and are free to live their own lives under a common protection.

"I am proposing government by the consent of the governed; that freedom of the seas which in international conference after conference representatives of the United States have urged with the eloquence of those who are the convinced disciples of liberty; and that moderation of armaments which makes of armies and navies a power for order merely, not an instrument of aggression or of selfish violence.

"These are American principles, American policies. We could stand for no others. And they are also the principles and policies of forward looking men and women everywhere, of every modern nation, of every enlightened community. They are the principles of mankind and must prevail."

In Helfferich's account of these matters, the author charges this appeal of Mr. Wilson's with having favored the Entente side, because in it the conditions laid down are regarded as an acceptable basis for peace. When I returned to Germany the Imperial Chancellor advanced the same argument in my presence; I have heard it repeated again and again at home, and among other places, before the Examination Committee of the National Assembly. It seems to me that this view is rather a Berlin fable convenue. There is no word in the document which would justify one in drawing such a conclusion. The President stated simply that he had invited both belligerent parties to define the conditions under which they would make peace, and that the Entente had replied fully to the invitation, whereas the Central Powers had not submitted their terms. He then proceeded to say that in so far as the conditions insisted upon by one side had become known, we had advanced a step nearer to the discussion of peace. If we read the wording of the document without prejudice, and in connection with the views expressed by American statesmen, it becomes abundantly clear that the President regarded the terms laid down by our enemies as maximum conditions, and further, that he believed that we also would submit our maximum terms, and finally come to an agreement by adopting a middle course.

Herr Helfferich makes a similar charge against Wilson's Note of the 18th December, owing to the threats that it contained. But this charge strikes me as being just as gratuitous as the first. The threats were uttered in London quite as plainly as they were in Berlin. The charge of partiality would have been justified only if the threats had been contained simply in the version of the Note which was sent to Berlin.

Besides, in all Entente countries, it was maintained that both the Note of the 18th December and the appeal of the 22nd January revealed partiality for the Central Powers. The diplomats of the Entente in Washington were quite beside themselves with anger, and plainly revealed their displeasure to Mr. Wilson. I am not concerned now with criticizing the President's efforts for peace in retrospect. The fact that Mr. Wilson became our personal enemy after the 31st January, 1917, and that he consented to the Peace of Versailles, is no proof of the contention that, before the 31st January, 1917, he would have proved a similar failure as a peacemaker. The President's spiteful censure and treatment of us, both during the war and at Versailles, may be explained psychologically, by the fact that we rejected his efforts as a mediator, and declared the U-boat war.

Mr. Wilson's personal sensitiveness and egocentric nature played an essential part in all the negotiations. When the French and English Press derided the President, in November, 1916, after the first cables had announced the election of Mr. Hughes, Mr. Wilson was deeply mortified. A further improvement in his attitude towards us followed, when we showed that we were favorably disposed to his mediation for peace. The fact that Germany relied on him, stimulated his self-esteem to such an extent that he became, to a certain degree, interested in bringing about a peace that would be satisfactory to Germany. Nor should the interest he showed in this matter be underrated. I openly confess that it was also my ambition to assist in restoring peace, in order to save our country from the catastrophe that threatened to overtake it, and to spare the world any further suffering. To this day I am still convinced that, had the Germans skilfully conducted their share in these peace negotiations, we should have achieved all we wanted to achieve. The happy personal relations which, in that case, would have prevailed between Mr. Wilson and the German representatives at the Peace Conference, would, in view of the element of chance, which is so conspicuous at such congresses, have turned the scales in our favor to a surprising extent. On the other hand, I was, and am still, of the opinion that the peace which would have been settled at that time, would not have satisfied the public opinion of the moment in Germany. But I attached no importance whatever to this consideration. He who practises politics in the interests of his native country, must be ready at any moment to plunge like Curtius into the abyss, in order to save his nation. This, however, is what made Curtius immortal. Besides, in a few years, if not sooner, the German people would surely have realized that "Peace without Victory" constituted a victory for Germany.