RUSSIA'S INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS
Between the principles underlying the foreign policy of the Tsardom
and those that shaped the public and private conduct of its
authorised trustees there was an unmistakable family likeness. The
background of the curious events recorded in this chapter of Russia's
international relations--in so far as these were the results of
deliberate endeavours on the part of the Petersburg Foreign
Office--may be recalled in outline by many readers. The West
European beheld these occurrences through a roseate haze, which made
the Tsardom seem the one deep gambler among European States and the
most astute. And as for the tactics of the wire-pullers in
Petersburg, they were taken to be so deft and efficacious that a
veritable wizard could hardly detect in them anything to better.
However desultory or aimless circumstance or folly might make the
intercourse of the remaining powers with each other, Russia's course
was believed to be steadfastly directed towards the unchanging
far-off goal fixed for her by the genial Peter. Faith in the depth
of the Tsars' designs and also in the inexhaustible strength of their
countless battalions remained unshaken even after the Russian defeat
in Manchuria. And yet the previous war against, and victory over,
the Turks in the reign of Alexander II. afforded ample proof that
neither assumption was well grounded. Moreover, no one who had an
opportunity of scrutinising at fairly close quarters the procession
of statesmen who glided across the Russian stage from Gortchakoff to
Sazonoff could discover in the men any qualities more genial than
average mother-wit, or any aims in their political strategy more
subtle than the attainment of certain secondary objects, the
utilisation of casual opportunities, the fulfilment of a personal
desire of the sovereign, {222} or even the wreaking of vengeance on a
rival statesman. In vain we ransack the records of the past fifty
years for indisputable evidences of the steady political purpose for
which down to the March revolution all Europe gave them credit. It
is humiliating to realise how easily legends like that which was
woven about the sagacity, self-discipline, and perseverance of the
rulers of the Tsardom can be foisted on mankind as verdicts of
history.
During the past three reigns Russia's foreign policy was made up
largely of aims believed at first to be vital, pursued for a time
with vigour, and finally discarded as harmful. And in the methods
employed from Gortchakoff's death down to M. Izvolsky's advent to
power one finds little that indicates grasp of fact, breadth of
vision, or capacity for construction. And as for the thankless task
of grafting ethical principles upon the stock of Russian politics, it
would not seem to have been undertaken or contemplated by any one of
the ministers who transacted the international affairs of the Tsardom
within the period mentioned. Not to go back further than the year
1894, I can distinctly call to mind an experience I had in
Constantinople--one of a long series. I had gone thither to inquire
into the truth of the reports about a massacre of Armenians which it
was alleged had taken place in the district of Sassun. Before I
started I had been assured that there was no truth in the rumours.
As Professor Vamberg of Budapest was one of those who vouched for
this reassuring statement I felt disposed to accept it provisionally.
Before starting for Armenia, however, I called on a Russian statesman
with whom I was en very friendly terms and requested him to confide
to me the truth. He said, "I will talk to you as a friend. What I
say is for your guidance, not for publication. The massacres did
take place. I will give you some ghastly details, for the accuracy
of which I vouch. We have Armenians in prison for conspiring against
the Sultan. They could not honestly do otherwise. Your government
has asked--and I may say asked somewhat insistently--for an
international inquiry with a view to a collective intervention of the
powers. That {223} may be a highly ethical step to take, but believe
me it is not a wise one. It will do harm to the Armenians.[1] The
French government and ours, being Christian and European, have agreed
to participate in the step suggested by Queen Victoria's advisers.
That will give employment to the embassies and consulates of the
interested powers. But your ambassador in Constantinople fancies
that we shall also join in putting pressure on the Sultan. That is
an illusion. We have no such intention. Indeed, we are resolved to
eschew all action joint and isolated. When the inquiry is over,
which will establish the guilt of the Moslem population of Kurdistan
and, I must add, of the Stambul cabinet, the work of Russia and
France will be over together with it. It will have no practical
consequences, and the Sultan knows it. There, now you have the
truth."
