' Would a
British Foreign Secretary in 1879, ^89, or 1899 have
said the same of a Russo-German alliance?
British Foreign Secretary in 1879, ^89, or 1899 have
said the same of a Russo-German alliance?
Robertson - Bismarck
The revolts of Montenegro,
Bosnia, Serbia, and Bulgaria, and the intervention of
Russia, followed by the Russo-Turkish War and the Treaty
of San Stefano, brought Europe within measurable distance
of a European conflagration. Bismarck had endeavoured
to meet the danger by the Berlin memorandum (May 11,
1876), which broke down because Great Britain, rightly
or wrongly, refused to be a party to it. National passion
was rising fast. It was Nationalism that had brought the
Russian armies to the gates of Constantinople. Neither
Great Britain nor Austria had forgotten Russian action in
1870, and the British fleet also was at the gates of Con-
stantinople. Austria could not keep out of a war between
Russia and Great Britain--her interest in the Balkans was
too deep. What was Germany to do in that case: side
with Austria or with Russia, or cut the sorry figure she
had cut in 1854? H she sided openly with Austria or
Russia it was certain that France would find an ally at
once in Germany's enemy. In the winter of 1877-8 Bis-
marck saw the foundation of his system crumbling away.
National ambitions were riving asunder the identity of
dynastic interest expressed in the Entente of the Three
Monarchies. At all costs, therefore, the war in the Near
East must be localised and ended, and the European
problem settled not by arms but by diplomacy.
Bismarck returned from Varzin on February 14. The
preliminaries of peace between Turkey and Russia had
been signed on January 31; on February 7 part of the
British fleet had entered the Sea of Marmora and was
within sight of the Russian lines. On January 14 the
British government, supported by Andrassy, demanded
the revision of the Russo-Turkish treatv by the Concert
of Europe. On February 19 Bismarck reviewed the situa-
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? THE IMPERIAL CHANCELLOR 339
tion for the Reichstag--a masterly performance on a very
slack rope. He emphasised the supreme need of peace, the
justifiability of a European revision, and the disinterested-
ness of Germany. He quietly disclaimed all idea of dic-
tating to any of the great Powers; Germany, however,
could perform one humble and efficient task--' that of the
honest broker'--facilitating business between clients at
cross-purposes, all of whom were the broker's friends.
Beneath the speaker's cool analysis surged the deep bass of
German power. It was because she was so strong that
Germany could be so calm. But if she chose to throw
her incomparable army into the scales, it would be decisive.
Russia had no option but to submit. Her ministers,
however, felt that here indeed was Bismarck's gratitude
for aiding the refusal to submit the Treaty of Frankfurt
to a Congress.
The Congress of Berlin under Bismarck's presidency
testified to the primacy of the German Empire in Europe.
In 1856 Prussia had been kindly allowed the vacant chair
in the Congress of Paris. It was now shared between
France and Turkey. The diplomatic salute that in 1856
had been taken by Napoleon in. was in 1878 taken by
Bismarck. 'The honest broker' did not merely act as a
clearing-house and take a small commission. For two
of the clients at least--Austria and Russia--if not for all,
he wrote out the contract notes and settled the article
to be transferred as well as the price. In 1878 the
principle was quietly laid down that the business of
Continental Europe must henceforward go through the
Berlin Exchange in the Wilhelmstrasse, and transactions
concluded without the Berlin official stamp would always
be at the buyer's or seller's peril.
The details of the Congress belong to general European
history and the particular States immediately concerned.
But apart from the registration of Germany's hegemony,
the Congress raises a pertinent and difficult question. At
what precise point did Germany's and Bismarck's direct
interest in the Near East commence? If we were to
believe the Chancellor's public utterances, that direct
interest did not begin until at least a decade later, if then.
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? 340
BISMARCK
In 1876 (December 7, 1876) he pronounced, in a pictur-
esque phrase, that to Germany the Near East was not
worth the bones of a Pomeranian grenadier, and he con-
tinued to repeat the disclaimer with a monotony and an
emphasis that convey the quintessence of suspiciousness.
It is, however, not necessary to pick the locks of the
German and Turkish archives to prove that for some
years prior to 1878 German diplomacy had been working
with stealthy and steady persistence at displacing British,
Russian, and French influence with the Sublime Porte, and
quietly substituting a German replica of' the great Eltchi,'
Stratford de Redclyffe, as the most important figure
at Constantinople. By 1878 Turkey had been already
taught to recognise that while Russia was an irrecon-
cilable enemy, Austria at best a very interested friend, and
Great Britain a useless ally or an open foe, Germany would
be ready to preserve the integrity of the Ottoman Empire,
in return for political and commercial control. Such a
control was an essential corollary to a secure Central
Empire, and was perfectly compatible with an ultimate
Austrian advance to Salonica. The argument and the
opportunity were immensely heightened by the sequel
to the Berlin Congress--the blunders, in particular, of
Russian policy in the treatment of Roumania and Bulgaria.
But it is demonstrable that the subsequent and growing
resistance of the Ottoman Empire to the Concert of
Europe rested on German support which did not begin in
1879. The success of the European Concert at Berlin in
averting war, and its failure in assigning the Balkans to
the Balkan peoples, were largely due to Bismarck. A
truer perspective has taught us that not ' der alte Jude'
(Beaconsfield) but 'der alte Junker' (Bismarck) was the
great figure at the Congress of Berlin. 1
It is no less true that in 1878 Bismarck primarily en-
1 To-day we can read many reminiscences by those who took part in the
Congress, and many and vivid are the stories related by eye-witnesses of Bismarck.
His temper throughout, we are assured, was ' vile. ' We have the picture of his
fainting, with Gortschakov, who thought he was going to die, offering him a
glass of water, and the Chancellor's reply,' Pas mort, mon cher, pas encore, mon
cher, pas encore! ' or of his striding up and down at a private session and ex-
claiming--' Settle, gentlemen, settle, I insist--to-morrow I go to Varzin. '
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? THE IMPERIAL CHANCELLOR 341
visaged the problem from an Austrian angle. The assign-
ment to Austria of Bosnia and Herzegovina with the Sandjak
of Novi Bazar, which opened up the road to the valley of
the Vardar, was certainly the result of a secret agreement
between Austria and Russia, and was probably the result
of a prior agreement between Vienna and Berlin. Tatis-
cheff takes it as proved that as early as 1873 Austria was
to secure such compensation in the Balkan peninsula,
with Germany's approval, as would partially make good
Austrian losses in Germany and Italy. Such a policy was
the logical completion of Bismarck's Central Europe,
based on Austria as a Danubian State, expansion of which
would be south-eastwards. Agreements behind the back of
an ally were part of Bismarck's methods, as the reinsurance
of 1884 and 1887 proved. He was always ready to find com-
pensation in territory that did not belong to Germany for
a State that he had mutilated. The understanding of 1873
was a reinsurance against the entente with Russia of 1872.
A Balkan sphere of control was a sop to the Magyar
ascendency, and since Beust's dismissal in 1871 the recon-
ciliation of Germany and Austria rested on an entente with
Andrassy and the Magyars. Vienna and Buda-Pesth com-
bined could be trusted to stem the tide of Panslavism in the
Balkans and hold the passes until Germany had completed
her diplomatic penetration and decided on her policy.
The international situation was very complicated. But
from his central position at Berlin Bismarck by ceaseless
effort and utilising every turn aimed first at maintaining
the national antagonisms of Russia, Austria, and Great
Britain, which enabled him always to have rival groups
to bargain with; secondly, at continuing the isolation of
France. The European Powers were to be grouped round
Berlin, with Germany as the arbiter of their rivalries.
A study of the evidence available suggests the suspicion1
1 The student can study, for example, the evidence derived from the dispatches
and memoranda in Crispi's Memoirs, vol. ii. ; Lord Newton's Life of Lord Lyons,
Lord Fitzmaurice's Life of Lord GraimiUe, Wertheimer's Life of Andrassy,
Busch's Bismarck, some Secret Pages of his History, Gontaut-Biron's Mon
Ambassade en AUemagne and Dernieres Annies de PAmba. 'sade, the letters of
General Le Flo published in the Figaro (1887), Prince Hohenlohe's Memoirs,
and the unpublished documents cited by M. Hanotaux in his chapters on
foreign policy in La France contemporaine (vols- i. -iv. ).
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? BISMARCK
that from 1872 onwards Bismarck continuously passed
on the confidential information obtained from Vienna
or Petersburg or London and used it to poison and
inflame Great Britain against Russia, Austria against
Russia, and all these against France. The Wilhelmstrasse
became a laboratory of international quarrels, fomented
by 'the honest broker. ' 'They dislike me,' as Bismarck
said of the petty Balkan States, 'but by a merciful dis-
pensation of Providence they dislike each other much
more. ' It was the agreeable duty of the Chancellor to co-
operate with Providence for Germany's untold advantage.
