The Rudolf Steiner Archive

[ 1 ] Within the vast body of war literature, Dr. Jacob Ruchti's "Zur Geschichte des Kriegsausbruches nach den amtlichen Akten der königlich großbritannischen Regierung", which was awarded a prize by the historical seminar at the University of Bern, is of particular value. This is because it contains an examination that is carried out according to the strict rules of historical research and that scientific conscientiousness that the historian seeks when he wants to form an opinion about factual contexts. What is usually only attempted in the academic world long after the events in question have taken place, Ruchti undertakes for the events of the immediate present. After examining his work, it must be said that a favorable judgment of its content, an appreciation of its results need not be the consequence of the point of view towards the causes of war that one takes according to one's ethnicity or similar causes, but that the author's factually satisfactory scientific method can lead to such an appreciation for those who are at all accessible to scientifically obtainable convictions.

[ 2 ] Now many people are of the opinion that a discussion of the causes of war has already become a fruitless matter. But such a view cannot be maintained in the face of the way in which the statesmen and the press of the Entente are trying to persuade the world that they are compelled to continue the war in spite of the peace offer of the Central Powers. Among the reasons they give, the fact that the beginning of the war proves that peaceful coexistence with the Central Powers can only be achieved through a devastating blow by the Entente against these powers plays a very special role. Now Ruchti shows that this assertion is based on an untrue legend, forged by the Entente against the statements of its own documents, in order to teach the world the view that it considers good to teach it about the outcome and aim of the war. Admittedly, Ruchti's conclusion has already been stated many times and in various forms. But the significance of his writing lies firstly in his scientific treatment of the facts, and secondly in the fact that a member of a neutral state unreservedly communicates his findings, and that a scientific seminar of this state finds the writing to be so in line with scientific requirements that it crowns it with a prize. Ruchti's style also remains that of a scientific researcher, who nowhere goes beyond what the sources reveal; indeed, in the manner of such a researcher, he draws attention at the appropriate points to exactly where the factual material becomes uncertain and objective judgment must be withheld. He relies almost exclusively on English documents and uses the other states only to supplement this or that factual account. And by this method he arrives at a result which may be summarized in the following words. The assertions by which the statesmen of the Entente seek to persuade the world are recognized by the English documents as the opposite of the truth. The whole fabric of assertions made by Grey and his comrades about the Entente statesmen's efforts for peace falls apart before Ruchti's scientific analysis and becomes one that shows only the appearance of peace efforts, but which in reality was not only bound to lead to war between Russia and France on the one hand and Germany and Austria on the other, but was also likely to place England on the side of the former powers. It is clear from these explanations how Sasonov makes the dispute between Austria and Serbia the starting point of a European conflict and how Grey makes this Russian starting point his own from the outset and establishes his so-called peace efforts from it. There is not the slightest evidence that it could have occurred to Grey to arrange his diplomatic steps in such a way that Russia would have been forced to let Austria fight out its dispute with Serbia alone. Since Austria had given the assurance that she intended to achieve nothing else by her warlike measures against Serbia than the complete recognition of her ultimatum, and this ultimatum demanded nothing but a reasonable attitude on the part of Serbia towards the Austrian state within its present boundaries, there would have been no reason for war for any other power if Grey had dissuaded Russia from interfering in the Austro-Serbian dispute. As a result, however, England was Russia's ally and opponent of the Central Powers from the outset, and Grey had initiated a policy that was bound to lead to the war in the form in which it came about. In contrast to what Grey did, the assertion that he did not succeed in maintaining peace only because Germany did not want it, turns out to be a reprehensible untruth precisely because it is as likely as possible to mislead the world by emphasizing a truth that is quite self-evident but also quite meaningless. For it is certainly clear that England, and indeed France and even Russia, would have preferred peace to war if it had not been possible to use diplomatic means to reduce Germany and Austria to political insignificance vis-à-vis the Entente and make them submit to the Entente's will to power. It is not a question of whether Grey wanted peace or war, but of his attitude to the claims of those powers at the outbreak of war which were England's allies in the war. And Ruchti proves that Grey's position was such that war was necessarily brought about by his behavior. One may certainly add to Ruchti's evidence that Grey himself did not want to push for war, but that he was a weakling who was pushed to his steps by others. However, this does not alter the historical assessment of his actions. Ruchti succeeds completely in proving that Grey's diplomatic steps do not give him the slightest right to claim that he did anything to prevent the war. But the Swiss historian also succeeds in showing that the English statesmen behaved in such a way in the negotiations with Germany that they had been offered a reason for war by breaking neutrality towards Belgium, which they could have avoided if they had accepted certain offers from Germany. But they needed this reason for war in order to make it acceptable to their people, who could not have been persuaded to go to war because of Serbia and Russia's European claims. And a forgery was also necessary to persuade the people, as Ruchti proves in the English White Book. False dates in a correspondence that Grey had conducted were intended to show the English people how peace-loving France had been invaded by Germany. By falsifying dates, the impression was created that Germany had attacked France much earlier than was actually the case. In addition, in his war speech of August 6, 1914, Asquith simply concealed decisive negotiations with Germany with the same success of deceiving the people. By objectively weighing up all these facts, Ruchti forms a judgment that entitles him to present the so-called peace efforts of the English statesmen as an untrue legend and even to point out the forces driving them to war. At the end he utters the grave words: "History cannot be falsified in the long run, the legend cannot stand up to scientific research, the dark fabric will be brought to light and torn apart, no matter how artfully and finely it was woven." But for the time being, the Entente is still seeking in this dark fabric one of the means to foist its dark craft of war on the world as a necessity of civilization and the noblest humanity.

[ 1 ] The spokesmen of the Entente cite among the reasons why they must continue the war the fact that they have been invaded by Germany. They therefore claim that they must put Germany in such a position of powerlessness that from now on it is deprived of any possibility of carrying out an invasion. All other causes of this war are nebulously submerged in this form of moral accusation against Germany.

[ 2 ] It is undoubtedly the case that, in the face of this accusation, Germany is forced to explain in a completely unvarnished manner how it was driven into the war. Instead, we have so far only doctrinaire arguments about the causes of the war, which seem like the conclusions of a professor who does not recount what he has seen, but who explains from documents what he has learned about distant events. For this is also how all the statements of the German Chancellor about the events at the outbreak of war are presented. Such statements, however, are unsuitable for making an impression. One simply rejects them by countering them with unjustified or justified other things.

[ 3 ] If, on the other hand, one were simply to recount the facts, the following would emerge: 1. Germany was not prepared to take the initiative for war in the summer of 1914.

[ 4 ] 2. Austria-Hungary had long been compelled to do something to counteract the threat of being reduced in size by the union of the southern Slavs under the leadership of the non-Austrian Serbs from the south-east. It is easy to admit that the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand and the whole ultimatum story were only an occasion. If this occasion had not been taken, another one would have had to be taken at the next opportunity. Austria could not have remained Austria if it had not done something to secure its south-eastern provinces, or if it had not been able to resolve the Slav question by some other generous act. However, Austrian policy had bled to death on this other action since 1879. Or rather, it had bled itself to death because this other action could not be found. The Slav question could not be mastered. As far as Austria-Hungary is considered to be responsible for the origin of the war, and thus also Germany, whose participation took place because it could not leave Austria-Hungary in the lurch without having to fear that it would face the Entente after a few years without Austria's alliance, it must be recognized that the Slav question contains the reason for the origin of this war. The "other action" is therefore the international solution of the Slav question It is demanded of Austria, not of Russia. For Russia will always be able to throw its basic Slavic character into the balance of the solution. Austria-Hungary can only counter this weight with that of the liberation of the Western Slavs. This liberation can only take place from the point of view of the autonomization of all branches of national life that concern national existence and everything connected with it. One must not shy away from complete freedom in the sense of the autonomization and federalization of national life. This federalization is prefigured in German federal life, which is to a certain extent the model prefigured by history for that which must be further developed in Central Europe up to the complete federalist-liberal shaping of all those living conditions which have their impulse in man himself, i.e. which are not directly dependent, like military-political conditions, on geographical conditions, and, like economic conditions, on geographical-opportunistic conditions. The shaping of these conditions will only take place in a healthy way if the national is released from freedom, not freedom from the national. If one strives for the former instead of the latter, one places oneself on the ground of world-historical becoming. If one wants the latter, one works against this becoming and lays the foundation for new conflicts and wars.

[ 5 ] To demand of Austria's leading statesmen that they should therefore have refrained from issuing the ultimatum to Serbia would be to demand of them that they should have acted against the interests of the country they lead. Theorists of any color can make such a demand. A man who reckons with the existing facts should not seriously speak of such a thing. For if the southern Slavs had achieved what the leading Great Heirs wanted, Austria could not have been preserved in the form in which it existed under the actions of the other Austrian Slavs. One could still imagine that Austria would then have taken on a different form. But can one expect a leading Austrian statesman to wait resignedly for such an outcome? Obviously, one could only do so if one were of the opinion that it was one of the absolute requirements of an Austrian statesman to be an absolute pacifist and to fatally await the fate of the empire. Under any other condition one must understand Austria's step with regard to the ultimatum.

[ 6 ] 3. Once Austria had issued the ultimatum, the further course of events could only be halted if Russia remained passive. As soon as Russia took an aggressive step, nothing could stop what followed.

[ 7 ] 4. Just as true as all this is, it is equally true that everyone in Germany who reckoned with the facts had a vague feeling: once the implied entanglements reached a critical stage, there would be war. It would be impossible to escape this war. And responsible people were of the opinion that, if it became necessary, this war would have to be fought with all our might. Certainly no one in Germany had any serious intention of waging war on their own initiative. One can prove to the Entente that it had not the slightest reason to believe in a war of aggression on the part of Germany. It can be forced to admit that it believed that Germany would become so powerful without war that this power would be dangerous to the powers now united in the Entente. But it will be necessary to conduct such political evidence quite differently from what has hitherto been done; for this is not political evidence, but only the making of political assertions, which others may find brutal. The Entente Powers believed that if things went on like this, they could not know what would happen to Germany; therefore a war with Germany was inevitable. Germany could take the position: we do not need war; but without war we will gain what the Entente states will not let us have without war; therefore we must be ready for this war and, if it threatens, take it in such a way that we cannot be harmed by it. All this also applies to the Serbian question and Austria. Austria could no longer cope with Serbia in 1914 without war, at least that must have been the conviction of its statesmen.

[ 8 ] However, if the Entente had decided that Austria-Hungary could have dealt with Serbia alone, then the general war would not have been necessary. The real reason for the war must therefore not be sought in the Central Powers, but in the fact that the Entente did not want to leave these Central Powers as they were in their balance of power after 1914. However, if the "other action" referred to above had taken place before 1914, then the Serbs would not have developed any international opposition to Austria-Hungary, and both the ultimatum and Russia's interference would not have been possible. And if Russia had turned against Central Europe at any time purely for reasons of conquest, it could not have found England on its side. Since the submarine was purely a means of war until the war, but America absolutely could not have entered the war with the European Central Powers without this means of war, only England need be taken into account for the question of peace in the sense indicated.

[ 9 ] 5. What should now be communicated to the world is:

[ 10 ] a) that Germany, as far as the personalities who had to decide on the outbreak of war are concerned, was completely surprised by the events of July 1914, that nobody foresaw them. This applies in particular to the attitude of Russia;

[ 11 ] b) that the responsible thinker in Germany could not help but assume that if Russia attacked, France would do so too;

[ 12 ] c) that Germany had been preparing its two-front war for this eventuality for years and had no choice but to launch it in the face of precipitating events unless it received a certain guarantee from the Western powers that France would not attack. This guarantee could only come from England ;

[ 13 ] d) that if England had given this guarantee, Germany would only have gone to war against Russia;

[ 14 ] e) that German diplomacy had believed that, as a result of the relationship it had established with England in recent years, England would act in the sense of such a guarantee;

[ 15 ] f) that German diplomacy was completely mistaken with regard to England's forthcoming policy, and that under the impression of this deception the march through Belgium was set in motion, which would have been refrained from if England had given the implied guarantee. It should be announced to the world in no uncertain terms that the invasion of Belgium was only set in motion when German diplomacy was surprised by the King of England's announcement that it was mistaken in waiting for such a guarantee from England. It is incomprehensible why the German government did not do what it unambiguously could: namely, prove that it would not have undertaken the invasion of Belgium if the decisive telegram from the King of England had stated otherwise. The whole further course of the war really depended on this decisive turn of events, and nothing was done by Germany to bring this decisive fact to the general knowledge of the world. If one knew this fact correctly, one would have to say that English policy had been misjudged at the decisive points in Germany, but one could not fail to recognize that England was the decisive factor in the Belgian question. Such language on the part of Germany would, however, present a difficulty to Russia, because Russia would see from it what it owed to England for this war. This difficulty could only be overcome if it were possible to show Russia that she had less to expect from England's friendship than from Germany's. This, of course, cannot happen without Germany undertaking at the present moment, in conjunction with Austria-Hungary, to develop a generous policy by which Wilson's program, launched without knowledge of European conditions, will be defeated from the field.

