This, also, is the chain of thought in the speech of the British Prime Minister in the House of Commons on Aug. 4. Translations of this speech have been spread by the British Government in neutral countries in hundreds of thousands of copies under the title: "The Power Responsible for War Is Germany."
Now, we claim that the British "White Paper" itself furnishes irrefutable proof that not Germany, which up to the last moment offered the hand of mediation, but Russia is responsible for the war, and that the Foreign Office at London was fully cognizant of this fact.
Furthermore, the "White Paper" shows that England's claim that she entered this war solely as a protector of the small nations is a fable.
STATE COUNCILLOR SAZONOF
Russian Minister of Foreign Affairs.
(Photo (C) by American Press Assn.)
The documents reproduced in the "White Paper" do not begin until July 20, and only a few introductory dispatches before the 24th are given. The first of the very important reports of the British Ambassador at St. Petersburg, Sir George Buchanan, to the Secretary of State, Grey, is dated on that day; on the same day the note addressed by Austria-Hungary to the Servian Government had been brought to the knowledge of the European Cabinets, and the British Ambassador conferred with the Russian Minister of Foreign Affairs, M. Sazonof, over this matter. The French Minister also took part in this conference. When the latter and M. Sazonof, in the most insistent way, tried to prove to Buchanan that England, together with Russia and France, must assume a threatening attitude toward Austria-Hungary and Germany, the British Ambassador replied:
I said that I would telegraph a full report to you of what their Excellencies had just said to me. I could not, of course, speak in the name of his Majesty's Government, but personally I saw no reason to expect any declaration of solidarity from his Majesty's Government that would entail an unconditional engagement on their part to support Russia and France by force of arms. Direct British interests in Servia were nil, and a war on behalf of that country would never be sanctioned by British public opinion.—(British "White Paper" No. 6.)
The British Ambassador thereupon asked the question whether Russia was thinking of eventually declaring war on Austria. The following was the answer:
M. Sazonof said that he himself thought that Russian mobilization would at any rate have to be carried out; but a council of Ministers was being held this afternoon to consider the whole question....