Ten years of secret diplomacy, an unheeded warning (being a reprint of "Morocco in diplomacy."

Front matter

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BookJ^7___

TEN YEARS OF 5ECRET

Foreword

BY J. RAMSAY MACDONALD, M.P.

I REMEMBER well the unpleasant effect this book had upon me when I first read it over two years ago. I did not want to believe it, and yet its facts were so authoritative and its conclusions so logical that I had to believe it. No more merciless exposure of the dishonour which is accepted as honour in diplomatic circles has ever been made.

** It is all ancient history now," it may be said. "We have our Egypt and France has her Morocco, and the end has justified the means." But the fact is that the events and the policy exposed in this hook form an introduction to the present war. The Morocco affair slammed the doors in the faces of the peacemakers in Europe.

I wrote at the time that it looked as though we had ended the policy of French pin-pricks in Egypt at the price of an enormous navy in the North Sea and an ultimate war. The Morocco experience had a most unfortunate influence on the mind of Germany. It convinced many of my own Socialist friends (particularly those of the Revisionist School who concern themselves more than the others with real politics) that Germany was the victim of an evil conspiracy, and that our friendship was merely feigned ; and it is also said with some show of authority that our readiness to go to war in support of the French claims in Morocco (though they were in violation of a treaty only a year or so old and in contradiction of our openly professed intentions though not of our secretly made agreements) convinced the Kaiser that sooner or later he would have to yield to the militarist advisers to whom he had hitherto lent but a deaf ear. In any event, 1911-1912 are the years of the diplomatic changes which immediately preceded the

FOREWORD

war. Then Fate became mischievous and malevolent, and even those who were but onlookers could not help seeingthe gathering of the clouds on the horizon. This book explains those years, and the most strikingly dramatic part of its revelation is that the agreements we made with France openly were good and made for peace, whilst those we made secretly were the cause of trouble, ill-feeling, and war. This is a most significant circumstance, and has an important bearing on the demand of growing strength that secret diplomacy should be done away with.

Mr. Morel has written history with a merciless accuracy. It ought to be read by everyone who is thinking of what the settlement after peace can be, for it reveals a method of government which is as inconsistent with and as subversive to democracy and popular freedom as Prussian militarism itself.

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Preface To Fifth Edition

The secret diplomacy of the war, revealed through the publication by the Russian Revolutionary Government of the Treaties and Arrangements concluded between the Allies since the war broke out, increases the need for studying the secret diplomacy which preceded the war.

The most complete record of pre-war secret diplomacy on the Entente side is to be found in this volume, which now goes to a Fifth Edition.

In reading the Morocco storyj two facts should be constantly borne in mind :

First, Morocco forged the chain which was to bind the British people, absolutely, to the fortunes of the third French Republic, and, in view of France's Treaty with Russia, to the decomposing corpse of Tsardooi.

Secondly, French official writers now freely admit^ — why, indeed, should they notP^that Morocco caused the scales oscillating between the Peace Party and the War Party in Germany to weigh down heavily on the side of the latter, and gave an enormous accretion of strength to the fatalistic school which looked upon war as " inevitable."

These facts can be accepted as historically true — apart altogether from the intrinsic merits of the Moroccan

ISee in particular the opening despatches in the French Yellow Book on the War.

PREFACE TO FIFTH EDITION

quarrel — by those who approve the policy followed by the British Foreign Office in committing us in honourable obligations to France, and contingently to Tsardom, with all the train of consequences which that policy has involved ; and by those who, like the writer, condemn that policy.

And it is these facts which give to the triangular Franco-British-German dispute about Morocco in 1905 and 191 1, an importance altogether disproportionate to the immediate and specific implications of the dispute itself.

The issues themselves were comparatively trifling. That which grew out of them was cataclysmic.

To the peoples of France, Germany, and Britain the land of the Moors was a name : hardly that. In the complex play and interplay of diplomatic intrigue,- of national vanity and antipathies, ' * largely created ' ' — as Lecky remarks — *'by newspaper invectives, and by the gross partiality of newspaper representations," to which ** most modern wars may be ultimately traced," Morocco became a symbol and a portent.

