The sun., 1919-10-19


when we might have approached Eng
LAND. such as the well known Chamber
lsin speech. the so-called "Hangste
agreement" and most recently the
visit of Lord Haldane to Berlin, but 1t
was always difficult to overcome that
II! humor OF the English toward us,
even II our concern about Russia had
not Influenced us too powerfully in
our actions The "Krueger Telegram"
was therefore all the more unfortunate
that 1t happened at a time when we no
longer had the right TO choose between
England and Russia. The Franco
Russian treaty had been established
and prevented any real alliance with
Russia The final turn of English
policy against Germany followed after
the Yangtse agreement. when they
saw clearly in London that we would
not fight with England against Russia.
Out of this recognition of conditions
came the English-Japanese alliance.
Meanwhile the i'll feeling against us
in England had grown constantly
| stronger, and especially in connection
with the Bagdad Railway and our
fleet policy. OF course. at the twelfth
| hour We tried to secure an under
! standing with England about these
| two questions. but what could not
then be accomplished with lowering
storms all over Europe might have
| been successfully brought about few
years earlier. l know quite we'll that
he who looks back and tries to fix the
| blame for our surrender has to set up
hypothesis which will be contradicted
by the other side. But in world his
tory there has never been in "a his
torical sense a guiltless surrender
Either the task undertaken was too
great for the powers brought to bear
or the means applied were false. Our
world politics Is a dollhouse plant In
space OF forty years we wanted to
retrieve the errors of past centuries
Our success was wonderful, and the
power which we showed in the wal
astonished ourselves and the world
Nevertheless the basis Of our world
policy was too weak. Our Orienta
policy swan in the air. Neither we
nor the weak Turks were in position
to protect 1t. Thus this policy finally
separated us from England and Rus
STA.
hut Who shall Prophecy
The statesman cannot forsee every
thing. Lord Cromer tells a story
about one Of his chiefs Of department,
to whom a young attache made some
very confident political prophecies
This Ambassador said to his secre
tary: young man, write down al
those fine prophecies. You will sooI
| I To
J contrary"
J It might very easily have been fore
} seen that a German policy based upor
the Constantinople-B agdad Railway
l. e., upon a road overland to IndiS
and the building of powerful wal
fieet-must inevitably lead to war with
England. I know among our diplo
mats who were before. with or aftei
me IN London none whom l coult
mention who did not certainly expec
, the war with England so soon as these
two questions reached an issue. II
Constantinople I was told that Baror
Marshall when saying good-by to
friend, remarked: II am going to Lon
don as Minister to consolidate m,
Oriental policy which now hovers IL
the air." II history were pct writer
after the fact that would have been
very wise word from Baron Marshall
Edward Wis Policy Defensive.
The encircling policy Of King Ed
/ ward began at the time when l wa
councillor to the Embassy in London
was then of the opinion, which still
hold. that the Kings policy was purel!
a defensive one. He had learned dur