The instructions from Berlin gave me occasion for repeated conversations with Colonel House. The Imperial Government were now ready to accept Mr. Wilson's League of Nations programme, which provided for general disarmament, freedom of the seas, and compulsory arbitration. My reports to Berlin on this question had the result that on 9th November the Chancellor in a speech publicly espoused this programme, and that I, at my own suggestion, received permission to communicate officially the Chancellor's speech to the American Peace League, which published my communication.
On the other hand, the Imperial Government desired that the territorial questions should be regulated by direct negotiations between the combatant Powers. Mr. Wilson, as Colonel House told me, was in agreement with this. Mr. Wilson had already expressed himself to this effect in the above mentioned speech of the 27th May, and in general adopted the point of view that the United States had no interest in the details of territorial adjustment; but that it was of equally fundamental importance for America as for Europe that in future wars should be avoided. The President was only willing to intervene in so far as he was certain of having American public opinion behind him. In my conversations with Colonel House we never spoke of the evacuation of any German territory. We always confined ourselves exclusively to a real peace by negotiation on the basis of the status quo ante. With such a peace Germany's position in the world would have remained unimpaired. The freedom of the seas, a principal point in the Wilson programme, could not but be welcome to us. The President and Colonel House have been the sponsors of this idea in America. Both were indefatigable in their efforts to materialize this idea in such a way that war on commerce should be abolished and that all commerce, even in war-time, should be declared free. As a necessary result of this development of the laws of naval warfare Mr. Wilson hoped to bring about general naval disarmament, since navies would lose their raison d'être if they could only be used against each other and no longer against commerce and for purposes of blockade. It is a regrettable fact that at the Hague Conference we accepted the English standpoint on the question of war on commerce, and not the American.
In October I was again instructed from Berlin to speed up Mr. Wilson's peace movement. With regard to this new urgency Herr von Jagow, on the 14th April, 1919, granted an interview to the Berlin representative of the New York Sun, the substance of which was as follows:
"In the autumn of 1916 the Emperor, Count Bernstorff and I opposed the resumption of unrestricted submarine warfare, which was urged with increasing vigor by our military and naval departments, as being the only means of bringing the war to an early conclusion. Week after week we watched for the hoped-for peace move of President Wilson, which, however, did not come. At last, in October, the Emperor, upon whom increasing pressure was being brought to bear to give his consent to the unrestricted submarine campaign, sent a memorandum to the American Government, reminding them or certain mediation promises which had been made at the time of the Sussex crisis.
"When this memorandum, addressed to Mr. Gerard, reached Berlin Mr. Gerard had already left for America. I, therefore, cabled the text to Washington and instructed Count Bernstorff to hand the memorandum to Mr. Gerard on his arrival in New York. Count Bernstorff, who had been made fully aware that the Emperor wished to avert the submarine campaign and a rupture with the United States, was also informed by me that the memorandum had been written by the Emperor in person. For reasons which there is no need for me to mention here, Count Bernstorff handed the memorandum, not to Mr. Gerard, but to Colonel House, who certainly communicated it to the President."
The telegram in which the Emperor's memorandum was communicated to me read as follows:
Telegram in Cipher
"Berlin, 9th October, 1916.
"His Majesty the Emperor desires that the following memorandum should be handed to Ambassador Gerard on the latter's arrival.
"Your Excellency should do this in strict confidence and say that the memoir is not intended to convey a threat of submarine warfare. I should only like you to remind the Ambassador before his interview with the President of the expectations we based in the spring on Wilson and to call his attention to the increasing ruthlessness with which the enemy is carrying on the war. I take it for granted that Gerard will treat my memoir as strictly confidential and will not publish it.