This book, . originally published two and a half years before the outbreak of war, and reproduced unaltered^ closes with the settlement of the immediate and specific issues which gave rise to the dispute. It provides a detailed narrative of the antecedents and origin of that dispute, and of the course taken in regard to it.

Now, six years later, I have no occasion to modify my narrative in the slightest degree. The accuracy of none 'Of the data it contains has been challenged. It is true that Prince Lichnowsky's recently published memoirs include

1 Except for a few structural and verbal amendments.

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PREFACE TO FIFTH EDITION

some general reflections on the subject, which appear to invalidate the conclusions set forth in this volume. But a casual reference in a couple of hundred words to a complicated series of transactions covering a period of twenty years, offers no basis for comparison and examination. Moreover, Prince Lichnowsky was not German Ambassador in London during any portion of the Moroccan .dispute. He only received his appointment to the Court of St. James a year after Germany had concluded her Convention with France, and had recognised a French Protectorate. On the other hand, the reports of the Belgian diplomatic representatives in London^ Paris, and Berlin, written while the dispute was in progress, fully bear out my conclusions.^

A fortnight before his murder, Jaur^s had publicly censured more severely than I ventured to do, the actions

of his Government in Morocco, which, he said, had "thereby inaugurated in Europe an era of ambitions^ covetousness, and conflicts," and set the example for the breaches of the Treaty of Berlin in the Austrian annexation of Bosnia and Herzegovina, and in the Italian descent upon Tripoli.

So' much for the narrative here set out.

It was only on the actual eve of hostilities between Britain and Germany — on August 3, 19 14, two years and a half after this book appeared — that we learned positively that the first undertaking towards France originated in the Morocco crisis of 1905, and was completed during the second Morocco crisis in 191 1.

It was only then that the nation became aware that Morocco was the originating cause through which the

^'Vide Preface to Third Edition.

PREFACE TO FIFTH EDITION

British people became morally pledged to support France — and Tsardom — against Germany and Austria in the event of a European war.

That is why the Morocco dispute is, and must ever be, for the British people, a capital episode in the national annals, and a turning point in the national destinies.

E. D. Morel.

Preface To First And Second Editions

December, 1914.

Except for a few structural and verbal alterations which make the meaning- and chronology easier to follow, this volume is a mere reprint, minus the appendix of documents, of the one entitled "Morocco in Diplomacy," which was published by Messrs. Smith, Elder and Co. in the spring of 1912.

I have deliberately refrained from all other chang-es and from any attempt to bring- the subject up to date,^ because whatever value and importance this work may have is now concerned in my eyes with the circumstance of its explanation of the events of 19 14 being- not retrospective, but prospective.^

The book was written in the hope of helping to avert a catastrophe such as has now overwhelmed us. It was a chapter of the mistaken policy which already in 191 1 had made the present European War a threatening possibility. It was a passionate and hopeless appeal to get that policy abandoned while it was still time. Needless to say that

1 Except in the matter of the new Note facing page 178.

'^e.g., page 183, "To-day (Spring, 1912) we are confronted with this situation. The German nation firmly believes not only that it is threatened by Great Britain, but that Great Britain intends to take the first favourable opportunity to force a war. The British nation knows itself to be absolutely innocent of any such desire or intention. Is there a way out of the impasse? Only, it seems to me, if British public opinion will think out the problem for itself, face the issues squarely and resolutely, and decline any longer to tolerate being in the position of finding itself involved in war without any real knowledge of the why and the wherefore.''

Again, page 200 et seq. *' It is in the interest neither of the British nor of the French peoples that they should be fettered in their intercourse with other peoples ; or committed by their Governments to a definite course of action in advance."

And page 202. " Especially is it necessary for the common-sense -elements in the British nation to set their faces like flint against the sections in Britain and France desirous of distorting. the existence of friendly relations with France into an instrument of aggression against ■Germany."

