out with Russia and Austria on Frederick’s account. And, on his side,
Frederick perhaps did not believe that an understanding with England
must necessarily mean a break with France. But France was beside
herself. Yes, Kaunitz was right. This man was an out and out wretch.
He openly put himself on the side of France’s enemies. But they would
show him.... They showed him. Kaunitz had meanwhile taken the helm of
foreign affairs at Vienna and was represented at Paris through Count
Starhemberg. He could at once report the most gratifying progress
in his French enterprise. It was at this time that our marquise
showed how well she could preside at a real council of state. In the
boudoir of her château of Babiole there took place those very private
negotiations between her, Count Starhemberg, and the Abbé Bernis, her
protégé, which, on May the first, resulted in a contract of defence
and neutrality between France and Austria: the Treaty of Versailles,
which was the answer to the Convention of Westminster, and which, as a
matter of fact, was so well seasoned that somebody called it a blank
declaration of war for the Austrian chancellor. In it was the statement
that France and Austria would stand together, that in case of need one
of them would place twenty-four thousand men at the disposition of the
other; and there were also included all sorts of things about subsidies
to Austria. It was not set down that Austria would cede territory in
the Netherlands to France as soon as Austria by France’s help had got
back Silesia; but they continually treated of it, and the Marquise so
understood it.
And if it were only France that was outraged! But Russia was outraged
too. “What?” Elizabeth cried; “have we taken so much money from England
only to have her patronize this man who has made a mock of me all
over Europe for the sake of a few harmless little fancies?” Russia
turned her back on England. With furious haste she set herself to get
into touch once more with France. Furiously she proffered Austria a
plain and blunt offensive alliance against Prussia. They could hardly
hold her back. Kaunitz, who had not quite yet got France where he
wanted her, had to preach patience to Saint Petersburg, and advise
discretion, “lest the desperate King of Prussia fall on us prematurely.”
So Frederick, then, had missed his reckoning altogether--granted, of
course, that he had reckoned as the writers of the period (among whom
he was one) say that he did. And granting that he had not known all
the time, in his heart of hearts, that in one way or another he would
one day have to prove the strength of his budding greatness before the
whole of Europe, and had been ready for many a day to do it. Today
it looks as though both alternatives were true: that he had war in
his blood, but that, more out of spite than love of peace, he played
the diplomatic game of balancing powers--just for the fun of leading
destiny by the nose. At all events, the Convention of Westminster
caused an incredible political upheaval; and any critic of the time
might have said that this royal statesman was such a bungler that he
had managed to unite against him all the sworn hereditary enemies of
Europe. A new system of understandings arose: Austria did not stick to
England against France, and Bourbon and Habsburg joined hands. Russia
disregarded the subsidies contracted for with England the previous
year; mad with rage, she went over to France and Austria. And so they
were united, they, the three greatest powers on the continent. And on
the other side stood Frederick; with a single friend, not exaggeratedly
loyal at that, who concealed from him that she was no longer friends
with Russia, and who, moreover, had her hands full with the war
overseas. However, the famous money-belt would be at his disposition,
at least for the present and if things did not go too badly with him.
Such was the position; and it did not take Frederick long to grasp
it. Not in vain did he keep spies at every court. He knew the
secrets of Babiole. From The Hague came hints of the Franco-Russian
_rapprochement_. “Are you sure of the Russians?” he continually asked
Mitchell, the English ambassador. And Mitchell replied: “My government
is sure of them.” Adding _sotto voce_ that he himself was not so sure,
and that just lately a courier had told him that all the roads up to
the Lithuanian frontier were full of marching Russians. For Mitchell
the Scot was an honest man and he had great respect for Frederick.
To make assurance doubly sure, word came from Dresden of Russia’s
eager urging, and of her leaving England in the lurch. The Viennese
ambassador gave further detail about the offensive Austro-French
alliance, which was not signed yet, but was under constant discussion;
comprehensively speaking, it was as follows; on the day when Austria,
with the help of France, won back Silesia, it ceded to France a part
of the Netherlands.--Take it all in all, the Kaunitz schemes, his
coalition and his dreams of partition, were pretty plain.
