The Development of the European Nations, 1870-1914 Part 45

That motives of genuine philanthropy played their part in the Far Eastern policy of the Czar may readily be granted; but the enthusiasts who acclaimed him as the world's peacemaker at the Hague Congress (May 1899) were somewhat troubled by the thought that he had compelled China to cede to his enormous Empire the very peninsula, the acquisition of which by little j.a.pan had been declared to be an unwarrantable disturbance of the balance of power in the Far East.

These events caused a considerable sensation in Great Britain, even in a generation which had become inured to "graceful concessions." In truth, the part played by her in the Far East has been a sorry one; and if there be eager partisans who still maintain that British Imperialism is an unscrupulously aggressive force, ever on the search for new enemies to fight and new lands to annex, a course of study in the Blue Books dealing with Chinese affairs in 1897-99 may with some confidence be prescribed as a sedative and lowering diet. It seems probable that the weakness of British diplomacy induced the belief at St. Petersburg that no opposition of any account would be forthcoming. With France acting as the complaisant treasurer, and Germany acquiescent, the Czar and his advisers might well believe that they had reached the goal of their efforts, "the domination of the Pacific."

With the Boxer movement of the years 1899-1900 we have here no concern.

Considered pathologically, it was only the spasmodic protest of a body which the dissectors believed to be ready for operation. To a.s.sign it solely to dislike of European missionaries argues sheer inability to grasp the laws of evidence. Missionaries had been working in China for several decades, and were no more disliked than other "foreign devils."

The rising was clearly due to indignation at the rapacity of the European Powers. We may note that it gave the Russian governor of the town of Blagovestchensk an opportunity of cowing the Chinese of northern Manchuria by slaying and drowning some 4500 persons at that place (July 1900). Thereafter Russia invaded Manchuria and claimed the unlimited rights due to actual conquest. On April 8, 1902, she promised to withdraw; but her persistent neglect to fulfil that promise (cemented by treaty with China) led to the outbreak of hostilities with j.a.pan[494].

[Footnote 494: Asakawa, chap. vii.; and for the Korean Question, chaps.

xvi, xvii]

We can now see that Russia, since the accession of Nicholas II., has committed two great faults in the Far East. She has overreached herself; and she has overlooked one very important factor in the problem--j.a.pan.

The subjects of the Mikado quivered with rage at the insult implied by the seizure of Port Arthur; but, with the instinct of a people at once proud and practical, they thrust down the flames of resentment and turned them into a mighty motive force. Their preparations for war, steady and methodical before, now gained redoubled energy; and the whole nation thrilled secretly but irresistibly to one cherished aim, the recovery of Port Arthur. How great is the power of chivalry and patriotism the world has now seen; but it is apt to forget that love of life and fear of death are feelings alike primal and inalienable among the j.a.panese as among other peoples. The inspiring force which nerved some 40,000 men gladly to lay down their lives on the hills around Port Arthur was the feeling that they were helping to hurl back in the face of Russia the gauntlet which she had there so insolently flung down as to an inferior race.

CHAPTER XXI

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.

[Footnote 495: Written in May-July 1915.]

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 j.a.pan 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 inst.i.tutions 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 Part.i.tion 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 Kruger was Teutonising the Transvaal." Germany undoubtedly stiffened the neck of Kruger and the reactionary Boers in resisting the much-needed reforms. It is significant that the Kaiser's telegram to Kruger 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 j.a.pan in the Far East. These developments had been rendered possible by the opening of the Kiel-North Sea Ca.n.a.l 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].

[Footnote 496: E, Lewin, _The Germans and Africa_, p. xvii. and chaps.

v.-xiii.; J.H. Rose, _The Origins of the War_, Lectures I.-III.; Reventlow, _Deutschlands auswartige Politik_, p. 71.]

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 Kruger 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, Delca.s.se, 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.

[Footnote 497: Delca.s.se was Foreign Minister in five Administrations until 1905.]

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 Bulow, 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.

[Footnote 498: Sir V. Chirol, _Quarterly Review_, Oct. 1914.]

[Footnote 499: Bulow, _Imperial Germany_, pp. 98-9 (Eng. transl.); Rachfahl, _Kaiser und Reich_ (p. 163), states that, as in 1900-1, the German fleet, even along with those of France and Russia, was no match for the British fleet, Germany necessarily remained neutral. See, too, Hurd and Castle, _German Sea Power_, chap. v.]