The administrative occupation of Bosnia was the first
instalment of a prior agreement, and a pledge of further
favours to come--if Austria behaved properly.
After 1878 Russia, in Bismarck's view, got out of hand.
The Nationalist party, led by Skobeleff and Katkoff, aided
by a great wave of Panslavist feeling, proclaimed that
Bismarck had instigated the Russian attack on Turkey
(which is quite probable), in order to favour Austria and
rob Russia of the fruits of victory. At Paris and Petersburg
the desirability of a Franco-Russian alliance was openly
canvassed. Schuvalov, the chief Russian plenipotentiary
at the Congress, was compelled to resign, and the Tsar
wrote a bitter letter to his relative, Emperor William.
When Bismarck inspired Busch to open a counter-attack
in the German press on Gortschakov and Russian Pan-
slavism, the wire between Petersburg and Berlin was not
broken but made red-hot with recriminations. 'Do not,'
Bismarck said to Gortschakov in 1878, 'Do not compel
me to choose between Austria and you. ' In truth it was
neither Gortschakov nor Austria, but France, that com-
pelled Bismarck to choose- Russia by herself he did not
fear, but France in conjunction with Russia--the war on
the two fronts--weighed like lead on Bismarck and
Moltke's minds.
While the Emperor William, much distressed by the
Tsar's indictment of German ingratitude, met his angry
relative at Alexandrovo, Bismarck met Andrassy at Gastein
(August 27, 1879). From Gastein Bismarck went to
Vienna, where the author of Austria's expulsion from
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? THE IMPERIAL CHANCELLOR 343
Germany received a triumphant ovation. Vienna, like
Petersburg, recognised Germany's services to Austria in
the Balkans. And without German support Francis
Joseph could not face Russia. In a long confidential
letter (September 10) to the King of Bavaria Bismarck
explained the imperative reasons for an alliance with
Austria. It was a dexterous move to invite in ad-
vance Bavarian support, which was given by King
Louis without reserve, but Bismarck was really plant-
ing a powerful breaching battery on the flank of his
own sovereign.
An alliance with Austria, avowedly against Russia, roused
the anger and obstinacy of the Emperor William: for it
was a violation of every precious tradition--the dynastic
connection, the support of Russia in every Prussian crisis,
and the solidarity of 'the system of order on a monar-
chical basis. ' The Emperor roundly dubbed the proposed
treaty a ' perfidy. ' For six weeks the Chancellor wrestled
with the conscience and limited political intelligence of
his master. 1 All my well-weighed arguments,' he writes
in his Memoirs, 'were entirely without effect . . . I was
compelled to bring the cabinet into play, a method of
procedure extremely against my grain. ' The Crown
Prince once . again supported the Chancellor. When the
Emperor finally yielded on October 7, 'he was not con-
vinced by the arguments of policy but . . . only because he
was averse to ministerial changes. ' In the autumn of 1879
Bismarck's place--for the Chancellor was determined to
have the treaty--could only have been filled by Bennigsen.
It was the last of Bismarck's historic struggles with his
sovereign, which stand out with the arresting significance
of obelisks on a straight road across an open plain, and each
marked a momentous decision. In 1862 he had persuaded
the King to fight out the struggle with the Liberal
Landtag; in 1863 he had prevented the King from going
to the Congress of Princes at Frankfurt; in 1866 he had
induced the King to sign 'a shameful treaty' with
Austria; in 1871 he compelled the King of Prussia to
become German Emperor; in 1879 he made the Dual
Alliance. The last was probably the greatest victory of
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? 344
BISMARCK
the five, and of a more pregnant import for the future of
the two Empires and the European State system.
The treaty of October 7 was secret, and the text was not
published until February 3, 1888, and then, naturally,
without any of the secret clauses or conventions which
unquestionably were attached to it. The nature and
extent of these can only be estimated by careful inference
from the course of German and Austrian policy after 1879.
In the published text the alliance provided for three even-
tualities: first, if either party were attacked by Russia the
other was to come to its assistance with its whole military
force; if either party were attacked by another Power
than Russia (i. e. France), the other was to observe a bene-
volent neutrality, which, if Russia intervened, was to turn
into an active support; and if Russia increased her
armaments so as to menace either of the contracting
Powers, the Tsar was to be informed that an attack against
either was an attack against both.
The treaty was in form 'defensive'--a distinction in-
tended for the intelligent public that assumes that phrases
are identical with the realities of international conflicts.
But a war in which the formal declaration of hostilities
comes from the side that has been diplomatically man-
oeuvred into a position in which it must either declare war
or accept a diplomatic defeat is technically for the other
side a defensive war. Bismarck had never waged an
'offensive ' war, in the technical sense, and he never in-
tended to bungle so badly as to be obliged to do so. The
casus foederis therefore of 1879 provided precisely what
he required--an ally, should it be necessary to force Russia
to declare war. On the other hand, he could always re-
pudiate his Austrian ally on the ground that she was about
to wage an offensive war, outside the scope and ambit of
the contract. In other words, Bismarck retained the
initiative and secured the control of Austrian policy, for it
is policy that makes wars, not wars that make policy.
'I was not blind,' wrote Bismarck,' to the perplexities
which made the choice (of Austria) difficult. ' All the
evidence available fully bears out this measured judgment.
The Chancellor weighed long and with a remorseless
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? THE IMPERIAL CHANCELLOR 345
scrutiny the case for and against so momentous a decision.
To-day, perhaps, when the Dual Alliance has lasted for
thirty-six years and seems as familiar and inevitable a
phenomenon in the firmament of continental policy as
King Charles's Wain in the heaven of stars, we are disposed
to ignore the problem that Bismarck strove to solve. The
Treaty of 1879 closes a crisis in the evolution of Bismarck's
statecraft. It marks a climax, but, like all climaxes, it
turned a fresh page, the writing in which was determined
by the character of the terminus.
What then were 'the perplexities'? It is clear on the
evidence that Bismarck in 1879 could have turned to
Russia and concluded a similar defensive treaty, with
Austria as the foe to be neutralised. The cordial meeting
of William and Alexander 11. at Alexandrovo, which cleared
up their personal relations, strengthened the German
Emperor's desire to heal the political breach and renew the
liaison established in 1872. William, indeed, failed to see
that Austrian and Russian ambitions were in conflict after
1878, and that Germany could not support both, but must
decide between them. Bismarck's deeper knowledge and
'prophetic coup d'aeil' had penetrated the logic of history,
'more remorseless than the logic of the Prussian audit
office,' and for him the antagonism of Austria and Russia
made the cruelty and inevitability of a choice. But why
not select Russia--the champion of order and monarchical
autocracy, the dynastic and political friend on whose sup-
ort Prussian policy had pivoted since 1862? Why not
y such a master-stroke close the Eastern frontier and
permanently dissolve the nightmare of a Franco-Russian
alliance? Would not such an alliance have before long
coerced Austria into renewing the Triple Entente of 1872?
Powerful critics in 1879 and 6ince have argued this thesis
impressively, and concluded that Bismarck now made his
first and biggest mistake. The road, it is said, to Peters-
burg via Vienna was impossible in reality; but the making
of a road to Vienna via Petersburg was not beyond
Bismarck's great gifts. The alienation of Great Britain
from Ruscia and the Anglo-Austrian entente in 1879 left, it
is also argued, Russia isolated, faced by a hostile Germany,
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? 346
BISMARCK
Austria, and Great Britain, the Near East closed, and
France alone as a possible friend. The Treaty of 1879, it
is therefore concluded, made a Franco-Russian entente--
the one result Bismarck feared--only a question of time.
Yet, if Bismarck erred, he did so with his eyes open. He
knew the arguments for a Russian alliance better than his
critics, and he rejected them. Why?
Three central points take us to the heart of the system
enshrined in the Austrian treaty. First, a sentence in the
confidential letter to the King of Bavaria, unaccountably
ignored by many students of Bismarck: 'The German
Empire in alliance with Austria would not lack the support
of England. ' Lord Salisbury, the British Foreign Secretary,
confirmed this prediction by saying that the rumour of such
an alliance was 'good tidings of great joy.
' Would a
British Foreign Secretary in 1879, ^89, or 1899 have
said the same of a Russo-German alliance? Bismarck
knew that an alliance with Russia must commit Germany
to the Russian antagonism to Great Britain, as well as to
the Russian antagonism to Austria. Neither in 1879
nor 1889 was he prepared to place such a wasting mort-
gage on German policy: for Bismarck had a sounder sense
of British strength than many of his critics then or since.