[ 16 ] It may seem practical to say that it is of no value today to talk about the causes of the war. But it is the most impractical thing imaginable in relation to the actual circumstances. For in fact the Entente has been waging war for a long time with its presentation of the causes of the war. It owes the situation it has created for itself to the fact that its presentation is believed for the reason that it has not yet been answered by Germany with anything effective. While Germany could show that it contributed nothing to the outbreak of war, that it was driven into the breach of neutrality towards Belgium only by England's behavior, Germany's official statements are still made in such a way that no one living outside Germany is prevented from forming the opinion that it was in Germany's hands not to start the war. It is not enough to compile the documents as they have been. For this compilation results in something that can be doubted by anyone, whereas the unvarnished presentation of the facts should in fact prove Germany's innocence. Anyone with an understanding of such things will know that the speeches made by the responsible men in Germany are not understood at all by the psyches of the people in the enemy countries and also in the neutral countries and are therefore only taken as a cover-up of the truth. To say that it would help nothing to speak differently in the face of the hatred of the enemy would only be justified if one had even made the attempt to really speak differently. One should not bring this hatred into the field at all, because this is simply naive; for this hatred is only the drapery of war, is only the slime of those who want or have to accompany the unspeakably sad events with their speeches, or of those who seek an effective means of achieving this or that by inciting this hatred. The war is being waged by France and Russia for reasons that are well known. And it is being waged by England merely as an economic war; but as an economic war which is the result of everything that has long been in preparation in England. To speak of the encirclement by King Edward and similar trifles in the face of the realities of English policy is like seeing a boy run away from a peg which afterwards falls over, and then saying that the boy caused the peg to fall because he shook it a little, when in fact the peg had long been so damaged that it needed only a slight impulse on the part of the boy to cause it to fall. The truth is that for many years England has understood how to pursue a policy based on the real conditions of Europe in a sense that seemed favorable to her, which was like a scientific exploitation of the existing forces of nations and states. Nowhere except in England did politics have a completely objective, coherent character. Take the popular forces at work in the Balkans, take what was going on in Austria, and from there look at the political formulas that existed in England among the initiated circles. These formulas always included: This and that will happen in the Balkans; England has to do this. And events moved in the direction indicated, and English policy moved in parallel. In England one could find phrases incorporated into such formulas as this: The Russian Empire will perish in its present form so that the Russian people may live. And the conditions of this people are such that it will be possible to carry out socialist experiments there, for which there is no possibility in Western Europe. Anyone who follows England's policy can see that it has always been designed on a grand scale to turn all such and many other points of view in England's favor. And in this it benefited from the fact that in Europe it proceeded solely from such points of view and thereby made its diplomatic advantages possible. Its policy always worked in the interests of the real forces of the people and the state, and it endeavored to make these forces serve its economic advantage. It worked to its advantage. Others do that too, of course. But England also worked in the direction of what could be realized by the forces within herself, while others did not engage in the observation of such forces, indeed would only have smiled nobly if they had been told of such forces. England's whole state structure is geared to such truly practical work. Others will only be able to develop an art of statecraft equal to that of England when what has been indicated will no longer be an English secret, but when it will be common property. Just think how infinitely naïve it was to believe that the Baghdad Railway problem could be tackled from Germany, because from there this problem was approached as if it were only necessary to tackle something like the construction of a road that had been agreed upon with one's neighbors. Or, to speak of something even more far-reaching, how did Austria think of organizing its relationship with the Balkans without bringing forces into play which, conceived from the popular and national forces of the Balkans, could paralyse England's trump cards? England not only did this and that at a given point in time, but also directed international forces in such a way that they ran in its direction at the right moment. In order to do this, one must firstly know these forces and secondly develop within oneself what is in the interests of these forces. Austria-Hungary should therefore have acted at the right time to bring the Southern Slav forces in the Austrian direction; Germany should have brought the Baghdad Railway interests in the direction of the economic-opportunistic forces, instead of the former turning into the Russian and thus into the Russian-English line, the latter into the English line.

[ 17 ] The war must lead Central Europe to become aware of what exists in the life of nations, states and economies. This alone can force England not to continue to behave towards the other states by way of superior diplomacy, but to negotiate with them as equals about what is to be negotiated between European human communities. Without the fulfillment of this condition, all imitation of English parliamentarianism in Central Europe is nothing more than a means of throwing sand in one's own eyes. In England a few people will always find ways and means of having their real policy carried out by their parliament, whereas German and Austrian action will not become a clever one merely because it is decided by an assembly of about 500 deputies instead of a few statesmen. One can hardly imagine anything more unfortunate than the superstition that it will work a magic spell if one adds to the rest of what one has put up with from England the fact that one allows the democratic template to be imposed by it. This is not to say that Central Europe should not experience a further development in the sense of an internal political organization, but such a development must not be an imitation of Western European so-called democratism, but it must bring precisely that which this democratism would prevent in Central Europe because of its special circumstances. For this so-called democratism is only suited to making the people of Central Europe a part of Anglo-American world domination, and if one were also to become involved in the so-called intergovernmental organization of the present internationalists, then one would have the good prospect of always being outvoted as a Central European within this intergovernmental organization.

[ 18 ] What is important is to show from Central European life the impulses which really lie here, and which the Western opponents, when they are pointed out, will see that they will have to bleed to death from them if the war continues. Against pretensions to power, the opponents can and will use their power as long as they remain pretensions. They will take up arms against real forces of power. Wilson's so effective manifestations must be countered by what can really be done in Central Europe to liberate the lives of the peoples, while his words can give them nothing but Anglo-American world domination. Agreement with Russia need not be seeked by a Central European program of reality; for this is self-evident. Such a Central European program must not contain anything that is merely an internal matter of state, but only that which has something to do with external relations. But of course it must be seen properly in this direction; for whether a person can think well is certainly a matter of his internal organization, but whether he acts outwardly in this or that direction through this good thinking is not an internal matter.

[ 19 ] Therefore, only a Central European program can beat the Wilsonian, which is real, that is, which does not emphasize this or that desirable thing, but which is simply a paraphrase of what Central Europe can do, because it has the forces within itself to do so.

[ 20 ] This includes:

[ 21 ] 1. that one should realize that the subject of a democratic representation of the people can only be purely political, military and police matters. These are only possible on the basis of the historically formed background. If they are represented in a people's representation and administered by a civil service responsible to this people's representation, they necessarily develop conservatively. An external proof of this is that since the outbreak of war even the Social Democracy has become conservative in these matters. And it will become even more so the more it is forced to think sensibly and objectively by the fact that only political, military and police matters can really be the subject of the people's representations. Within such an institution, German individualism can also unfold with its federal system, which is not an accidental thing, but is inherent in the German national character.

[ 22 ] 2. all economic affairs shall be organized in a special economic parliament. When this parliament is relieved of all political and military matters, it will conduct its affairs purely in a manner appropriate to them, namely opportunistically. The administrative officials of these economic affairs, within whose area also lies the entire customs legislation, are directly responsible only to the economic parliament.

[ 23 ] 3. All legal, educational and intellectual matters shall be left to the freedom of the individual. In this field the state has only the police power, not the initiative. What is meant here is only apparently radical. In reality, only those who do not want to face the facts impartially can be offended by what is meant here. The state leaves it up to the corporations of the subject, the profession and the people to establish their courts, their schools, their churches and so on, and it leaves it up to the individual to choose his school, his church, his judge. Not from case to case, of course, but for a certain period of time. In the beginning, this will probably have to be limited by territorial borders, but it carries the possibility of peacefully reconciling national differences, including other differences. It even carries the possibility of creating something real in place of the shadowy arbitration of states. National or other agitators are thus completely deprived of their powers. No Italian in Trieste would find supporters in this city if everyone could develop his national forces in it, even though, for obvious opportunistic reasons, his economic interests are organized in Vienna, and even though his gendarme is paid from Vienna.

[ 24 ] The political entities of Europe could thus develop on the basis of a healthy conservatism, which can never be concerned with the dismemberment of Austria, but at most with its expansion.

[ 25 ] The economic entities would develop in an opportunistically healthy manner; for no one can want Trieste in an economic entity in which it must perish economically, if the economic entity does not prevent him from doing what he wants ecclesiastically, nationally and so on.

[ 26 ] Cultural affairs will be freed from the pressure exerted on them by economic and political matters, and they will cease to exert any pressure on them. All these cultural affairs will be kept in constant healthy motion. A kind of senate, elected from the three bodies responsible for the organization of politico-military, economic and legal-educational affairs, takes care of the common affairs, including, for example, the common finances.

[ 27 ] No one who thinks in terms of the actual conditions in Central Europe will doubt the feasibility of what is stated in this description. For nothing at all is demanded here that is to be carried out, but only what wants to be carried out is shown, and what succeeds at the same moment that it is given free rein.

[ 28 ] If one recognizes this, then it becomes clear above all why we have this war and why, under the false flag of the liberation of nations, it is a war for the suppression of the German people, in the broader sense for the suppression of all independent national life in Central Europe. If one strips the Wilsonian program, which is the latest paraphrase of the Entente's cover programs, one comes to the conclusion that its implementation would mean nothing other than the destruction of this Central European freedom. This is not hindered by the fact that Wilson speaks of the freedom of nations; for the world is not judged by words, but by facts which follow from the realization of these words. Central Europe needs real freedom, but Wilson is not talking about real freedom at all. The entire Western world has no concept at all of the real freedom that Central Europe needs. They talk about the freedom of nations and do not mean the real freedom of the people, but a fictitious collective freedom of human associations, as they have developed in the Western European states and in America. According to the special conditions of Central Europe, this collective freedom cannot result from international conditions, so it can never be the subject of an international agreement such as can form the basis of a peace treaty. In Central Europe the collective freedom of the peoples must result from general human freedom, and it will result if a clear path is created for it by the separation of all circles of life that do not belong to purely political, military and economic life. It is quite natural that those who always reckon only with their ideas, not with reality, should raise such objections to such a detachment as can be found in a recently published book, namely in Krieck's "Die deutsche Staatsidee" on page 167 f.: "Occasionally, among others by E. von Hartmann, the demand for an economic parliament alongside the representation of the people was raised. The idea lies entirely in the direction of economic and social development. But apart from the fact that a new large wheel would increase the already abundant awkwardness and friction of the machine, it would be impossible to delimit the responsibilities of two parliaments against each other." With this idea it should be observed that it must be admitted here that it arises from the real conditions of development, must therefore be carried out and must not be rejected against development because its realization is difficult to find. For if one stops short of such difficulties in reality, one creates entanglements which later discharge themselves violently, and ultimately this war, in the peculiarity in which it is lived out, is the discharge of difficulties which one has neglected to clear away by the right, different path while there was still time to do so.

[ 29 ] The Wilsonian program assumes to make impossible in the world what is the legitimate task and the condition of life of the Central European states. It must be countered with what will happen in Central Europe if this event is not disrupted by the violent destruction of Central European life. He must be shown what only Central Europe can do on the basis of what has happened here historically, if it does not join forces with the Entente, which can have no interest at all in leading Central Europe towards its natural development.

[ 30 ] As things stand today, Germany and Austria only have the choice between the following three things:

[ 31 ] 1. to wait under all circumstances for a victory of their weapons, and to hope from it the possibility of being able to carry out their Central European task.

[ 32 ] 2. to enter into peace with the Entente on the basis of its present program and thus to approach its certain destruction.

[ 33 ] 3. to say what they will regard as the result of peace in terms of real conditions, and thus to present the world with the opportunity, after clear insight into the conditions and the will of Central Europe, to let the peoples choose between a real program that brings real freedom to the European people and thus quite naturally the freedom of the peoples, or the sham programs of the West and America, which speak of freedom but in reality bring the impossibility of life for all of Europe. For the time being, we in Central Europe give the impression that we are afraid to tell the West what we must want, while the West simply showers us with the manifestations of its will. In this way the West creates the impression that it alone wants something for the salvation of mankind, and that we are only anxious to disturb these laudable endeavors by all sorts of things like militarism, while in truth it is the creator of our militarism, because it has long set itself up to turn us into shadow people and wants to do so even better. Certainly, such and similar things have often been said, but the important thing is not that they are said by this or that person, but that they really become the leitmotif of Central European action, and that the world learns to recognize that it has no other action to expect from Central Europe than one that must take up the sword when the others force this sword into its hands. What the Western peoples now call German militarism, they have forged over centuries of development, and it can only be up to them, not to Germany, to deprive it of its meaning for Central Europe. But it is up to Central Europe to make its will for freedom clear, a will that cannot be built on programs in the Wilsonian manner, but on the reality of human existence.

[ 34 ] There is therefore only one peace program for Central Europe, and that is: to let the world know that peace is immediately possible if the Entente replaces its present, untrue peace program with one that is true, because in its realization it will not bring about the downfall but the possibility of life for Central Europe. All other questions that can become the subject of peace efforts will be resolved if they are tackled on the basis of these premises. Peace is impossible on the basis now offered to us by the Entente and accepted by Wilson. If no other is substituted, the German people could only be brought to accept this program by force, and the further course of European history would prove the correctness of what has been said here, for if Wilson's program is realized, the European peoples will perish. In Central Europe we must face without illusion what those personalities have believed for many years, which they regard from their point of view as the law of world development: that the future of world development belongs to the Anglo-American race, and that it must take over the inheritance of the Latin-Roman race and the education of Russianness. When this world-political formula is invoked by an Englishman or American who thinks himself initiated, it is always remarked that the German element has no say in the ordering of the world because of its insignificance in world-political matters, that the Romanic element need not be taken into consideration because it is dying out anyway, and that the Russian element has the one who makes himself its far-historical educator. One might think little of such a creed if it lived in the minds of a few people who were susceptible to political fantasies or Utopias, but English policy uses innumerable ways to make this program the practical content of its real world policy, and from England's point of view the present coalition in which she finds herself could not be more favorable than it is when it comes to the realization of this program. But there is nothing that Central Europe can oppose to this but a truly human liberating program, which can become a reality at any moment if human will is committed to its realization. One can perhaps think that peace will be a long time in coming, even if the program meant here is presented to the European peoples, since it cannot be carried out during the war and, moreover, would be presented as such by the Entente peoples, as if it had been presented by the leaders of Central Europe only to deceive the peoples, while after the war what the Entente leaders present as the terrible thing they had to eliminate from the world for moral reasons in a "struggle for freedom and justice of the peoples" would simply happen again. But anyone who judges the world correctly according to the facts, not according to his favorite opinions, can know that everything that corresponds to reality has a completely different persuasive value than that which comes from mere arbitrariness. And we can wait and see what will become apparent to those who will realize that with the Central European programme the peoples of the Entente will only lose the possibility of destroying Central Europe, but nothing will flow from it that would be incompatible with any real life impulse of the Entente peoples. As long as we remain in the realm of masked aspirations, understanding will be impossible; as soon as the realities behind the masks are revealed, not only militarily but also politically, the present events will take on a completely different form. The world has come to know the weapons of Central Europe for the salvation of this Central Europe; the political will, as far as Central Europe is concerned, is a closed book to the world. But every day the world is presented with a horrifying picture of what a terrible thing this Central Europe actually is, worthy of destruction. And it looks to the world as if Central Europe only has to remain silent about this horror, which of course must appear to the world like a yes to it.