PREFACE TO FIRST AND SECOND EDITIONS

:the story of our diplomatic entang-lements in the past, and vthe warning against their continuation in the future, remained equally unnoticed. The danger we had run in 191 1, evident and enormous though it had been, was a danger escaped ; and having escaped it. Englishmen remained lazily willing to leave once more the fate of Europe at the mercy of a system which had, after all, brought only the peril of war, not war itself. Indeed it is probable that the diplomacy which had created that peril of 191 1 was even given credit for having averted it !

, But now the catastrophe has come. It has become evident that Secret Diplomacy and the ** Balance of Power," with their alliances and commitments, have not saved Europe from a universal loss of life, of wealth, of international goodwill far surpassing the most frightful examples and the most frightful forecasts. We are now in the presence of the utter failure of the old-fashioned methods of safeguarding peace by preparing for war. A'nd it may therefore be that the story of Morocco in Diplomacy, that is to say of ten years of secret diplomacy, will now command more attention and that its lesson will now he taken to heart by a reading public which was indifferent to warnings of future perils, but which is already, and will be more and more, seeking eagerly for the origin of present calamities. And the story of Morocco in Diplomacy is not merely one of the historical explanations of the present war ; it is also the type of many other similar explanations. For this reason, as already said, I have chosen to leave the book as it was, feeling that its value, that is to say whatever influence it may possibly have in preparing a less dangerous future, consists largely in the circumstance that if it helps to explain 191 4, that explanation had already sbeen furnished in 191 2.

E. D. Morel.

October, 191 5-

I EXPLAINED in the " New Preface "^ why I had authorised this reprint of the orig-inal volume, and why I had not developed the sequel of the story therein set forth through its various phases to its logical consummation — the great war. This reprint has now reached a third edition, and it seems appropriate to allude briefly to two collections of diplomatic documents which have appeared since the issue of the second edition, and which throw a vivid light upon the facts adduced and the arguments advanced by the Author in the Spring of 191 2 — the date of the original publication. The first of these collections is contained in the French Yellow Book^ on the war. The documents it embraces demonstrate beyond any possibility of doubt the capital role played by the Morocco quarrel in bringing about the cataclysm which has overwhelmed civilisation. If these documents, upon which I have commented in a recent pamphlet,^ stood alone, they would justify to the hilt what I wrote here, three-and-a-half years ago. But they do not stand alone. It now transpires that at the very time I was engaged in v/riting this book the diplomatic representatives of a neutral country, which has since suffered so cruelly — Belgium — resident at Berlin, London and Paris, were expressing to their Government, precisely the same views as to the character of Anglo-French diplomacy in the Morocco affair and* towards Germany generally, which I was endeavouring to express to the British Public ; that they were consumed by the same fears as I was, and that they had come tothe same conclusions as I had, reluctantly and by the sheer weight of evidence, arrived at. Moreover, they had! been expressing similar views for several years before m;y book appeared, and they continued to do so with an ever-increasing vehemence to within a few weeks of the crash^

1 P. xxiii.

3 "Morocco and Armageddon,' National Labour Press, idi.

So extraordinary, indeed, is the similarity, not only of ideas but, in some cases, of actual language, that I might have had access to the majority of these State documents when compiling my volume ! Never before, I imagine, have such disclosures become publicly accessible in the life-time of the contemporary generation.^ Never, certainly, has an author dealing with international affairs been able, in his life-time, to invoke such a mass of corroborative testimony. In many respects, indeed, these Belgian diplomatic reports go further than anything which is to be found in my book. My object was at once to appeal and to warn. They conceived it to be their duty not only to warn, but to denounce the diplomacy of the British and French Foreign Offices with a vigour as direct as it is uncompromising. These are samples of their language at the time of the second Morocco crisis : ** France signed the Algeciras Act with the firm intention ■of never observing it," writes Baron Greindl from Berlin (April, 191 1 ). " England, which has pushed France into the Moroccan morass, contemplates complacently her work," writes Baron Guillaume from Paris (April, 191 1). *' There will be much less chance of reaching an understanding with Germany if England takes part in the conversation," this from the same pen (July, 191 1). And again, in the course of a despatch, in which he states his disbelief in a French desire for war at that moment, and expresses '* very great confidence in the pacific sentiments of the German Emperor " :

** T experience, generally speaking, less faith in Great Britain's desire for peace, for she does not dislike to see other parties devouring one another. ... As I thought from the first day, the key of the situation is in London." (July, 191 1.)

