Note 3 — PART I PEACE AND WAR

It would be easy, I am informed on good authority, to illustrate this from passages in the works of German writers from Treitschke, the great exponent of Bismarckism, to writers of the present day. And I may quote a paragraph in support of my thesis from an unexpected source, that of Mr. H. M. Hyndman, in a letter to the Morning Post of November 9, nearly three weeks after my Manchester speech. Mr. Hyndman, I need not remind my readers, not only enjoys a wide experience of German Socialism, but of many phases of German politics and political life. He writes: "I cannot for the life of me understand what Sir Edward Grey hopes to gain by rebuking Lord Roberts for stating that which the whole Continent knows perfectly well to be the truth. The German Fleet is being strengthened now, as it has been increased up to the present time, in order either to attack us in the North Sea, when the German Government thinks it safe to do so; or, by threats of what will occur, to force us to accept German policy, and allow the German Empire to do what it pleases with Holland, Belgium, Denmark, and Switzerland, after having crushed or arranged with France. If Germany is not hostile to this country, why does the whole Pan-German party (and Press), to which the heir to the German throne openly belongs, declare that she is? Why is it that 'England is the enemy' is the common talk all through German middle-class circles? Or, on the other hand, if the relations between the two nations are so excellent as our Foreign Minister assures us they are—thus leading many sober Frenchmen to believe that our entente with France only means that we shall betray the French Republic the moment it suits us to do so—why are we fortifying Rosyth as a naval base, why have we withdrawn our Fleet from the Mediterranean to concentrate it in home waters, and why was every journal in this country discussing the issues of peace and war with the German Empire when the late German Ambassador came to this country? More important still, why have we given way to a worse Government than that of Germany—the Russian Government, to wit—on matters of the first importance in Persia and elsewhere? Are the English people mere children thus to be fed on the pap of fatuous pacificism and convenient party misrepresentation at one of the most serious crises in the history of our race?"