It was a great deal that Frederick had in his hands; quite enough to
afford him the moral possibility which he was supposed to give the
good Maria Theresa by attacking. It is not hard to guess his state of
mind--to presume to understand his feelings would be more daring. A
bitter, angry, Mephistophelian laughter must have risen to his lips
at the thought of that clique over there striving so hard to preserve
their innocence, to put on him the odium of the offensive--on him,
who was above either the simplicity or the hypocrisy of such clear
psychological distinctions between offensive and defensive; and
who had no fear of either praise or blame. And again, he felt that
Prussia would have in the end to assert herself and show what she
could do; he had war in his blood, he meant war--whereas the others
only meant, in the first instance, diplomatic chicanery. The draft of
that Franco-Austrian alliance, whose aim was the recovery of Silesia,
presupposed an offensive taken by Frederick--and even so it remained
a draft. The whole Kaunitz scheme of a coalition for the destruction
of Prussia was in the first place no more than that, and very little
of it had been put on paper. There is no document in existence from
which Maria Theresa’s intention to attack Prussia can be proved; nor
any showing that Russia’s and Saxony’s part in her plans was either a
neutral or a hostile one. No human being, learned or unlearned, will
ever be able to decide whether these plans would ever have become more
than plans if it had not been that.... One thing more: a contemporary,
who must have known, Count Hertzberg, who at the King’s request
prepared a paper upon the events of the year 1756 and preceding,
declared, thirty years later: “It is, to be sure, a fact that plans
were in existence for the partition of Frederick’s territories; but
they were only provisional, and presupposed the condition that he would
give occasion to carry them out; so it will always remain unsettled
whether or no those plans would have been executed.” If it had not
been that--what? That Frederick himself began.
If one turns to the historians to try to discover whether the frightful
war which thus began was really an offensive or a defensive war on
Frederick’s part, one finds that the historians contradict themselves
to the point of absurdity. All those whose breasts are covered with
orders have one song to sing; everything, they say, is against the
libellous hypothesis of a long-prepared war of attack and conquest: the
bearing of the King, his utterances, public and private, during the
ten years of peace and the last summer months before the catastrophe.
Those whose breasts are not covered with orders (which of course is
only the result and not the cause of the views they hold), who have
a grudge against genius, holding it to be incompatible with virtue,
in the nature of things: these sing a different song: positively
everything, they say, that is known to us of the villain speaks for
the interpretation of an offensive war. His utterances, forsooth! They
are just so many subterfuges, just so much dust in people’s eyes. “If
I thought my shirt or my skin knew anything of my intentions ...” Yes,
we remember. Had he not also said that he had no desire to be like
those princes who become famous by reason of one brilliant operation
and afterwards enjoy peace and quiet? His plans date from far back.
He wanted to conquer Saxony and West Prussia, that was all, and he
spied out the diplomacy of the other powers in order to get pretexts
for attack.--Yes, the historians are a mass of contradictions. For my
part, if anybody asks me, I prefer to say nothing. For it seems to
me that when the various opinions on his life and deeds cancel each
other out, silence is what is left. That Frederick began the war is no
evidence that it was not defensive; for he was encircled, and might
quite possibly have been attacked the following spring. But did he will
the war? The question leads us into the slough of unsolved problems
concerning the freedom of the will. He probably understood quite early
that he would be forced to will it; and after he had led destiny awhile
by the nose, he had enough human pride and human spite to will it
voluntarily.
So much is true: that the others, no matter how much they may have
plotted, began their actual warlike preparations only when those of
Prussia had turned to certainty the great and general mistrust. As
early as the spring of this year 1756 Frederick had sent a corps
to Stolp under Field-marshal Lehwald; and further, ostensibly to
safe-guard Hanover, he took measures to bring up the Westphalian troops
and strongly provisioned the Silesian fortresses. His own officers had
shaken their heads. After the middle of June, “_Alarmzustand_” was
declared in East Prussia as well as Silesia, all leaves were cancelled,
the reserves called in before the end of the regular manœuvres. One
army was by then completely mobilized; it stood in Farther Pomerania
ready to act as reserve in East Prussia. The plan of campaign, drawn
up by the King together with General von Winterfeld, had long been
ready, save for details. Winterfeld, a sort of general chief of staff,
sat bent over route plans and lists. Everywhere horses were being
bought. General von Retzov was intendant in the field. The files were
formed, the marching order of the army in three great divisions was
settled upon. The machine was working smoothly. And Kaunitz smiled and
compressed his lips. “His Majesty of Prussia,” he said, “is already
making the second great mistake in state policy. First Westminster,
and now these preparations. It is good we have not armed up to now,
it might have spoilt everything. Now we and Russia have all the
provocation in the world to hurl our troops against the boundary.” And
Austria set up an extraordinary armament commission; it brought its
regiments on a war footing and concentrated them in Bohemia and Moravia.