IThe documents in question are 119 in number, and cover the period of 1905-1914. They were discovered in the Belgian Archives, and have been published in the original French and in German, by the German Government in the Norddeutsche AUgemeine Zeitung, of which they fill several special supplements in July and August. Their authenticity has not been questioned. The authors of the Reports are as follows :

Belgian diplomatic representatives accredited tcJ the British Government : Count de Lalaing and M. E. de Cartier.

Belgian diplomatic representatives accredited to the French Government : Baron Guillaume, Count d'Arschot Schoonhoven, and M. A, Leghait.

Belgian diplomatic representatives accredited to the German Government : Baron Greindl and Baron Beyens.

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** 1 am assured," writes the same Belgian diplomatist : " that the first intention of England was to propose tO' France that the two Governments should each send without delay a couple of men-of-war to Agadir. The Paris- Cabinet opposed the proposal in the strongest terms, and there it ended." (August, 191 1.)

The Count de Lalaing, referring to Lord Courtney's speech in the House of Lords criticising the policy of the Government on the ground that it appeared to aim at the isolation of Germany, remarks :

"It is rare to hear this truth stated in the British Parliament." (November, 191 1.)

There are several remarkable despatches towards the close of that year from Baron Greindl and Count de Lalaing, reviewing the crisis. The former writes :

'* Sir E. Grey declared that there is no secret Treaty between England and France other than the one which has been published.^ I do not question his sincerity; but it is none the less true that with or without a written or verbal engagement, everyone in England and France considers the entente cordiale as a defensive and offensive alliance against Germany. . . . The entente cordiale was founded, not on the positive basis of a defence of common interests, but on the negative basis of hatred against the German Empire. . . . It is the entente which has revived the spirit of revenge in France which had largely subsided. The condition of anxiety and discomfort in which Europe has been writhing for the past seven years originates with it."

" . . . . Until advised to the contrary, we must, / therefore, regard as admitted that the project of helping France in a war with Germany by landing 150,000 mea has been discussed in London. ^ There is nothing in this which need surprise us. It is the continuance of the singular proposals which were made a few years ago to General Ducarne by Colonel Barnardiston.-^ . . . Was

l/.e., the»secret clauses of the Anglo-French Declaration and the Secret Franco-Spanish Convention, revealed by the French newspaper* in November, 191 1.

2 Compare with p. 146 of text and foot-note (i) to p. xxv.

3 In connection with the possible landing of British troops in Belgium. The statements made by Colonel Barnardiston, our military attach^, have been disavowed by Sir E. Grey.

it not tantamount to claiming a right of veto upon German enterprise to raise such a clamour because a German war-vessel had anchored at Agadir when England had observed without a tremor the progressive conquest of Moroccan territory by France and the crushing of the Sultan's independence? England could not act otherwise. I She was tied by her secret Treaty with France. The* explanation is of the simplest — but not at all calculated L to appease German irritation. The consequence (of the f secret Treaty) was that, that at the very moment the Act | of Algeciras was signed, three at least of the participating : Powers were contracting undertakings among themselves i which were incompatible with their public professions.^ (December, 191 1.)

Count de Lalaing is equally outspoken. Commenting upon the reaction which set in against the anti-German character of our diplomacy when the facts became better known and the nation realised that it had stood on the brink of war, Belgium's representative in London remarks :

'* People here hardly dare to admit that they have been more loyalist than the King, more intractable than the friend they desired to support. ^ . . . The entente, solely designed to dispel certain specified clouds, was not an Alliance. The fault of the Asquith Government has been to look upon it, in fact, as such, wath the result that serious enmity against Great Britain has arisen in Berlin.'* (January, 191 2.)

