Germany's Fighting Machine Her Army, her Navy, her Air-ships and Why She Arrayed Them Against the Allied Powers of Europe

But a few weeks ago the author of this little book was in Germany studying the land and its institutions and full of admiration for its achievements in every field. Two days after he had taken ship for America Germany was practically at war with France and Russia. England soon joined in the conflict, and the splendid Hamburg liner on which the author was a passenger was a hunted thing on the ocean, owing her safety at last to a friendly fog. The great shipping company, with its nearly two hundred vessels, was out of the running as a commercial enterprise, a symbol of the paralyzed industries of the whole country.

To the ordinary observer the conflict came like a bolt from the blue, but to the historian and to the man who reads the foreign newspapers it was not unexpected. The historians recognized that it was the appointed time for a war between the great nations. The Franco-Prussian War took place forty-three years ago. When, since the days of the grandsons of Charlemagne, have the chief powers kept out of war for so long a time? In the ninth and tenth centuries the question of Lorraine was as troublesome as it has been in the nineteenth and twentieth; in the eleventh and twelfth an expedition against Italy was in the day’s work of almost every German emperor; and England and Sicily were conquered by the Normans; in 1215 took place the first general international battle; in 1250 the final expeditions against the Emperor Frederick II; in 1272 the Sicilian wars of the house of Anjou. The Guelphs and Ghibellines carry us on to the Hundred Years’ War; the Hapsburg struggles against Italy and the Turks bring us down to the invasion of Italy by Charles VIII of France, to the campaigns of Maximilian, to the Field of the Cloth of Gold, to the religious wars of Charles V. Close on the heels of the latter struggles came not only the French religious wars but the invasion of England by Philip II’s great armada. The Thirty Years’ War, Louis XIV’s war of conquest, the Spanish Succession, the Silesian and the Seven Years’ Wars fill the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries; the Napoleonic, Crimean and Franco-Prussian Wars the nineteenth. Yes, it was time for a new struggle.

When a great and extraordinary event takes place it is easy, somewhere in the world, to point to omens and prophecies that have heralded it. But in the case of the present war we can see in the German newspapers how, from month to month of the present year, the struggle was felt to be more and more imminent and how Russia, the power that eventually precipitated the catastrophe, was felt to be the center of real danger. “In well-informed diplomatic circles,” writes the Magdeburger Zeitung in January, 1914, “the impression can not be concealed that in Russia at present there prevails a thoroughly hostile attitude to Germany and Austria-Hungary, and that the agitation in the czar’s realm is greater even than during the last Balkan crisis. … It looks as though Russia were preparing to make an extraordinarily great show of strength against a specific, not far distant date.” And the Deutsche Tageszeitung: “What is Russia’s purpose in building a mighty fleet of dreadnaughts for the Baltic? Surely not merely to coerce Sweden.” Again the Madgeburg paper: “The Russian government, which already owes French capitalists twelve billions, has received a new loan of two billions five hundred millions, of which five million are yearly to be issued in Paris. This whole gigantic sum is exclusively to be spent for building strategic railways along the German-Russian boundary. … France compelled Russia to do this. The French general staff thinks that Russia, because of her clumsiness in mobilizing, but especially for lack of tracks leading to the German frontier, will not be able, in a new war with Germany, to bring help to France in time. Russia has now fulfilled France’s wishes in this regard. Thus does the Franco-Russian alliance, which of late seemed to be falling into oblivion, celebrate its resurrection.”

In February the Hallesche Zeitung writes: “To keep friendship with Russia is one of the chief aims of our foreign policy, but it is sometimes made very hard for us indeed. … They keep the peace because it is to the advantage of the czar’s empire to do so; but they are to be had for every combination directed against Germany.” And the Dresdener Nachrichten: “The Russian-German relations leave very much to be desired at the moment. The Russian government fails to show the least approachableness in foreign questions and Russian society and the press are in an extremely anti-German mood. Evidences of the same thing are to be seen in their attitude to Austria. … The Russian policy lets itself be taken more and more in tow by the French desires, and has nothing but polite speeches left for Germany.” The Weser Zeitung finds the explanation of the hostility in Germany’s efforts to help the Turks reorganize their army, and declares, “Here we have touched one of the weakest spots in Russia’s world-policy, her endeavor to get to the Mediterranean.” The Fränkische Kurier thinks that Russia intends to form a protectorate over the Balkan states as a military weapon against Austria and her allies: “The soul of this endeavor is the Russian diplomacy and the Servian minister-president, Pasitsch.” The Dresdener Anzeiger observes that the influence of the Pan-Slavist party over the Russian government is steadily growing and that the extraordinary activity in military matters ill suits the constant peace assurances: “The measures are pointed against Austria-Hungary.”