The alienation of Great Britain and of Austria in 1879
would almost certainly have involved a renewal of the
Anglo-Austrian alliance of 1856, to which France in 1879,
as in 1856, would have become a partner. 1
Secondly, was Germany prepared to see Russia at
Constantinople? Apart from any prior promises to
Austria, not involving Constantinople but Salonica, that
was a question of profound import for Bismarck in 1878-9.
His answer as given in his acts is a decisive 'No'; not
1 The Secret Treaty of April 15,185 6, which pledged Great Britain, France, and
Austria to unite in resisting any attempt to tear up the Treaty of Paris of 1856.
1 The extraordinary obiter dictum in the Memoirs (ii. 285) that Bismarck
personally would have 'welcomed ' the 'physical and diplomatic possession of
Constantinople' by Russia cannot be taken seriously. It is contradicted by the
argument in which it is embedded, and is belied by the action of" Germany
prior to, and after, 1879. Written late in life, it probably is a criticism on
German policy in the Near East after the Chancellor's dismissal, and is one of
the many similar 'confessions' suggesting that in matters of high military
policy he was continuously overruled by the Emperor, or the soldiers, or by his
colleagues, or by public opinion. CreJat Judteus Apella.
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? THE IMPERIAL CHANCELLOR 347
because a Russian Constantinople rang out a sharp quietus
to Austrian ambitions, but because it ended all German
ambitions in the Balkans. Austria at Salonica was no bar
--rather a help--to German control of Constantinople and
the Ottoman Empire, the ' integrity' of which Beaconsfield
'consolidated' by annexing Cyprus, securing a tighter hold
on Egypt, and by handing over Bosnia to Austria, half
Bulgaria to a virtual Russian protectorate and the Armenian
frontier fortresses to Russia. But if a Russian alliance did
not mean Germany's acquiescence in the Russian advance
to Constantinople, it meant nothing. It meant, more-
over, that either Germany must support Russia in her
Eastern quarrel with Great Britain or obliterate the
treaty; and if there was an excentric dissipation of German
strength it would be to sacrifice Pomeranian Grenadiers
in Europe that Russia might annex Turkestan or Afghan-
istan. Bismarck was confident that Austrian Chauvinism
could be controlled, but a complete German control of
Russian policy was not a practical proposition. Teuton
and Slav could not work together as Teuton and Magyar
could for a common interest.
Thirdly, a Russian alliance left the main gateway of
Central Europe--the Danube--in neutral, and probably
hostile, hands. The strategical and economic confor-
mation of Central -Europe is moulded by three great river
basins--the Rhine, the Danube, and the Vistula. The
Rhine was now firmly in German hands: a Russian alliance
did not secure Germany the control of the Vistula, and it
left the Danube out of the central German control alto-
gether. Without a control of the Danube basin as com-
plete as the control of the Rhine, the political and economic,
no less than the military, conditions of centralism could not
be adequately realised. Moreover, Bismarck reckoned on
bringing Roumania with Austria's help into the system; and
thanks to Russian bungling, the Treaty of 1879 was promptly
followed by that close understanding between Bucharest
and Vienna which was certainly expressed in a precise con-
tract, the text of which has never been published. The
Austrian alliance, therefore, closed the Danube from source
to mouth: it brought Serbia and Bulgaria on the southern
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? 348
BISMARCK
bank into the sphere of Austrian policy; for it placed
Roumania as a German outpost to the north, and an
Ottoman Empire under German influence on their backs.
Moreover, the Austrian bastion in Galicia, from Cracow to
Czernowitz, left Russia controlling the Vistula only from
Thorn to Ivangorod, with Prussia on one, and Austria on
the other, flank, of the Russian Polish salient. In short,
the framework of Central Europe was completed by the
Austrian alliance. A Russian alliance, and Austria hostile,
would have destroyed it. Bismarck's diplomacy from
1879 to 1890 aimed at filling the mould thus created with
an organic and expanding system of political traditions,
habits, and ideals--the full life of the allied States incor-
porate in the environment that gave them blood and air.
There were two other positive advantages of great
weight--the maintenance of the Austrian monarchy, which
coincided with the maintenance of the Prussian State
regime, and the checking of Slav influence, working then
and since so powerfully against Germanism. The German
alliance gave to the Habsburg throne a support moral and
political, difficult to exaggerate. How the Habsburgs
would have fared without that support in the next thirty
years can be as easily imagined as can the effect on the
German Empire and the Hohenzollern throne if the
Habsburg monarchy had been crippled as a monarchy.
The alliance of 1879 was a compact with Buda-Pesth even
more than with Vienna. It set the seal of German approval
on, and assured the promise of German support to, the true
construction of the Compromise (Ausgleich) of 1867--an
alliance of German and Magyar to crush all non-German
and non-Magyar elements (about one-half of Austria-
Hungary) into subordination. Was Bismarck not right,
from his point of view, in concluding that, so construed in
action, the Compromise which he supported on principle
in 1867 was worth an Emperor's ransom to an Imperial
Germany determined to establish a German hegemony?
What would have been the result had he in 1879 rejected
Andrassy's overtures, closed the door to Buda-Pesth, and
opened the door that led to the Nevsky Prospect and
Tsarskoe-Seloe?
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? THE IMPERIAL CHANCELLOR
Two obvious disadvantages, however, perplexed Bismarck
--the Polish question and the Austrian future in the
Balkans. The denationalisation of the Poles and the con-
tinuity of the tripartite dismemberment of 1795, endorsed
in 1815, was a question of existence for Prussia. Bismarck
held, as had been already indicated, that the dissolution of
the ancient kingdom of Poland by Frederick the Great and
Catherine was the pre-condition of a safe and strong
Prussia. The Polish problem was with him day and night,
and it had flamed into a fresh crisis with the Kulturkampf.
The relations and policy of the Dual Monarchy to the
Austrian Poles provided a very thorny internal conundrum
for the Ball-Platz, and Bismarck foresaw in 1879 that the
interests of Vienna and Berlin in Polish policy were not
identical, and might easily become antagonistic. The
Vatican, with its trusteeship for Roman Catholic Poland,
had an influence on Roman Catholic Vienna and Buda-
Pesth that foreshadowed the gravest complications. Nor
could the Dual Monarchy, in face of the Ruthenian popu-
lation in Galicia, treat the Poles as Prussia treated the
province of Posen. A liberal policy at Vienna towards
the Austrian Poles went ill with the drastic oppression of
Polish Prussia by Berlin. If Austria ' got out of hand' in
this sphere of action the basis of the Treaty of 1879 might
crumble away entirely.
There was a similar danger in the Balkans. If we knew
the whole truth of what lay behind the innocent clauses
of the Treaty of 1879, itself a further instalment of the
system begun in 1872, it is quite certain that it would con-
firm one broad conclusion. Germany endorsed cautiously
but deliberately the Austrian bill of exchange in the
Balkans. The nature and extent of the commitment can
only be roughly inferred from the tangled diplomacy that
preceded 1879 and fills the next thirty years. But in 1879
Bismarck took a great risk--all his public utterances con-
firm the guarded language of the Memoirs--and he took it
deliberately. The 'occupation' of Bosnia and Herze-
govina was nominally a transitory arrangement: its con-
version into an 'annexation' was a permanent bait to
Austria, but Germany secured a powerful control, for she
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? 350
BISMARCK
could always refuse to support the conversion. He placed
an ally in shining armour behind Francis Joseph and the
Magyar oligarchy: and the ally stood there, not in the
interest of Austria but of a Prussianised Germany. The
contention that the Treaty of 1879 made a Franco-Russian
alliance inevitable rests on arguing back from 1896 to 1879.
It is certain that no alliance between France and Russia
took place before 1890. Diplomatic coquetry and flir-
tations are even less convincing evidence of alliances than
glasses of wine and the toasts of monarchs (drafted by their
ministers) at ceremonial banquets. The whole point of
Bismarck's criticism of the policy of his successors after
1890 is concentrated in the indictment, that while he
prevented such an alliance (which was true), his successors
not merely permitted it, but by their diplomatic bungling
actually brought it about. It is therefore neither fair nor
historical to argue that the Dual Alliance of 1879 made
a Russo-French alliance inevitable. Bismarck could and
did argue that, so far from that result being inevitable, the
Dual Alliance, properly handled, made an entente between
Paris and Petersburg impossible.
Bismarck was a continentalist, and remained a continen-
talist to the end of his days; that is, he held as an axiom
that German supremacy must rest on mastery of the
strategical and political situation in Europe. Efforts out-
side the central European theatre were an excentric and
unjustifiable dissipation of German strength, the concen-
tration of which was required on the major objective.