In order to discourage the futile anti-British diatribes in the German Press, Bulow declared in the Reichstag that in no quarter was there an intention to intervene against England. There are grounds for questioning the sincerity of this utterance; for the Russian statesman, Muraviev, certainly desired to intervene, as did influential groups at Petrograd, Berlin, and Paris. In any case, the danger to Great Britain was acute enough to evoke help from all parts of the Empire, and implant the conviction of the need of closer union and of maintaining naval supremacy. The risks of the years 1899-1902 also revealed the very grave danger of what had been termed "splendid isolation," and aroused a desire for a friendly understanding with one or more Powers as occasion might offer.

The war produced similar impressions on the German people. Dislike of England, always acute in Prussia, especially in reactionary circles, now spread to all parts and all cla.s.ses of the nation; and the Kaiser, as we have seen, made skilful use of it to further his naval policy. His speech at Hamburg on October 18, 1899, on the need of a great navy, marked the beginning of a new era, destined to end in war with Great Britain. Admiral von Tirpitz, in introducing the Amending Bill of February 1900, demanded the doubling of the navy in a scheme working automatically until 1920. The Socialist leader, Bebel, opposed it as certain to strain relations with England, a war with whom would be the greatest possible misfortune for the German people. On the other hand, the Chancellor, Prince Hohenlohe, voiced the opinions of the governing cla.s.s and the German Navy League when he declared that the demand for a great navy originated in the ambition of the German nation to become a World-Power[500]. The Bill pa.s.sed; and thenceforth the United Kingdom and Germany became declared rivals at sea. Fortunately for the islanders, the new German Navy could not be ready for action before the year 1904; otherwise, a very dangerous situation would have arisen. Even as it was, British statesmen were induced to secure an ally and to end the Boer War as quickly as possible.

[Footnote 500: Prince Hohenlohe, _Memoirs_, vol. ii. p. 480.]

During that conflict the tension between England and the Dual Alliance (France and Russia) was at times so acute as to render it doubtful whether we should not gravitate towards the rival Triple Alliance. The problem was the most important that had confronted British statesmen during a century. Kinship and tradition seemed to beckon us towards Germany and Austria. On the other hand, democracy and social intercourse told in favour of the French connection. Further, now that Russia was retiring more and more from her Balkan and Central Asian projects in order to concentrate on the Far East, she ceased to threaten India and the Levant. Moreover, the personality of the Tsar, Nicholas II., was rea.s.suring, while that of Kaiser Wilhelm II. aroused distrust and alarm.

In truth, the inordinate vanity, restless energy, and flamboyant Chauvinism of the Kaiser placed great difficulties in the way of an Anglo-German Entente. An article believed to have been inspired by Bismarck contained the following reference to the Kaiser's megalomania: "It causes the deepest anxiety in Germany, because it is feared that it may lead to some irreparable piece of want of tact, and thence to war.

For it is argued that, vanity being at the bottom of it all, and the Emperor finding he is unable to gain the premature immortality he thirsts for by peaceful prodigies, his restless nervous irritability may degenerate into recklessness, and then his megalomania may blind him to the dangers he and, above all, poor blood-soaken Germany may encounter on the war-path[501]." Kaiser William possesses more power of self-restraint than this pa.s.sage indicates; for, though he has spread a warlike enthusiasm through his people, he has also restrained it until there arrived a fit opportunity for its exercise. It arrived when Germany and her Allies were far better prepared, both by land and sea, than the Powers whom she expected to meet in arms.

[Footnote 501: _Contemporary Review_, April 1892.]

His att.i.tude towards Great Britain has varied surprisingly. During several years he figured as her friend. But it is difficult to believe that a man of his keen intellect did not discern ahead the collision which his policy must involve. His many claims to acquire maritime supremacy and a World-Empire were either mere bluff or a portentous challenge. Only the good-natured, easy-going British race could so long have clung to the former explanation, thereby leaving the most diffuse, vulnerable, and ill-armed Empire that has ever existed face to face with an Empire that is compact, well-fortified, and armed to the teeth. In this contrast lies one of the main causes of the present war.

Moreover, the internal difficulties of France and the preoccupation of Russia in the Far East gave to Kaiser William a disquietingly easy victory in the affairs of the Near East. His visit to Constantinople and Palestine in 1898 inaugurated a Levantine policy destined to have momentous results. On the Bosphorus he scrupled not to clasp the hand of Sultan Abdul Hamid II., still reeking with the blood of the Christians of Armenia and Macedonia. At Jerusalem he figured as the Christian knight-errant, but at Damascus as the champion of the Moslem creed.