[ 35 ] It is quite natural that innumerable misgivings arise in everyone's mind when he wants to think about how what is indicated here should be carried out in detail, but such misgivings would only come into consideration if what is presented were conceived as a program which an individual or a society should go about realizing. But that is not how it is conceived; indeed, it would refute itself if it were conceived that way. It is intended as an expression of what the peoples of Central Europe will do when governments set themselves the task of recognizing and releasing the forces of the people. What will happen in detail will always become apparent when such things are put into practice. For they are not prescriptions about what has to happen, but predictions of what will happen if things are allowed to take the course demanded by their own reality. And this own reality prescribes, with regard to all religious and spiritual-cultural matters, to which the national also belongs, administration by corporations, to which the individual person professes of his own free will, and which are administered in their parliaments as corporations, so that this parliament has to do only with the corporation in question, but never with the relationship of this corporation to the individual person. And never may a corporation deal with a person belonging to another corporation from the same point of view. Such corporations are admitted to the circle of parliament when they unite a certain number of persons. Until then, they remain a private matter in which no authority or representative body has the right to interfere. For those for whom it is a sour apple that from such points of view all intellectual cultural matters must in future be deprived of privileges, they will have to bite into this sour apple for the salvation of the people's existence. As people become more and more accustomed to this privilege, it will be difficult to realize in many circles that we must return to the good old, ancient principle of free corporatization by way of privileging the intellectual professions in particular. And that the corporation should make a person capable in his profession, but that the exercise of this profession should not be privileged, but left to free competition and free human choice. This will be difficult to understand for those who like to say that people are not ready for this or that. In reality, this objection will not come into consideration anyway, because with the exception of the necessarily free professions, the choice of the petitioners will be decided by the corporation.

[ 36 ] Neither can difficulties arise with regard to the political and the economic, which could not be remedied in reality by realizing what is intended. How, for example, pedagogical institutions must come about, which in their guidelines touch on the two representations that do not include the actual pedagogy itself, is a matter for the higher senate.

[ 1 ] "No people shall be compelled to live under a rule to which it objects. Change of possession and return to former sovereignty shall be permitted only in those countries where the people themselves demand change and return in order to secure their freedom, comfort and future happiness ... The liberated peoples of the whole earth must unite in a sincere sense of community ... to form a firm union which, with the united forces of all, will be able to protect peace and justice in the intercourse of nations. Fraternity must no longer be an empty word: it must become a universally recognized concept that rests on the rock of reality."

[ 2 ] This is how Mr. W. Wilson describes what America's participation in this war should make a reality. They are captivating words, to which one can say that every sensible man of sound mind must subscribe. If they were written down by a philanthropist for the edification of a readership, one could stop at the recognition of their self-evidence. One could also assert, with the gesture of a moralist, that anyone who objects to them cannot be a friend of progress and freedom. One can even hear voices today that emphasize that this war has taught the lesson that only those who profess such or similar ideals and act accordingly are currently pursuing a higher, contemporary policy.

[ 3 ] It is in any case a thankless task to be forced to oppose ideas that seem to have the reason and the heart of men for themselves to such an extent. Which, moreover, seem to be the result of the "true historical development of mankind towards the noblest democracy". And yet the following must be built on the basis that the commitment to Wilson's will must not only be a logical vice for the members of the Central and Eastern European peoples, but also that within this war and after it, every single action and measure must be taken in such a way that this Wilsonian will must be broken by the health and fruitfulness of these measures and actions.

[ 4 ] The war aims of the Entente, which strive to obscure their true form, are questionably concealed in this expression which Mr. Wilson has given to his will. One has to deal with the latter at the same time as one deals with the former. No matter how ingenious a conceptual refutation of Wilson's "program" may be, it should not matter at this time. We are not currently dealing with disputes that are supposed to decide who is right or wrong. In the field we are dealing with here, only what happens or what carries the seeds of what happens has value. And thoughts that are thought and discussed in Central Europe as seeds for the actions of today and tomorrow only have value if they are held in this sense.

[ 5 ] Wilson's words are not spoken by a writerly philanthropist. They are the flag for deeds which the Americans are arming themselves to do, and which the Entente has been accomplishing against Central Europe for three years. The facts are that Central Europe has to fight against that which claims behind this flag to be fighting for the salvation of mankind, for the liberation of the peoples. The Entente and Wilson say what they claim to be fighting for. Their words have advertising power. Their advertising power is becoming increasingly alarming. There are people in Central Europe who certainly don't want to admit that they are parroting Wilson, but whose ideas sound not dissimilar to his words.

[ 6 ] Those who know the origins of this war in a deeper sense cannot but emphasize the necessity that the Entente-Wilson programme be rejected by Central Europe in the strongest possible terms. For the real prospect of this program - apart from its moral blindness - lies in the fact that it seeks to use the instincts of the peoples of Central and Eastern Europe to bring these peoples into economic dependence on Anglo-Americanism through moral and political overpowering. Spiritual dependence would then only be the necessary real consequence. Anyone who knows that since the last century the "coming world war" has been spoken of in initiated English circles as the event that must bring world domination to the Anglo-American race cannot attach any particular importance to the fact that the Entente peoples were surprised by this war or that they wanted to prevent it, even if these assurances should have subjective truth among those who are currently uttering them. For those who spoke of the "coming world war" as an inevitable event were reckoning with the real historical and national forces of Europe. They reckoned with the instincts of the European, especially the Slavic peoples. And they wanted to direct the ideals of these Slavic peoples and use them in such a way that they would serve the national egoism of Anglo-Americanism. They were also counting on the downfall of Romanism, on whose "ruins they wanted to spread themselves out. They were therefore counting on generous historical-ethnic points of view, which they wanted to put at the service of their own aims. And these goals, no matter how strongly denied by the Entente, lead to the intention of crushing the Central European state formations.

[ 7 ] Only the realization that this is the case can provide Central Europe with the impetus that will lead it out of the chaos of the present. The Central European states can only take the position of rendering the Entente program ineffective through their own measures. This Entente program is based - whether more or less pronounced or unspoken - on three preconditions:

[ 8 ] 1. that the Central European state formations which have become historical must not be recognized - from the point of view of the Entente - as those which are responsible for solving the problems of European peoples;

[ 9 ] 2. that these Central European states must be economically dependent on Anglo-Americanism rather than in competition with it;

[ 10 ] 3. that the cultural (intellectual) relations of Central and Eastern Europe be organized in a way that is in line with the popular egoism of Anglo-Americanism.

[ 11 ] Only those who are able to recognize that the translation of these three points into the Wilson-Entente language is the one Wilson used in his missive to the Russians will see through what is at stake.

[ 12 ] It may also be that by the compelling position of facts we shall get a peace in the near future. Perhaps when England sees that she can no longer hold out for the moment without giving her consent to end the war. All this does not change the essentials on the side of Anglo-Americanism. If this Anglo-Americanism finds it possible to continue the war, then it will continue to clothe the three points above in the formula of Wilson's epistle:

[ 13 ] "To this end we have always striven, and were we now to scrimp in blood and money, we might never attain the unity and strength necessary in the struggle for the great cause of human liberation." If the leading powers of England are forced to bring the war to an end in the near future, then the future policy, which would continue to be oriented along the lines of the above three points, will be expressed in the formula: "We have wanted to sacrifice money and blood for the liberation of mankind, we have done so to a great extent, while the Central European powers were only concerned with the opposite. For the time being, we have only been able to achieve partial results against violence. Our goal remains undiminished before our eyes, because it is the goal of humanity itself."

[ 14 ] The only way to really come to terms with this is to act practically according to the realization in Central Europe: In the West, the rule of Anglo-Americanism is called human liberation and democracy. And because we do this, we create the appearance that we really want to be a liberator of humanity.

[ 15 ] The only thing that can be effective against the consequences of this monstrous deception, against the consequences of a self-evident racial egoism in the guise of an impossible morality, is Central Europe's own attitude towards the full truth of the facts. And this truth is:

[ 16 ] 1. With the achievement of the Entente goals with regard to the Central European state formations, the real European freedom of nations is lost. For these state formations can realize it because it is in the interests of these state formations themselves, and states cannot act otherwise than with their interests in mind. Anglo-Americanism cannot realize this freedom of nations because, as soon as it exists in reality, it is against the interests of the Anglo-American state entities, as long as these interests remain as they are now and as they have given this war its character by historical necessity.

[ 17 ] 2 From the Central European point of view, this war is a people's war towards the East, and towards the West - against England-America - an economic war. The war of revenge on the part of France has only become possible through the combination of the idea of revenge with Anglo-American economic aspirations and Russian-Slavic ideals of nations.

[ 18 ] 3. The liberation of nations is possible. But it can only be the result, not the basis of human liberation. If the people are liberated, the peoples will be liberated through them.

[ 19 ] Central Europe can, if it wants to, act in accordance with these three principles. And its actions will be a factual program. It will act in this way if it opposes a factual program of human liberation to the Entente-Wilsonian blind program. Such a program is not radical in the sense in which certain circles are frightened by any radicalism. Rather, it is merely an expression of the facts that want to be realized in Central Europe through their own power. They should be realized with full consciousness, not kept hidden, only to strive towards their realization by their own nature in the fog of the Entente Wilson goals and thus be corrupted.

[ 20 ] The realization will never happen if what Central Europe must want remains obscured by the unnatural mixture of political, economic and general human interests. For political conditions, if they are to flourish, demand conservatism in the sense of preserving and building up the historical state structures. The economic and general interests of mankind only resist this conservatism as long as they have to suffer from it. When this suffering ceases, they reconcile themselves to it because they learn to recognize its necessity. Economic conditions demand opportunism for their prosperity, which brings about their order only according to their own nature. It must lead to conflict when economic measures are connected with political or general human requirements and this connection is such that it thwarts economic development. The general human conditions and the conditions of the peoples demand the individual freedom of man in the sense of the present and the future. Man must be able to profess his allegiance to a nation, to a religious community, to another context which is connected with his general human aspirations, without being kept from his political or economic context by the structure of the state. It is important to realize that all forms of state structure, as something that has come into being historically, are capable of carrying out the liberation of humanity if their own interests require that they do not merely serve racial egoism. A parliamentary representation of a people may be desirable for reasons of the development of the times; it does not change the conditions that have led to the present chaos if political, economic and general human conditions are constantly disrupted in this parliament. And Central Europe, by its very nature, strives to exclude such disruption. No Entente, no Wilsonian aims can arise in the face of the power that lies in the realization of the European instincts of freedom by Central Europe. For these instincts of freedom are the germ of the European freedoms of nations, not Wilsonian ideas.

[ 21 ] In legislation, administration and social structure, recognizing and accepting the separation of the political, economic and general human as the goal of Central European aspirations paralyses the Western powers, forcing them to commit themselves to peace alongside the European Central Powers in their union with Eastern Europe, which allows these Western powers to confine themselves to seeking the social structure appropriate to them in the area of their national instincts, and to allow the Central and Eastern Europeans to live out their commonality of peoples in the sense of real liberation of humanity within the space that has become historically theirs.

[ 22 ] The parliamentarism that is necessary for Central Europe will emerge if it is no longer regarded as the first thing, but as the consequence that must emerge if one recognizes as the first thing the separation into the political-military, which arranges its relationship to other states according to its nature as well as the requirements of the internal structure of the people, into the economic, which is ordered opportunistically according to its own nature, i.e. is represented and administered legislatively in this sense, and into the general human, which is based on the corporation to which man professes himself in the sense of his own free feeling. The abstract League of Nations with its utopian courts of arbitration could lead to nothing other than the continued majorization of Central Europe by the other states. The ordering of relations in Central Europe in the sense of the separation of powers leads to the ongoing balancing of the interests of humanity anchored in the peoples. Wilson's League of Nations creates institutions that must suffer from the misfortune that is always suffered when human abstractions of desire are imposed on the facts; that which the whole nature of the Central and Eastern European peoples urges for does not create such institutions, but liberates human forces from the oppression of such institutions, and thus liberates that which, liberated in the sense of peaceful development, must lead to warlike conflicts without liberation. A future state of mankind cannot be created by institutions, as Wilson and the Entente want, but it will come into being if the facts are given their freedom, through which it can arise.

[ 23 ] If the Entente-Wilsonian peace formula were to be replaced by that which is the essence of this formula without a mask, the following would emerge:

[ 24 ] "We Anglo-Americans want the world to be what we want it to be. Central Europe must submit to this wish." - This unmasked peace formula shows that Central Europe had to be driven into war. If the Entente won, Central Europe's development would be wiped out. If Central Europe adds to the invincibility of its weapons as a peace offer to the world the most unconditional intention to realize what only Central Europe can realize in Europe, the liberation of peoples through the liberation of men, then this Central Europe can counter the talk of the "rights and freedom of peoples" with the actual true word:

[ 25 ] "We are fighting for our right and our freedom and the realization of these human goods, which we cannot and will not allow to be taken from us, does not by its very nature affect any real right or freedom of another. For what we will want will carry the guarantee of it within itself. If you Western peoples can come to an understanding with us on this basis and if you Eastern peoples realize that we want nothing other than yourselves, if you understand yourselves first of all, then peace will be possible tomorrow."

[ 1 ] "No people shall be compelled to live under a rule to which it objects. Change of possession and return to former sovereignty shall be permitted only in those countries where the people themselves demand change and return in order to secure their freedom, comfort and future happiness ... The liberated peoples of the whole earth must unite in a sincere sense of community ... to form a firm union which, with the united forces of all, will be able to protect peace and justice in the intercourse of nations. Fraternity must no longer be an empty word: it must become a universally recognized concept that rests on the rock of reality."

[ 2 ] This is how Mr. W. Wilson describes what America's participation in this war should make a reality. They are captivating words, to which one can say that every sensible man of sound mind must subscribe. If they were written down by a philanthropist for the edification of a readership, one could stop at the recognition of their self-evidence. One could also assert, with the gesture of a moralist, that anyone who objects to them cannot be a friend of progress and freedom. You can even hear voices today emphasizing that this war has taught us a lesson: Only those are currently pursuing higher, contemporary politics who profess such an ideal or a similar one and act accordingly.

[ 3 ] Talking about "views" and that this or that view must be held because one believes in it never leads to a basis for practical action. The only way to do this is to take a close look at reality. For the citizens of the Central European states, no debate about the "general human" justification of the Entente's goals, in a sense about their "beauty", can be of value, but only the realization of their real balance of power in the life of nations. For this reason, the following will focus on the real form of the Entente goals for Europe, regardless of the fact that what is said here may not sound pleasant to the Entente leaders. Only by thinking in this way can one arrive at practical impulses. Things will be formulated somewhat sharply because they have to be for the reasons given. It should be expressly noted that existing moods should not play a role in this formulation, but only the sober observations of the facts in recent decades. What the Entente wants to say must be the basis for the guidelines to be found in Central Europe; allowing oneself to be blinded by what it says will lead one astray in the worst possible way.

[ 4 ] In any case, it is a thankless task to be forced to turn against ideas that seem to have a high degree of appeal to people's reason and hearts. Moreover, they seem to be the result of the "true historical development of mankind towards the noblest democracy". And yet the following must be built on the basis that the commitment to Wilson's will must not only be a logical vice for the members of the Central and Eastern European peoples, but also that within this war and after it, every single action and measure must be taken in such a way that this Wilsonian and Entente will must be broken by the health and fruitfulness of these measures and actions.