Secure that, and the rest followed; lose it, and no
gains elsewhere would compensate the loss. Austria-
Hungary and the Balkans--the two could not be separated,
for the problem of south-eastern Europe was the problem
of the Dual Empire--were essential to German hegemony
and the sole avenue of continental expansion. The crisis
of 1875 reinforced the lesson that Europe would not
tolerate a further expansion westwards at the expense of
France and Belgium. But an expansion to the south-east
could secure British neutrality, if not active support, for
it would be at the expense of Russia. To-day we are apt
to forget that in 1879 Great Britain viewed Russia not
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? THE IMPERIAL CHANCELLOR 351
with the eyes of 1908 or 1914, but of 1856 and 1870.
How--Bismarck might well ask--was German trade to
expand after 1879 if Great Britain, the sea-power par
excellence, were driven by German action into the camp
of Germany's foes?
Nevertheless the gravity of the risk taken in 1879 is
proved by the insurance against its exploding into an un-
limited liability. Until 1890 Austria was never allowed
to get out of hand. How precisely this was done we
cannot say with certainty. But it was done. The control
of the Wilhelmstrasse over the Ball-Platz was effective, for
Bismarck had his personal prestige, unrivalled knowledge,
and experience to help in the difficult task. These are
qualities not acquired by intuition, still less by birth or
hereditary succession, but by brains and the travail of a
lifetime. Control of Austria was also assisted by positive
counterchecks--the alliance with Italy and the continuous
ring at the Russian front door. It is safe to conclude that
Bismarck prepared for the inclusion of Italy in 1879, and
that without the Dual Alliance Italy could not have been
secured. We have Bismarck's word for it, and his judg-
ment outweighs a dozen criticisms. For he had the whole
of the facts before him, whereas his critics argue from
edited documents written on one side only.
A further consideration is very relevant. Down to 1879
the isolation of France had been the prime object of
German policy. The policy was breaking down. France,
excluded from the Congress of London in 1870, took part
in the Congress of Berlin in 1878. After 1879 the diversion
of France became more important than her isolation: and
with it went the diversion of Russia and the diversion of
Great Britain--in each case the diversion being intended
ultimately to increase the antagonism. But these develop-
ments open up a fresh section of Bismarckian policy, with
an intrinsic character of its own. They lead to the Triple
Alliance and the consequences of that consummation of
the Chancellor's diplomacy.
Gastein in 1865 saw the making of a new Austria; Gastein
in 1879 provided the new Ar stria with an alluring future
and the means of realising it. Vienna was right in welcom-
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? 352
BISMARCK
ing Bismarck with a gratitude which deeply touched that
seared, proud, and sensitive heart. The Treaty of 1879
was a masterpiece. 1 It was signed by Bismarck and
Andrassy on October 7. On October 8 Francis Joseph
But the statesman who made it for Austria received the
reward of Beust, Benedek, Rechberg, Schmerling, Buol,
and Bach.
? 4. The New Era--Home Policy, 1878-1888
The years 1878-80 witnessed a gradual but complete
change in the home policy of the Chancellor, culminating
in the establishment of the system which Bismarck main-
tained until his fall. In foreign policy, as has been
already indicated, the development of events prevented
the continuance of the alliance of the Three Monarchies
on the lines originally planned, and imposed on Bismarck
the necessity of a choice. In home affairs the necessity of
a choice was even more urgent. Bismarck practically
said to Bennigsen, ' Do not compel me to choose between
you and Windthorst. ' And Bennigsen's reply was vir-
tually to the effect that the choice must be made.
The several elements in the problems by the spring of
1878 were clear, but together they made a very complicated
situation. First of all, there was the Chancellor himself.
His health and strength were no longer capable of bearing
the continuous strain of mastering and directing the foreign
and home policy of a great and expanding Empire, in
which Prussia was the predominant partner. An imperial
ministry did not exist. The imperial executive was
organised as a branch of the Imperial Chancery, the secre-
taries of the various departments being simply depart-
1 Prince von Biilow writes in his Imperial Germany (edition of 1916):--
'Prince Bismarck, a second Hercules, accomplished many great labours. . . .
If I were asked which of these is the more admirable from the point of view of
foreign policy I should say without hesitation--the Austrian alliance. ' The
whole chapter (v. ), as indeed the whole book, bears out Mr. Headlam's con-
sidered judgment on its importance as an authoritative exposition of German
principles and a German interpretation of the meaning of Bismarckianism--
a meaning falsified by his successors, of whom Prince von Biilow is the ablest.
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? THE IMPERIAL CHANCELLOR
mental and executive officers, appointed by the Chancellor,
and responsible as managers of sub-departments to him
alone. Bismarck had stoutly resisted every effort to convert
these departments into independent ministerial offices,
with ministerial chiefs, colleagues in an imperial cabinet,
and representing their several departments in the Reichs-
tag; and his reason was not pure autocracy and personal
jealousy--the determination to keep everything in his
own hands--though they accentuated his. refusal. The
reasons went far deeper; an imperial cabinet, such as the
Progressives and the Left Wing of the National Liberals
had advocated since 1867 as an irrevocable advance to
parliamentary government and were urging with persist-
ence in 1877, cut at the root of the position of the Federal
Council, and the interlocking machinery by which Prussia
maintained her control of policy as a whole. For the
Federal Council, like the Tudor Privy Council in England,
was the real governing organ in the Empire, and combined
legislative with executive duties (through its committees),
and was essentially the organ which made policy. Al-
though we are without exact information as to how
Prussia, behind the closed doors of the Bundesrat, main-
tained her control, it is clear that it was exercised and
maintained by the chairmanship of the Imperial Chancellor,
who as Minister-President of Prussia cast the Prussian
vote; and in the secret deliberations of the Federal
Council, just as in the Tudor Privy Council or the modern
Cabinet in England, there could be perfect freedom of dis-
cussion, and a complete representation of different points
of view, while the decision arrived at was the decision of
the organ as a whole, and the voting was unknown except
to the initiated. A real Imperial Minister of Finance,
for example, responsible to the Reichstag, would obviously
supersede to a large extent the power and functions of the
Federal Council and transfer them partly to himself and
(no less important) partly to the Reichstag. The creation
of such imperial ministers simply meant that in a few years
the Federal Council would either shrivel into the position
that the British Privy Council has shrivelled into, rela-
tively to the Cabinet and the House of Commons; or, it
b. z
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? 354
BISMARCK
would be transformed into a real Upper Chamber of the
Imperial Reichstag, as had been in 1870 the ideal of the
unitarians led by the Crown Prince and the intellectuals
of the 'Coburg and Gotha' school. But such a trans-
formation destroyed the essence of the institution which
was constituted out of, not over, the Federated governments.
No less serious (and to all Prussians of the Bismarckian
and conservative type, far more serious) would be the
effect on Prussia. The British student is apt to forget
that beside the Federal Council (Bundesrat) and the
Imperial Reichstag existed the Prussian Ministry, presided
over by the Prussian Minister-President, and the Prussian
Parliament (Landtag), and that Imperial Reichstag and
Prussian Parliament were frequently sitting at one and the
same time in Berlin. Indeed, a large number of Reichstag
members (who were Prussians) spent their time between
the two bodies, voting on and fighting the same issues in
two separate legislatures. The Kulturkampf was essen-
tially a Prussian affair, and the greater part of the 'May
Laws' was a Prussian, not an imperial, concern: just as
the administrative execution of those laws was mainly the
duty of the Prussian Minister of the Interior.
Prussia had, like the other federated States, her separate
(and very narrow) franchise, ministry, and bureaucracy,
the only difference being that Prussia was very nearly two-
thirds of the Empire, and that behind ministry and
bureaucracy stood a solid concrete wall of tradition and
conventions, the parapet of which was the royal autocracy.
There was a Prussian Minister, but no Imperial Minister,
of War; a Prussian Minister of Finance, Education, and so
forth, and the Prussian Foreign Minister was the Minister-
President who was also-Imperial Chancellor: an Imperial
Minister of Finance or War, not directly under the Chan-
cellor's control, involved the dual system in a terrible
dilemma. Either it meant the government of that im-
perial department by Prussia, or the government of that
Prussian department by the Empire. The former would
have led to a revolt of every non-Prussian State from the
imperial system, the latter to the dissolution of Prussia
in the Empire. Bismarck plainly told the Reichstag more
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? THE IMPERIAL- CHANCELLOR 355
than once that an independent Imperial Minister of
Finance would have for his greatest antagonist the Prussian
Minister of Finance. He might have added with even
greater truth that an Imperial Minister of War would
either have to swallow the Prussian War Office or spend
all his time in fighting the Prussian Minister of War. Was
the Imperial Minister to exercise the prerogative of the
Prussian Crown, or only the much more restricted power
of the Imperial Praesidium?
The duty of correlating this dualism and ensuring its
harmonious working was Bismarck's main task, and he did
it by combining the office of Chancellor and Minister-
President, by controlling the Federal Council, and by the
domination of the conservative majority in the Prussian
Landtag. As Minister-President he took care that the
decisions of the Prussian Ministry broadly coincided with
the policy of the Federal Council; as Imperial Chancellor
he took care that the Federal Council's decisions coincided
with the broad requirements of Prussian policy.