But Sir Philip Currie did not know it. And when having cautiously
questioned him on the subject I received his answer that the three
governments would force Abdul Hamid to rue the day when he prescribed
mass massacre, and to change his tack, I ventured to inquire, "Are
you quite sure of that?" "Yes, do you doubt it?" "I confess I am
not very hopeful." "Well, allow me to be so, and please give me
credit for knowing something more about the matter than you do." I
fear I did not give him credit for knowing the only thing that
mattered just then. I at once went to Armenia, disguised as a
Russian general, collected evidence about the massacres, made a map
of the country in which they occurred, and had the melancholy
satisfaction to see my friend the eminent statesman's forecast borne
out by events. Thus it was Russia's interest to allow this crying
sin against humanity to go unpunished in order that the process of
decomposition in the Ottoman Empire might continue unchecked. This
attitude was in strict accordance, not indeed with any testament left
by Peter the Great, but with the whole spirit of the Tsarist State
from its first foundation down to March, 1917, when it was fighting
for the goods if {224} not the good of some of the lesser
nationalities like Poland and expecting Constantinople for its reward.
Russia's foreign policy in the past, whatever its real motives, may
therefore be summarily described in the light of its effects as
ruinous "protection" of the feeble. It was the lethal hug of the
polar bear. She would shield the government of a weaker neighbour
from the immediate consequences of its own folly and enable it to go
on misgoverning its subjects, thwarting attempts at internal reform,
financial and administrative. The body politic would thus be left to
decompose until it entered upon a stage sufficiently advanced to
allow of it being digested almost without an effort. Hence the
common argument derived from her alleged peaceful disposition, put
forward by her partisans in England and elsewhere--who claim that she
had no intention to annex this or that strip of territory, to take,
say, Port Arthur until forced by Germany's aggression in Kiao
Chow--however true in fact, is devoid of force. For part of her plan
was precisely to respect the technical frontiers of the country which
she hoped to subdue and to refrain from snatching a part in order
ultimately to obtain the whole. The seizure of a country bit by bit
would only have awakened feelings of jealousy and other unchristian
sentiments in the hearts of covetous neighbours. As a cynical
diplomatist once expressed himself, "It is the way of the vulture
with the dying ass: leave the body until it is sufficiently
decomposed and then swallow it all; the vulture's only fear being
lest the jackal should come upon the scene and devour the animal
before the process is completed." It is thus that Georgia, Persia,
Turkey, China, Korea, were dealt with.
Since the partition of Poland, to which the Empress Maria Theresa
once alluded regretfully as "_cette division si injuste et si
inégale_," Russia's protective policy has undergone no material
change. Catherine, who was then the ruler of Muscovy, would fain
have left Poland untouched, scrupulously respecting the technical
frontiers of the kingdom while effectually hindering the abolition of
the veto and the introduction of any reform of the constitution. She
was {225} convinced that when Poland had stewed long enough in its
own juice, Muscovy might then step in and enjoy the banquet all
alone. It was with this object that she bribed a number of
unprincipled Poles to keep the abuses unchanged. But Frederick,
seeing through the plan, baffled it and, curiously enough, in almost
the same way in which his successor Wilhelm II. discerned the policy
which Russia was pursuing in China, and foiled that by obtaining Kiao
Chow and forcing the hand of the Tsar.
Only once has this method undergone a modification, and for that
there were special reasons. Bulgaria was not methodically
"protected" in the special sense of the term. Frank Russian
diplomatists were wont to explain that chapter of Russian history
thus: "We have only two ways of dealing with weaker nations, and they
are exemplified in our treatment of Georgia and Bulgaria. The
kingdom of Georgia came to us and asked for an alliance. We made it.
Some time afterwards the Georgians fell upon evil days. Being
attacked by Persia they claimed our active help as equals and allies.
But we answered that we were too busy elsewhere, and left them to
their fate. Thereupon the Persians fell upon them and killed two men
out of every three, so that the nation was literally bleeding to
death. Then the Georgians came to us a second time, now no longer as
equals and allies, but as humble suppliants. 'Help us,' they said,
'not as friends aid friends, but as masters rescue their slaves.'
