374 



The Review of Reviews. 



HOW GERMANY DISTRUSTS ENGLAND. 



Some Plain 'J'ri tus bv Mr. R. E. C. Long. 

 The article, " The New Reichstag and Old Policy," 

 contributed by Mr. R. E. C. Long to the Forlniglilly 

 Review, should be attentively read, not only by every 

 Cabinet Minister, but by every mcmher of the Anglo- 

 German Friendship Committee. For it contains plain 

 but unpalatable truths too often forgotten, which, 

 nevertheless, should constantly be borne in mind by 

 all those who seek to improve the relations between 

 the two countries. It is true that Mr. Long is a pessi- 

 mis.t, but he is a shrewd observer who studies inter- 

 national politics from the inside track. 



THE HOPELESSNESS OF AN ENTENTE. 



Mr. Long despairs of any friendly arrangement such 

 as that which Lord Ilaldane attempted to negotiate :— 



If the liiitish Foreign (Jfhcc is about to offer bribes in Africa 

 or elsewhere in the hope of placating Germans and getting in 

 return a general abamlonnient of naval and other competition, 

 it is likely soon to be undeceived. Germany will lake the 

 payment, but she will refuse to give the consideration ; and she 

 will make the good defence of the advertiser who offers gold 

 watches for a shilling — that the buyers by their own credulity 

 invited fraud. No policy is wanted by the German people 

 which places their Empire at the mercy of a foreign State which 

 tlity dislike and distrust. 



THE ROOT OF Germany's dislike. 



Mr. Long attributes what he regards as the ineradic- 

 able distrust and even hatred of England to the fact 

 that we are now openly allied with their enemies, 

 France and Russia : — 



How can she, they ask, desire equal friendship with three 

 Powers, when she is leagued with two of them to make war, if 

 necessary, upon the third t 



To Germans the protest that the agreement with France and 

 Russia is only defensive has no value. All governments, and all 

 alliances, they say, protest the same thing ; usually with perfect 

 good faith. 



HOW IT IS WATERED. 



If the Triple Entente is the root of German distrust, 

 it is plentifully watered by the amazing inconse- 

 quence and impertinence of the speeches of English 

 statesmen : — 



They do not think it an official's business to make quasi- 

 diplomatic speeches i/f omiiihis nbiis ct i/uilnist/am aliis, to rain 

 down comments on other country's affairs, indeterminate offers, 

 frantic asseverations of goodwill, moral classifications of the 

 universe from the point of view of racifism, and advice apropos 

 of no particular matter, to other States as to how they shall 

 negotiate and how they shall arm. Germans held that our 

 Ministers ought to leave them alone ; drop the word 

 "Germany'' out of their speeches, except when they must use it 

 with some serious aim ; and generally cease lecturing, insulting, 

 flattering, and meddling in tlieir aflairs. And above all they 

 ask that Ministeis cease bombarding them with conciliatory 

 ■speeches and offers, nearly every one of which, owing to lhe» 

 appalling lirilish ignorance of German affairs and sentiments, 

 cuntaihed unintended cffenee. 



WHY GERMANY IS INCREASING HER NAVY. 



Mr. Long says the Germans believe we al\\ays 

 quarrel with the next strongest Power, and they think 

 we have only made friends of our old foes, France and 

 Russia, in order to quarrel with Germany. They are, 

 therefore, resohed to create a fleet equal to that of 



Britain. Not two keels to one, nor three keels to two, 

 but a standard " on the prin(ii)le of parity " : — 



The real Germany docs not in the least care what we think 

 of her shipbuilding ; she would if [lossible this year build ten 

 capital ships and rejoice in our helpless irritation ; she .abstains 

 from this, and abstains from supplementing the Navy Law 

 merely because her finances are disordered. 



As for Sir Edward Grey's " surprising proposal " 

 that Germany should recognise our right to a superior 

 navy, " Germans alvva\s laughed at it as an instance 

 of British simplicity or impudence." 



WHY WAR IS THOUGHT INEVITABLE. 



Mr. Long regards the German ambition to have a 

 supreme navy as the rock upon which all agreements 

 will founder. The two countries have drifted into a 

 posture of defiance and of rivalry : — 



The gravest questions with France and Russia have suddenly 

 become childishly easy to settle, whereas every trifle 'n which 

 German interests are opposed to ours is considered worth a war. 

 That is how Germans see our policy. And that is why they 

 distrust the indications that we are again starting reconciliation 

 attempts from the wrong end, and laljouring at an agreement 

 which will be satisfactory only in so far as it leaves untouched 

 the real causes of the quarrel. They know that the quarrel 

 itself will remain ; and that the next trifling dift'eiences, which 

 with France or Russia would be easily settled, will with them 

 be cause of war. The totality of the Empire's domestic and 

 diplomatic conditions dictate, therefore, a new bid at national 

 self-rcali:ation perhaps in a domain of which the agreement- 

 makers do not dream, and this will, of course, provoke British 

 opposition, and probably— judging by the angry temper of 

 Germans last summer— this time bring about the long overdue 

 war. If waged against British dictation it will be a popular 

 war with Germans ; and in any case, they reason, a popular 

 war with us, in.asmuch as the military factors indicate that in 

 the end the only sufferers will be our Continental allies. 



There is therefore nothing to be done but to say 

 nothing and build two keels to one. 



Dr. Dillon on the Other Side of the Question. 



The English distrust of Germany seems to be as 

 deeply seated as the German distrust of England, if 

 we may judge from Dr. Dillon's chromque in the 

 Conlcinporary Revinv : — 



Germany is set on outvying us in a race for undisputed naval 

 sujjeriority. No one with a feeling for realities can blame us 

 for setting down such action to a resolve to bring the British 

 nation under her political yoke, or for drawing such practical 

 conclusions .as may seem warranted. The touchstone of her 

 sincerity is precisely that question of the relative growth of 

 naval armaments. It cannot be reserved or shelved. The 

 German Press, one regrets to say, does little to dispel the 

 clouds of misunderstandings which hinder the Kaiser's subjects 

 from viewing the people of Great Britain and their policy in 

 the proper light. -Many of the leailing newspapers treat the 

 negotiations for a better understanding as thongfi success were 

 neither likely nor desirable. 



Undeterred by this double distrust, Lord Courtney 

 of Penarth, Mr. L. '1". Hobhouse, and Mr. Ensor, of the ' 

 Foreign Policy Committee, discuss in the same review 

 whether any practical step can be taken to clear 

 the air and prove to Germany that we have no desire 

 to hem her in. They contend :— 



(l) That an Anglo-German agreement, far from being incom- 

 patible with the French <•«.',«/<■, is the natural supplement to 

 that c-ri/cntt; as it was originally and projierly understood. 