Bosnia, Serbia, and Bulgaria, and the intervention of
Russia, followed by the Russo-Turkish War and the Treaty
of San Stefano, brought Europe within measurable distance
of a European conflagration. Bismarck had endeavoured
to meet the danger by the Berlin memorandum (May 11,
1876), which broke down because Great Britain, rightly
or wrongly, refused to be a party to it. National passion
was rising fast. It was Nationalism that had brought the
Russian armies to the gates of Constantinople. Neither
Great Britain nor Austria had forgotten Russian action in
1870, and the British fleet also was at the gates of Con-
stantinople. Austria could not keep out of a war between
Russia and Great Britain--her interest in the Balkans was
too deep. What was Germany to do in that case: side
with Austria or with Russia, or cut the sorry figure she
had cut in 1854? H she sided openly with Austria or
Russia it was certain that France would find an ally at
once in Germany's enemy. In the winter of 1877-8 Bis-
marck saw the foundation of his system crumbling away.
National ambitions were riving asunder the identity of
dynastic interest expressed in the Entente of the Three
Monarchies. At all costs, therefore, the war in the Near
East must be localised and ended, and the European
problem settled not by arms but by diplomacy.
Bismarck returned from Varzin on February 14. The
preliminaries of peace between Turkey and Russia had
been signed on January 31; on February 7 part of the
British fleet had entered the Sea of Marmora and was
within sight of the Russian lines. On January 14 the
British government, supported by Andrassy, demanded
the revision of the Russo-Turkish treatv by the Concert
of Europe. On February 19 Bismarck reviewed the situa-
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? THE IMPERIAL CHANCELLOR 339
tion for the Reichstag--a masterly performance on a very
slack rope. He emphasised the supreme need of peace, the
justifiability of a European revision, and the disinterested-
ness of Germany. He quietly disclaimed all idea of dic-
tating to any of the great Powers; Germany, however,
could perform one humble and efficient task--' that of the
honest broker'--facilitating business between clients at
cross-purposes, all of whom were the broker's friends.
Beneath the speaker's cool analysis surged the deep bass of
German power. It was because she was so strong that
Germany could be so calm. But if she chose to throw
her incomparable army into the scales, it would be decisive.
Russia had no option but to submit. Her ministers,
however, felt that here indeed was Bismarck's gratitude
for aiding the refusal to submit the Treaty of Frankfurt
to a Congress.
The Congress of Berlin under Bismarck's presidency
testified to the primacy of the German Empire in Europe.
In 1856 Prussia had been kindly allowed the vacant chair
in the Congress of Paris. It was now shared between
France and Turkey. The diplomatic salute that in 1856
had been taken by Napoleon in. was in 1878 taken by
Bismarck. 'The honest broker' did not merely act as a
clearing-house and take a small commission. For two
of the clients at least--Austria and Russia--if not for all,
he wrote out the contract notes and settled the article
to be transferred as well as the price. In 1878 the
principle was quietly laid down that the business of
Continental Europe must henceforward go through the
Berlin Exchange in the Wilhelmstrasse, and transactions
concluded without the Berlin official stamp would always
be at the buyer's or seller's peril.
The details of the Congress belong to general European
history and the particular States immediately concerned.
But apart from the registration of Germany's hegemony,
the Congress raises a pertinent and difficult question. At
what precise point did Germany's and Bismarck's direct
interest in the Near East commence? If we were to
believe the Chancellor's public utterances, that direct
interest did not begin until at least a decade later, if then.
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? 340
BISMARCK
In 1876 (December 7, 1876) he pronounced, in a pictur-
esque phrase, that to Germany the Near East was not
worth the bones of a Pomeranian grenadier, and he con-
tinued to repeat the disclaimer with a monotony and an
emphasis that convey the quintessence of suspiciousness.
It is, however, not necessary to pick the locks of the
German and Turkish archives to prove that for some
years prior to 1878 German diplomacy had been working
with stealthy and steady persistence at displacing British,
Russian, and French influence with the Sublime Porte, and
quietly substituting a German replica of' the great Eltchi,'
Stratford de Redclyffe, as the most important figure
at Constantinople. By 1878 Turkey had been already
taught to recognise that while Russia was an irrecon-
cilable enemy, Austria at best a very interested friend, and
Great Britain a useless ally or an open foe, Germany would
be ready to preserve the integrity of the Ottoman Empire,
in return for political and commercial control. Such a
control was an essential corollary to a secure Central
Empire, and was perfectly compatible with an ultimate
Austrian advance to Salonica. The argument and the
opportunity were immensely heightened by the sequel
to the Berlin Congress--the blunders, in particular, of
Russian policy in the treatment of Roumania and Bulgaria.
But it is demonstrable that the subsequent and growing
resistance of the Ottoman Empire to the Concert of
Europe rested on German support which did not begin in
1879. The success of the European Concert at Berlin in
averting war, and its failure in assigning the Balkans to
the Balkan peoples, were largely due to Bismarck. A
truer perspective has taught us that not ' der alte Jude'
(Beaconsfield) but 'der alte Junker' (Bismarck) was the
great figure at the Congress of Berlin. 1
It is no less true that in 1878 Bismarck primarily en-
1 To-day we can read many reminiscences by those who took part in the
Congress, and many and vivid are the stories related by eye-witnesses of Bismarck.
His temper throughout, we are assured, was ' vile. ' We have the picture of his
fainting, with Gortschakov, who thought he was going to die, offering him a
glass of water, and the Chancellor's reply,' Pas mort, mon cher, pas encore, mon
cher, pas encore! ' or of his striding up and down at a private session and ex-
claiming--' Settle, gentlemen, settle, I insist--to-morrow I go to Varzin. '
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? THE IMPERIAL CHANCELLOR 341
visaged the problem from an Austrian angle. The assign-
ment to Austria of Bosnia and Herzegovina with the Sandjak
of Novi Bazar, which opened up the road to the valley of
the Vardar, was certainly the result of a secret agreement
between Austria and Russia, and was probably the result
of a prior agreement between Vienna and Berlin. Tatis-
cheff takes it as proved that as early as 1873 Austria was
to secure such compensation in the Balkan peninsula,
with Germany's approval, as would partially make good
Austrian losses in Germany and Italy. Such a policy was
the logical completion of Bismarck's Central Europe,
based on Austria as a Danubian State, expansion of which
would be south-eastwards. Agreements behind the back of
an ally were part of Bismarck's methods, as the reinsurance
of 1884 and 1887 proved. He was always ready to find com-
pensation in territory that did not belong to Germany for
a State that he had mutilated. The understanding of 1873
was a reinsurance against the entente with Russia of 1872.
A Balkan sphere of control was a sop to the Magyar
ascendency, and since Beust's dismissal in 1871 the recon-
ciliation of Germany and Austria rested on an entente with
Andrassy and the Magyars. Vienna and Buda-Pesth com-
bined could be trusted to stem the tide of Panslavism in the
Balkans and hold the passes until Germany had completed
her diplomatic penetration and decided on her policy.
The international situation was very complicated. But
from his central position at Berlin Bismarck by ceaseless
effort and utilising every turn aimed first at maintaining
the national antagonisms of Russia, Austria, and Great
Britain, which enabled him always to have rival groups
to bargain with; secondly, at continuing the isolation of
France. The European Powers were to be grouped round
Berlin, with Germany as the arbiter of their rivalries.
A study of the evidence available suggests the suspicion1
1 The student can study, for example, the evidence derived from the dispatches
and memoranda in Crispi's Memoirs, vol. ii. ; Lord Newton's Life of Lord Lyons,
Lord Fitzmaurice's Life of Lord GraimiUe, Wertheimer's Life of Andrassy,
Busch's Bismarck, some Secret Pages of his History, Gontaut-Biron's Mon
Ambassade en AUemagne and Dernieres Annies de PAmba. 'sade, the letters of
General Le Flo published in the Figaro (1887), Prince Hohenlohe's Memoirs,
and the unpublished documents cited by M. Hanotaux in his chapters on
foreign policy in La France contemporaine (vols- i. -iv. ).
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? BISMARCK
that from 1872 onwards Bismarck continuously passed
on the confidential information obtained from Vienna
or Petersburg or London and used it to poison and
inflame Great Britain against Russia, Austria against
Russia, and all these against France. The Wilhelmstrasse
became a laboratory of international quarrels, fomented
by 'the honest broker. ' 'They dislike me,' as Bismarck
said of the petty Balkan States, 'but by a merciful dis-
pensation of Providence they dislike each other much
more. ' It was the agreeable duty of the Chancellor to co-
operate with Providence for Germany's untold advantage.