[ 5 ] The war aims of the Entente, which strive to obscure their true form, are questionably concealed in the expression which Mr. Wilson has given to his will. One has to deal with the latter at the same time as one deals with the former. No matter how ingenious a conceptual refutation of Wilson's "program" may be, it should not matter at this time. We are not currently dealing with disputes that are supposed to decide who is right or wrong. In the field we are dealing with here, only what happens or what carries the seeds of what happens has value. And thoughts that are thought and discussed in Central Europe as seeds for the actions of today and tomorrow only have value if they are held in this sense.

[ 6 ] Wilson's words are not spoken by a writerly philanthropist. They are the banner for "deeds which the Americans are arming themselves for, and which the Entente has been carrying out against Central Europe for three years. The facts are that Central Europe has to fight against that which claims behind this flag to be fighting for the salvation of mankind, for the liberation of the peoples. The Entente and Wilson say what they claim to be fighting for. Their words have advertising power. Their advertising power is becoming more and more alarming. There are people in Central Europe who certainly do not want to admit that they are imitating Wilson, but whose ideas sound not dissimilar to his words.

[ 7 ] Those who know the origins of this war in a deeper sense cannot but emphasize the necessity that the Entente-Wilson programme be subjected to the sharpest rejection by Central Europe through facts. For the real prospect of this program - apart from its moral blindness - lies in the fact that it wants to use the instincts of the Central and Eastern European peoples to bring these peoples into economic dependence on Anglo-Americanism through moral and political overpowering. Spiritual dependence would then only be the necessary real consequence. Anyone who knows that since the last century the "coming world war" has been spoken of in initiated English circles as the event that must bring world domination to the Anglo-American race cannot attach any particular importance to the fact that the leaders of the Entente peoples say that they were surprised by this war or that they wanted to prevent it, even if these assurances should have subjective truth among those who utter them at the moment. For those who spoke of the "coming world war" as an inevitable event were reckoning with the real historical and national forces of Europe. They reckoned with the instincts of the European, especially the Slavic peoples. And they wanted to direct the ideals of these Slavic peoples and use them in such a way that they would serve the national egoism of Anglo-Americanism. They were also counting on the downfall of Romanism, on whose ruins they wanted to spread themselves. They therefore reckoned with generous historical-ethnic points of view, which they wanted to put at the service of their own goals. And these goals, however strongly denied by the entente side, lead to the intention of crushing the Central European state formations.

[ 8 ] The right thing is to emphasize quite soberly that the goal of the Entente leaders is the crushing of Central Europe, because only the emphasis of this goal can be the answer to the Entente statements that are so effective. But an answer that is in a sense negative, because it seeks to refute what is said on the Entente side, has no value. Therefore, the following answer should be positive, that is, point out the facts that confront the Entente from Central Europe.

[ 9 ] Only the realization that this is the case can provide Central Europe with the impetus that will lead it out of the chaos of the present. The Central European states can only take the position of rendering the Entente program ineffective through their own measures. This Entente program is based - whether more or less pronounced or unspoken - on three preconditions:

[ 10 ] 1. that the Central European state formations which have become historical must not be recognized - from the point of view of the Entente - as those which are responsible for solving the problems of European peoples;

[ 11 ] 2. that these Central European states must be economically dependent on Anglo-Americanism rather than in competition with it;

[ 12 ] 3. that the cultural (intellectual) relations of Central and Eastern Europe be organized in a way that is in line with the popular egoism of Anglo-Americanism.

[ 13 ] Only those who are able to recognize that the translation of these three points into the Wilson-Entente language is the one Wilson used in his missive to the Russians will see through what is at stake.

[ 14 ] It may also be that we shall obtain a peace in the near future through the compelling situation of facts. Perhaps, if England sees that she can no longer hold out for the moment without giving her consent to end the war. None of this changes the essentials on the Anglo-American side. If this Anglo-Americanism finds it possible to continue the war, then it will continue to put the above three points into the formula of Wilson's epistle: "We have always striven for this goal, and if we were now stingy with blood and money, we might never achieve the unity and strength that are necessary in the struggle for the great cause of human liberation." If the leading powers of England are forced to bring the war to an end in the near future, then the future policy, which would continue to be oriented along the lines of the above three points, will be expressed in the formula: "We have wanted to sacrifice money and blood for the liberation of mankind, we have done so to a great extent, while the Central European powers were only concerned with the opposite. For the time being, we have only been able to achieve partial results against violence. Our goal remains undiminished before our eyes, because it is the goal of humanity itself."

[ 15 ] What actually lies in these intentions will only really be achieved if people in Central Europe act practically according to the realization: In the West, the rule of Anglo-Americanism is called human liberation and democracy. And because we do this, we create the appearance that we really want to be a liberator of humanity.

[ 16 ] The only thing that can be effective against the consequences of this monstrous deception, against the consequences of a self-evident racial egoism in the guise of an impossible morality, is Central Europe's own attitude towards the full truth of the "facts. And this truth is:

[ 17 ] 1. With the achievement of the Entente goals with regard to the Central European state formations, real European freedom is lost. For these state entities can realize it, because it is in the interests of these state entities themselves, and states cannot act otherwise than by having their interests in mind. Anglo-Americanism cannot realize this freedom of nations because, as soon as it exists, it is against the interest of the Anglo-American state entities, as long as this interest is as it is now, and as it has given this war its character with actual necessity. The Anglo-American states must realize that they must respect the interests of the Central European states next to them, and that they must leave the ordering of Central European international freedoms to the Central European states, which alone can see their real national interest in the promotion of these freedoms.

[ 18 ] 2 From the Central European point of view, this war is a people's war to the east, and an economic war to the west - against England-America. The war of revenge against France only became possible through the combination of the idea of revenge with Anglo-American economic interests and the Russian-Slavic ideals of nations.

[ 19 ] 3. The liberation of peoples is possible; but it can only be the result, not the basis of the liberation of humanity. If the people are liberated, the peoples will be liberated through them.

[ 20 ] Central Europe can, if it wants to, act in the spirit of these three foundations. And its actions will be a factual program. It will act in this way if it opposes a factual program of human liberation to the Entente-Wilsonian program, which, without any knowledge of the Central European ethnic forces, speaks of something that does not exist in the world of facts, only in the aspirations of Anglo-American racial egoism. The program considered correct here for Central Europe is not radical in the sense in which radicalism is shied away from in many circles. Rather, it is merely an expression of the facts that want to be realized by their own power in Central Europe. They should be realized with full consciousness, not kept hidden, only to strive towards their realization through their own nature in the fog of the Entente-Wilson goals and thus be corrupted and become the impetus and pretext for warlike entanglements.

[ 21 ] The right realization will never happen if what Central Europe must want remains obscured by the unnatural mixture of political, economic and general human interests.

[ 22 ] Because political conditions, if they are to flourish, demand healthy conservatism in the sense of preserving and expanding the state structures that have developed historically. Economic and general human interests only resist this conservatism, which is a condition of life for Central Europe, for as long as they have to suffer by mixing with it. And political conservatism, if it remembers its true interest, has not the slightest reason to allow its legitimate circles to be continually disturbed by being thrown together with economic and general human interests. If the mixing ceases, then economic and general human conditions will be reconciled with political conservatism, and the latter can calmly develop according to its own nature.

[ 23 ] Economic conditions demand opportunism for their prosperity, which brings about their order only according to their own nature. It must lead to conflicts if the economic measures stand in a different connection with political and general human requirements than that which results from the natural context of life in the case of their own legislation and administration. What is meant here are not merely internal conflicts, but primarily those that are discharged outwardly in political difficulties and warlike explosions.

[ 24 ] The general human conditions and the questions of international freedom connected with them demand individual human freedom as their basis for the present and the future. On this point, one will not even make a start with proper views as long as one believes that one can speak of a freedom or liberation of peoples without building it on the basis of the individual freedom of the individual human being, and as long as one does not realize that with real individual freedom the liberation of peoples is also necessarily given, because it must occur as a consequence of the former through a natural connection. Man must be able to profess his allegiance to a nation, to a religious community, to any context that arises from his general human aspirations, without being kept from his political or economic context by the structure of the state. It is important to recognize that all forms of state structure, as something that has historically evolved, are capable of carrying out the liberation of humanity if they are directed towards it by their own interests, which is the case in an eminent sense with the Central European states. A parliamentary organization of these states may be regarded as necessary today for reasons of the development of the times and the feeling of the people. The questions that must now be raised in the face of the turmoil of war in the world only have to do with the characterized tripartite structure of the state. The mere question of parliamentarism does not change the conditions that have led to the present chaos. Western nations talk so much about it because they understand nothing about Central European conditions and believe that what they consider to be right for their interests must serve as a universal template. For Central Europe, even if parliamentarism is to prevail, it should be one in which political, economic and general human conditions develop independently of each other in legislation and administration, thus supporting each other instead of becoming entangled in their effects on the outside and discharging themselves in conflict. Central Europe frees itself and the world from such substances of conflict when it excludes the implied mutual interference of the three forms of human life in its state structures. No Entente goals and no Wilsonian goals can arise in the face of the power demonstrated by Central Europe when it presents to the world what it alone can do and what no one else can accomplish. The liberation of mankind and thus the liberation of peoples is presented to the world as a necessary part of the Central European instincts of the state and peoples when they are thrown into the events of the present as a fact-guaranteeing impulse, as indicated here.

[ 25 ] What is set out here is not intended to present a utopian program. It is not intended to abolish historical rights and legal structures. For those who look at it carefully, it represents something that can grow out of the current state structures without any reservations if all historical rights are fully respected and the actual circumstances are recognized. It is therefore self-evident that what is to be explained here refrains from going into any details. In the case of truly practical impulses, such details only emerge in the implementation. Only the utopian can go into detail, but his constellations, which arise from abstract thinking, are not feasible. What is said here may only appear in general guidelines. These guidelines, however, have not been devised, but observed in Central European living conditions. This guarantees that they will prove their worth precisely when practice begins to use them as guidelines. What we are talking about here is already there, so to speak, as a vital need. It is only a matter of serving this need for life. And that is another reason why there is no need to talk about the individual now, because this is an internal matter for the Central European states. At this moment it is only necessary to assert as much of the matter before the world as has external significance. What is important is to show from within Central European life the impulses that really lie within it, and to show this in such a way that Western opponents see that they will have to face these indestructible impulses if the war continues. The Entente leaders are thereby confronted with something, not merely held up to them, which they have not yet been confronted with, and which they cannot overcome by any war program on their part. Such language before the world as is meant here, which carries within it the germ of fact, must have consequences. There is no need at the present moment to seek a settlement with Russia for what is stated here, for this settlement must arise of its own accord in the pursuit of the cause. And the realization that such a result must come about will provide the Russian leaders with impulses that can only have favourable consequences. In all this, it must always be borne in mind what what has been indicated does not initially mean as an internal state affair, but what it means as an external manifestation within the present world conflict to end it, especially in the political struggle with the manifestations of the Entente leaders and Wilson. The inner comes into consideration in this case in a similar sense to the way in which the effects of a man's thinking are a reality for other men, even though the way he thinks is only an inner matter of his organization. However, he only needs to argue with others about the effect of his thinking, not about the state of his inner being.

[ 26 ] Recognizing and accepting in legislation, administration and social structure the separation of the political, the economic and the generally human as the goal of Central European [aspirations] paralyzes the forces of the Western powers. This forces them to think of themselves alongside the European Central Powers and the Eastern Powers, which are united with the latter under such conditions, in a relationship in which the Western Powers limit themselves to giving themselves the structure appropriate to them (as state entities) in the area of their national instincts, and to allow the Central and Eastern European peoples to live out their commonalities in the sense of real human liberation within the natural space allotted to them without disturbance, as was the cause of this war, while they now believe they alone can present their will as the decisive one in the world conflict.

[ 27 ] It is all a question of seeing how differently the relations between states and peoples, and also between individuals, take place when these relations are based on that external effect which results from the separation of the three factors of life, than when the conflicts which result from their mixture are involved in this external effect. In future the history of this war will be written in such a way as to show how it arose from the unfortunate mutual disturbance of the three circles of life in the intercourse of peoples. When they are separated, the power of one circle of life acts outwardly in the sense of harmonizing the others; in particular, the economic forces of interest balance out conflicts that arise on political ground, and the general human circles of interest can unfold their power to unite peoples, while precisely this power is driven into complete ineffectiveness when it has to appear outwardly burdened with political and economic conflicts. Nothing in the recent past has been more deceptive than the latter point. It was not recognized that general human relations can only develop their true power externally if they are built internally on the basis of a free corporation. They then work in connection with economic interests in such a way that, in the pursuit of these effects, those things naturally develop in the living process which one wants to give a dubious future existence by creating utopian, supranational organizations: utopian arbitration courts, a Wilsonian "League of Nations" and so on, which can lead to nothing other than the continuing majorization of Central Europe by the other states. Such things suffer from the error from which everything suffers that is imposed on the facts out of wishful abstractions, while what is meant here creates a free path for a development that strives for its realization out of the facts themselves, and which can therefore also be realized.

[ 28 ] If one recognizes this, then it becomes clear above all why we have this war and why it is a war for the oppression of the German people under the false flag of the liberation of nations. In a broader sense, for the suppression of all independent national life in Central Europe. If one strips the Wilsonian program, which emerged as the latest paraphrase of the Entente's cover programs, one comes to the conclusion that its execution would mean nothing other than the destruction of this Central European freedom. This is not hindered by the fact that Wilson speaks of the freedom of nations; for the world is never judged by words, but by the facts that follow from the realization of these words. Central Europe needs real freedom. But Wilson is not talking about real freedom at all. The entire Western world has no concept at all of this freedom that is really necessary for Central Europe. They talk about the freedom of nations and they do not mean the real freedom of the people, but a chimerical collective freedom of human associations, as they have developed in the Western European states and in America. According to the particular circumstances of Central Europe, this collective freedom cannot arise from international circumstances, so it can never be the subject of an international agreement such as can form the basis of a peace treaty. In Central Europe, the collective freedom of the peoples must result from general human freedom, and it will result if a clear path is created for it by the separation of all circles of life that do not belong to purely political, military and economic life. It is quite natural that those who only ever reckon with their ideas, not with reality, should raise objections to such a separation, as can be found in a recently published book, namely in Krieck's "Die deutsche Staatsidee" on page 167: "Occasionally the demand for an economic parliament alongside the representation of the people was raised in the past, among others by E. von Hartmann: the idea lies entirely in the direction of economic and social development. But apart from the fact that a new large wheel would increase the already abundant awkwardness and friction of the machine, it would be impossible to delimit the responsibilities of two parliaments against each other." With this idea, it should be noted that it must be admitted here that it arises from the real conditions of development, must therefore be implemented and must not be rejected against development because its realization is difficult to find. For if one stops short of such difficulties in reality, one creates entanglements for oneself which later discharge violently; and ultimately this war, in the peculiarity in which it is lived out, is the discharge of difficulties which one has neglected to clear away by the right, different path while there was still time to do so.

