Note 409 — Chapter IX

William II wrote to Nicholas II, Dec. 1, 1903, as follows: “The visit of the hundred British Parliamentary—gentlemen and ladies—to Paris shows how ‘the Crimean combination’ is warming to its work. Your ally is making rather free with his flirt [with Great Britain]. You should pull him up a little.” Again on Jan. 3, 1904, he wrote to the same: “Therefore it is evident to every unbiassed mind that Korea must and will be Russian. When and how that is nobody’s affair and concerns only you and your country.” See Bülow to F. O., Oct. 31, 1903, ibid., 853 f., No. 5918; memo. by Bülow, Nov. 7, 1903, ibid., 70 ff., No. 5422; Walter Goetz (ed.), Briefe Wilhelms II an den Zaren, 1894-1914 (Berlin, 1920), pp. 330 ff.; Savinsky, Recollections of a Russian Diplomat, pp. 63 ff. William II addressed Nicholas in various letters as “Admiral of the Pacific” and signed himself “Admiral of the Atlantic.” In spite of these words, to hold the Emperor responsible for the Russo-Japanese War is to underestimate the force of Russian foreign policy.