Is it true that the Cabinet of St. Petersburg has imposed upon this
country [France] the adoption of the law of three years, and would
now bring to bear the whole weight of its influence to ensure its
maintenance? I have not been able to obtain light upon this delicate
point, but it would be all the more serious, inasmuch as the men who
direct the Empire of the Tsars cannot be unaware that the effort thus
demanded of the French nation is excessive, and cannot be long sustained.
Is, then, the attitude of the Cabinet of St. Petersburg based upon the
conviction that events are so imminent that it will be possible to use
the tool it intends to put into the hands of its ally?
What a sinister vista is opened up by this passage! I have no wish to
insinuate that the suspicion here expressed was justified. It is the
suspicion itself that is the point. Dimly we see, as through a mist, the
figures of the architects of war. We see that the forces they wield are
ambition and pride, jealousy and fear; that these are all-pervasive; that
they affect all Governments and all nations, and are fostered by conditions
for which all alike are responsible.
It will be understood, of course, that in bringing out the fact that there
was national chauvinism in Russia and that this found its excuse in the
unstable equilibrium of Europe, I am making no attack on Russian policy.
I do not pretend to know whether these elements of opinion actually
influenced the policy of the Government. But they certainly influenced
German fears, and without a knowledge of them it is impossible to
understand German policy. The reader must bear in mind this source of
friction along with the others when we come to consider that policy in
detail.