[ 29 ] The Wilsonian program is based on making impossible in the world that which is the legitimate task and the condition of life of the Central European states. It must be countered by what will happen in Central Europe if this event is not disrupted by the violent destruction of Central European life. He must be shown what only Central Europe can do on the basis of what has happened here historically, if it does not join forces with the Entente, which can have no interest in leading Central Europe towards its natural development.

[ 30 ] As things stand today, Germany and Austria only have the choice between the following three things:

[ 31 ] 1. to wait under all circumstances for a victory of their weapons, and to hope from it the possibility of being able to carry out their Central European task.

[ 32 ] 2. to enter into peace with the Entente on the basis of its present program and thus approach its certain destruction.

[ 33 ] 3. to say what it will regard as the result of peace in terms of real conditions, and thus to present the world with the opportunity, after clear insight into the conditions and the will of Central Europe, to let the peoples choose between a real program that brings the European people real freedom and thus quite naturally the freedom of the peoples, or the sham programs of the West and America, which speak of freedom but in reality bring the impossibility of life for all of Europe. For the time being, we in Central Europe give the impression that we are afraid to tell the West what we must want, while the West simply showers us with the manifestations of its will. In this way the West creates the impression that it alone wants something for the salvation of mankind and that we are only striving to disrupt these laudable endeavors with all sorts of things like militarism, while in truth it is the creator of our militarism, because it has long set out to make us into shadow people and wants to do so even more. Certainly such and similar things have often been said, but it is not important that they are said by this or that person, but that they really become the leitmotif of Central European action and that the world learns to recognize that it has no other action to expect from Central Europe than one that must take up the sword when the others force this sword into its hands. What the Western nations now call German militarism, they have forged over centuries of development, and only they, not Germany, can take away its meaning for Central Europe. But it is up to Central Europe to make its will for freedom clear, a will that cannot be built on programs in the Wilsonian manner, but on the reality of human existence.

[ 34 ] There is therefore only one peace program for Central Europe, and that is: to let the world know that peace is immediately possible if the Entente replaces its present, untrue peace program with one that is true, because in its realization it does not bring about the downfall but the possibility of life for Central Europe. All other questions that can become the subject of peace efforts will be resolved if they are tackled on the basis of these premises. Peace is impossible on the basis now offered to us by the Entente and accepted by Wilson: if no other is put in its place, the German people could only be brought to accept this program by force, and the further course of European history would prove the correctness of what has been said here, for if Wilson's program is realized, the European peoples will perish. In Central Europe we must face without illusion what those personalities have believed for many years, which they regard from their point of view as the law of world development: that the future of world development belongs to the Anglo-American race, and that it must take over the inheritance of the Latin-Roman race and the education of Russianness. When this world-political formula is invoked by an Englishman or American who thinks himself initiated, it is always pointed out that the German element has no say in the ordering of the world because of its insignificance in world-political matters, that the Romanic element need not be taken into account because it is dying out anyway, and that the Russian element has the one who makes himself its world-historical educator. One might think little of such a creed if it lived in the minds of some people who were susceptible to political fantasies or utopias, but English politics uses innumerable ways to make this program the practical content of its real world policy, and from England's point of view the present coalition in which she finds herself could not be more favorable than it is when it comes to the realization of this program. But there is nothing that Central Europe can oppose to it but a truly human liberating program, which can become a reality at any moment if human will is committed to its realization. One can perhaps think that peace will be a long time coming, even if the program meant here is put before the European peoples, since it cannot be carried out during the war and, moreover, it would be put there by the Entente peoples, as if it had been put forward by the leaders of Central Europe only to deceive the peoples, while after the war what the Entente leaders put forward as the terrible thing they had to eliminate from the world for moral reasons in a "struggle for freedom and justice of the peoples" would simply happen again. But anyone who judges the world correctly according to the facts, and not according to his favorite opinions, can know that everything that corresponds to reality has a completely different persuasive value than that which comes from mere arbitrariness. And we can wait and see what will become apparent to those who realize that the Central European program will only deprive the peoples of the Entente of the possibility of destroying Central Europe, but not of anything that would be incompatible with any real vital impulse of the Entente peoples. As long as we remain in the realm of masked aspirations, understanding will be impossible; as soon as the realities behind the masks are revealed, not only militarily but also politically, a completely different form of current events will begin. The world has come to know the weapons of Central Europe for the salvation of this Central Europe; the political will, as far as Central Europe is concerned, is a closed book to the world. Instead, every day the world is presented with a horror picture of what a terrible thing this Central Europe actually is, worthy of destruction, and it looks to the world as if Central Europe only has to remain silent about this horror picture, which of course must appear to the world like a yes to it.

[ 35 ] It is quite natural that many will have countless misgivings about what is being said here. However, such reservations would only come into consideration if what is presented here were intended as a program that an individual or a society should set out to realize. But that is not how it is conceived; indeed, it would refute itself if it were conceived that way. It is intended as an expression of what the peoples of Central Europe will do when governments set themselves the task of recognizing and releasing the forces of the people. What will happen in detail will always become apparent when such things are put into practice. For they are not prescriptions about what has to happen, but predictions of what will happen if things are allowed to take the course demanded by their own reality. And this own reality prescribes with regard to all religious and spiritual-cultural matters, to which the national also belongs: administration by corporations, to which the individual person professes of his own free will and which are administered in their parliaments as corporations, so that this parliament only has to do with the corporation in question, but never with the relationship of this corporation to the individual person. And a corporation may never deal with a person belonging to another corporation from the same point of view. Such corporations are admitted to the circle of parliament when they unite a certain number of persons. Until then, they remain a private matter in which no authority or representative body has the right to interfere. For those for whom it is a sour apple that from such points of view all intellectual cultural matters must in future be deprived of privileges, they will have to bite into this sour apple for the salvation of the people's existence. As people become more and more accustomed to this privileged status, it will be difficult to accept in wide circles that we must return from the privileged status of intellectual professions in particular to the good old, ancient principle of free corporatization, and that the corporation should indeed make a person capable in his profession, but that the exercise of this profession should not be privileged, but left to free competition and [free] human choice, that will be difficult to understand by all [those] who like to talk about [people] not being ready for this or that. In reality, this objection will not come into consideration anyway, because with the exception of the necessarily free professions, the choice of the petitioners will be decided by the corporations.

[ 36 ] Neither can difficulties arise with regard to the political and the economic that could not actually be resolved in the realization of what is intended. How, for example, pedagogical institutions must come about, which in their guidelines touch on the two representations that do not include the actual pedagogy in themselves, is a matter for the higher [Senate]. All individual institutions, as they are conceived here, can be achieved by expanding the historically given factors, which need not be eliminated or radically replaced by others in any country in Central Europe. The points can be found everywhere in the existing, which, pursued in the direction indicated, result in the liberation of peoples on the basis of the liberation of man. To "prove" here that what has been said is "correct" would be absurd; for this correctness must result from the fact of realization. The next realization would be the confession of these impulses in an authoritative place. There is no need to worry about the fact that this open commitment alone must have a tremendous effect that is beneficial for the Central European states. On the contrary, we can wait and see what the Entente leaders will do (not say) if they are confronted with this open declaration. They must reckon with it differently than they have reckoned with everything that has emanated from Central Europe so far. Until now, they only had to count on Central Europe's success in arms; they should also count on its political will.

[ 37 ] Those who think of what has been outlined here in a truly practical sense, that is, in harmony with the actual circumstances, will find that a basis has been created on which even such complicated questions as the Austrian language question - including the language of the state and the lingua franca - and the German colonial question can rest. This is because what is being considered here avoids the mistake that has always been made in the past, namely that a solution to such questions was thought of before the factual foundations had been laid on which a solution could be built. Up to now, the idea has always been to build a first floor without thinking about the first floor. For the Central European states, however, this first floor is the recognition of their naturally necessary structure in conservative-historical-political representation and administration, separated from the organization of the opportunistic-economic and intellectual-cultural element. If one stands firmly on this ground, then only on this basis can one speak of parliamentarism, democratism and the like. For these things do not become different in themselves, whether they are the expression of a combination of political, economic and intellectual-cultural elements that is impossible in Central Europe in the long run or of the natural organization of these elements. - It is precisely the effect that an open confession in this sense would have on the leaders of the Entente that would show, when this effect occurs, how one stands with this confession on the real ground of facts.

[ 38 ] No one who thinks in terms of the actual conditions in Central Europe will doubt the feasibility of what is stated here. For nothing is demanded here "as a program", but it is only shown what wants to be carried out and what succeeds at the same moment in which it is given free rein.

[ 39 ] If the Entente-Wilsonian peace formula were to be replaced by that which is the essence of this formula without a mask, the following would emerge: "We Anglo-Americans want the world to become what we want it to be. Central Europe must submit to this wish." This unmasked peace formula shows that Central Europe had to be driven into war. If the Entente won, Central Europe's development would be wiped out. If Central Europe adds to the invincibility of its weapons as a peace offer to the world the most unconditional intention to realize what only Central Europe can realize in Europe, the liberation of peoples through the liberation of people, then this Central Europe can counter the talk of "the rights and freedom of peoples" with the actual, true word: "We are fighting for our right and our freedom and the realization of these human goods, which we cannot and will not allow to be taken from us, does not by its very nature affect any real right or freedom of another. For what we will want will carry the guarantee of it within itself. If you Western peoples can come to an understanding with us on this basis and if you Eastern peoples realize that we want nothing other than yourselves, if you understand yourselves first, then peace will be possible tomorrow."

[ 1 ] The German people must face the truth about the outbreak of war. It can draw strength for the action it now needs from this truth. The gravity of the present situation demands that all reservations raised by one side or the other against the revelation of the events that preceded the outbreak of war in Germany

[ 2 ] This publication is intended as a contribution to the presentation of the truth about these events. It stems from the man who was at the center of what happened in Berlin at the end of July and beginning of August 1914, the Chief of the General Staff, Colonel General Helmuth von Moltke. You will see from the article how strongly this man can be said to have been at the center of these events.

[ 3 ] The widow of Mr. von Moltke, Mrs. Eliza von Moltke, is fulfilling a duty imposed on her by history by not withholding these records from the public. Anyone who reads them will probably come to the conclusion that they are the most important historical document that can be found in Germany about the beginning of the war.

[ 4 ] They characterize the mood in which the war was considered inevitable in military circles. They set out the military reasons that led to the war's initial development, which brought the German people the condemnation of the whole world.

[ 5 ] The world wants an honest confession of truth from the German people. Here it has one, written down by the man whose records bear the stamp of honesty in every sentence, who - as you will see from the records - at the moment when he wrote could want nothing other than to let the purest subjective truth flow from his pen.

[ 6 ] And this truth: read correctly, it results in the complete condemnation of German politics. A condemnation that could not be harsher. A condemnation that points to completely different things than those that are accepted by friend and foe alike.

[ 7 ] It is not the actual causes of the war that are described in these records. These are to be found in events that naturally go back a long way. But what happened at the end of July 1914 sheds the right light on these events. The collapse of the house of cards that has been called German politics can be seen in this light. We see people involved in this policy who have no need to prove that they wanted to avoid war. You can believe them that they wanted to avoid the war. It could only have been avoided if they had never been able to get to their posts. It was not what they did that contributed to bringing about the disaster, but the whole nature of their personalities.

[ 8 ] It is shocking to read in these records how German military judgment contrasts with German political judgment at the decisive moment. The political judgment is completely beyond any possibility of assessing the situation, is at the zero point of its activity, and the result is a situation about which the chief of staff writes: "The mood became more and more agitated and I stood there all alone."

[ 9 ] Consider what is written in these notes from this sentence to the other: 'Now you can do' what you want."

[ 10 ] Yes, that's how it was: the Chief of the General Staff stood there all alone. Because German politics had reached the zero point of its activity, Europe's fate on July 31 and August 1, 1914 lay in the hands of the man who had to do his military duty. Who did it with a bleeding heart.

[ 11 ] Whoever wants to judge what happened there must pose the question properly, without bias; how did it come about that at the end of July 1914 there was no other power in Germany to decide the fate of the German people than the military alone? If this was the case, then the war was a necessity for Germany. Then it was a European necessity. The Chief of the General Staff, who "stood alone", could not avoid it.

[ 12 ] The unfortunate invasion of Belgium, which was a "military necessity" and a political impossibility, shows how everything in Germany was based on military judgment in the times leading up to the outbreak of war. The writer of these lines asked Mr. von Moltke, with whom he had been friends for years, in November 1914: What did the Kaiser think of this invasion? And he replied: He knew nothing about it before the days leading up to the outbreak of war. Because, given his character, one would have had to fear that he would have blabbed the matter to the whole world. This could not happen, for the invasion could only succeed if the enemy was unprepared. - And did the Chancellor know about it? Yes, he knew about it.

[ 13 ] These things must not be concealed today by anyone who knows them, no matter how reluctant he may be to share them. Just for the sake of abundance I want to remark that, after the whole nature of my discussions with Mr. von Moltke, I have not the slightest obligation to conceal these things, and that I know I am acting in his interest when I communicate them. They show how German politics drifted into the zero point of its activity.

[ 14 ] One must point to these things if one wants to speak of the "guilt" of the German people. This "guilt" is of a very special kind. It is the guilt of a completely apolitical people, to whom the intentions of their "authorities" have been veiled by impenetrable veils. And which, due to its apolitical disposition, did not even suspect how the continuation of its policies would lead to war.

[ 15 ] It must also seem incomprehensible that even some time before the war words were spoken in an official capacity by a personality from which one had to conclude that in Germany there was no intention of ever violating Belgian neutrality, while Mr. von Moltke also told me in November 1914 that this personality must have known of the intention to march through Belgium.

[ 16 ] The question of whether the German people could have intervened to prevent the outbreak of war in 1914 is completely answered by these records. The deeds that could have brought about the events of that year to leave Germany in a different state than it was would have had to lie far in the past. Once this state existed, nothing else could have happened than did happen. This is how the German people must view their fate today. And from the strength that this insight gives them, they must find their way forward. The events during the terrible catastrophe of the war prove this no less than those contained in these notes on the beginning of the war. But it is not for me to speak about them here; for it is incumbent upon me only to introduce these notes.

