Accordingly Hertzberg hoped that, however the fortunes of war inclined, he would gain his ends. They were as follows. The Turks, if victorious, must sacrifice their gains (the Crimea, etc.) at the demand of Prussia, and thus enable her to compel Austria to restore to the Poles the great province of Galicia, torn from them in the partition of 1772. The Poles in their turn were to reward Frederick William by ceding to him the fortresses of Danzig and Thorn, along with part of Great Poland, which so inconveniently divided Prussia’s eastern lands.
The same general result was to follow in the event of Russia and Austria driving back the Turks to their last natural barrier, the Balkans. Prussia was then to draw the sword on behalf of Turkey and Sweden, restore the balance in the South-East, and give the law to all parties. In that case, it appeared (though Hertzberg wavered on this point), Austria might acquire Moldavia and Wallachia from Turkey, and thereby close against Russia the door leading to the Balkans. At times Hertzberg stated that Austria must in any case gain those commanding provinces, which would sever her friendship with Russia.[830] As for Catharine, she might retain the Crimea, and gain land perhaps as far as the Dniester. On the whole, however, Hertzberg hoped that Prussia need not go to war, but that the Turks would make a good enough stand at the Danube to enable the mere appearance of the splendid army of Prussia on the frontiers of the two Empires to enforce his demands.
Much has been written for and against this scheme. Among the many projects of that time it holds a noteworthy place. Certainly it would greatly have simplified the boundaries of Eastern Europe. The recovery by Poland of her natural frontier on the south-west, the Carpathians, would strengthen that State, and enable her, with the help of her Prussian ally, to defy the wrath of the two Imperial Courts. Hertzberg believed that the Poles would gladly accept the offer. For was not the great province of Galicia worth the smaller, though commercially valuable, districts on the lower Vistula which would go to Frederick William? Further, would not a good commercial treaty between the Allies (in which England, it was hinted, might have her share) make up for the loss of the prosperous city of Danzig? In truth, the proposal reminds one of the schemes for scientific frontiers which Rousseau outlined and Napoleon reduced to profitable practice.
It might have succeeded had nations been mere amoebae, divisible at will. Traders and philosophers might acclaim Hertzberg as the Adam Smith of Prussia and Poland. In truth, his plan was defensible, even on its Machiavellian side—the aggrandisement of Prussia, ultimately at the expense of the Turks. For it might be argued that the ultimate triumph of the crescent was impossible, and that only the action of Sweden, Prussia, and to a less extent England, could avert disaster. Hertzberg also claimed that Prussia and her Allies should guarantee to Turkey the security of her remaining possessions, and deemed this a set-off to the disappointments brought by his other proposals.
Nevertheless the balance of argument was heavily against the scheme. As the Pitt Cabinet pointed out in a weighty pronouncement on 24th June, Hertzberg proposed to use Turkey as a medium for the attainment of his ends, which were the depression of Austria and the aggrandisement of Prussia. However well and successfully the Turks fought, the gain was to accrue to Frederick William, not to the Swedes, who were fighting desperately for the Ottoman cause. True, Prussia promised in the last resort to help the Sultan to recover some of his lost provinces; but even then, the acquisitions of the two Empires at the end of costly campaigns were scarcely to balance those of Prussia and Poland. Well might the British Cabinet say of the Turks: “It seems very doubtful whether either their power or their inclination would answer the expectations of the Court of Berlin.”
After this ironical touch the verdict of the Pitt Ministry was given to Ewart as follows:
You will not fail to assure the Ministers at Berlin of the satisfaction with which the King will see any real and solid advantages derived to His Prussian Majesty by such arrangements as may be obtained by way of negotiation and without the danger of extending those hostilities [which] it is so much the interest of all Europe to put an end to. We cannot but acknowledge the friendly attention manifested by His Prussian Majesty towards his Allies in taking care not to commit them in the event of the Porte acceding to the proposed plan of co-operation, the operations of which go so much beyond the spirit of our treaty of Alliance, which is purely of a defensive nature, and by which we cannot of course be considered as in any degree bound to support a system of an offensive nature, the great end of which appears to be aggrandisement rather than security, and which from its very nature is liable to provoke fresh hostilities instead of contributing to the restoration of general tranquillity.
In discussing these points, and indeed upon every other occasion, I must beg of you, Sir, to remember that it is by no means the idea of His Majesty, or of his confidential servants, to risk the engaging this country in a war on account of Turkey, either directly or indirectly; and I am to desire you would be particularly careful in your language, to prevent any intention of that nature being imputed to us. I think it necessary to mention this distinctly, as I observe in one of your dispatches, you state the continuance of the Northern War as in some degree advantageous, as it would be a powerful diversion in case the Allies should take part in the Turkish War. This I must again observe to you is an object by no means in our view.
With respect to any future guarantee of the Ottoman Empire it is impossible for us to commit ourselves at present. The consideration will naturally arise how far such a guarantee is either necessary or beneficial when the terms of peace come under discussion. The effect which a guarantee of the Turkish possessions might create in Russia likewise deserves some consideration; and I cannot but observe that the whole tenor of these Instructions [those sent to Dietz] seems likely to throw at a greater distance the chance of detaching Russia from Austria and connecting it with us; whereas hitherto it has been our object, and, as it appeared to us, that of Prussia, while we made Russia feel the disadvantage of being upon distant terms with us, and avoided doing anything which looked like courting her friendship, still to avoid pushing things to an extremity or precluding a future connection.[831]
At several points this pronouncement challenges attention. Firstly, it does not once refer to the feelings and prejudices of the peoples who were to be bartered about. Only four days previously the Commons of France had sworn by the Tennis Court Oath that they would frame a constitution for their land—a declaration which rang trumpet-tongued through England; but not the faintest echo of it appears in the official language of Pitt and the Duke of Leeds. Their arguments are wholly those of the old school, but of the old school at its best. For, secondly, they deprecate changes of territory forced by a mediating Power on the people it ostensibly befriends, which tend to their detriment and its own benefit. They question whether Prussia can press through these complex partitions without provoking a general war—the very evil which the Triple Alliance has sought to avoid. Certainly England will never go to war to bring them about; neither will she draw the sword on behalf of Turkey. On the contrary, she hopes finally to regain the friendship of Russia. Most noteworthy of all is the central criticism, that the aim of Hertzberg is “aggrandisement rather than security.” We shall have occasion to observe how often Pitt used this last word to denote the end for which he struggled against Revolutionary France and Napoleon; and its presence in this despatch bespeaks the mind of the Prime Minister acting through the pen of the Duke of Leeds.