The War that Ended Peace
Page 55
In Germany, the hardening of the British position shook Kiderlen, who was already encountering difficulties. Germany’s ally Austria-Hungary was mildly disapproving. ‘We stand loyally with Germany in the east’, Aehrenthal told a confidant, ‘and will always be faithful to our alliance duties, but I can’t follow Kiderlen to Agadir … We can’t practise any politics of prestige.’50 The Kaiser, who for all the ferocity of his comments and marginalia, invariably shrank from the prospect of war, was threatening to come back from his summer cruise of Norway. ‘For I cannot let my Government act like this without me being on the spot and to oversee the consequences and to take a hand. Otherwise it would be inexcusable and make me look like a mere parliamentary ruler! Le roi s’amuse! And in the meantime we head for mobilisation! This must not happen with me away!’51 On 17 July word came from the Kaiser’s yacht that he did not want a war and by the end of the month he was back in Germany.
It is disconcerting in light of what was to come how jittery Europe was and how readily the possibility of war was accepted in what was after all a colonial dispute capable of being settled relatively easily by international agreement. By the start of August, the British army was considering whether it could get an expeditionary force quickly to the Continent and there was consternation when the Admiralty lost track of the German navy for twenty-four hours.52 The British military authorities took some defensive measures, for example sending soldiers to guard weapons depots.53 Later that month, in response to the continuing crisis, a special meeting of the Committee of Imperial Defence was called to examine Britain’s strategic position and war plans and Grey came clean to his colleagues in Cabinet about the continuing staff talks between the British and the French armies. Rumours circulated that the German military was looking into landing troops at Agadir, even that Wilhelm had given the preparatory orders for mobilisation.54 On 4 September, Henry Wilson, Director of War Operations, was so spooked by reports coming in from British military attachés in Germany and by a story that Germany was buying stocks of wheat, that he phoned the Café Royal in Piccadilly to warn Churchill and Grey, who were dining there. The three men sat up late into the night at Wilson’s house discussing the situation.55 In Germany there was serious discussion of a preventive war and even Bethmann seems to have felt that it might do the German people good.56 ‘The wretched Morocco story is beginning to get on my nerves,’ Moltke wrote to his wife, adding:
If we once again emerge from this affair with our tail between our legs, if we cannot bring ourselves to make energetic demands which we would be ready to force through with the sword, then I despair of the future of the German Reich. In that case I will leave. But before that I will make a request to get rid of the army, and to have us placed under a Japanese protectorate; then we can make money without being disturbed and we can turn completely simple-minded.57
On 1 August, after a meeting with the Kaiser at the Baltic port of Swinemunde (which was going to be badly damaged by Allied bombing in 1945), Kiderlen indicated that he was ready to drop his demands for the whole of the French Congo and seek a compromise with the French. The nationalist press in Germany moaned about ‘humiliation’, ‘shame’, and ‘ignominy’.58 ‘If only we could have been spared this moment of unspeakable shame, of national dishonor,’ said a leading conservative paper. ‘Has the old Prussian spirit vanished, have we become a race of women, ruled by the interests of a few racially alien merchants?’ Foreigners, the paper claimed, were calling the emperor ‘Guillaume le timide, le valeureux poltroon!’59 Eminent businessmen led by Ballin, on the other hand, were calling for a settlement before Germany’s economic situation got worse. At the start of September, fears of war led to a collapse of the stock market in Berlin.