And this time we helped them effectually and absorbed their country
over and above. But in the case of the Bulgarians we committed an
unpardonable blunder. They appealed to us as brothers, and instead
of waiting until they also had lost two men out of every three, we
freed them from the Turkish yoke without more ado, after which the
little brothers developed into enemies. We shall not make the same
mistake with the Macedonians or the Armenians."
And the system carried out in Georgia was the same that was being
tried in Turkey and elsewhere. Thus "protection" was the main
principle which underlay the {226} Hunkiar Skelessi Treaty concluded
with the Porte.[2] By the terms of this agreement Russia undertook
to "protect" Turkey from all maritime foes, while that empire was
mouldering slowly away. The Sultan was humoured, pampered, and his
throne propped while his regime was ruining his people. Armenians,
Slavs, and even Mohammedans were revolted by the system. The navy
dwindled to a mere name; the soldiers were unpaid; fortresses were
left without guns; officials were literally forced to live by
extortion. The Ottoman Empire would soon have been ripe for the
vulture if the jackal had not come unawares to feast on the remains
of the body politic. Germany looked with longing upon Asia Minor and
created commercial interests there, and the semi-atrophied organs
were galvanised by the breath of new life.
The tripartite Eastern tangle which so long exercised the ingenuity,
and drew out the least estimable traits, of Europe's diplomatists was
to a large extent twisted and coiled by the Tsars and their State
Secretaries. In this respect there was no essential difference in
the treatment applied to the Near, the Middle, and the Far East. The
patient was first coaxed or bullied into making a will--in diplomatic
language, a secret treaty--in Russia's favour, was then forbidden to
call in a doctor, and in some cases forced to sip slow poison in lieu
of efficacious medicaments. It was thus that as far back as 1723
Muscovy undertook to "protect" Persia against the Afghans in return
for a secret treaty making over to her the Persian provinces on the
Caspian. And ever since then, with some pauses and a few failures,
the Tsars went on fostering the process of gangrene which was eating
away the energies, material and moral, of a people, never indeed
progressive or promising, but hardly deserving such a miserable fate.
The results were striking. Four Persian provinces--Mazenderan,
Khorassan, Azerbeijan, and Ghilan--fell as completely under Russia's
thumb as if they were actually occupied by her troops. The
administrative wires were {227} pulled by her representatives in
Teheran and the Shah was enabled to live in luxurious vice while his
people toiled and moiled in squalid misery. Persia was poor, its
bureaucracy corrupt, all officers being bought and sold at the
expense of the masses, justice was poisoned at its source, law was a
myth, the spendthrift Shah was arbitrary and cruel, and the people
periodically famine-stricken. And the Tsars, whose heaven-sent
mission was to diffuse Christian light and truth and justice, invoked
the sacredness of treaties and insisted on these things remaining as
they were.
Lord Salisbury made a praiseworthy effort to change them by
identifying Britain's interests with Persia's material and moral
well-being. As the Shah's government needed money he volunteered to
advance a certain sum and to consent to Russia supplying as much
again on the express condition that the proceeds of the loan should
be spent on the nation's needs. The exchange of views and shaping of
measures to this end were going slowly forward between London and
Petersburg when, one day, the British Premier learnt to his dismay
that the Russian Finance Minister had surreptitiously struck up an
arrangement with the Shah, supplied him not merely with Russia's own
quota of the loan, but with all the money that was to be allotted by
both governments, and let him spend two out of the four million
pounds on the gratification of his personal whims and vices. And
Persia's needs? Ways of communication were peremptorily required,
but the Tsars not only connived at the Shah's ministers, who ignored
this, but positively forbade the construction of a single line and,
indeed, vetoed every attempt to better the country economically.
They recognised the need for railways, but seeing themselves unable
to afford the necessary funds for the purpose would brook no attempt
on the part of others to provide them. And when Lord Salisbury asked
the Tsar's Foreign Secretary for an explanation, this official made
answer that it was the Finance Minister who had taken the measures
complained of, and over him the Foreign Office had, of course, no
authority. In Turkey the same dog-in-the-manger policy and Spenlow
and Jorkins procedure were {228} persisted in down to a few years
before the war, and even Russia's faithful ally France, occasionally
losing patience, uttered plangent representations and humble requests
and was grateful for even the slight concessions which M. Sazonoff
made when he was minister.