All through 191 2 and 19 13 we find anxiety displayed by these Belgian diplomatists as to the far-reaching effect of the Morocco affair upon the peace of the world. In this respect Baron Guillaume's despatches from Paris are most illuminating. The growing popularity of President Poincar^ he considers ominous :

'' One must see in this, first of all a manifestation of the old French jingoistic spirit which had been eclipsed for many years, but which has assumed new life since the Agadir incident. M. Poincar^ is a Lorrainer, and never loses an occasion to recall it. He was the collaborator and instigator of the militarist policy of M. Millerand. " (February, 1913.)

1 Compare with Chapter XIII

2 Compare with p. 148 of the text.

^xiii

The dangerous lengths to which French jingoism is proceeding is the constant theme of the Belgian despatches, and the sinister effect of the Morocco affair is alluded to :

** Steps should be taken to stop this tendency which the Government has really encouraged since the Agadir affair and the formation of the Poincar^-Millerand- Delcasse Ministry. . . . Half the theatres in Paris are now playing jingo pieces. . . . The Journal publishes this morning an article entitled ' To the Frontier.* " (April, 1913.)

The pessimistic note becomes more and more accentuated :

The propaganda in favour of the three years (military) law which is calculated to bring about an awakening of chauvinism, has been admirably prepared and carried out ; it began by bringing about the election of M. Poincar^ to the Presidency. It continues its work without thought of the dangers to which it gives rise ; uneasiness is great in the country. 'V (June, 1913.)

In a grave passage he denounces French chauvinism (or rather the chauvinism of certain powerful French political groups, ** the General Staff and the jingoes," because he pays a tribute to the generally pacific dispositions of the French people) as a danger to Europe and Belgium :

" I have already had the honour of reporting that it is Messrs. Poincare, Delcasse, Millerand, and their friends who have invented and pursued the nationalist, boastful and chauvinistic policy, whose renascence we are witnessing. It is a danger for Europe and for Belgium. I see in it the greatest peril which threatens the peace of Europe to-day, not because I am entitled to suppose that the Government of the Republic intends deliberately to break it — I think rather the contrary — but because the attitude of the Barthou Cabinet is, in my opinion, the determining cause of the increase of military tendencies in Germany."

In the same despatch he refers to the incessant calls for more soldiers from the French military commanders in Morocco. (January, 1914.) A few days before Baron Guillaume was expressing himself thus, Count de Lalaing was reporting from London that the fall of the Barthou Cabinet was looked upon as an attack upon President

Poincar^, ''persona grata with the London Cabinet"; that the opposition in France to the three-years' law was regarded " with some bitterness," and that the somewhat "unusual" course had been taken to issue an exchange -of official telegrams with the new French Premier (M. Barthou's successor) and with M. Sazanoff, the Russian Foreign Minister, announcing a common intention to collaborate in maintaining the Franco-Russian alliance. The bellicosity of M. Poincar^, " persona grata with the London Cabinet," continues to be accentuated by the Belgian Minister in Paris, Baron Guillaume. He speaks -of the *' military and nationalist policy " which M. Poincare has ** systematically pursued since he became Premier " :

*' With Messrs. Delcass^, Millerand, and a few others he postulated persistently a political and military uplifting (relevement) for France, combined with closer and more trusting relations with Russia. He went to Petrograd as Premier ; he will return thither in a few months as President. He recently despatched thither M. Delcass6, to whom he had confided the mission of seeking by every means to exalt the benefits of the Franco-Russian alliance and to induce the great Empire to accentuate its military preparations. (March, 1914.)

Baron Guillaume insists again and again upon the impossibility in which France will find herself to maintain the three-years' law for more than a relatively short period. He speaks of the dislike of the country for the law and of the extreme violence of the Paris Press campaign in favour of it :

" Every possible means has been adopted to influence public opinion, even to the point of seeking to compromise General Joffre. We have even seen the French Ambassador at Petrograd take a step — contrary to all usages — and somewhat dangerous for the future of France. Is it true that the Petrograd Cabinet imposed the three-years' law upon this country, and is pressing with all its weight for the maintenance of that law? I have not been able to secure light upon this delicate matter, but it would be all the graver because the men who direct the destiny of the Empire of the Tsars cannot be ignorant that the effort which is being thus demanded of the French people is excessive and cannot be long sustained. Is. then, the

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attitude of the Cabinet of Petrograd based upon the conviction that events are near enoug-h to use the tool which it intends to place in the hands of its ally." (June, 1914.)