On March second an article in the Kölnische Zeitung aroused great excitement all over Germany. It declared that Russia was not yet in a position to supplement political threats by military action, however much France might “rattle with the Russian saber.” But in three years all the enormous preparations would be completed, and already “it is openly said even in official military periodicals, that Russia is arming for war against Germany.” There is no immediate danger, the article continued, but the legend of the historical German-Russian friendship had better be thrown to the dogs.

The papers took different attitudes toward this article, but there were not wanting those who considered the warnings of the Kölnische Zeitung justified. General Keim, in the Tag, declares that the German-Russian boundary is one huge camp, that the underlying thought of the whole armament is an offensive war against Germany, that France had proceeded in the same way just before 1870 and that the recent visit to St. Petersburg of President Poincaré and his chief of staff Joffre had not been merely a pleasure jaunt. Had not a French general, only last summer, declared in a treatise published anonymously that the tension between Russia and Austria was ground for a European war “perhaps in the near future”? And had not this French officer even gone so far as to spread the legend that in case of war Germany would disregard the neutrality of Belgium and Luxemburg in order to be able to envelop the French left wing?

Several of the March newspapers bring the Russian hostility into connection with the commercial treaty that has only about two years more to run. Russia, by making a bold front, can gain from Germany better terms than she has had in the past. “Russia, with her military preparations,” writes the Pester Lloyd, “wishes to put Austria and Germany under military pressure in order to achieve diplomatic successes and harm her neighbors economically.” The idea that France is behind it all crops out repeatedly. The Neue Preussische Zeitung speaks of the pressure “ever stronger, that the French need for revenge is exercising on the Russian ally and debtor.” The Hannöverische Courier accuses the French press of having first caused the agitation of public opinion in Russia, on which it afterward comments as so remarkable. As far back as March 10th, 1913, the Kölnische Zeitung had written: “Never was our relation to our western neighbor so strained as to-day, never has the idea of vengeance shown itself so openly and never has it been made so evident that in France the Russian alliance, the English friendship, are claimed only for the purpose of reconquering Alsace-Lorraine. In whatever corner of the world the flame starts up it is quite certain that we shall have to cross swords with France. When that will be, no one can tell.”

The Russian military preparations cause the German papers much concern in the month of April also. The Vossische Zeitung considers them a gigantic bluff, and declares that they have been worth millions to the Russian government. “For only because France thinks that in Russia she possesses an ally ready for war has she heaped billions and billions on her in the form of loans. … That the latest French loans to Russia were accompanied by instructions seriously to take up the anti-Austrian and anti-German preparations no one doubts. Just as little is it doubted that Pan-Slavism is not pleased with the latest changes in the Balkans or that the freedom of the Dardanelles and the seizure of Constantinople still present themselves as the goal of Russian policy. Hatred of the Germans is increasing. … One thing is certain: Russia is arming to a gigantic extent. She wishes to throw a heavy weight into the scale of the national quarrels. Germany and Austria have every reason to be on their guard.” The Allgemeine Zeitung, of Chemnitz, writes that “The goals of French and Russian policy are unattainable without world-shattering callings-to-account,” and the Weser Zeitung, after speaking of Pan-Slavism as threatening the existence of the Austrian-Hungarian monarchy, finally exclaims, “It neither can nor should be concealed that if—which God forbid!—this direction gain the upper hand in Russian politics it would mean the very war-danger against which we sought and found refuge in the Triple Alliance.”

The newspapers of May have a somewhat calmer tone than those of March and April. “There is, to be sure,” writes the Tag, “danger for peace in the possibility that the anti-German tendency in Russia may prove so strong that the government will not be able to check it. Another danger lies in the relations of Russia and Austria. … Although there is much talk to the effect that we shall once more be compelled to fight for our national existence, it is not absolutely necessary that such a war shall come.” On the other hand, Admiral Breusing, in the Tägliche Rundschau of May the seventh, writes: “The striving of the Slavic and Mongolian races to extend their power and possessions will surely lead to an encounter with the German race.” The Rheinisch-Westphälische Zeitung declares of France that “public sentiment in military and political circles has long gone over from the defensive to the offensive. Apparently the aim is to create a situation where Germany will have to choose between receding or attacking.” The Dresdener Anzeiger, too, thinks that the “relations between Germany and France give the key to the grouping of the European powers,” and the Berliner Tageblatt says, “The future and salvation of Europe and its culture lies solely in a German-French-English rapprochement; that alone will guarantee the world-peace.” Toward the end of the month the Dresdener Anzeiger writes: “The German-Russian relations have latterly taken a remarkable change for the worse. Certainly the nationalistic elements in Russia are once more conspicuously active. … Should the whole mass of the Russian people once become conscious of its nationality the world will see the most mighty movement both as regards extent and elemental intensity. … For Russia, Pan-Slavism is the idea of the Russian leadership over all Slavs.”