The Great War and How It Arose Part 5

_DECLARATION OF COMMON POLICY._

On September 5, 1914, the British Official Press Bureau issued the following statement from the Foreign Office:--

DECLARATION.

The undersigned duly authorised thereto by the respective Governments hereby declare as follows:--

The British, French, and Russian Governments mutually engage not to conclude peace separately during the present war. The three Governments agree that when terms of peace come to be discussed no one of the Allies will demand terms of peace without the previous agreement of each of the other Allies. In faith whereof the undersigned have signed this Declaration and have affixed thereto their seals.

Done at London in triplicate, the 5th day of September, 1914.

E. Grey, His Britannic Majesty's Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs.

Paul Cambon, Amba.s.sador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of the French Republic.

Benckendorff, Amba.s.sador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of His Majesty the Emperor of Russia.

TURKEY JOINS GERMANY.

Directly war broke out the Turkish Army was mobilised, under the supreme command of Enver Pasha, who was entirely in German hands.[48] Although the Turkish Government had declared their intention of preserving their neutrality, they took no steps to ensure its maintenance. They forfeited their ability to do so by the admission of the German wars.h.i.+ps, "Goeben"

and "Breslau," which, fleeing from the Allied Fleets, had entered the Dardanelles on August 10.

Instead of interning these war vessels with their crews, as they were repeatedly asked to do by the Allied Governments, the Turkish Government allowed the German Admiral and his men to remain on board, and while this was the case the German Government were in a position to force the hand of the Turkish Government whenever it suited them to do so.

In pursuance of a long-prepared policy, the greatest pressure was exercised by Germany to force Turkey into hostilities. German success in the European War was said to be a.s.sured; the perpetual menace to Turkey from Russia might, it was suggested, be averted by an alliance with Germany and Austria; Egypt might be recovered for the Empire; India and other Moslem countries would rise against Christian rule, to the great advantage of the Caliphate of Constantinople; Turkey would emerge from the War the one great power of the East, even as Germany would be the one great power of the West. Such was the substance of German misrepresentations.

Enver Pasha, dominated by a quasi-Napoleonic ideal, and by the conviction of the superiority of German arms, proved a most active agent on behalf of Germany.

A strong German element was imported into the remainder of the Turkish Fleet, even before the British Naval Mission, which had been reduced to impotence by order of the Minister of Marine, was recalled by His Majesty's Government. Large numbers of Germans were imported from Germany to be employed in the forts of the Dardanelles and Bosphorus, and at other crucial points.

Numerous German merchant vessels served as bases of communication, and as auxiliaries to what had become in effect the German Black Sea Fleet.

Secret communications with the German General Staff were established by means of the "Corcovado," which was anch.o.r.ed opposite the German Emba.s.sy at Therapia. The German Military Mission in Turkey acted in closest touch with the Turkish Militarist Party. They were the main organisers of those military preparations in Syria which directly menaced Egypt.

Emissaries of Enver Pasha bribed and organised the Bedouins on the frontier; the Syrian towns were full of German officers, who provided large sums of money for suborning the local chiefs. The Khedive of Egypt, who was in Constantinople, was himself a party to the conspiracy, and arrangements were actually made with the German Emba.s.sy for his presence with a military expedition across the frontier. All the Turkish newspapers in Constantinople and most of the provincial papers became German organs; they glorified every real or imaginary success of Germany or Austria, and minimised everything favourable to the Allies.

Millions of money were consigned from Germany to the German Emba.s.sy in Constantinople, and delivered under military guard at the Deutsche Bank.

At one time these sums amounted to 4,000,000. A definite arrangement was arrived at between the Germans and a group of Turkish Ministers, including Enver Pasha, Talaat Bey and Djemal Pasha, that Turkey should declare war as soon as the financial provision should have attained a stated figure.

The final point was reached when Odessa and other Russian ports in the Black Sea were attacked by the Turkish Fleet on October 29, 1914. It is now certain that the actual orders for these attacks were given by the German Admiral on the evening of October 27.

On October 30 the Russian Amba.s.sador asked for his pa.s.sports and there was nothing left but for the British and French Amba.s.sadors to demand theirs on the same day. The Russian Amba.s.sador left Constantinople on October 31, while the British and French Amba.s.sadors left the following evening.[49]

Thenceforward the Turks, at the instigation of the Germans, unsuccessfully endeavoured to raise Mahomedans in all countries against Great Britain and her Allies. The Sultan of Turkey, misusing his position as Padishah and t.i.tular Head of the Moslems, gave a perverted history of the events and proclaimed a Holy War. The Sultan, in his speech from the Throne on December 14, 1914 (at which ceremony the ex-Khedive of Egypt was present), said:--

"We were just in the best way to give reforms in the interior a fresh impetus when suddenly the great crisis broke out. While our Government was firmly resolved to observe the strictest neutrality, our Fleet was attacked in the Black Sea by the Russian Fleet.

England and France then began actual hostilities by sending troops to our frontiers. Therefore I declared a state of war. These Powers, as a necessity, compelled us to resist by armed force the policy of destruction which at all times was pursued against the Islamic world by England, Russia, and France, and a.s.sumed the character of a religious persecution. In conformity with the Fetwas I called all Moslems to a Holy War against these Powers and those who would help them."[50]

What the Moslems of India thought of the situation is succinctly shown by a speech delivered on October 1, 1914, by the Agha Khan, the spiritual head of the Khoja community of Mahomedans and President of the All-India Moslem League.[51] He said he had always been convinced that Germany was the most dangerous enemy of Turkey and other Moslem countries, for she was the Power most anxious to enter by "peaceful penetration" Asia Minor and Southern Persia. But she had been posing for years past as a sort of protector of Islam--_though Heaven forbid that they should have such an immoral protector_.