A week later the Count de Lalaing reports what he conceives to be the British view, which is that the three-years' law " can alone permit the Republic to honour the engagements which bind it to its ally, Russia, and to its friend England." The last despatch but one is from Baron Beyens in Berlin, who speaks of Russia, "who is directing the Dual Alliance to her exclusive profit, and who is also increasing her armaments in enormous proportions. " He hopes that in the interests of Belgium the three-years' law may be dropped.

Such is a very bald epitome of some of the Belgian documents which have now seen the light of day, which have doubtless been communicated to the Government of every neutral State, and which have probably appeared in the papers of neutral countries. Their importance to the people of Britain and of France in the future work of European reconstruction, in consort with the people of Germany — which is the world's only hope — cannot be exaggerated. Their character is such as to bring conviction to any sane mind that if the Entente Governments imagined themselves to be threatened by the Teutonic Powers, the latter had equally good reason to believe themselves threatened by the Governments of the Entente. In the eyes of these Belgian diplomatists, neutral observers stationed in the innermost sanctuaries of the great world of diplomatic intrigue, British and French diplomacy had for the past seven years been steadily directed to the isolation and discomfiture of Germany all over the world. If they thought that, how must the German Government, and Germany's diplomatic representatives abroad, have interpreted the situation ! In the face of these documents the charge that Germany cynically planned this war and let Hell loose upon Europe is no longer tenable by anyone who retains a sense of judgment. The blame has not been hers alone. Ten years of secret diplomacy have done their deadly work. If the British Parliament were wisely inspired it would insist upon the integral publication of these documents in this country.

E. D. Morel.

Preface To Fourth Edition

"Ten Years of Secret Diplomacy '' goes to a fourth edition. This shows that the importance of the Morocco intrigue as a factor in producing the great war is becoming increasingly evident to a considerable body of opinion. And therein lies hope for the future. For, unless a contemplation of the universal wreckage induces a grim resolve to investigate its origin, in order to avoid its repetition, the future is black indeed.

In the Personal Foreword to ** Truth and the War '* — a later book which contains a brief summary of the Morocco affair, and which should be read in connection with " Ten Years of Secret Diplomacy " — mention is made of a number of books, by different authors, on international relations published since the third edition, and in which the facts collected in this work receive generous acknowledgment. But these facts continue to be studiously ignored by the great majority of writers on public affairs. The falsification of events which did duty in 1905, and again in 191 1, is perpetuated in 1916. Nothing that has since transpired is permitted to affect the parrot-like iteration of myths long exposed. Invincible determination to remain ignorant, or deliberate policy? Who shall tell? But when the Minister responsible for our foreign relations, and, therefore, presumed to possess a knowledge of history more profound than that of a leader writer on the Daily Mail, actually imputes^ sole responsibility to Germany . . . for the war, not of 1914, hut of i8'/o, we can hardly expect a regard for accuracy concerning the Morocco affair from those who accept such a statement as that with unruffled equanimity. It is, therefore, all to the good that *' Ten Years of Secret Diplomacy " is still being read by people who desire to get at facts in order to form judgments.

E. D. Morel.

ILord Grey addressing the Foreign Press Association on October 23rd, 1916.

February 29, 19 12.

Perhaps I should preface this volume by a brief profession of faith which is my justification — to myself — for having written it.

I believe that the greatest national interest of the British people is at this moment, and will continue increasingly to be, the establishment and maintenance of friendly relations with Germany ; a full and frank examination by responsible statesmen in both countries of the national problems peculiar to each in their relations with one another, leading to an appreciation of their respective national necessities, and to a mutual adjustment of the same with the sacrifice neither of honour, nor prestige, nor legitimate needs on either side.