Under that treatment the Persian body politic was rotting limb by
limb, until M. Isvolsky taking over the portfolio of Foreign Affairs
ordered his diplomatic subalterns to turn over a new leaf and
supplied a fresh proof of the impotence of individual officials to
modify the deep-rooted instincts of Tsarism. For the most part the
Russian employees in Persia offered passive resistance to their new
head. In particular the Tsar's minister at Teheran, Hartwig,
deliberately perpetuated the abominable system of his predecessors in
spite of the expostulations and remonstrances of his chief. People
asked how he dared thus oppose the Foreign Office on which he
depended. The answer was that he was encouraged and put up to it by
the Tsar himself. And when at last M. Izvolsky extorted permission
to recall the rebellious minister, Nicholas II. distinguished him,
decorated him, told him that his was the only policy that the Russian
nation could pursue with dignity and profit, and let it be known that
it was with the utmost reluctance that he gave way to Izvolsky.
Thereupon he entrusted Hartwig with the most responsible post in the
Balkan peninsula.
This criticism of the demoralising action of the Tsardom in Persia, I
should like to add, must not be taken to commit me to any theory
which would recognise the present fitness of the Persians for a
parliamentary regime. The Persians have lived for ages under
grinding despotisms and their mental and moral temper, warped in that
crushing mill, renders it temporarily difficult for them to enter
into the spirit of the democratic regime in vogue in the West. I am
aware that this view may be deemed erroneous--heretical--but there is
a vast array of incontrovertible facts to support it. Russia
profited in her own way by the helplessness of the Iranian people and
Britain followed at a distance.
{229}
Many years ago I gave expression to these strictures on Russia's
methods of shaping her intercourse with nations, and I stated that in
Europe there were "still two predatory States, the Tsardom and
Germany."[3] Discussing the chances of an Anglo-Russian
understanding for which I was then zealously working I wrote: "The
difficulties in the way are of a twofold character: the one formal,
emanating from the awkward fact that Russia has come to look upon
engagements entered into by her Foreign Minister as partial in extent
and temporary in duration; the others have their roots in the
fundamental policy hitherto pursued by the Muscovite Empire, the
character of which seems incompatible with any parchment
limitations."[4] And characterising the government of the country at
its best I described it as "composed of public servants of his
Majesty the Tsar, each of whom conscientiously strives to further
what he deems to be the interests of his imperial master in the way
which he considers most efficacious and without reference to the
views, aims, or obligations of his colleagues."[5]
But the governments and the press of France and Britain took a much
more sanguine view of the Tsardom and condescendingly bore with me as
an "incorrigible but well-meaning pessimist." France had gone so far
in her friendship for the great ally as to shut her eyes to the
massacres of the Armenians and her ears to the piteous appeals for
help made by the ill-starred population of Macedonia.
The methods applied in Russia to international affairs whenever a
foreign government complained of a breach of treaty or an unredeemed
promise I likened to that followed by the firm of Spenlow and
Jorkins. Each minister would lay the responsibility on some
colleague whose engagements bound only himself. It was thus that
when Hayashi called on the Tsar's Foreign Secretary, Muravieff, and
protested against the despatch of Russian military instructors to
Korea, the answer came pat: "That is a step that was taken by my
predecessor. I have nothing whatever to do with that." {230} In all
these cases there was no central government, only a number of
isolated State departments not one of which bound Russia or could
pledge her word.
Thus duplicity and guile were the principal means employed in peace
time to effect or prepare for that territorial expansion which was a
standing postulate of the self-preservation of the Tsardom.