On the tenth of July, Frederick ordered his generals to Potsdam;
appeared among them and without more ado declared that the war must
begin. “That it must,” Winterfeld supported him. “Impossible!” said
all the rest; and advised strongly against it. They were Prussian
generals: Haudegen, Schwerin, Keith, Retzov, Schmettau, Ferdinand von
Braunschweig; but they all most strenuously advised against it. The
King’s brother could not trust his ears. “Are we to understand,” cried
Prince Wilhelm, “that Your Majesty hopes to conquer this overwhelming
strength? The greatest powers in Europe, the public opinion of the
continent, are against us. And justice--ah, Sire, it is not on our
side!” “To want to wrest victory from superior power like that is to
court defeat at the hands of Providence!” So cried the princes Henry
and Ferdinand. Frederick pished and pshawed, and jeered at them and
said they might stop at home if they were afraid. At which they
naturally fired up and said that obedience was higher than personal
opinions.
In the whole world he had not one moral support. England never ceased
to warn him not to invoke certain destruction--against which she would
be powerless to save him. But when in the middle of July he learned
that Austria was mobilizing all along the line, he had the question
put in Vienna, which sounded dangerously like an ultimatum: was the
mobilization directed against him? Probably he had in mind to spring
the combination by showing a brusque deportment. If they came to blows
in midsummer, he reckoned, then Russia was not likely to march that
year. Perhaps, even, English gold would keep her still, or there would
be a change of thrones--for the Little Mother was not in the best of
health, her love-affairs were bad for her. And France: she had signed
the Treaty of Versailles, but nothing is easier than to deny the _casus
fœderis_ if you do not want it and cannot have it. And it seemed to the
King like a case of cannot.
But if France and Russia did fall away, would Austria stand up to him
alone? Frederick did not think it, he did not hope for it. But if,
said he, they were really with child by war, he was ready to play the
midwife. A detestable figure! And another allusion to the sex of his
opponent.
They were not ready yet, in Vienna. So they delayed for two weeks
with their answer. Then it came. Maria Theresa explained that in the
universal crisis she had taken steps to secure herself and her allies,
which were not intended to injure anybody. Kaunitz told her what to
say--disingenuous, time-taking rubbish. Frederick still pressed. He
sent word that he could not remain in ignorance of Austria’s agreement
with Russia. If Her Majesty could not give him, in good set terms,
without employing any of the usual Austrian evasions, the assurance
that she would not attack him within the next two years, then she
would have her own exalted self to thank for whatever consequences
might ensue upon her silence. That this demand did not admit of any
discussion was obvious. Frederick’s own ambassador hardly found
the courage to transmit it. But simultaneously with his ultimatum
Frederick in quick succession mobilized first the Pomeranias, then the
Westphalias, Silesia, Brandenburg, and lastly the Berlin garrison. In
six days the troops were in fighting trim and only needed a few days
to reach their rendezvous. Schwerin with thirty thousand men was in
Silesia. The three columns, commanded by the King in person, pushed
toward a certain frontier.... Everything was buried in the profoundest
mystery; not even the divisional commanders were informed. But there
was still a delay.... What was Vienna’s answer? After full three weeks
she haughtily replied: the first steps toward mobilization had been
Prussia’s. Further, the alliance with Russia had existed for a decade,
and was not offensive in its character--from which it followed that
Prussia’s anxiety was groundless.--Kaunitz again. Between the lines
could be read: “If you swallow that, then you are a fool, and we shall
brush you aside. If you don’t, then you are a criminal disturber of the
peace. Take your choice.”--Frederick gave the order to cross the Saxon
frontier.
The Saxon frontier! Why, but Saxony was neutral, wasn’t she? Saxony
was not playing!--That was all one; on the twenty-ninth of August
Frederick, with sixty thousand moustaches, invaded Saxony.