[ 17 ] You can see from the notes that the decisive factor was not the assumption that France or England would violate Belgian neutrality if Germany did not do so, but that France would wage a defensive war behind its strong eastern front, which was to be avoided. For Germany, this starting point had determined the entire organization of the war for many years. And this starting point had to place the decision at the forefront of military judgment, unless politicians had been working for just as long to be able to bring other forces into the field for such a decision. This did not happen. We had been driven towards a development which, at the decisive moment, made it necessary to allow every political judgment to take precedence over military judgment. Behind what the records point to at this point lies what is actually decisive. The appeal "to the German people and the cultural world" pointed this out. The German Reich was "placed in the world context without an essential objective justifying its existence". This objective should not have been such that only military power had to carry it, could not be directed at all towards development of power in the external sense. It could only be directed towards the internal development of its culture. Through such an objective, Germany would never have needed to build its being on things that would bring it into competition and then into open conflict with other empires, to which it would have to succumb in the development of external power. A German Reich would have had to develop a policy that refrained from the external idea of power, a true cultural policy. The idea should never have arisen in Germany that anyone who considers this cultural policy to be the only possible one is an "impractical idealist". For the general world situation meant that all development of power ultimately had to be transformed into purely military power; and the fate of the German people could not be left to this alone.

[ 18 ] In these notes, the authoritative figure recounts in a simple manner what he experienced and did at the end of July and beginning of August 1914; and this account sheds a bright light on the tragedy of Germany's fate. It shows "how German politics at that time behaved like a house of cards, and how, by arriving at the zero point of its activity, all decisions as to whether and how to start the war had to pass into the judgment of the military administration. Whoever was in charge of this administration could at that time, from the military point of view, not act differently than was done, because from these points of view the situation could only be seen as it was seen. For outside the military sphere, one would have been in a position that could no longer lead to action." ¹

[ 19 ] The full proof of this can be found in Helmuth von Moltke's notes. A man speaks there who regarded the "coming war" as the greatest misfortune of the German, indeed of the European peoples; to whom it had been so close to his mind for years and who was about to do so at the decisive moment: to violate his military duty if he allowed the start of the war to be postponed even for a few hours. For many years before the war I saw how this man was devoted to the highest spiritual ideas with fervent longing, how his attitude was such that the slightest suffering of any being was close to his heart; I heard him speak many things; hardly anything significant about military matters. Truly it is not he, but the military mindset through him that speaks from a sentence like the following in the notes: "The highest art of diplomacy, in my opinion, does not consist in maintaining peace under all circumstances, but in permanently shaping the political situation of the state in such a way that it is in a position to enter into war under favorable conditions." And how military thinking overshadows the explanations that Helmuth von Moltke gives himself about the historical development of mankind and Europe when writing these notes.

[ 20 ] You will understand why, based on such premises, these notes contain the sentence: "Germany did not bring about the war, it did not enter it out of a desire for conquest or out of aggressive intentions against its neighbors. - The war was forced upon it by its enemies, and we are fighting for our national existence, for the survival of our people, our national life." I could never have had any other impression than that this inwardly so distinguished man would have taken his leave long before the war if he had had to say anything other than what is expressed in the above sentences about the "coming" war, which he considered inevitable. As things stood, military thinking in Germany could not come to a different judgment. And through this judgment it was condemned to bring itself into conflict with the rest of the world. The German people will have to learn from their misfortune that their thinking must be different in the future. Militarily, the war had to be considered necessary; politically, it was unjustifiable, indefensible and futile.

[ 21 ] How tragic it is that a man must turn to an act whose responsibility makes his heart bleed, which he must regard as his sacred duty; and which outside Germany must be regarded as a moral transgression, as the deliberate bringing about of war. Thus world events collide in a sphere of life where the idea of "guilt" would have to be cast in a completely different light than is now so often the case on all sides.

[ 22 ] There has been talk of the German "warmongers". And rightly so, they were there. It was said that Germany never wanted the war. And rightly so. Because the German people did not want it. But the "warmongers" could not really have brought about the war in the last days; their efforts would have come to a dead end if military thinking had not considered it necessary. The records do contain the sentence: "I am convinced that the Emperor would not have signed the mobilization decree at all if Prince Lichnowsky's dispatch had arrived half an hour earlier". The political mood was against the war; only this political mood had become zero compared to the military considerations. And it had itself become zero in relation to the question of how to proceed against the East or the West. This did not depend on the political situation at the time in question, but on military preparations. Much has been made of a Crown Council or the like, which is said to have been held in Potsdam on July 5, and which is said to have prepared the war according to plan. Well, Mr. von Moltke, in whose military will the decision was made at the end of July, went to Carlsbad for a cure in June; he only returned from there towards the end of July. Until the end of his life he knew nothing of such a crown council. He made the decision purely from a military point of view. Certainly, what was expressed in the European situation in July 1914 and what ultimately provided the basis for the military considerations to turn out as they did: it goes back to events that took place over a period of years. Many German personalities are to blame for these events; but they brought them about because they saw the essence of Germany in external power and splendor, not because they wanted to "incite" to war. And those who agitated for war: the politically peaceful mood would have come to an end with them in the fateful days of July; their efforts would have run out blindly if the events that forged the chain of immediate causes of war in Germany from the beginning had not occurred after July 26. The decision lay with Mr. von Moltke; and he would have had nothing to do with any warmongers, as is clear from the records. How often, after his farewell, could I hear words from his mouth that clearly stated: one would never have listened to warmongers, no matter which camp they came from. If asked about Bernhardi, he would only have said that he could have written as many books as he wanted: no one in our country ever listened to anyone like that. I would not write something like that here if the records did not give me the full right to do so; and if numerous conversations with Mr. von Moltke during the war did not also give me this right. - Before that, as already mentioned, he hardly ever spoke to me about military matters. - I know through how many channels such sentiments as Bernhard's can also pass to authoritative personalities, and how authoritative those who are not in the "authoritative" places can be. But Mr. von Moltke was authoritative; and what he did stemmed from his uninfluenced convictions. - One can disregard all the war-mongering - which is by no means denied here: the immediate causal current that led to Germany's declarations of war began with the judgments that Mr. von Moltke formed after his arrival in Berlin from the purely military point of view of the European situation. Everything else, which one wants to count among the immediate causes of war, ran blind and could not have led to what has become.

[ 23 ] Thus the records are full proof that not the military judgment as such and not the completely inadequate political judgment on the part of Germany caused the war in 1914, but the fact that there was no German policy which could prevent the exclusiveness of the military judgment. Only through such a policy could something different have happened in 1914 than happened. Thus these records are a terrible indictment of this policy. This realization must not remain hidden.

[ 24 ] One might object to the publication of these notes on the grounds that the sentence at the end reads: "They are only intended for my wife and must never be made public." Mr. von Moltke wrote this in November 1914 in Homburg, where these notes were written. There is nothing in these communications that I did not hear from Mr. von Moltke in November and later and for which I was never given an obligation to conceal. On the contrary: I would be violating my duty against the necessary communication of what must not be concealed if I were to hold back even now with what I know. I would have to saw what is in these communications, even if they were not there; and could saw it, for I knew all the things before I had read the records. And by publishing them, Mrs. von Moltke shows that she has an understanding for historical duties; and she knows from the difficult time of mental suffering that began for her husband with his departure that she is acting in his spirit and not against it by publishing them. This man suffered unspeakably. In his soul he lived every vibration of his people's war fate until his death. And so the words that the notes should only be "intended for my wife" are proof of the absolute honesty and sincerity of what he wrote down. At the moment of writing, this man believed that he was only writing for his wife: how could the slightest dishonesty enter into the notes! I say this only to the public, for I knew the man from whose lips a subjective untruth never came.

[ 25 ] Why did these records not become known earlier? You might ask. Oh, people have tried long enough to make their content heard by those who should have heard it in order to give direction to their actions. They did not want to hear it. They were not interested in it. It was not part of the "department". Now the public has to get to know him.

Written in Stuttgart, May 1919
Rudolf Steiner

• 1. Cf. the author's "Kernpunkte der sozialen Frage", Verlag Greiner und Pfeiffer, Stuttgart 1919.

The German people can only create space for a healthy reconstruction of the social order by unreservedly uncovering the truth about the causes of the outbreak of war, insofar as they can be found by them, and about the effectiveness of the powers that were really decisive in Germany during the war. Regardless of what the rest of the world does, the German people are finally doing their duty: they are finally telling the full truth, which has not yet been told. Today, it owes itself and its honor unsparing truthfulness before the public.

The undersigned committee of the Bund für Dreigliederung des sozialen Organismus, which - following the appeal "An das deutsche Volk und an die Kulturwelt" written by Dr. Rudolf Steiner - has set itself the goal of liberating the forces that can lead to a reconstruction of the social body, declares in order to create space for these forces:

1. we demand a truthful account of the events that led to the war, in particular everything that took place in Berlin in the last days before its outbreak, regardless of whether this is approved from a low utilitarian point of view or not, and regardless of whether leading personalities are compromised as a result. We call on official bodies and private individuals who can contribute to overcoming the cover-up of the causes of the war created by the leading circles during the war and not removed after the capitulation to come forward with their knowledge without reserve. If anyone needs assistance in revealing the truth, we are ready to be of service to them. We are not concerned with punishing the guilty, but with ruthlessly exposing the truth.

2. as far as we ourselves are able, we help the truth to break through. The publication initiated by Dr. Rudolf Steiner in these 'days in agreement with the wife of Colonel General v. Moltke of the records of this man, who was at the center of the decisive events, on the course of the actions and omissions of the leading circles in Berlin that led directly to the war, we make our own affair.¹

3 We call on the relevant government circles to allow the facts brought to light in these records to be made the basis of a discussion of the truth before the widest public, covering all related facts.

Bund für Dreigliederung des sozialen Organismus Working Committee.

Whoever shares the view expressed in the above appeal and wishes to uncover the full truth about the important events before the beginning of the war is requested to send in this sheet with their signature and address.

Bund für Dreigliederung des sozialen Organismus
Stuttgart office
Champignystrasse 17

• 1. Die "Schuld" am Kriege. Published by Greiner & Pfeiffer, Stuttgart. Published by the Bund für Dreigliederung, Stuttgart. Price M. 1.20.

An interview by "Matin" reporter Jules Sauerwein with Dr. Rudolf Steiner about the unpublished memoirs of the late German Chief of Staff von Moltke October 1921

[ 1 ] "You know that, if your opponents are to be believed, the Chief of the General Staff is said to have lost first his head and then the Battle of Marne through you."

[ 2 ] This is the question I put to the famous spiritual researcher and sociologist Rudolf Steiner, born a German-Austrian. I have had sincere admiration and friendly feelings for him for more than fifteen years. It gave me great satisfaction at the time to translate several of his theosophical works into French. Whenever my travels permit, I never fail to pay a brief visit to Dr. Steiner in Dornach when passing through Basel.

[ 3 ] This time, too, I met him at the strange and imposing building that was given the name Goetheanum by his students in honor of Goethe as a forerunner of spiritual science. I have already written in the "Matin" about the man as well as the building and its wonderful location on the last foothills of the Jura, crowned by castle ruins.

[ 4 ] Rudolf Steiner had just returned from Germany after giving lectures on his teachings to thousands of enthusiastic listeners in Stuttgart and Berlin. In Dornach on the same day he received a group of 120 theologians with whom he had entered into a discussion of theological and religious questions. Quite a number of these theologians intended to tackle a reorganization of religious life on the basis of the teachings advocated by Dr. Steiner.

[ 5 ] Dr. Steiner was working on a huge group of wooden sculptures depicting Christ and the underlying seductive powers, Lucifer and Ahriman. It is one of the most impressive creations I have ever seen; it will form the central end of the smaller domed room in the Goetheanum. As I watched the listeners coming up the hill in small groups at dusk to gather for the lecture, Dr. Steiner told me about the attacks of his opponents. Clerics and all-Germans and fanatical followers of various religious denominations are fighting against him with every weapon and at every opportunity.

The fear of the truth

[ 6 ] When I asked him the question about General von Moltke straight away, he turned his penetrating eyes on me, which looked at me from a face furrowed by forty years of intense spiritual struggle.

[ 7 ] "What you tell me does not astonish me. No means will be spared to drive me out of Germany and possibly also out of Switzerland. These attacks are based on a wide variety of grounds. But insofar as they extend to my relations with Moltke, they have a very specific aim. They want to prevent the publication of some notes that Moltke made for his family before his death and whose publication in the book trade I was supposed to arrange in agreement with Mrs. von Moltke.

[ 8 ] These memoirs should have been published in 1919. Immediately before its publication, a person in charge of Prussia's diplomatic representation in Stuttgart came to see me to tell me that this publication was impossible and that they would not want it in Berlin. Later, a general who had been in positions around General von Moltke and Wilhelm II came to me and gave me the same ideas. I protested against this and wanted to disregard it. I thought of turning to Count von Brockdorff-Rantzau, who was present in Versailles at the time, but could achieve nothing. My efforts were all the more unsuccessful as at the same time Mrs. von Moltke was approached with ideas that she could not resist.

[ 9 ] Why these fears? These memoirs are by no means an indictment of the imperial government. But it is clear from them, what is perhaps worse, that the imperial government was in a state of complete confusion and under incomprehensibly reckless and ignorant leadership. One can apply to the responsible personalities the sentence I wrote down in my preface: 'It was not what they did that contributed to bringing about the disaster, but the whole nature of their personalities.

[ 10 ] I might add that it was the peculiar circumstances which caused the weight of the decisive decisions to rest finally on a single man, the Chief of the General Staff, who saw himself compelled to do his military duty because politics had come to a standstill. I never spoke to him about political or military issues before Moltke's resignation. It was only later, when he was seriously ill, that he naturally spoke openly to me about all these matters, and since this will interest you, I will tell you what he told me himself and what is also evident from his unpublished memoirs.

[ 11 ] At the end of June 1914, Moltke, who had been Chief of the General Staff since 1905, went to Carlsbad for health reasons. Until his death, he knew nothing of a Potsdam consultation on July 5 or 6. He had only returned to Berlin in good health after the ultimatum to Serbia. Since his return he had, as he said, been firmly convinced that Russia would attack. He clearly foresaw the tragic development that things were bound to take, that is, he believed in the participation of France and England in the world conflict. He wrote a memorandum for the Kaiser pointing out the necessity of measures to be taken. The plan of the German General Staff had essentially been laid down for a long time. It had been drawn up by Moltke's predecessor, von Schlieffen. You know its main features: Large masses were to be thrown against France in order to achieve a quick decision in the west at any cost. A weak defensive army was planned against Russia, which was to be replenished later after the decision on the western theater of war.