After laying a wreath on the tomb of Saladin, he made a speech which revealed his plan of utilising the fighting power of Islam. He said: "The three hundred million Mohammedans who live scattered over the globe may be a.s.sured of this, that the German Emperor will be their friend at all times." Taken in conjunction with his pro-Turkish policy, this implied that the Triple Alliance was to be b.u.t.tressed by the most terrible fighting force in the East[502].

[Footnote 502: See Hurgronje, _The Holy War; made in Germany_, pp.

27-39, 68-78; also G.E. Holt, _Morocco the Piquant_ (1914), who says (chap, xiv.): "Islam is waiting for war in Europe. . . . A war between any two European Powers, in my opinion, would mean the uprising of Islam."]

During the tour he did profitable business with the Sublime Porte by gaining a promise for the construction of a railway to Bagdad and the Persian Gulf, under German auspices. The scheme took practical form in 1902-3, when the Sultan granted a firman for the construction of that line together with very extensive proprietary rights along its course.

Russian opposition had been bought off in 1900 by the adoption of a more southerly course than was originally designed; and the Kaiser now sought to get the financial support of England to the enterprise. British public opinion, however, was invincibly sceptical, and with justice, for the scheme would have ruined our valuable trade on the River Tigris and the Persian Gulf; while the proposed prolongation of the line to Koweit on the gulf would enable Germany, Austria, and Turkey to threaten India.

By the year 1903 Austria was so far mistress of the Balkans as to render it possible for her and Germany in the near future to send troops through Constantinople and Asia Minor by the railways which they controlled. Accordingly, affairs in the Near East became increasingly strained; and, when Russia was involved in the j.a.panese War, no Great Power could effectively oppose Austro-German policy in that quarter. The influence of France and Britain, formerly paramount both politically and commercially in the Turkish Empire, declined, while that of Germany became supreme. Every consideration of prudence therefore prompted the Governments of London and Paris to come to a close understanding, in order to make headway against the aggressive designs of the two Kaisers in the Balkans and Asia Minor. Looking forward, we may note that the military collapse of Russia in 1904-5 enabled the Central Powers to push on in the Levant. Germany fastened her grip on the Turkish Government, exploited the resources of Asia Minor, and posed as the champion of the Moslem creed. Early in the twentieth century that creed became aggressive, mainly under the impulse of Sultan Abdul Hamid II., who varied his propagandism by ma.s.sacre with appeals to the faithful to look to him as their one hope in this world. Constantinople and Cairo were the centres of this Pan-Islamic movement, which, aiming at the closer union of all Moslems in Asia, Europe, and Africa around the Sultan, threatened to embarra.s.s Great Britain, France, and Russia. The Kaiser, seeing in this revival of Islam an effective force, took steps to encourage the "true believers" and strengthen the Sultan by the construction of a branch line of the Bagdad system running southwards through Aleppo and the district east of the Dead Sea towards Mecca.

Purporting to be a means for lessening the hardships of pilgrims, it really enabled the Sultan to threaten the Suez Ca.n.a.l and Egypt.

The aggressive character of these schemes explains why France, Great Britain, and Russia began to draw together for mutual support. The three Powers felt the threat implied in an organisation of the Moslem world under the aegis of the Kaiser. He, a diligent student of Napoleon's career, was evidently seeking to dominate the Near East, and to enrol on his side the force of Moslem enthusiasm which the Corsican had forfeited by his attack on Egypt in 1798. The construction of German railways in the Levant and the domination of the Balkan Peninsula by Austria would place in the hands of the Germanic Powers the keys of the Orient, which have always been the keys to World-Empire.

Closely connected with these far-reaching schemes was the swift growth of the Pan-German movement. It sought to group the Germanic and cognate peoples in some form of political union--a programme which threatened to absorb Holland, Belgium, the greater part of Switzerland, the Baltic Provinces of Russia, the Western portions of the Hapsburg dominions, and, possibly, the Scandinavian peoples. The resulting State or Federation of States would thus extend from Ostend to Reval, from Amsterdam (or Bergen) to Trieste.

Even those Germans who did not espouse these ambitious schemes became deeply imbued with the expansively patriotic ideas championed by the Kaiser. So far back as 1890 he ordered their enforcement in the universities and schools[503]. Thenceforth professors and teachers vied in their eagerness to extol the greatness of Germany and the civilising mission of the Hohenzollerns, whose exploits in the future were to eclipse all the achievements of Frederick the Great and William I.

