When I had read the speech, I turned to the President and said: "This speech will bring Germany to terms and will convince her that we play no favourites and will compel the Allies openly to avow the terms upon which they will expect a war settlement to be reached. In my opinion, it means the end of the war." The President was surprised at the emphasis I laid upon the speech, but he was more surprised when I ventured the opinion that he would be in Paris within six months discussing the terms of the treaty. The Washington Post, a critic of the President, characterized this speech, in an editorial on September 29, 1918, as "a marvellous intellectual performance, and a still more marvellous exhibition of moral courage."
CHAPTER XXXIV
GERMANY CAPITULATES
Germany had begun to weaken, and suddenly aware of the catastrophe that lay just ahead, changed her chancellor, and called upon the President for an armistice upon the basis of the Fourteen Points. The explanation of Germany's attitude in this matter was simply that she knew she was beaten and she recognized that Wilson was the only hope of a reasonable peace from the Berlin point of view. Germany professed to be a liberal and was asking Wilson for the "benefit of clergy."
On the 6th day of October, 1918, the following note from Prince Max of
Baden was delivered to the President by the Secretary of State:
The German Government requests the President of the United States of America to take steps for the restoration of peace, to notify all belligerents of this request, and to invite them to delegate plenipotentiaries for the purpose of taking up negotiations. The German Government accepts, as a basis for the peace negotiations, the programme laid down by the President of the United States in his Message to Congress of January 8,1918, and in his subsequent pronouncements particularly in his address of September 27, 1918. In order to avoid further bloodshed, the German Government requests the President of the United States of America to bring about the immediate conclusion of a general armistice on land, on water, and in the air.
(Signed) MAX, Prince Of Baden,
Imperial Chancellor.
The President was not surprised when the offer of peace came for on all sides there was abundant evidence of the decline of Germany and of the weakening of her morale. The President felt that Germany, being desperate, it would be possible for him, when she proposed a settlement, like that proposed by Prince Max, to dictate our own terms, and to insist that America would have nothing to do with any settlement in which the Kaiser or his brood should play a leading part. I stated to him that the basis of our attitude toward Germany should be an insistence, in line with his speech of September 27, 1918, wherein he said:
We are all agreed that there can be no peace obtained by any kind of bargain or compromise with the governments of the Central Empires, because we have dealt with them already and have seen them deal with other governments that were parties to this struggle, at Brest-Litovsk and Bucharest. They have convinced us that they were without honour and do not intend justice. They observe no covenants, accept no principle but force and their own interest. We cannot come to terms with them. They have made it impossible. The German people must by this time be fully aware that we cannot accept the word of those who forced this war upon us. We do not think the same thoughts or speak the same language of agreement.
At the time of the receipt of Prince Max's note by the State Department, on October 5, 1918, the President was in New York, staying at the Waldorf- Astoria, preparatory to attending a concert given by the Royal Italian Grenadiers. A message from the Army Intelligence Department, conveyed to me by General Churchill, at the Knickerbocker Hotel, in New York, where I was staying, was the first word we had of Germany's desire for an armistice. General Churchill read me the German proposal over the 'phone and I carried it to the President, who was in conference with Colonel House at the Waldorf. The offer of Germany was so frank and unequivocal in seeming to meet the terms of the President's formal proposals of peace, that when Colonel House read it to the President, he turned and said: "This means the end of the war." When I was interrogated as to my opinion, I replied that, while the German offer of peace seemed to be genuine, in my opinion no offer from Germany could be considered that bore the Hohenzollern-Hapsburg brand. For a moment this seemed to irritate the President, and he said: "But, at least, we are bound to consider in the most serious way any offer of Germany which is practically an acceptance of my proposals of peace." There our first discussion regarding the German peace offer ended.