Note 896 — Chapter XV

Memo. by Mühlberg, Aug. 1, 1905, G.P., XX, 648 f., No. 6868; Mühlberg to William II, Aug. 4, 1905, ibid., 649 ff., No. 6869; Metternich to Bülow, Aug. 14, 1905, ibid., 651 ff., No. 6870. The Emperor did not fear an attack at the time, but certainly at some later date. He thought that the maneuvers were meant to remind Denmark that she was an outpost for Great Britain just as Portugal was and that she must not be too familiar with Germany. And with an English princess married into the Swedish royal family and King Edward’s son-in-law seeking the Norwegian throne, he feared that Norway would also become a British satellite (William II to Bülow, July 30, 1905, quoted in a dispatch from Bülow to F. O., July 30, 1905, ibid., XIX, 477 ff., No. 6229). Even so sane a person as General Moltke, who in the next year became chief of staff, confided to his diary on July 30, 1905: “The visit of the Channel Fleet in the Baltic announced by England is to be regarded as a demonstration. . . . . The English are inciting in the most unbelievable fashion, they are telling the most despicable lies about us, and are representing Germany as the evil spirit in the whole world. . . . . The future lies dark before us. May Germany have the strength to bear difficult times” (Moltke, p. 331).