What a hubbub arose in Europe at this unheard-of breach of the peace,
this attack on the rights of nations! We have no idea--or, rather,
yes, perhaps just lately we have had an idea. But let us listen to
Frederick before we listen to Europe: according to him his breach of
the law was due to the following reflections and considerations. He had
to be absolutely certain of Saxony, in order that she might not fight
on the wrong side when she had the chance. Things must not go as they
had in ’44, when Saxony had stuck a dagger in his back. By occupying
the country and disbanding the army or incorporating it in his own,
he should have a secure base for his operations against Bohemia. As
for neutrality, there was none, in any true sense of the word. In her
heart, and with all her evil-disposed intentions, Saxony was with the
coalition, though cowardice prevented her from admitting where she
stood. Frederick, in breaking the letter of the law, in violating a
neutrality that stood on paper, whereas its own betrayal did not so
stand, was actuated by the sternest necessity. He had to take the guilt
upon his own shoulders in order to bring it home to his enemies; he
had to get hold of the archives of the state of Dresden, that nest of
treachery, in order to be able to prove to all the world how Saxony
had manœuvred. If Saxony were wise, she would offer no opposition;
she would let him get across the mountains without delay. But let her
persist in carrying her skin to market for Austria, and he would crush
her once for all. When Schwerin repulsed an invasion into Silesia, and
Frederick surprised them by appearing in Bohemia, then Maria Theresa
might perhaps think better of it? With just one slash, perhaps, he
would have cut the web that bound him, so that the severed pieces
floated harmless away? Of course, the opposite result was conceivable:
the various combinations still in a fluid state about him might
crystallize at his touch, just as ice-cold water in a basin will begin
to freeze when shaken. But one way or the other, things must be brought
to a head.
Thus Frederick. But Europe had no mind at all for such balancings and
experimentations. Europe shrieked as with one voice. It was terrific
to hear her. The public, of course, had no “_Kujons_” in its pay; it
was not posted as to preliminaries, and in its eyes the march into
Saxony had taken place in the middle of the profoundest peace and
was a shameless breach of international law, an attack so wanton and
unprovoked that it put one quite beside oneself. To fall in force
upon a neutral country, a good, innocent country which was not at all
expecting such a barbarous onset and had only lately placed its army on
a pathetically small peace footing, twenty-two thousand men, in order
to enable Brühl to buy more wigs and coaches and scent-bottles! It was
insufferable, it rent the heart, it could not and must not be that this
snuff-taking Satan should tread under the heels of his top-boots all
morality, all justice, all humanity, all that ennobled life, all that
the upright must needs believe in. So Europe shrieked and continued
to shriek; and loudest of all shrieked Austria, pointing her finger
at Frederick and crying over and over again: “Now you see, don’t you?
There you are!”
And, as a matter of fact, Saxony was not in the least resolved on
fight. She had plotted, but she was not in the least resolved. However,
she was carried away by the general indignation, which confirmed her
in a false and sentimental conviction of her own innocence and the
justice of her cause; and she elected to perform the rôle of martyr in
the cause of Austria and the rights of nations--a choice which could
not save her from imminent destruction. It was impossible to withstand
the masterly entry of the Prussian troops, carried out as it was with
the utmost order and discipline. The defence hastily fell back on the
Bohemian frontier, and let Wittenberg, Torgau, Leipsic, let Dresden,
let the whole electorate fall without a blow into Frederick’s hands,
into the power of Prussia. The Saxon army stopped at Pirna, in a
fortified position, and thither came Augustus, in flight from Dresden.
This prince, otherwise rather slack, now displayed an astonishing
obstinacy, backed up by the moral support of all Europe. What Frederick
demanded of him was pretty thick, after all: it was no more, and no
less, than an offensive alliance against Austria, and the oath of
fealty of the Saxon troops. In other words, Saxony was to link her
fate, for better or worse, with Prussia’s; since, as Frederick said,
Saxony and Prussia were indispensable to each other and it was to their
mutual advantage to stick together. We have learned since then that
mutual advantage counsels a permanent alliance not only to Prussia
and Saxony, but to Prussia and Austria as well. But they had not got
so far on in those days; and Frederick’s theory, in the circumstances
under which it was set up, must have sounded Satanic indeed. “How
should I,” asked Augustus in numerous letters, “turn my sword against
a princess who has never given me any ground for doing so? It is my
intention not to take any part in this war ... my integrity, which
I have preserved up to my sixtieth year, encourages me to reply to
Your Majesty that you have possessed yourself of my territory without
any justification. Europe will be the judge of my cause, and of the
genuineness of the schemes you lay at my door, of the non-existence
of which all the courts of Europe are convinced.... It seems Your
Majesty can secure himself in no way save through the destruction of
my army, either by the sword or by famine. Until the second happens it
still lacks much; and with regard to the first, I have hopes that in
the divine protection and in the constancy and loyalty of my troops
I shall rest secure from the ultimate event.” They were good, moving
letters that poor King Augustus wrote, prompted by his consciousness
that he had Europe with him. He addressed his army just as touchingly.
They would, he said, thrust toward Bohemia together--which was sheerly
impossible--despite the strength of the enemy. He was resolved to
sacrifice his life in the attempt; it belonged to his subjects; it was
for them to save the honour of their king, and to defend him to the
last drop of their blood.