Disturbed people

[ 12 ] Von Moltke had changed his predecessor's plan on one important point, however. While Schlieffen had envisaged a simultaneous march through Belgium and Holland, Moltke had renounced Holland in order to give Germany breathing space in the event of a blockade.

[ 13 ] When Moltke arrived at the castle on Friday, July 31, he found people completely confused. He had the impression, as he said, that he found himself in the position of having to make a decision all by himself. The Kaiser had not yet signed the mobilization order that day, an order which in Germany was tantamount to a declaration of war, for as soon as this order was given, everything, including the first operation, was carried out at specific times with a relentless automatism. Wilhelm II contented himself for that day with proclaiming the imminent threat of war. The following day, on Saturday, August 1, at four o'clock in the afternoon, he summoned Moltke again, and in the six hours that followed, the following drama unfolded.

[ 14 ] Moltke met the Emperor in the presence of Bethmann Hollweg, whose knees were literally trembling, the War Minister Falkenhayn, General von Plessen, Lyncker and several others. The Emperor voiced strong opposition to the intentions of the Chief of Staff. He had, he said, received the best news from England. England would not only remain neutral - as George V informed him - but would even prevent France from taking part in the war. Under these conditions, it would be logical to throw the whole army against Russia. No, replied Moltke, the plan must be carried out in the East as well as in the West as it is laid down, if we do not wish to bring about the greatest misfortune.

The technical reasons

[ 15 ] The objections do not affect Moltke; he refuses to change anything. He asserts that the mobilization order must be complied with without delay. He does not believe in the English telegrams, and with the mobilization order in his hand, which Wilhelm II has just signed, he is dismissed, leaving the others in a state of complete confusion. Thus it came about that the decision on the outbreak of war had to be made for purely military reasons. On the way from the palace to the General Staff, his car was overtaken by an imperial automobile. Moltke is recalled on behalf of the Emperor. The Emperor is more excited than ever. He shows his Chief of Staff a telegram from England. He believes he can see with absolute certainty from this telegram that the conflict is confined to the East and that England and France will remain neutral. 'An order must be sent immediately to the army,' he concludes, 'not to proceed in the west. Moltke's reply was that an army could not be exposed to the alternative of orders and counter-orders. While Moltke was standing there, the Kaiser turned to the wing adjutant on duty and ordered him to immediately transmit an order to the command of the 16th Division in Trier that it was not to march into Luxembourg. Moltke went home. Shaken, because he expects the greatest disaster from such measures, he sits down at his table. He declares that he cannot take any measures for the army in accordance with the Emperor's telephonic order. This order is brought to him by an adjutant for his signature. He refuses to sign and pushes the order back. He remained in a state of dull exhaustion until 11 o'clock in the evening, even though he had returned from Karlsbad in good health. At 11 o'clock he is rung up. The Emperor asks for him again. He immediately goes to the palace. Wilhelm II, who had already retired, throws on a robe and says: "Everything has changed. Disaster is on its way. The King of England has just declared in a new telegram that he has been misunderstood and that he will not accept any obligation on behalf of himself or France. He concludes with the words: "Now you can do what you like. And now the war begins.

Bloomy omens

[ 16 ] In the month of August, I saw General von Moltke only once, on August 27 in Koblenz. Our conversation revolved around purely human matters. The German army was still in full victory mode. There was no reason to talk about what was not yet there. The Battle of Marne unfolded later. I had not seen von Moltke until then. It took place under conditions which must have shaken von Moltke's expectations to the core. During the trial maneuvers he had several times ordered a cautious advance on the right wing, which could have been considered in a march on Paris. Three times Kluck, who had supreme command of the right wing, had advanced too quickly. Each time Moltke said to him, "If you advance just as quickly at the decisive moment, we will lose the war in an emergency. When Kluck's army was threatened with being surrounded, Moltke was seized by a terrible premonition. The thought came to him: the war could be lost for Germany. This seems to me to be part of the 'psychology' of the course of the war. When von Moltke returned to headquarters on September 13, he gave the impression of a deeply shaken man. Those around the Kaiser thought he was ill. From that moment on, Falkenhayn, without having the official title, was in fact in command. Later, when Moltke was confined to bed, Wilhelm II visited him. Is it still me who is in charge of the operations? he asked the Emperor. I do indeed believe that it is still you, replied Wilhelm II. For weeks, the Kaiser did not even know who was the actual commander-in-chief of his troops.

[ 17 ] But now a new example of the opinion people had of Wilhelm II in his own environment. One day, when von Moltke was describing to me the feelings of deep sorrow he was experiencing on his return to Belgium after the capture of Antwerp, I asked him for the first time about the invasion of Belgium. How was it, I asked, that a Minister of War could claim in the Reichstag that the plan to invade Belgium had not existed? This minister, Moltke replied, did not know my plan, but the Chancellor was up to date. And the Kaiser? Never, said Moltke: he was too talkative and indiscreet. He would have blabbed it to the whole world!"

Jules Sauerwein

Note from the editors, Rudolf Steiner, whom we informed of our intention to publish his conversation with Jules Sauerwein here as well, writes the following

Dreigliederung, Vol. 3, No. 15, October 12, 1921 / Das Goetheanum, Vol. 1,. No. 9, October 16, 1921

[ 1 ] It seemed impossible not to answer the questions put to me during a visit by my friend Dr. Jules Sauerwein. For, firstly, I consider the present moment to be one in which everyone who knows anything about the truth of the war must speak. Under the circumstances, I should have considered silence to be a breach of duty. What I have said, I could say quite independently of Mr. von Moltke's memoirs. I heard all this from Mr. von Moltke in November 1914 and later myself - even often - and was never under any obligation to remain silent. It was only natural not to talk about it at an inappropriate time.

[ 2 ] Secondly, there is something else to consider. I knew Mr. von Moltke and for years learned to appreciate the nobility of this personality, whose lips certainly never uttered a subjective untruth. In July 1914 he was placed in a tragic situation. He knew the dreadful thing that had to be decided, and his military duty required him to decide alone. Now I may perhaps remark that on another visit shortly before, Dr. Jules Sauerwein told me that news was now being spread from certain quarters that von Moltke had died in mental derangement. He asked me what was true about these things and their connection with the war. I also felt obliged not to remain silent in the face of these outrageous and untrue scatterings. (I need hardly say that Mrs. von Moltke knew nothing of a conversation with Dr. Sauerwein.)

[ 3 ] I believe that the discussions about the "guilt" of the war are on the wrong track. One cannot speak of "guilt" in the way one does. There is tragedy. And the war was caused by a tragic situation. That shows best how I must believe what I have heard from Mr. von Moltke about the next war. I do not feel compelled to go into the nonsensical talk of von Moltke's "mystical" inclinations. What he did with regard to the war he considered a necessity out of his military duty. And I think that what he said is suitable for putting the discussion about the "guilt" of war on a different footing from that on which it stands in the world today.

Rudolf Steiner

[ 1 ] When I wrote the few "subsequent remarks" in No. 15 of this weekly on Dr. Sauerwein's reproduction of a conversation between him and me, I had not yet read any of the comments that appeared in the press about the "Matin" article. I assumed that every unbiased reader of this article must recognize that there is something in what I have communicated about von Moltke's oral or written statements, the right further discussion of which must lead to the world no longer being able to speak of a "guilt" of Germany, but of a tragic doom. For these statements make it clear:

[ 2 ] 1. that the circumstances at the end of July 1914 in Germany placed the decision on the measures to be taken in the hands of one man, the Chief of the General Staff von Moltke. At the decisive moment, he was allowed to do nothing other than his military duty. This eliminates all talk of German warmongers. For it is precisely von Moltke's account that proves that even if such warmongers had been present, they would have had no influence on von Moltke's decision. Moltke's account is not that of a party, but that of a man who acted with a highly developed sense of responsibility. His word comes before all others. It is not spoken to the detriment of Germany.

[ 3 ] 2 It is clear from the reproduction of von Moltke's statements that he knew nothing of a Potsdam consultation (an alleged Crown Council) on July 5 or 6 until his death. This disproves all the fairy tales that have linked decisive events to such a council. How anyone can say that I continue to perpetuate this fairy tale is beyond me.

[ 4 ] 3. I have often heard from von Moltke that the war plan essentially originated with von Schlieffen. It seems important that von Moltke emphasized that he had abandoned von Schlieffen's intention of marching through southern Holland with the right wing, preferring to take on the great technical difficulties caused by the fact that the right wing of the German army had to force its way through the narrow space between Aachen and the southern border of the province of Limburg. From this it is clear to any unbiased person that the German army command was most earnestly endeavoring not to do a single bit more towards the west of what was then regarded as such a grave injustice than it had to do according to the responsibility it bore. Anything else would have been a matter for the political leadership. The fact that von Schlieffen considered more to be necessary can serve as proof of this fact. From the fact that more than a decade before the outbreak of war there was the intention to march through Holland, nothing can really be concluded about the events of 1914. To want to incriminate Germany with this is simply ridiculous.

[ 5 ] 4. Anyone who knew von Moltke should know that no untruth could come from his lips in any of these matters. But it is important for the world to know how he found himself in his surroundings in that hour which he regarded like no other as Germany's hour of destiny. To conceal what was going on between him and those around him is to withhold from the world the most important thing that can be known about the outbreak of war. Others may think differently, perhaps to spare this or that person. But they should not impute dishonest intentions to those who cannot agree with them.

[ 6 ] Now, of the press statements that have been linked to Dr. Sauerwein's article, those in the "Deutsche Allgemeine Zeitung" are probably the ones that can be taken most seriously.

[ 7 ] In response to Major General von Haeften's remark that my reports are intended to make it clear that "all those men in whose hands the fate of Germany lay at that time were more or less weaklings", I will only say this: After all, one need only read the many memoirs that have been written since the end of the war to see what "those men" threw at each other; and one will then hardly say, with an unbiased judgment, "Such a tendency cannot be opposed explicitly enough. " I have reproduced Moltke's judgment. If you want proof of this, read von Tirpitz's memoirs. What I cannot accept, however, is von Haeften's sentence: ... . for weakness and recklessness in such a situation are perhaps more burdensome and a greater guilt than a conscious will to war." Can one speak like this if one lives in the real world and not in a ghost world? What Germany is accused of is a "conscious will to war". It is seen as its fault. If one can no longer speak of a conscious will to war, but only of "légèreté" and "ignorance inconcevables" (incomprehensible recklessness and ignorance), then it is possible to work towards revising the views on "guilt". Incidentally, it is significant that von Haeften does not speak of what I actually said, but of "weakness and recklessness". I have often heard and read these words in Germany, but I have not used them. The fact that recklessness and ignorance, i.e. qualities for which those who have them are ultimately not responsible, can justify "greater guilt" than a "conscious will to war", will firstly be difficult to convey to a legal mind, and secondly, if viewed correctly, "in such a situation" as that of July 1914, it may well lead to tragic doom, but not to a conviction for "conscious" guilt.

[ 8 ] What Mr. von Haeften further claims about von Moltke's relationship with me, he could know better. He says: "As long as he was in full possession of his health, Colonel General von Moltke was completely opposed to Mr. Steiner and his endeavours, even though Mrs. von Moltke, who was under the spell of Steiner's ideas, had often tried to influence her husband in Steiner's direction. Only the mentally and physically ill colonel general showed himself open to Steiner's ideas during his visit to Homburg Castle in November 1914, and after his resignation from his position as chief of the general staff of the army, he placed his trust in Mr. Steiner, a trust that the latter does not repay him well today." These assertions about my relationship with Mr. von Moltke are all objective falsehoods. Rather, the following is true. I have frequented Mr. von Moltke's house since 1904. I was invited to every single visit. The invitation came not only from Mrs. von Moltke, but also from Mr. von Moltke. I have the greatest admiration for Mr. von Moltke. But I never imposed myself on him. The conversations, which often lasted many hours, always covered questions of worldview. Mr. von Moltke was enlightened enough to see that my world view was far removed from all nebulous mysticism and wanted to rest on a secure foundation of knowledge. He would not have been easy to "influence", even if I had tried. But he saw that I was not at all interested in "influencing" him. He told me not once, but very often: "Your world view satisfies the mind, because it is the case with it, which I have never encountered with any other, all things support each other and fit together without contradiction." Because his thinking was quite healthy, he also had healthy skepticism and did not get over many things easily. He had doubts time and again. But even in the face of these doubts, he always made use of the above-mentioned sentence. He also said to me: "When people with the usual education of today find out about your views, you will have wonderful things to experience."

[ 9 ] This relationship has existed between Mr. von Moltke and me since 1904; and my visit to Homburg, which was also by invitation, has not changed it in the slightest. From my visit to Homburg until his death, he believed me no less and no more than he had done ten years earlier. - Whether, in his opinion, which is the only thing that really matters to me in this matter, I thank him less for his trust than someone who says that von Moltke only talked to me because he was mentally and physically ill, and yet he also enjoyed his trust, I don't want to argue about that at all. It just strikes me that someone who was "in the official environment" of Colonel General von Moltke at the outbreak of the war and during his stay in Homburg speaks of his "resignation from his position as Chief of the General Staff of the Field Army" without fear of using a dubious phrase with this formulation.

[ 10 ] I have already said above that Sauerwein's article disproves the fairy tale of the Crown Council on July 5. If it is said that I have concealed the fact that Colonel General von Moltke could not have known anything about the Crown Council because it never took place, then this seems to me to be a quibble, for if Mr. von Moltke knew nothing about such a thing, then nothing of any significance could have taken place.

[ 11 ] The fact that today Holland cannot be drawn into a new French propaganda campaign regarding the question of guilt by reasonable people, because it has been said that Mr. von Moltke wanted to refrain from marching through Holland, seems to me, as I have said above, quite clear. Mr. von Moltke's words prove that long before 1914 such a march through Holland was refrained from, despite the fact that Mr. von Schlieffen, whom Mr. von Moltke also regarded as a great military authority, believed that such a march might be necessary. But it is not entirely irrelevant that this march through, which Mr. von Haeften also admits that von Schlieffen had included in the "circle of his considerations", should only have been carried out on the condition that "Holland would voluntarily join the German side in the event of the outbreak of war". So says Mr. von Haeften. No one will dispute this. And if, as must certainly be admitted from the military point of view, this is a relief for Germany, it may also be asserted that, on further examination of this matter, the mention of von Schlieffen's intentions with regard to Holland should also make the march through Belgium appear in a different light than the one in which it has hitherto been seen alone. For this premise also applies to Belgium within certain limits. Mr. von Moltke reckoned that although Belgium would not side with the Germans, it would be friendly enough not to put up any resistance in arms to the march through. It is therefore not at all certain that Germany would have marched through Belgium in any case if things had not simply been rushed in the decisive days. How to judge these things politically is not for me to discuss here, although I know that the Belgian guarantee of neutrality was a very special one; for I did not speak about it with Dr. Sauerwein, but only about Mr. von Moltke's opinion.