FOOTNOTES:

[48] Cd. 7716.

[49] Cd. 7628 and Cd. 7716.

[50] A Reuter's Amsterdam telegram of December 15, 1914.

[51] _Times_, October 2, 1914,

MORE GERMAN INTRIGUES.

The vastness of German intrigues throughout the world in preparation for a great war have come out piece by piece.

=The Near East.=--Taking the Near East first, we find that Germany, having suborned the ex-Khedive of Egypt, Abbas Hilmi, proceeded weeks before the rupture with Turkey to give orders, through the Ottoman Empire, to Shukri, the acting Chief of the Turkish Special Mission, to prepare public opinion in Egypt for Turkish invasion and to await the coming of the German Mors, whose trial was attended by such startling disclosures.[52]

Mors had been introduced to Enver Pasha by Dr. Pruefer (Secretary to Prince Hatzfeldt when he was German Agent in Egypt) and had held long conferences with Omar Fauzi Bey, of the Turkish General Staff, who on September 6, 1914, worked out a scheme for disturbances in Egypt by bands of criminals led by Turkish officers and for an attack on the Suez Ca.n.a.l.

In 1908 Prince Hatzfeldt succeeded Count Bernstorff, as German Agent in Egypt, and he at once established close relations with the Egyptian disloyalists of the extreme faction. In this he appears to have been aided by Baron von Oppenheim, and by Dr. Pruefer, the Oriental Secretary of the Agency, who was a fine Arabic scholar, and who had travelled a great deal in Syria and the Near East. The leaders of the disloyal section in Egypt were kept in the closest touch, and visited Prince Hatzfeldt at the German Agency, and were in constant communication with Dr. Pruefer, who, in Oriental disguise, often visited them, and other Panislamic Agents.[53]

=The Far East.=--In India the German merchants joined our Chambers of Commerce and were elected as representatives of commercial life, and as trustees of port trusts, which gave them a knowledge of our local defences. In some instances they appear to have become volunteers, and so to have gained knowledge of our forts and armouries. Small German merchants and traders in the Punjab and other districts constantly endeavoured to undermine the British Raj, and preached sedition wherever they went. Such were the agents and spies of the German Government.

Since the Mutiny at Singapore it has been proved that the Germans were calling home their reserves from Singapore and the East in May, 1914, and even as early as April of last year.[54] The first thing the mutineers did was to go to the German Encampment, open the doors, and supply those inside with rifles. Sir Evelyn Ellis, member of the Singapore Legislative Council, who was President of the Commission appointed by the Governor to collect evidence with reference to the Mutiny, which took place on February 15, 1915, stated that:--

"They were not to think that they had been engaged in suppressing a small local disturbance. On the contrary, there was evidence to show that they had a.s.sisted in defeating one of the aims of the destroyer of Europe. They had been dealing with work that had been engineered by the agents of our common foes, and they had contributed to the suppression of a most diabolical plot. What had taken place in Singapore was only part of a scheme for the murder of women and children such as they had had instances of on the East Coast of England."[55]

The head of a big German firm in Singapore, after being released on parole, was found with a wireless installation in his house, with which he was stated to have kept the "Emden" supplied with news.[56]

In Persia and Arabia there is abundant proof of German intrigues, while in China few opportunities have been lost by German agents of impugning British good faith, and German money appears to have been used for years in keeping the Chinese press--in Peking more particularly--as anti-British as possible. Since the declaration of war an attempt has been made by Captain Pappenheim, Military Attache of the German Legation in Peking, to organise an expedition into Russian Siberia to damage the Trans-Siberian railway. His action was, of course, a gross abuse of his diplomatic position, and has been disclaimed by the Chinese Government.[57]

=West Africa.=--In West Africa the report of Colonel F. C. Bryant on operation in Togoland shows how well the Germans were prepared for war in that region.[58]

=South Africa.=--In South Africa[59] it has been proved that so far back as 1912 the Germans were in communication with Lieut.-Colonel Maritz with a view to a rebellion. The latter appears to have brooded over schemes for the establishment of a Republic in South Africa. As the Blue Book, published in Cape Town on April 28, 1915, states: "One witness, Captain Leipold, of the Government Intelligence Department, who was sent to find out how things stood with Maritz, describes how the rebel leader dramatically threw his cards on the table in the shape of a bundle of correspondence with the German Administration at Windhuk, dating as far back as August, 1912."[60]

In a speech to his troops on August 9, 1914, Maritz declared that he had 6,000 Germans ready to help him, and he further stated that Beyers and De Wet had been fully informed of his plans long before the war.[61]

Evidence was also given during the trial of De Wet that the rebellion in South Africa "was planned a couple of years ago when General Hertzog left the Ministry."[62] The Germans, either directly or indirectly, suborned, amongst others, Maritz, De Wet, De La Rey, Beyers, Kemp, and k.o.c.k. But the magnificent services of General Botha and the loyalists of South Africa--both British and Dutch--rendered nugatory the machinations of the German Government.