Kiderlen and Jules Cambon rapidly reached an agreement in principle: part of French Africa for Germany in return for German recognition of France’s dominance in Morocco. As so often happens with negotiations, they then spent three months haggling over the details, such as the banks of rivers or tiny villages in the interior of Africa which no one, apart from the locals whose wishes, of course, were not consulted, knew anything about. A little strip of territory nicknamed the Duck’s Beak in the north Cameroons caused particular trouble. Kiderlen also caused a stir when he chose to take a brief holiday in the French resort of Chamonix with his mistress, who was rumoured to be a French agent. Although he intended to travel incognito, they were greeted at the station by the local prefect and a guard of honour. The nationalist French press was furious, not at the mistress but at what it felt to be a tactless choice of place. Kiderlen left her there for a few weeks and his letters to her, which he might well have assumed would be seen by the French, warned that Germany might have to fight if it did not receive satisfaction in the negotiations.60
The treaty which was finally signed on 4 November gave France the right to establish a protectorate over Morocco with a commitment to respect German economic interests. In return Germany got some 100,000 square miles of central Africa. Kiderlen and Cambon exchanged photographs. ‘To my terrible adversary and charming friend’, said Kiderlen’s inscription, while Cambon put ‘To my charming adversary and terrible friend’.61 At the French railway station of Lyons, a porter recognised Cambon. ‘Aren’t you the ambassador at Berlin?’ Cambon replied that he was. ‘You and your brother in London have done us a great service. Without you we would have been in a fine mess.’62
As Grey said later, though: ‘The consequences of such a foreign crisis do not end with it. They seem to end, but they go underground and reappear later on.’63 The powers had fresh reasons to mistrust each other, and key decision-makers and their publics were closer to accepting the likelihood of war. Izvolsky, now Russian ambassador to France, wrote back to his successor in St Petersburg, that Europe’s international order had been seriously weakened: ‘There is no doubt that every local clash between the powers must undoubtedly result in a general European war in which Russia as well as every single other European power will have to participate. With God’s help, the onset of this conflict can be delayed, but we have to take hourly into consideration that it can happen anytime, and we have to prepare ourselves every hour for this.’64
The Entente Cordiale between Britain and France had survived even though each side felt that the other had behaved badly. The French felt that the British could have backed them more firmly from the start while the British were annoyed with France for being difficult about the Congo and for trying to get hold of the Spanish area of Morocco.65 The British Cabinet continued to be uneasy about the Anglo-French military talks. In November the Cabinet had two stormy meetings at which some of the moderates who opposed military commitments to France threatened to resign. Even Asquith was getting cold feet; as he wrote to Grey that September, the talks were ‘rather dangerous’ and ‘the French ought not to be encouraged in the present circumstances to make their plans on any assumptions of this kind’.66 While Grey argued hard for a free hand in foreign affairs he was forced for the first time to accept a degree of control by the Cabinet. It was agreed that there should be no exchanges between the British and French general staffs that amounted to a commitment on the part of Britain of military or naval intervention in a war, and if such communications did occur it should only be with previous Cabinet approval. The military talks continued nevertheless and Henry Wilson continued to travel to France and reassure his French counterparts that Britain would stand by them. And naval talks started which were to lead to an agreement in February 1913 for cooperation in the Mediterranean and in the waters between Britain and France, with the French concentrating on the former and the British on the latter. The British could tell themselves that they had not signed a military alliance with the French but the ties that bound their two countries had thickened and increased.