[ 12 ] The shifts in dates mentioned by Mr. von Haeften, which can be found in Sauerwein's article, have been corrected in No. 15 of this weekly publication. What Mr. von Haeften adds in detail to what was said in the "Matin" article does not essentially contradict what was said there; it even supplements it and confirms it in essential points. Mr. von Haeften says: "Mr. Steiner's assertion that Colonel General von Moltke refused to countersign an order from the Kaiser delivered to him by a wing adjutant and sent the officer back is a free invention. Colonel-General von Moltke merely refused to sign a corresponding draft order from the head of the Operations Department (Lieutenant-Colonel Tappen)." There is nothing to correct other than the "wing adjutant", because I did not claim that the "draft order" was written by the Kaiser himself. And I readily admit that an officer knows more about wing adjutants than Sauerwein. Von Moltke's own words about it are: "As the dispatch to the 16th Division was presented to me, repeating the order given by telephone, I struck the pen on the table and declared I would not sign it." Mr. von Haeften emphasizes: "General von Moltke was a soldier unwaveringly loyal to his Emperor, despite some conflicting opinions, especially during the last years of his life." I fully agree with this. One can say even more. Von Moltke was one of the very best servants of his Emperor. And as a man who was always fully aware of his responsibilities, he never held back from giving the Emperor the advice he considered most suitable for him, even if it ran counter to the Emperor's opinions. But that is precisely what makes von Moltke's statements, which are reproduced completely correctly, so valuable. It was not an opponent of the Emperor who made them, but one of his most loyal servants who wrested them out of the matter. Anyone who believes that von Moltke spoke out of resentment or bitterness misjudges the colonel general. Everything that he experienced from the end of July 1914 onwards has cast him down; but he was never in a state that can be described as mentally ill in the sense that those who now believe they have to excuse his statements with the state of his soul do.

[ 13 ] What he said is, in my firm conviction, suitable for placing all previous discussion about the "question of guilt" on a basis on which the present rulers of the victorious states do not want it, but for which more and more reasonable people all over the world will be accessible. I cannot understand why Mr. von Haeften, whom I have come to know as a reasonable man, is not open to such a consideration today. One should realize that the German people will have the most to "pay for" if saying things like those of Moltke's opinion is repeatedly portrayed as an offence. The German people have no need to hold back with the truth. Those who believed they had to do so have done them the most harm so far. The truth will not incriminate the German people, it will exonerate them. We should have realized this in the days leading up to the Versailles peace treaty. We should realize it again today. Those who want to defend the German politicians of 1914 should be reminded of what von Tirpitz wrote in his "Memoirs". For example, on page 242: "The impression of the headlessness of our political leadership became more and more disturbing. The march through Belgium did not seem to have been an established fact beforehand (he means on the night of August 1 to 2). Since the Russian mobilization, the Chancellor gave the impression of a drowning man... . While the lawyers of the Foreign Office were engrossed in the doctoral question of whether we were already at war with Russia or not yet, it turned out in passing that they had forgotten to ask Austria whether it wanted to fight with us against Russia." On page 245, the same von Tirpitz says: "After the Chancellor left the meeting, Moltke complained to the Kaiser about the 'deplorable' state of the political leadership, which had no preparations for the situation and now that the avalanche was rolling, was still thinking of nothing but legal notes." And men about whom someone (von Tirpitz) who has worked with them has to speak in this way should not be criticized by the German people, but "thanked". They should be satisfied with the opinion that they "thought and acted logically and dutifully". On page 248, von Tirpitz says: "The moral blamelessness of our government at that time can only be made clear by an open presentation of its diplomatic inadequacy.....

[ 14 ] Von Moltke's views and statements are certainly in the direction in which these matters must be clarified. If they are discussed correctly, they cannot fail to have an effect. However, if they are discussed in the way they have been so far, this will of course result in something that the German "people will have to pay for", as unfortunately they already have to "pay for" enough.

[ 15 ] Whether one has a right to speak of "political dilettantes" in the way Mr. von Haeften does, with the background provided by von Tirpitz's words on page 248, among others, must be seriously questioned. It says that the politicians of 1914 "were lacking" ... "through lack of straight and clear thinking."

[ 16 ] I would prefer to remain silent for the time being about personal slurs such as those contained in sentences about my "addiction to playing a political role". I would not have expected this judgment from Mr. von Haeften, whom I once got to know as a noble-minded man. It seems as if you can't just have prejudices from the outset, but as if, even if you didn't have them once, you can still acquire them afterwards.

[ 17 ] What I have said I believed I could not conceal, because unfortunately I see that personalities who can certainly have the subjective opinion that they do not want to do the "business of their enemies" do so precisely because they do not want to give the truth free rein. In my opinion, I have to recognize again today how some people are sinning in this direction.

[ 1 ] I feel obliged to respond to the thoroughly objective objections raised by Major Muff ("Stuttgarter Neues Tagblatt", November 1, 1921) against the intention and content of the "Matin" interview. For the time being, however, I would like to express my satisfaction with this objectivity; for when one continually hears only personal slurs from so many sides, one is glad to have to deal with a noble tone in polemics for once.

[ 2 ] First of all, Major Muff says that I added to Dr. Sauerwein's interview in subsequent remarks: "One cannot speak of guilt in the way one does. There is tragedy. And the war was caused by a tragic situation." If you read a few more sentences in my "supplementary remarks", you will come across the following words: "And I think that what he (Moltke) said is suitable for putting the discussion about the 'guilt' of the war on a different basis than the one on which it stands in the world today." Major Muff says: "As Germans, we have every reason to oppose such a shift in the level of discussion." To be honest, that seems a little unworldly to me. The whole context of my words implies that the discussion "in the world", that is, under today's conditions, should essentially be placed on a different footing from the one on which it stands among Germany's opponents. On what basis does it stand? On no other basis than that Germany deliberately brought about the war. The fact that Lloyd George sometimes speaks this way, sometimes a little differently, cannot really lead to the belief that "the truth about the guilt of the war" ... "is already on the march". If one looks at the discussion about war guilt today without being unworldly, then one could be satisfied if the discussion were based on the following by reasonable people outside Germany: there is no "guilt" on the German side, as has been thought up to now, but at the starting point there is a tragic situation in Germany. I believe that it is really not in Germany's interest to reject such a shift in the basis for discussion. Especially not if one admits the essence of this tragic situation, as Major Muff does. He speaks of the "political harmlessness, to put it mildly" of the leading German politicians in the face of Moltke's judgment at the outbreak of the war. Now, in view of the magnitude of the matter, it is perhaps not entirely necessary to express oneself "mildly". If this is not the case, Major Muff's sentence will also have to be seen as proof that the German politicians failed completely in 1914. But therein lies the tragic situation.

[ 3 ] That is what is so peculiar about the polemic surrounding the "Matin" interview: One says that what this interview contains is mistaken; and one then states what one oneself has to say: and in everything factual one only gives confirmations of what is in the interview.

[ 4 ] Major Muff believes that the "Matin" article will cause the "normal thinker" to "blame" Germany after all, because it is said that the German mobilization plan provided for war not only against Russia but also against France, and that this plan had to be carried out with an "inexorable automatism". To support this belief, Major Muff quotes a sentence from the interview, to which he adds an interjection of his own: "So it came about that the decision on the outbreak of war had to be made out of purely military considerations - meaning the inflexible deployment plan of the German General Staff." This quote becomes incorrect when Major Muff adds the words: "what is meant is the inflexible deployment plan of the German General Staff". These words are not in the interview. What is meant is stated in the words that precede them in the interview. And these are: "With the mobilization order in his hand, which Wilhelm II has just signed, he (Moltke) is dismissed, leaving the others in a state of complete confusion." After pointing out that the leading political figures were in "complete confusion", Major Muff says the following: "So it came about that the decision on the outbreak of war had to be made for purely military reasons." Major Muff now construes a decision which, according to Moltke's clear statements, according to his records (and also according to Haeftens' statements in the "Deutsche Allgemeine Zeitung"), cannot be understood as anything other than military, into a political one brought about by Molike. He says that Moltke had the firm conviction "that Russia would attack and that France and England would side with him. For him, this meant a war on two fronts, not for military but for political reasons". Moltke told the Kaiser, when he expressed his will to march east with the entire army for political reasons, that the deployment of an army of millions could not be improvised, that it was the result of long, arduous work, and that once it had been decided, it could not be changed. If the emperor wanted to lead the entire army to the east, he would not have a ready army, but a desolate heap of disorganized armed men without provisions. What could be clearer than that military reasons are being pitted against political ones. Major Muff actually feels compelled to admit this. That is why he says Moltke's reasons were political; but he gave military ones. And he constructs his train of thought as follows: "If Moltke refused to abandon the two-front deployment, which was based on Schlieffen's operational studies, this was ... not because it would not have been technically possible to carry out a different deployment, but because he was firmly convinced that France and England would immediately side with Russia... . He, the soldier, had no political grounds against the appointed leaders of German foreign policy. He had to use every means at his disposal to prevent a decision which, as head of military operations, presented him with an insoluble and disastrous task for Germany. Naturally, he resorted to a means by which alone he could expect success. For technical reasons, he declared himself unable to carry out the deployment against Russia alone, as demanded by the Kaiser and his political advisors. However, Moltke's records clearly show that his refusal was in fact based solely on political reasons." The opposite is the case. If anything is clear from Moltke's notes, it is that for military-technical reasons - Major Muff says: "as head of military operations" - he considered the strict implementation of the two-front war to be absolutely necessary at the hour in which the relevant decisions had to be made. Given Moltke's character, I cannot imagine that he would have simply closed his mind to the reasons that were certainly expressed. If one then does not quibble over words, if one refrains from describing what is certainly characterized as military-technical as political, then one can compare Major Muff's statements with those of the interview without bias. And lo and behold: the interview states: "He (Moltke) clearly foresaw the tragic development that things had to take, that is, he believed in the participation of France and England in the world conflict." Moltke's decision is attributed exactly the same as that of Major Muff. And he too thinks nothing of the appointed political leaders. But he thus admits that the decision was in von Moltke's hands. And he had to do his military duty. - How one can then still believe that the interview leads to the assertion that the German general staff brought about the tragic situation is unfathomable. From beginning to end, the interview wants to show that the tragic situation was due to the politicians' incompetence and that the German Chief of Staff acted as he had to act according to his duty. For Dr. Sauerwein, there was no reason to "laugh up his sleeve". This could only arise if people in Germany continued to say that they were "opposed" to the "shift in the level of discussion" in the direction that one could not speak of "German guilt" in the sense in which it had previously been spoken of in the non-German world.

[ 5 ] If one wishes to stick to the straightforward, unconcealed facts as described by von Moltke, it is not a matter of discussing the doctoral question of whether the assertion that the mobilization order in Germany was equivalent to a declaration of war was nonsensical from a military point of view. We are not talking about military-technical definitions, but about the reality of late July and early August 1914. And Major Muff himself says of this reality that the military-technical "nonsense" was politically correct insofar as "in our efforts to localize the war, unlike our opponents, we had postponed every military measure until the very last minute, thereby giving them a valuable head start, so that the mobilization order and the start of the war coincided in time". One would think that for events taking place in time, this temporal coincidence would come into consideration, not the fact that the mobilization order and the beginning of the war have theoretically different definitions. Major Muff says: "According to plan, however, the deployment should follow immediately after mobilization so as not to lose any time. But according to the nature and manner of the preparations, the simple addition to the mobilization order should have been made: Aufmarsch wird zunächst nicht ausgeführt, would have sufficed to merely bring the mobilization to a conclusion." Certainly, according to everything that can be known from Moltke's statements, he would not have made this addition after issuing the mobilization order. For he was of the opinion that any delay would be detrimental. So although this assertion is theoretically correct, it is of no practical significance.

[ 6 ] Major Muff attaches great importance to the fact that there was also a plan for a sole deployment in the east. In contrast, two questions must be asked. First, why did von Moltke not reckon with this plan at the moment of the decision? Major Muff will say because he thought the politicians' opinion that the West would remain neutral was nonsense. But then he could not say to the Emperor: if you marched in the East, you would not have a powerful army, but rather a desolate pile of armed, unprovisioned people. And secondly: if he said this - and he did say it - why wasn't he told back? We also have the deployment plan for the East alone? There is no need to doubt that Major Muff rightly spoke of such a deployment plan on paper; but Moltke obviously did not consider it feasible for military reasons at the time when the decision had to be made by him.

[ 7 ] Major Muff also says: "Steiner undoubtedly wants to hold his shield over Moltke's memory. In truth, however, he places a tremendous responsibility on him when he claims that the decision on the outbreak of war was made by the Chief of Staff's rigid deployment plan." Firstly, I have not "claimed" anything at all, as far as I am concerned, but simply reproduced Moltke's own statements faithfully. Secondly, it is clear from this reproduction that, according to the wording of the interview, the final decision was made as follows: "At 11 o'clock he (Moltke) is rung... He goes immediately to the castle. Wilhelm II.... says: Everything has changed. The King of England has just declared in a new telegram that he has been misunderstood and that he does not assume any obligation on his behalf or on behalf of France. He concludes with the words: Now you can do what you like."

[ 8 ] I have already discussed the passage through Holland in No. 17 of this weekly publication. With regard to the Battle of the Marne, the sentences in the interview are based on von Moltke's statements; what Major Muff says is largely based on conclusions, which, however, do not affect the essence of the interview at all. For this lies in the emphasis on the "psychology" of the course of the war at the time of the Battle of the Marne. I have spoken of this because, as Major Muff does again, it is claimed that "the Chief of the General Staff, whose leadership lacked a sure hand, was more to blame than the leader of the 1st Army". Moltke's statement is a psychological counter to this assertion. - If one were to confront the "Matin" interview impartially, one would see what could be gained from Moltke's statements to exonerate Germany. In France, they are not "laughing up their sleeves" about it, but are trying to discuss it as little as possible for the time being. Because the right discussion leads to things that people don't want to hear yet. In Germany, this discussion should be conducted differently than it is. There will be more to say about this in this weekly publication.