WW1 POSTERS

It was the growing feeling of insecurity that led the European governments, one after another, to try to strengthen their positions by concluding alliances with other governments having similar interests. To Germany belongs the doubtful honor of inaugurating this system of alliances as well as the system of conscript armies, for it was Prince Otto von Bismarck, the principal author of the wars of 1864-1871 and German chancellor after 1871, who in 1879 made an alliance with Austria-Hungary and in 1882 brought about the Triple Alliance of Germany, AustriaHungary, and Italy. These alliances were something new in the history of Europe, since in the past alliances had usually been concluded for specific purposes and were dissolved when the aim was accomplished; the alliance of France and Sardinia in 1859 to drive Austria out of Italy is an example. The alliances arranged by Bismarck were intended to be permanent; the Triple Alliance survived until 1915, and the Austro-German treaty until it was dissolved by military defeat in October 1918. According to the tradition of the balance of power, which is centuries old in European history, the creation of a counterpoise to this grouping was to be expected. Bismarck was able to stave off such a counterpoise by clever diplomacy, first by the renewal of the Three Emperors' League (Germany, Austria-Hungary, and Russia) from 1881 to 1887, and then by the Reinsurance Treaty with Russia from 1887 to 1890, which kept France isolated. After his dismissal in 1890, however, his successor, Gen. Count Leo von Caprivi, rejected his system as too complicated, and in 1891-1894 a Franco-Russian alliance, which had been Bismarck's nightmare, came into being. One combination of powers dominated the center of Europe, while the other possessed the periphery.

Both of the Continental alliances were originally strictly defensive, providing for the maintenance of the status quo and for assistance only if one of the parties were attacked. Gradually, however, each alliance was altered. The Triple Alliance was modified to permit changes in the status quo in the Balkans, in Africa, and even in Europe; in the second treaty of the alliance, concluded in 1887, Germany promised under certain conditions to support Italian claims to Nice and Savoy (which had been ceded to France in 1860 as payment for French help in the war for Italian unification). In 1899 the Franco-Russian alliance was modified to provide for "the maintenance of the balance of power," the words being designed to take care of the situation which might arise when Austria-Hungary went to pieces, as it was confidently expected to do when Emperor Francis Joseph I should die. Finally, in 1909, the AustroGerman alliance was given a new meaning when the chief of the German General Staff, Col. Gen. Helmuth von Moltke, in an exchange of letters with the Austrian chief of staff, Gen. Baron (later Field Marshal Count) Franz Conrad von Hotzendorf, promised that if Austria invaded Serbia and Russia intervened on behalf of the latter, Germany would go to the help of Austria-Hungary. (In spite of many solicitations, Bismarck had consistently refused to make this promise, for he always insisted that Austria must not provoke Russia.) Thus the alliances ceased to be the guarantors of the status quo and might become instruments of aggression. Except in the case of the Austro-German treaty of 1879, the text of which was published in 1888, the terms of the Triple Alliance and the Franco-Russian alliance were closely guarded secrets which, so far as is known, were not penetrated by espionage or revealed by treachery. Although there was much speculation about the possible terms, the guesses were wide of the mark; the texts of the several treaties were not revealed until after the war, and in the absence of positive information the imagination had free rein.

Great Britain did not at first join either of the Continental groups, preferring a policy of "splendid isolation" or a "free hand." Although, according to the treaties of alliance, the two groups were directed against each other, in the 1890's they were more often concerned with diplomatic action against Britain; they stood, as it were, not face to face but side by side. In 1898 and again in 1901, Britain tried to reach an agreement with Germany, but the German terms were too high: Britain was asked to join the Triple Alliance, which it was unwilling to do because it was reluctant to underwrite what was later called the "ramshackle" Habsburg state. The German chancellor of the day, Count (later Prince) Bernhard von Billow, was confident that in the end Britain must come to heel and stood on his terms. But in 1904, in the so-called Entente Cordiale , Britain adjusted its many disputes with France in various parts of the world, and in 1907 it compromised its differences with Russia in the Middle East. Germany therefore found itself confronted by the Triple Entente of the three nations which it had believed impossible of realization. Europe was not mentioned in any of the agreements made by Britain with France and Russia, but by settling their own differences, they secured for themselves free hands in dealing with Germany.

The dominant position which Germany had hitherto occupied in Europe was further undermined by the action of Italy. In 1902, Italy had concluded a secret agreement with France by which it promised to remain neutral if the latter went to war with Germany in consequence of a German attack on Russia. Then, in 1909, Italy had reached a secret understanding with Russia by which both parties recognized each other's interests in the Balkans and promised support for each other's policies. Thus for some years the Triple Alliance was a broken reed, and in opposing the Triple Entente Germany was thrown back on Austria-Hungary as its one reliable ally and supported that ally in its dangerous Balkan policy.