In France, the signing of the treaty with Germany was seen as a victory, as great, said some, as the taking of Algeria in 1830.67 Caillaux’s government fell, however, helped on its way by revelations that he had bee
n in secret contact with the Germans, and a new government came in under the anti-German nationalist Raymond Poincaré. The crisis, which was seen as evidence that Germany was prepared to use war to get what it wanted, also had a profound impact on French opinion and stimulated France’s own preparations for war.68 The French military attaché in Berlin was later to warn that the German public was in a warlike mood and bitterly resented what it saw as a defeat over Morocco, and that it was not prepared to compromise or accept compensation in a future crisis. In his view a military confrontation between France and Germany was inevitable. Stephen Pichon, who had been Foreign Minister between 1906 and 1911 and who came back into office in 1913, Joffre, and a number of his leading generals, were strongly influenced by such reports.69
In Germany, the treaty was seen as another defeat, comparable to the one in the first Morocco crisis. When Bethmann had to defend the agreement in the Reichstag he got angry comments from the right: ‘a defeat, whether we say so or not’. The crown prince was seen in the gallery applauding demonstrably.70 The empress, who normally did not interfere in politics, said reproachfully to Kiderlen: ‘Are we always going to retreat before the French and put up with their insolence?’71 The Kaiser himself received much of the blame. ‘What has happened to the Hohenzollerns’, asked a right-wing newspaper, ‘from whom once a Great Elector, a Friedrich Wilhelm I, a Friedrich the Great, a Kaiser Wilhelm I have emerged?’72 An American politician travelling in Germany heard army officers say that the Kaiser had made them look foolish in 1905 and 1911 and they would not let him do it again.73
The very real prospect of war in the summer of 1911 had brought home to Germans that Germany’s strategic position was not good. The crisis further served to confirm the view in the minds of many Germans that their country was encircled by enemies.74 It might well have to fight a three-front war, against France and Russia on land and Britain at sea, and it was not clear that its resources were adequate.75 There were increasing doubts about whether the navy was ever going to be up to the task of taking on the British. And the widening of the Kiel Canal to allow the big battleships to go safely back and forth from the Baltic to the North Sea and make it possible for Germany to have a presence in both would not be finished until 1914. (The canal was opened on 24 June 1914, four days before the assassination at Sarajevo.) Tirpitz, as he had done before, took the opportunity of the crisis to demand a new naval bill. He wanted six more big ships over the next few years and to add a third active squadron to the navy. This, he argued, would rally the right wing and the middle classes against the left and ‘take the wind out of the social-democratic and left-liberal parties’.76 He met resistance from many of his own admirals who argued that to announce that Germany was building more dreadnoughts at a time of international tension might well lead to war with Britain. Bethmann too opposed Tirpitz, on grounds of both cost and the dangers. In the end he could not prevail against the Kaiser, who called him a coward and said he himself was not going to be intimidated by Britain. ‘I told the Reich Chancellor’, Wilhelm boasted to the chief of his Naval Cabinet, ‘to remember that I was a successor to the Great Elector and Frederick the Great, who never hesitated to act when the time seemed to come. I also told the Chancellor that he should reckon with political Providence, which would see to it that a people with so much on their conscience as the English would one day be brought low.’77
The army, which over the years had watched quietly as increasing resources went to the navy, now made their own demands for enlargement. It was a question of ‘self-preservation’, Moltke said.78 The Kaiser agreed to a compromise whereby both the army and navy got their new bills but with some cuts. German public opinion and the Reichstag, which had resisted increased expenditure, were now in a mood to approve them. The new Navy Law of 1912 provided for three new dreadnoughts and two light cruisers while, under the Military Law, the peacetime army was to expand over the next five years by some 30,000 men with changes in organisation such as a strengthened military transport system.79 As a sop to Bethmann, he was allowed to reopen talks with Britain. Not surprisingly, the British approached these with some scepticism.
The Morocco crisis left another dangerous residue in the minds of Europe’s leaders. It also led directly to a war between Italy and the Ottoman Empire in the autumn of 1911 which in turn paved the way for the Balkan wars of 1912 and 1913. Italy, which had watched the worldwide scramble for colonies with envy, now decided the time had come to add to its small collection of overseas territories. The Ottoman Empire was weak, torn as it was by internal divisions and fighting rebellions in Albania and Yemen, and the other powers were preoccupied by Morocco. Over the years Italy had obtained promises from Britain, France, Austria-Hungary, and Russia which recognised that Italy had special interests in two provinces of the Ottomans in North Africa: Cyrenaica and Tripoli. (Today we know them as Libya.) If the status in North Africa changed, as it clearly was about to with Morocco in 1911, then Italy could make a good argument for consolidating a hold, in some form or other, over Libya. Acquiring colonies also seemed a good deal easier than fulfilling that other dream of Italian nationalists – the seizing of Italian-speaking areas such as the great port of Trieste and the Trentino from Austria-Hungary – something which Italian weakness made a long way off in the future, if ever.80 Austria-Hungary itself was more than happy to think of Italy directing its attention towards the southern shore of the Mediterranean and away from the Alps and the Adriatic.81
Italy’s previous attempts at building an empire had, however, been spectacularly unsuccessful. Italian nationalists still resented France’s seizure of Tunisia in 1881. History (after its defeat of Carthage, Rome had turned the region into its breadbasket), geography (the coast of Tunisia was directly across from Sicily), and emigration (there were some 130,00 Italians living in Tunisia by the time of the Great War) all made Tunisia Italian and not French. True, Italy had managed to establish two small and backward colonies in Eritrea and Somaliland on the Horn of Africa, but its attempt to take Ethiopia had resulted in a stunning defeat at the hands of the Ethiopians at Sadowa in 1896. It was a deep humiliation for Italy, which had a strong desire to play a part on the European and world stage.
