But Wangenheim was interested then in something more tangible than this philosophic principle. Germany had immediate reasons for desiring the end of hostilities, and Wangenheim discussed them frankly and cynically. He said that Germany had prepared for only a short war because she had expected to crush France and Russia in two brief campaigns, lasting not longer than six months. Clearly this plan had failed, and there was little likelihood that Germany would win the war. Wangenheim told me this in so many words. Germany, he added, would make a great mistake if she persisted in fighting the war to exhaustion, for such a fight would mean the permanent loss of her colonies, her mercantile marine, and her whole economic and commercial status. “If we don’t get Paris in thirty days, we are beaten,” Wangenheim had told me in August, and, though his attitude changed somewhat after the battle of the Marne, he made no attempt to conceal the fact that the great rush campaign had collapsed, that all the Germans could now look forward to was a tedious, exhausting war, and that all which they could obtain from the existing situation would be a drawn battle. “We have made a mistake this time,” Wangenheim said, “in not laying in supplies for a protracted struggle; it was an error, however, that we shall not repeat; next time we shall store up enough copper and cotton to last for five years.”
Wangenheim had another reason for wishing an immediate peace, and it was a reason which shed much light upon the shamelessness of German diplomacy. The preparation which Turkey was making for the conquest of Egypt caused this German Ambassador much annoyance and anxiety. The interest and energy which the Turks had manifested in this enterprise were particularly causing him concern. Naturally I thought at first that Wangenheim was worried that Turkey would lose, yet he confided to me that his real fear was that their ally would succeed. A victorious Turkish campaign in Egypt, Wangenheim explained, might seriously interfere with Germany’s plans. Should Turkey conquer Egypt, naturally Turkey would insist at the peace table on retaining this great province, and would expect Germany to support her in this claim. But Germany had no intention then of promoting the re-establishment of the Turkish Empire. At that time she hoped to reach an understanding with England, the basis of which was to be something in the nature of a division of interests in the East. Germany desired above all to obtain Mesopotamia as an indispensable part of her Hamburg-Bagdad scheme. In return for this, she was prepared to give her endorsement to England’s annexation of Egypt. Thus it was Germany’s plan at that time that she and England should divide Turkey’s two fairest dominions. This was one of the proposals which Germany intended to bring forth in the peace conference which Wangenheim was now scheming for, and clearly Turkey’s conquest of Egypt would have presented complications in the way of carrying out this plan. On the morality of Germany’s attitude to her ally, Turkey, it is hardly necessary to comment. The whole thing was all of a piece with Germany’s policy of “realism” in foreign relations.
Nearly all German classes, in the latter part of 1914 and the early part of 1915, were anxiously looking for peace, and they turned to Constantinople as the most promising spot where peace negotiations might most favourably be started. The Germans took it for granted that President Wilson would be the