Moreover, the new German Navy was acclaimed as a necessary means to the triumph of German _Kultur_ throughout the world. Other nations were depicted as slothful, selfish, decadent; and the decline in the prestige of Great Britain, France, and Russia to some extent justified these pretensions. The Tsar, by turning away from the Balkans towards Korea, deadened Slav aspirations. For the time Pan-Slavism seemed moribund.

Pan-Germanism became a far more threatening force.

[Footnote 503: Latterly, the catchword, _England ist der Feind _("England is the enemy"), has been taught in very many schools.]

Summing up, and including one topic that will soon be dealt with, we may conclude as follows: Germany showed that she did not want England's friendship, save in so far as it would help her to oppose the Monroe Doctrine or supply her with money to finish the Bagdad Railway. For reasons that have been explained, she and Austria were likely to undermine British interests in the Near East; while, on the other hand, the diversion of Russia's activities from Central Asia and the Balkans to the Far East, lessened the Muscovite menace which had so long determined the trend of British policy. Moreover, Russia's ally, France, showed a conciliatory spirit. Forgetting the rebuff at Fashoda (see _ante_, pp. 501-6), she aimed at expansion in Morocco. Now, Korea and Morocco did not vitally concern us. The Bagdad Railway and the Kaiser's court to Pan-Islamism were definite threats to our existence as an Empire. Finally, the development of the German Navy and the growth of a furiously anti-British propaganda threatened the long and vulnerable East Coast of Great Britain.

A temporary understanding with Germany could have been attained if we had acquiesced in her claim for maritime equality and in the oriental and colonial enterprises which formed its sequel. But that course, by yielding to her undisputed ascendancy in all parts of the world, would have led to a policy of part.i.tion. Now, since 1688, British statesmen have consistently opposed, often by force of arms, a policy of part.i.tion at the expense of civilised nations. Their aim has been to support the weaker European States against the stronger and more aggressive, thus a.s.suring a Balance of Power which in general has proved to be the chief safeguard of peace. In seeking an Entente with France, and subsequently with Russia, British policy has followed the course consistent with the counsels of moderation and the teachings of experience. We may note here that the German historian, Count Reventlow, has pointed out that the Berlin Government could not frame any lasting agreement with the British; for, sooner or later, they would certainly demand the limitation of Germany's colonial aims and of her naval development, to neither of which could she consent. The explanation is highly significant[504].

[Footnote 504: Reventlow, _Deutschlands auswartige Politik_, pp. 178-9; _Mr. Chamberlain's Speeches_, vol. ii. p. 68.]

Nevertheless, at first Great Britain sought to come to a friendly understanding with Germany in the Far East, probably with a view to preventing the schemes of part.i.tion of China which in 1900 a.s.sumed a menacing guise. At that time Russia seemed likely to take the lead in those designs. But opposite to the Russian stronghold of Port Arthur was the German province of Kiao Chau, in which the Kaiser took a deep interest. His resolve to play a leading part in Chinese affairs appeared in his speech to the German troops sent out in 1900 to a.s.sist in quelling the Boxer Rising. He ordered them to adopt methods of terrorism like those of Attila's Huns, so that "no Chinaman will ever again dare to look askance at a German." The orders were ruthlessly obeyed. After the capture of Pekin by the Allies (September 1900) there ensued a time of wary balancing. Russia and Germany were both suspected of designs to cut up China; but they were opposed by Great Britain and j.a.pan. This obscure situation was somewhat cleared by the statesmen of London and Berlin agreeing to maintain the territorial integrity of China and freedom of trade (October 1900). But in March 1901 the German Chancellor, Prince von Bulow, nullified the agreement by officially announcing that it did not apply to, or limit, the expansion of Russia in Manchuria. What caused this _volte face_ is not known; but it implied a renunciation of the British policy of the _status quo_ in the Far East and an official encouragement to Russia to push forward to the Pacific Ocean, where she was certain to come into conflict with j.a.pan. Such a collision would enfeeble those two Powers; while Germany, as _tertius gaudens_ would be free to work her will both in Europe and Asia[505].

[Footnote 505: In September 1895 the Tsar thanked Prince Hohenlohe for supporting his Far East policy, and said he was weary of Armenia and distrustful of England; so, too, in September 1896, when Russo-German relations were also excellent (_Hohenlohe Mems_., Eng. edit., ii.