The administrative occupation of Bosnia was the first
instalment of a prior agreement, and a pledge of further
favours to come--if Austria behaved properly.
After 1878 Russia, in Bismarck's view, got out of hand.
The Nationalist party, led by Skobeleff and Katkoff, aided
by a great wave of Panslavist feeling, proclaimed that
Bismarck had instigated the Russian attack on Turkey
(which is quite probable), in order to favour Austria and
rob Russia of the fruits of victory. At Paris and Petersburg
the desirability of a Franco-Russian alliance was openly
canvassed. Schuvalov, the chief Russian plenipotentiary
at the Congress, was compelled to resign, and the Tsar
wrote a bitter letter to his relative, Emperor William.
When Bismarck inspired Busch to open a counter-attack
in the German press on Gortschakov and Russian Pan-
slavism, the wire between Petersburg and Berlin was not
broken but made red-hot with recriminations. 'Do not,'
Bismarck said to Gortschakov in 1878, 'Do not compel
me to choose between Austria and you. ' In truth it was
neither Gortschakov nor Austria, but France, that com-
pelled Bismarck to choose- Russia by herself he did not
fear, but France in conjunction with Russia--the war on
the two fronts--weighed like lead on Bismarck and
Moltke's minds.
While the Emperor William, much distressed by the
Tsar's indictment of German ingratitude, met his angry
relative at Alexandrovo, Bismarck met Andrassy at Gastein
(August 27, 1879). From Gastein Bismarck went to
Vienna, where the author of Austria's expulsion from
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? THE IMPERIAL CHANCELLOR 343
Germany received a triumphant ovation. Vienna, like
Petersburg, recognised Germany's services to Austria in
the Balkans. And without German support Francis
Joseph could not face Russia. In a long confidential
letter (September 10) to the King of Bavaria Bismarck
explained the imperative reasons for an alliance with
Austria. It was a dexterous move to invite in ad-
vance Bavarian support, which was given by King
Louis without reserve, but Bismarck was really plant-
ing a powerful breaching battery on the flank of his
own sovereign.
An alliance with Austria, avowedly against Russia, roused
the anger and obstinacy of the Emperor William: for it
was a violation of every precious tradition--the dynastic
connection, the support of Russia in every Prussian crisis,
and the solidarity of 'the system of order on a monar-
chical basis. ' The Emperor roundly dubbed the proposed
treaty a ' perfidy. ' For six weeks the Chancellor wrestled
with the conscience and limited political intelligence of
his master. 1 All my well-weighed arguments,' he writes
in his Memoirs, 'were entirely without effect . . . I was
compelled to bring the cabinet into play, a method of
procedure extremely against my grain. ' The Crown
Prince once . again supported the Chancellor. When the
Emperor finally yielded on October 7, 'he was not con-
vinced by the arguments of policy but . . . only because he
was averse to ministerial changes. ' In the autumn of 1879
Bismarck's place--for the Chancellor was determined to
have the treaty--could only have been filled by Bennigsen.
It was the last of Bismarck's historic struggles with his
sovereign, which stand out with the arresting significance
of obelisks on a straight road across an open plain, and each
marked a momentous decision. In 1862 he had persuaded
the King to fight out the struggle with the Liberal
Landtag; in 1863 he had prevented the King from going
to the Congress of Princes at Frankfurt; in 1866 he had
induced the King to sign 'a shameful treaty' with
Austria; in 1871 he compelled the King of Prussia to
become German Emperor; in 1879 he made the Dual
Alliance. The last was probably the greatest victory of
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? 344
BISMARCK
the five, and of a more pregnant import for the future of
the two Empires and the European State system.
The treaty of October 7 was secret, and the text was not
published until February 3, 1888, and then, naturally,
without any of the secret clauses or conventions which
unquestionably were attached to it. The nature and
extent of these can only be estimated by careful inference
from the course of German and Austrian policy after 1879.
In the published text the alliance provided for three even-
tualities: first, if either party were attacked by Russia the
other was to come to its assistance with its whole military
force; if either party were attacked by another Power
than Russia (i. e. France), the other was to observe a bene-
volent neutrality, which, if Russia intervened, was to turn
into an active support; and if Russia increased her
armaments so as to menace either of the contracting
Powers, the Tsar was to be informed that an attack against
either was an attack against both.
The treaty was in form 'defensive'--a distinction in-
tended for the intelligent public that assumes that phrases
are identical with the realities of international conflicts.
But a war in which the formal declaration of hostilities
comes from the side that has been diplomatically man-
oeuvred into a position in which it must either declare war
or accept a diplomatic defeat is technically for the other
side a defensive war. Bismarck had never waged an
'offensive ' war, in the technical sense, and he never in-
tended to bungle so badly as to be obliged to do so. The
casus foederis therefore of 1879 provided precisely what
he required--an ally, should it be necessary to force Russia
to declare war. On the other hand, he could always re-
pudiate his Austrian ally on the ground that she was about
to wage an offensive war, outside the scope and ambit of
the contract. In other words, Bismarck retained the
initiative and secured the control of Austrian policy, for it
is policy that makes wars, not wars that make policy.
'I was not blind,' wrote Bismarck,' to the perplexities
which made the choice (of Austria) difficult. ' All the
evidence available fully bears out this measured judgment.
The Chancellor weighed long and with a remorseless
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? THE IMPERIAL CHANCELLOR 345
scrutiny the case for and against so momentous a decision.
To-day, perhaps, when the Dual Alliance has lasted for
thirty-six years and seems as familiar and inevitable a
phenomenon in the firmament of continental policy as
King Charles's Wain in the heaven of stars, we are disposed
to ignore the problem that Bismarck strove to solve. The
Treaty of 1879 closes a crisis in the evolution of Bismarck's
statecraft. It marks a climax, but, like all climaxes, it
turned a fresh page, the writing in which was determined
by the character of the terminus.
What then were 'the perplexities'? It is clear on the
evidence that Bismarck in 1879 could have turned to
Russia and concluded a similar defensive treaty, with
Austria as the foe to be neutralised. The cordial meeting
of William and Alexander 11. at Alexandrovo, which cleared
up their personal relations, strengthened the German
Emperor's desire to heal the political breach and renew the
liaison established in 1872. William, indeed, failed to see
that Austrian and Russian ambitions were in conflict after
1878, and that Germany could not support both, but must
decide between them. Bismarck's deeper knowledge and
'prophetic coup d'aeil' had penetrated the logic of history,
'more remorseless than the logic of the Prussian audit
office,' and for him the antagonism of Austria and Russia
made the cruelty and inevitability of a choice. But why
not select Russia--the champion of order and monarchical
autocracy, the dynastic and political friend on whose sup-
ort Prussian policy had pivoted since 1862? Why not
y such a master-stroke close the Eastern frontier and
permanently dissolve the nightmare of a Franco-Russian
alliance? Would not such an alliance have before long
coerced Austria into renewing the Triple Entente of 1872?
Powerful critics in 1879 and 6ince have argued this thesis
impressively, and concluded that Bismarck now made his
first and biggest mistake. The road, it is said, to Peters-
burg via Vienna was impossible in reality; but the making
of a road to Vienna via Petersburg was not beyond
Bismarck's great gifts. The alienation of Great Britain
from Ruscia and the Anglo-Austrian entente in 1879 left, it
is also argued, Russia isolated, faced by a hostile Germany,
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BISMARCK
Austria, and Great Britain, the Near East closed, and
France alone as a possible friend. The Treaty of 1879, it
is therefore concluded, made a Franco-Russian entente--
the one result Bismarck feared--only a question of time.
Yet, if Bismarck erred, he did so with his eyes open. He
knew the arguments for a Russian alliance better than his
critics, and he rejected them. Why?
Three central points take us to the heart of the system
enshrined in the Austrian treaty. First, a sentence in the
confidential letter to the King of Bavaria, unaccountably
ignored by many students of Bismarck: 'The German
Empire in alliance with Austria would not lack the support
of England. ' Lord Salisbury, the British Foreign Secretary,
confirmed this prediction by saying that the rumour of such
an alliance was 'good tidings of great joy.
' Would a
British Foreign Secretary in 1879, ^89, or 1899 have
said the same of a Russo-German alliance? Bismarck
knew that an alliance with Russia must commit Germany
to the Russian antagonism to Great Britain, as well as to
the Russian antagonism to Austria. Neither in 1879
nor 1889 was he prepared to place such a wasting mort-
gage on German policy: for Bismarck had a sounder sense
of British strength than many of his critics then or since.
The alienation of Great Britain and of Austria in 1879
would almost certainly have involved a renewal of the
Anglo-Austrian alliance of 1856, to which France in 1879,
as in 1856, would have become a partner. 1
Secondly, was Germany prepared to see Russia at
Constantinople? Apart from any prior promises to
Austria, not involving Constantinople but Salonica, that
was a question of profound import for Bismarck in 1878-9.