Germany was slow to recognize that it had brought this situation on itself by its own mistakes. When the Entente Cordiale of 1904 permitted France to go ahead with its plans for obtaining control of Morocco, the German government raised strong objections to the French actions and by a covert threat of war (about which Billow boasted in his memoirs) not only compelled the French foreign minister, Theophile Delcasse, to resign ( June 1905), but also forced France to submit the question of Morocco to an international conference, which was held at Algeciras in January-April 1906. This proved to be a Pyrrhic victory, for not only did the conference on the whole support the pretensions of France, but the British government, which had been greatly worried by Germany's conduct, authorized the beginning of secret military conversations between the British and French general staffs. These conversations, which were not revealed until 1914, led to the formulation of plans for sending a British army of 160,000 men to fight alongside the French Army in case Britain decided to join France in war.

In 1911, Germany again challenged France over Morocco, which seemed to be passing under French control, and this time the German government sent a gunboat to the closed port of Agadir. The French were willing to negotiate, being prepared to buy off German opposition in Morocco by making concessions elsewhere in Africa. The German move made the British so uneasy, however, that a pacifist cabinet minister, David Lloyd George, delivered at the Mansion House in London a sensational speech to the effect that Britain was not to be ignored, a speech that angered the Germans but forced them to recognize that they could not ride roughshod over France. In the end a Franco-German compromise was reached whereby Germany gave up its aspirations in Morocco ( which had never been clearly formulated) in return for two strips of French Equatorial Africa.

Nevertheless, the consequences of the Agadir crisis were far reaching. The German government promptly decided to increase its navy and refused to discuss a possible limitation of naval armaments unless Britain would promise to remain neutral in a European war. Not only did Britain decline to give any such promise, but in the summer of 1912 it entered into an agreement with France by which the entire French Fleet was to be deployed in the Mediterranean while the British Navy guarded the North Sea and the English Channel. Moreover, in November 1912, secret notes were exchanged between the British and French governments to the effect that if Britain should decide to participate in a European war, the plans drawn up by the general staffs would form the basis of action. The notes still left Britain free to decide whether to take part in a war, and it did not decide to do so until August 1914, but its decision was certainly made easier because of the secret military conversations. Thus German diplomacy was responsible for the expansion of the original Anglo-French entente into a close-knit diplomatic combination which did not exclude the possibility of resort to war.

Germany also acted unwisely toward Russia. In October 1908, when Austria-Hungary proclaimed the annexation of the Province of Bosnia and Hercegovina, Germany gave unqualified support to the action of its ally, and March 1909 forced the Russian government to accept the annexation by a threat to let matters take their course-that is, to let Austria attack Serbia. The Russian government did not forget or forgive this brutal German step, and in the next few years not only tightened its ties with France, but sought closer relations with Britain.

Actually, Anglo-Russian relations never achieved the intimacy prevailing between Britain and France. Russian interests in the Balkans and the Middle East were never regarded in England as something Britain might have to fight for (as it was prepared to fight for French interests in Morocco), and Russian activity in Persia was much disliked and sharply criticized. When, in the spring of 1914, the Russian foreign minister, Sergei Sazonov, proposed that the Triple Entente be converted into a triple alliance, this invitation was declined by the British foreign secretary, Sir Edward Grey. Grey agreed, however, to the Russians' being informed of the Anglo-French notes exchanged in 1912 (which were then betrayed to the German government by a spy in the Russian embassy in London). He also agreed to the opening of conversations between the British and Russian admiralties; these conversations had barely started when the crisis of July 1914 broke out, but the Germans 'got wind of them and were much upset. Grey denied to the German ambassador in London that Britain was allied with France and Russia, but he admitted that it "did from time to time talk with them as intimately as allies." Thus in 1914 the Triple Entente had become a very tight diplomatic group.

In the autumn of 1912, when the small Balkan states pounced on Turkey and almost drove it from Europe, Germany manifested a change of front. While in general terms it stood by its Austrian ally, it did not push that ally to extreme action, it tried to bring about a compromise between Austria and Russia, and above all it worked in close association with Britain. The happy result was that, although the Balkan states quarreled among themselves and fought one another in 1913, the general peace of Europe was not broken. This Anglo-German cooperation was so striking and so successful that a similar course seemed indicated to solve the crisis of 1914.

In the course of the long Balkan crisis, Italy found it to its interest to work with AustriaHungary for the establishment of an independent Albania, and in the winter of 1913-1914 new military and naval conventions with Germany and Austria seemed to bring the wavering ally back into the fold of the Triple Alliance. General von Moltke became convinced that Italy's loyalty was "not open to doubt," and he acted on that assumption, although the German Foreign Office did not, in the crisis of 1914.