THE NEW GROUPING OF THE GREAT POWERS[495]
(1900-1907)
When I penned the words at the end of Chapter XX. it seemed probable that the mad race in armaments must lead either to war or to revolution. In these three supplementary chapters I seek to trace very briefly the causes that have led to war, in other words, to the ascendancy (perhaps temporary) of the national principle over the social, and international tendencies of the age.
The collapse of the international and pacifist movement may be ascribed to various causes. The Franco-German and Russo-Turkish Wars left behind rankling hatreds which rendered it very difficult for nations to disarm; and, after the decline of those resentments, there arose others as the outcome of the Greco-Turkish War and the Boer War. Further, the conflict between Japan and Russia so far weakened the latter as to leave Germany and Austria almost supreme in Europe; and, while in France and the United Kingdom the social movement has made considerable progress, Germany and Austria have remained in what may be termed the national stage of development, which offers many advantages over the international for purposes of war. Then again in the Central Empires parliamentary institutions have not been successful, tending on the whole to accentuate the disputes between the dominant and the subject races. The same is partially true of Russia, and far more so of the Balkan States. Consequently, in Central and Eastern Europe the national idea has become militant and aggressive; while Great Britain, the Netherlands, and to some extent France, have sought as far as possible to concentrate their efforts upon social legislation, arming only in self-defence. In this contrast lay one of the dangers of the situation.
Nationality caused the movements and wars of 1848-77. Thereafter, that principle seemed to wane. But it revived in redoubled force among the Balkan peoples owing partly to the brutal oppressions of the Sublime Porte; and the cognate idea, aiming, however, not at liberty but conquest, became increasingly popular with the German people after the accession of Kaiser William II. The sequel is only too well known. Civilisation has been overwhelmed by a recrudescence of nationalism, and the wealthiest age which the world has seen is a victim to the perfection and potency of its machinery. A recovery of the old belief in the solidarity of mankind and a conviction of the futility of all efforts for domination by any one people, are the first requisites towards the recovery of conditions that make for peace and good-will.
Meanwhile, recent history has had to concern itself largely with groupings or alliances, which have in the main resulted from ambition, distrust, or fear. As has already been shown, the Partition of Africa was arranged without a resort to arms; but after that appropriation of the lands of the dark races, the white peoples in the south came into collision late in 1899.
Much has been written as to the causes of the Boer War; but the secret encouragements which those brave farmers received from Germany are still only partly known. Even in 1894 Mr. Merriman warned Sir Edward Grey of the danger arising from "the steady way in which Krüger was Teutonising the Transvaal." Germany undoubtedly stiffened the neck of Krüger and the reactionary Boers in resisting the much-needed reforms. It is significant that the Kaiser's telegram to Krüger after the defeat of Jameson's raiders was sent only a few days before his declaration, January 18, 1896, that Germany must now pursue a World-Policy, as she did by browbeating Japan in the Far East. These developments had been rendered possible by the opening of the Kiel-North Sea Canal in 1895, an achievement which doubled the naval power of Germany. Thenceforth she pushed on construction, especially by the Navy Bill of 1898. Reliance on her largely accounts for the obstinate resistance of the Boers to the just demands of England and the Outlanders in 1899. A German historian, Count Reventlow, has said that "a British South Africa could not but thwart all German interests"; and the anti-British fury prevalent in Germany in and after 1899 augured ill for the preservation of peace in the twentieth century so soon as her new fleet was ready[496].
The results of the Boer War were as follows. For the time Great Britain lost very seriously in prestige and in material resources. Amidst the successes gained by the Boers, the intervention of one or more European States in their favour seemed highly probable; and it is almost certain that Krüger relied on such an event. He paid visits to some of the chief European capitals, and was received by the French President (November 1900), but not by Kaiser William. The personality and aims of the Kaiser will concern us later; but we may notice here that in that year he had special reasons for avoiding a rupture with the United Kingdom. The Franco-Russian Alliance gave him pause, especially since June 1898, when a resolute man, Delcassé, became Foreign Minister at Paris and showed less complaisance to Germany than had of late been the case[497]. Besides, in 1898, the Kaiser had concluded with Great Britain a secret arrangement on African affairs, and early in 1900 acquired sole control of Samoa instead of the joint Anglo-American-German protectorate, which had produced friction. Finally, in the summer of 1900, the Boxer Rising in China opened up grave problems which demanded the co-operation of Germany and the United Kingdom.
It has often been stated that the Kaiser desired to form a Coalition against Great Britain during the Boer War; and it is fairly certain that he sounded Russia and France with a view to joint diplomatic efforts to stop the war on the plea of humanity, and that, after the failure of this device, he secretly informed the British Government of the danger which he claimed to have averted[498]. His actions reflected the impulsiveness and impetuosity which have often puzzled his subjects and alarmed his neighbours; but it seems likely that his aims were limited either to squeezing the British at the time of their difficulties, or to finding means of breaking up the Franco-Russian alliance. His energetic fishing in troubled waters caused much alarm; but it is improbable that he desired war with Great Britain until his new navy was ready for sea. The German Chancellor, Prince von Bülow, has since written as follows: "We gave England no cause to thwart us in the building of our fleet: . . . we never came into actual conflict with the Dual Alliance, which would have hindered us in the gradual acquisition of a navy[499]." This, doubtless, was the governing motive in German policy, to refrain from any action that would involve war, to seize every opportunity for pushing forward German claims, and, above all, to utilise the prevalent irritation at the helplessness of Germany at sea as a means of overcoming the still formidable opposition of German Liberals to the ever-increasing naval expenditure.