His answer as given in his acts is a decisive 'No'; not
1 The Secret Treaty of April 15,185 6, which pledged Great Britain, France, and
Austria to unite in resisting any attempt to tear up the Treaty of Paris of 1856.
1 The extraordinary obiter dictum in the Memoirs (ii. 285) that Bismarck
personally would have 'welcomed ' the 'physical and diplomatic possession of
Constantinople' by Russia cannot be taken seriously. It is contradicted by the
argument in which it is embedded, and is belied by the action of" Germany
prior to, and after, 1879. Written late in life, it probably is a criticism on
German policy in the Near East after the Chancellor's dismissal, and is one of
the many similar 'confessions' suggesting that in matters of high military
policy he was continuously overruled by the Emperor, or the soldiers, or by his
colleagues, or by public opinion. CreJat Judteus Apella.
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? THE IMPERIAL CHANCELLOR 347
because a Russian Constantinople rang out a sharp quietus
to Austrian ambitions, but because it ended all German
ambitions in the Balkans. Austria at Salonica was no bar
--rather a help--to German control of Constantinople and
the Ottoman Empire, the ' integrity' of which Beaconsfield
'consolidated' by annexing Cyprus, securing a tighter hold
on Egypt, and by handing over Bosnia to Austria, half
Bulgaria to a virtual Russian protectorate and the Armenian
frontier fortresses to Russia. But if a Russian alliance did
not mean Germany's acquiescence in the Russian advance
to Constantinople, it meant nothing. It meant, more-
over, that either Germany must support Russia in her
Eastern quarrel with Great Britain or obliterate the
treaty; and if there was an excentric dissipation of German
strength it would be to sacrifice Pomeranian Grenadiers
in Europe that Russia might annex Turkestan or Afghan-
istan. Bismarck was confident that Austrian Chauvinism
could be controlled, but a complete German control of
Russian policy was not a practical proposition. Teuton
and Slav could not work together as Teuton and Magyar
could for a common interest.
Thirdly, a Russian alliance left the main gateway of
Central Europe--the Danube--in neutral, and probably
hostile, hands. The strategical and economic confor-
mation of Central -Europe is moulded by three great river
basins--the Rhine, the Danube, and the Vistula. The
Rhine was now firmly in German hands: a Russian alliance
did not secure Germany the control of the Vistula, and it
left the Danube out of the central German control alto-
gether. Without a control of the Danube basin as com-
plete as the control of the Rhine, the political and economic,
no less than the military, conditions of centralism could not
be adequately realised. Moreover, Bismarck reckoned on
bringing Roumania with Austria's help into the system; and
thanks to Russian bungling, the Treaty of 1879 was promptly
followed by that close understanding between Bucharest
and Vienna which was certainly expressed in a precise con-
tract, the text of which has never been published. The
Austrian alliance, therefore, closed the Danube from source
to mouth: it brought Serbia and Bulgaria on the southern
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? 348
BISMARCK
bank into the sphere of Austrian policy; for it placed
Roumania as a German outpost to the north, and an
Ottoman Empire under German influence on their backs.
Moreover, the Austrian bastion in Galicia, from Cracow to
Czernowitz, left Russia controlling the Vistula only from
Thorn to Ivangorod, with Prussia on one, and Austria on
the other, flank, of the Russian Polish salient. In short,
the framework of Central Europe was completed by the
Austrian alliance. A Russian alliance, and Austria hostile,
would have destroyed it. Bismarck's diplomacy from
1879 to 1890 aimed at filling the mould thus created with
an organic and expanding system of political traditions,
habits, and ideals--the full life of the allied States incor-
porate in the environment that gave them blood and air.
There were two other positive advantages of great
weight--the maintenance of the Austrian monarchy, which
coincided with the maintenance of the Prussian State
regime, and the checking of Slav influence, working then
and since so powerfully against Germanism. The German
alliance gave to the Habsburg throne a support moral and
political, difficult to exaggerate. How the Habsburgs
would have fared without that support in the next thirty
years can be as easily imagined as can the effect on the
German Empire and the Hohenzollern throne if the
Habsburg monarchy had been crippled as a monarchy.
The alliance of 1879 was a compact with Buda-Pesth even
more than with Vienna. It set the seal of German approval
on, and assured the promise of German support to, the true
construction of the Compromise (Ausgleich) of 1867--an
alliance of German and Magyar to crush all non-German
and non-Magyar elements (about one-half of Austria-
Hungary) into subordination. Was Bismarck not right,
from his point of view, in concluding that, so construed in
action, the Compromise which he supported on principle
in 1867 was worth an Emperor's ransom to an Imperial
Germany determined to establish a German hegemony?
What would have been the result had he in 1879 rejected
Andrassy's overtures, closed the door to Buda-Pesth, and
opened the door that led to the Nevsky Prospect and
Tsarskoe-Seloe?
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? THE IMPERIAL CHANCELLOR
Two obvious disadvantages, however, perplexed Bismarck
--the Polish question and the Austrian future in the
Balkans. The denationalisation of the Poles and the con-
tinuity of the tripartite dismemberment of 1795, endorsed
in 1815, was a question of existence for Prussia. Bismarck
held, as had been already indicated, that the dissolution of
the ancient kingdom of Poland by Frederick the Great and
Catherine was the pre-condition of a safe and strong
Prussia. The Polish problem was with him day and night,
and it had flamed into a fresh crisis with the Kulturkampf.
The relations and policy of the Dual Monarchy to the
Austrian Poles provided a very thorny internal conundrum
for the Ball-Platz, and Bismarck foresaw in 1879 that the
interests of Vienna and Berlin in Polish policy were not
identical, and might easily become antagonistic. The
Vatican, with its trusteeship for Roman Catholic Poland,
had an influence on Roman Catholic Vienna and Buda-
Pesth that foreshadowed the gravest complications. Nor
could the Dual Monarchy, in face of the Ruthenian popu-
lation in Galicia, treat the Poles as Prussia treated the
province of Posen. A liberal policy at Vienna towards
the Austrian Poles went ill with the drastic oppression of
Polish Prussia by Berlin. If Austria ' got out of hand' in
this sphere of action the basis of the Treaty of 1879 might
crumble away entirely.
There was a similar danger in the Balkans. If we knew
the whole truth of what lay behind the innocent clauses
of the Treaty of 1879, itself a further instalment of the
system begun in 1872, it is quite certain that it would con-
firm one broad conclusion. Germany endorsed cautiously
but deliberately the Austrian bill of exchange in the
Balkans. The nature and extent of the commitment can
only be roughly inferred from the tangled diplomacy that
preceded 1879 and fills the next thirty years. But in 1879
Bismarck took a great risk--all his public utterances con-
firm the guarded language of the Memoirs--and he took it
deliberately. The 'occupation' of Bosnia and Herze-
govina was nominally a transitory arrangement: its con-
version into an 'annexation' was a permanent bait to
Austria, but Germany secured a powerful control, for she
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BISMARCK
could always refuse to support the conversion. He placed
an ally in shining armour behind Francis Joseph and the
Magyar oligarchy: and the ally stood there, not in the
interest of Austria but of a Prussianised Germany. The
contention that the Treaty of 1879 made a Franco-Russian
alliance inevitable rests on arguing back from 1896 to 1879.
It is certain that no alliance between France and Russia
took place before 1890. Diplomatic coquetry and flir-
tations are even less convincing evidence of alliances than
glasses of wine and the toasts of monarchs (drafted by their
ministers) at ceremonial banquets. The whole point of
Bismarck's criticism of the policy of his successors after
1890 is concentrated in the indictment, that while he
prevented such an alliance (which was true), his successors
not merely permitted it, but by their diplomatic bungling
actually brought it about. It is therefore neither fair nor
historical to argue that the Dual Alliance of 1879 made
a Russo-French alliance inevitable. Bismarck could and
did argue that, so far from that result being inevitable, the
Dual Alliance, properly handled, made an entente between
Paris and Petersburg impossible.
Bismarck was a continentalist, and remained a continen-
talist to the end of his days; that is, he held as an axiom
that German supremacy must rest on mastery of the
strategical and political situation in Europe. Efforts out-
side the central European theatre were an excentric and
unjustifiable dissipation of German strength, the concen-
tration of which was required on the major objective.
Secure that, and the rest followed; lose it, and no
gains elsewhere would compensate the loss. Austria-
Hungary and the Balkans--the two could not be separated,
for the problem of south-eastern Europe was the problem
of the Dual Empire--were essential to German hegemony
and the sole avenue of continental expansion. The crisis
of 1875 reinforced the lesson that Europe would not
tolerate a further expansion westwards at the expense of
France and Belgium. But an expansion to the south-east
could secure British neutrality, if not active support, for
it would be at the expense of Russia. To-day we are apt
to forget that in 1879 Great Britain viewed Russia not
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? THE IMPERIAL CHANCELLOR 351
with the eyes of 1908 or 1914, but of 1856 and 1870.
