The Audacious War | Page 6

of the Allies. It is first a defensive war in which the Germans are the heaviest losers. On the part of the Germans it is an audacious war and its very audacity has astounded the whole world. But Germany never meant to war against the world collectively. That was the accident of her bad diplomacy.
The audaciousness of Prussian war conceptions began in the latter part of the last century. They did not grow out of the war with the French in 1870, for Bismarck's legacy to the German nation was a warning against any war with Russia. The German scheme was concocted by the successor of Bismarck himself, none other than Kaiser William II. He planned a steady growth of German power that would first vanquish the Slav of southeastern Europe and give Germany control through Constantinople and Asia Minor to the Persian gulf; then, as opportunity arose, a crushing of France and repression of Russia; and the overthrow of the British empire; and then the end of the Monroe Doctrine, to be followed by American tariffs dictated from Germany.
This seems so audacious a program as to be almost beyond comprehension in America. Yet it will be made clear in the next chapter.
CHAPTER II
TARIFFS AND COMMERCE THE WAR CAUSES
War with Russia was Inevitable--Finance and Tariffs made Germany great--Commercial War--How Germany loses in the United States--The Tariff Danger.
For the causes of this most audacious war of 1914 one must study, not only Germany and her imperial policy, but most particularly her relations with Russia. These relations are very little understood in America, but they become vital to us when open to public view.
Disregarding all the counsels of Bismarck and the previous reigning Hohenzollerns, the present Kaiser has steadily offended Russia. War with her within two years was inevitable, irrespective of any causes in relation to Servia. Russia knew this and was diligently preparing for it. Germany--the war party of Germany--knew it and with supreme audacity determined through Austria first to smash Servia and put the Balkan States and Turkey in alignment with herself for this coming war with Russia.
Sergius Witte is one of the great statesmen of Russia. He formulated the programme for the Siberian railroad and Russian Asiatic development. The party of nobles opposed to him arranged that he should receive the humiliation of an ignoble peace with Japan, under which it was expected that Russia would have to pay a huge indemnity.
But when Witte arrived at the naval station at Portsmouth, New Hampshire, to make the famous treaty with Japan, his first declaration was, "Not one kopeck for indemnity." He won out and returned in triumph to Russia.
But during the progress of the Japanese war Germany thrust her commercial treaties upon St. Petersburg. Goods from Russia into Germany were taxed while German goods went under favorable terms into Russia, with the result that Russia has had a struggle now for ten years to keep her gold basis and her financial exchanges.
It was Witte who was sent to Berlin to protest against these proposed treaties and secure more favorable terms. Witte made his protest and refused to accept the German demands. Then suddenly he received peremptory orders from the Czar to grant all the demands of Germany. The Czar declared Russia was in no condition to have trouble with Germany. These commercial treaties expire within two years. Russia many months back proposed the discussion of new terms. Germany responded that the present treaties were satisfactory to her and he should call for their renewal.
This meant either further humiliation to Russia or war. Russia had already suffered the affront of being forced by Germany at the point of the bayonet to assent to the taking by Austria of Bosnia and Herzegovina in violation of the Treaty of Berlin. The Czar realized many months ago that Russia must now fight for her commercial life. She would not, however, be ready for the war until 1916.
Let Americans consider what this means--a German war over commercial tariffs--and see what, if successful in Europe, it would lead to.
The German nation is a fighting unit under the dominion of Prussia, the greatest war state, not only of the empire, but of the world. Having welded Germany by the Franco-Prussian war into a nation with unified tariffs, transportation, currency, and monetary systems, Prussia has been able to point to the war as the cause of the phenomenal prosperity of Germany.
It is a popular fallacy in Germany that militarism makes the greatness of a nation. Germany's prosperity did not begin with the war of 1870. This was only the beginning of German unity which made possible unified transportation and later unified finances and tariffs. Several years after the war, France, which had paid an indemnity to Germany of a thousand million dollars, or five billion francs, was found,