Italy was a great power largely by courtesy rather than in reality. In everything but poverty, it lagged behind the others. Its population was only 35 million; that of its neighbour and rival Austria-Hungary was 50 million. And it was losing large numbers, 873,000 in 1913 alone, through emigration.82 Its railway network was undeveloped; it was less industrialised and more agricultural than the other Western powers; and it spent less on its military than all the others including Russia.83 It was a new country, where the different regions and cities often inspired, as they do today, stronger loyalties than to Italy itself. There were deep divisions between the new working classes and their employers, between north and south and between the Catholic Church and the state. The dominant figure in politics in the years before 1914 was Giovanni Giolitti, a liberal reformer who tried to modernise Italy’s economy, society and politics, but there was a feeling among the political classes and the public that it was all something of an improvisation and not terribly effective. At the highest levels of government, key officials such as the military and the civilian leaders simply did not communicate with each other. Italian chiefs of general staff, for example, did not know the terms of the Triple Alliance which they might one day have to go to war to uphold. In theory the king was in charge of foreign affairs and the military, but in practice Victor Emmanuel III, who succeeded his assassinated father in 1900, largely left his ministers alone. A small, fussy man he devoted his attentions to his beloved family, including his much larger Montenegrin wife, and his coin collection.
Foreigners came to Italy for its climate and its many beauties but they also laughed at it. Italians were seen as charming, chaotic, childlike but not a people to be taken seriously. In international affairs, the other powers, even its own allies in the Triple Alliance, tended to treat Italy as
negligible. During the crisis over the Bosnian annexation, for example, Italy’s suggestions for a settlement were brushed aside and there was no thought of giving it any compensation in the Balkans. (The dreadful earthquake at Messina made 1908 a particularly grim year for Italy.) Italian diplomats, who were increasingly drawn from old southern aristocratic families, were seen by their colleagues abroad as men of culture who were not always up to complicated negotiations, especially in matters involving trade or economics, and conservative in outlook, such as the Italian ambassador who hated motorcars and always had himself driven in a coach and four to meetings in Vienna with his Austrian-Hungarian counterparts. While Italy did in fact have capable diplomats, its poverty made their work difficult; embassies frequently did not have such modern basic equipment as typewriters.84
Italy’s foreign relations were determined in part by its own weakness and its strategic position. It had potential enemies on either side, both on land and seaborne; its long coastline was impossible to defend properly and the navy admitted that it could not protect all the major ports. Its armies were concentrated in the north to meet attacks from either France or Austria-Hungary, leading one deputy to remark that Italy’s head was protected by a steel helmet but its body was naked.85 Italian leaders tended, understandably, to be nervous, seeing malevolence everywhere and assuming, less reasonably, that Italy’s enemies were irrational and likely to attack suddenly without good reason. After 1900 evidence of Austrian preparations along the common frontier heightened Italian fears; 1911 brought some relief when Conrad was removed – as it turned out only for a short time – from office.86 As Europe divided itself into two power blocs, successive Italian Foreign Ministers tried desperately to manoeuvre between the two. As a deputy remarked in parliament in 1907: ‘Unbreakable faithfulness to the Triple Alliance, sincere friendship for England and France, and cordial relations with the other powers always remain the bases of our foreign policy.’87