How--Bismarck might well ask--was German trade to
expand after 1879 if Great Britain, the sea-power par
excellence, were driven by German action into the camp
of Germany's foes?
Nevertheless the gravity of the risk taken in 1879 is
proved by the insurance against its exploding into an un-
limited liability. Until 1890 Austria was never allowed
to get out of hand. How precisely this was done we
cannot say with certainty. But it was done. The control
of the Wilhelmstrasse over the Ball-Platz was effective, for
Bismarck had his personal prestige, unrivalled knowledge,
and experience to help in the difficult task. These are
qualities not acquired by intuition, still less by birth or
hereditary succession, but by brains and the travail of a
lifetime. Control of Austria was also assisted by positive
counterchecks--the alliance with Italy and the continuous
ring at the Russian front door. It is safe to conclude that
Bismarck prepared for the inclusion of Italy in 1879, and
that without the Dual Alliance Italy could not have been
secured. We have Bismarck's word for it, and his judg-
ment outweighs a dozen criticisms. For he had the whole
of the facts before him, whereas his critics argue from
edited documents written on one side only.
A further consideration is very relevant. Down to 1879
the isolation of France had been the prime object of
German policy. The policy was breaking down. France,
excluded from the Congress of London in 1870, took part
in the Congress of Berlin in 1878. After 1879 the diversion
of France became more important than her isolation: and
with it went the diversion of Russia and the diversion of
Great Britain--in each case the diversion being intended
ultimately to increase the antagonism. But these develop-
ments open up a fresh section of Bismarckian policy, with
an intrinsic character of its own. They lead to the Triple
Alliance and the consequences of that consummation of
the Chancellor's diplomacy.
Gastein in 1865 saw the making of a new Austria; Gastein
in 1879 provided the new Ar stria with an alluring future
and the means of realising it. Vienna was right in welcom-
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BISMARCK
ing Bismarck with a gratitude which deeply touched that
seared, proud, and sensitive heart. The Treaty of 1879
was a masterpiece. 1 It was signed by Bismarck and
Andrassy on October 7. On October 8 Francis Joseph
But the statesman who made it for Austria received the
reward of Beust, Benedek, Rechberg, Schmerling, Buol,
and Bach.
? 4. The New Era--Home Policy, 1878-1888
The years 1878-80 witnessed a gradual but complete
change in the home policy of the Chancellor, culminating
in the establishment of the system which Bismarck main-
tained until his fall. In foreign policy, as has been
already indicated, the development of events prevented
the continuance of the alliance of the Three Monarchies
on the lines originally planned, and imposed on Bismarck
the necessity of a choice. In home affairs the necessity of
a choice was even more urgent. Bismarck practically
said to Bennigsen, ' Do not compel me to choose between
you and Windthorst. ' And Bennigsen's reply was vir-
tually to the effect that the choice must be made.
The several elements in the problems by the spring of
1878 were clear, but together they made a very complicated
situation. First of all, there was the Chancellor himself.
His health and strength were no longer capable of bearing
the continuous strain of mastering and directing the foreign
and home policy of a great and expanding Empire, in
which Prussia was the predominant partner. An imperial
ministry did not exist. The imperial executive was
organised as a branch of the Imperial Chancery, the secre-
taries of the various departments being simply depart-
1 Prince von Biilow writes in his Imperial Germany (edition of 1916):--
'Prince Bismarck, a second Hercules, accomplished many great labours. . . .
If I were asked which of these is the more admirable from the point of view of
foreign policy I should say without hesitation--the Austrian alliance. ' The
whole chapter (v. ), as indeed the whole book, bears out Mr. Headlam's con-
sidered judgment on its importance as an authoritative exposition of German
principles and a German interpretation of the meaning of Bismarckianism--
a meaning falsified by his successors, of whom Prince von Biilow is the ablest.
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? THE IMPERIAL CHANCELLOR
mental and executive officers, appointed by the Chancellor,
and responsible as managers of sub-departments to him
alone. Bismarck had stoutly resisted every effort to convert
these departments into independent ministerial offices,
with ministerial chiefs, colleagues in an imperial cabinet,
and representing their several departments in the Reichs-
tag; and his reason was not pure autocracy and personal
jealousy--the determination to keep everything in his
own hands--though they accentuated his. refusal. The
reasons went far deeper; an imperial cabinet, such as the
Progressives and the Left Wing of the National Liberals
had advocated since 1867 as an irrevocable advance to
parliamentary government and were urging with persist-
ence in 1877, cut at the root of the position of the Federal
Council, and the interlocking machinery by which Prussia
maintained her control of policy as a whole. For the
Federal Council, like the Tudor Privy Council in England,
was the real governing organ in the Empire, and combined
legislative with executive duties (through its committees),
and was essentially the organ which made policy. Al-
though we are without exact information as to how
Prussia, behind the closed doors of the Bundesrat, main-
tained her control, it is clear that it was exercised and
maintained by the chairmanship of the Imperial Chancellor,
who as Minister-President of Prussia cast the Prussian
vote; and in the secret deliberations of the Federal
Council, just as in the Tudor Privy Council or the modern
Cabinet in England, there could be perfect freedom of dis-
cussion, and a complete representation of different points
of view, while the decision arrived at was the decision of
the organ as a whole, and the voting was unknown except
to the initiated. A real Imperial Minister of Finance,
for example, responsible to the Reichstag, would obviously
supersede to a large extent the power and functions of the
Federal Council and transfer them partly to himself and
(no less important) partly to the Reichstag. The creation
of such imperial ministers simply meant that in a few years
the Federal Council would either shrivel into the position
that the British Privy Council has shrivelled into, rela-
tively to the Cabinet and the House of Commons; or, it
b. z
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? 354
BISMARCK
would be transformed into a real Upper Chamber of the
Imperial Reichstag, as had been in 1870 the ideal of the
unitarians led by the Crown Prince and the intellectuals
of the 'Coburg and Gotha' school. But such a trans-
formation destroyed the essence of the institution which
was constituted out of, not over, the Federated governments.
No less serious (and to all Prussians of the Bismarckian
and conservative type, far more serious) would be the
effect on Prussia. The British student is apt to forget
that beside the Federal Council (Bundesrat) and the
Imperial Reichstag existed the Prussian Ministry, presided
over by the Prussian Minister-President, and the Prussian
Parliament (Landtag), and that Imperial Reichstag and
Prussian Parliament were frequently sitting at one and the
same time in Berlin. Indeed, a large number of Reichstag
members (who were Prussians) spent their time between
the two bodies, voting on and fighting the same issues in
two separate legislatures. The Kulturkampf was essen-
tially a Prussian affair, and the greater part of the 'May
Laws' was a Prussian, not an imperial, concern: just as
the administrative execution of those laws was mainly the
duty of the Prussian Minister of the Interior.
Prussia had, like the other federated States, her separate
(and very narrow) franchise, ministry, and bureaucracy,
the only difference being that Prussia was very nearly two-
thirds of the Empire, and that behind ministry and
bureaucracy stood a solid concrete wall of tradition and
conventions, the parapet of which was the royal autocracy.
There was a Prussian Minister, but no Imperial Minister,
of War; a Prussian Minister of Finance, Education, and so
forth, and the Prussian Foreign Minister was the Minister-
President who was also-Imperial Chancellor: an Imperial
Minister of Finance or War, not directly under the Chan-
cellor's control, involved the dual system in a terrible
dilemma. Either it meant the government of that im-
perial department by Prussia, or the government of that
Prussian department by the Empire. The former would
have led to a revolt of every non-Prussian State from the
imperial system, the latter to the dissolution of Prussia
in the Empire. Bismarck plainly told the Reichstag more
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? THE IMPERIAL- CHANCELLOR 355
than once that an independent Imperial Minister of
Finance would have for his greatest antagonist the Prussian
Minister of Finance. He might have added with even
greater truth that an Imperial Minister of War would
either have to swallow the Prussian War Office or spend
all his time in fighting the Prussian Minister of War. Was
the Imperial Minister to exercise the prerogative of the
Prussian Crown, or only the much more restricted power
of the Imperial Praesidium?
The duty of correlating this dualism and ensuring its
harmonious working was Bismarck's main task, and he did
it by combining the office of Chancellor and Minister-
President, by controlling the Federal Council, and by the
domination of the conservative majority in the Prussian
Landtag. As Minister-President he took care that the
decisions of the Prussian Ministry broadly coincided with
the policy of the Federal Council; as Imperial Chancellor
he took care that the Federal Council's decisions coincided
with the broad requirements of Prussian policy.