Aggrandisement was being achieved gradually, almost imperceptibly, by
means of railways, of secret treaties, of money lent to needy
governments by the Tsar's ministers who themselves had to borrow it
from France. And on the top of all this came intimidation. "My
government," a Russian diplomatist at Pekin, Tokio, or Seoul would
virtually say, "represents a people of 160,000,000 and disposes of
military and naval forces in proportion. If, therefore, you are bent
on quarrelling with us you know what to expect." And the crestfallen
diplomatist of the little State would give way at the green table
lest his people should have to give way on the field of battle. In
other words, he was beaten by bluff. In this way modern Muscovy long
steered clear of great wars while harvesting in material successes
which no other power could expect to win by mere diplomacy. In this
way, too, she hoped to get the better of Japan, but that power,
refusing to accept counters for current coin, at last and most
unwillingly challenged her to carry out her implied threats, with the
results which the world has witnessed. The other predatory State,
Germany, put the same method into practice for over a generation
until Russia at last cried, "Halt," but unlike the Tsardom, Germany's
military strength was equal to, if anything greater than, her
prestige and influence in diplomacy.
Between Russia and Britain a binding agreement existed and exists
respecting Afghanistan. At the time of the Boer War, however, the
Tsar's government came out with the theory that that covenant, having
been struck up at a time when things were different, had ceased to be
applicable, because "circumstances destroy the binding force of
compacts," exactly the doctrine of the other predatory State, {231}
Germany. Consequently the Petersburg Foreign Office signified its
desire to enter into direct relations with the Emir. And
accommodating action to theory, a letter to the same effect was
despatched by the Tsar's ministers to the Emir's agent in Bokhara who
sent it on unopened to his master. And at the same time Russia
mobilised troops and transferred 4000 men from Tiflis to Kushk on the
Afghan frontier. The Emir having kept the letter for some time in
Kabul at last had it forwarded to Downing Street. Witte intervened,
hindered what bade fair to become an expedition against Herat, and at
my request announced that the real object of the mobilisation was but
to make an experiment, not to inaugurate a campaign.
_The Tsar's Plot to seize the Heights of the Upper Bosphorus_
One of the most striking exhibitions of the temper of Tsarism
occurred in the year 1896. I guardedly touched upon it several years
later in an article which was necessarily euphemistic. But people
refused to credit the story because it tended to throw a slur upon
the Tsar whose loyalty was above question in England. Probably at no
time and in no country since the reign of Louis XIV. in France have
current events been so highly coloured, embellished, and grouped in
such an unreal light as during the first ten years of the reign of
Nicholas II. The French press, with the exception of a few
uninfluential journals, was wont to extol him to the skies. In the
comments passed on the various public manifestations of his policy
one looked in vain for traces of average historic vision. Every move
of the Petersburg government that could be construed as a cultural
advance was eulogised and ascribed to the initiative of the
high-minded monarch whose political wisdom was implicitly taken to be
almost equal to his power, whereas deeds that could not be dovetailed
with this fulsome theory were attributed to malevolent agents or
boldly denied. In Great Britain a somewhat similar, if less
inflexible, attitude was observed and it cost me repeated and
strenuous efforts to enlighten public opinion. When my pseudonymous
{232} article on the Tsar appeared in the _Quarterly Review_, its
statements, tone, and conclusions were unctuously deprecated by a
press accustomed to envisage the Russian ruler as an indispensable
member of that happy family of monarchs who would in time lead Europe
sensibly nearer to the cultural goal. He was the world's
peace-preserver and much else, and only a Thersites could thus
misread his acts. The artificial and precarious character of the
apparent unity of his Empire, the rapacious instincts of the State,
the morbid conceit and profound ignorance of its head, who would
insist on transforming what was good into bad and on turning bad to
worse by his constant intermeddling, were unsuspected or ignored by
the panegyrists, English and French, of the Russian Tsar. It was
they who prodigally conferred immortality on this pitiful specimen of
a ruler, leader, or reformer, and pleaded in justification his high
humanitarian instincts, his selfless devotion to the common good, and
the courage with which he strove to realise one of the loftiest
politico-social conceptions on record--that of establishing general
peace on earth by quickening the noblest instincts of individuals and
peoples at the first Hague Conference.
Every statement, every opinion that ran counter to this preconceived
theory was thrust aside as malevolent or unfounded. Time and again I
published facts that pulverised the accepted doctrine and ruined the
conventional portrait, but the articles embodying these unorthodox
views were either blamed as iconoclastic or wholly ignored, and more
than once systematic efforts were put forth to have me punished by
the Tsar's government for my temerity.
Doubtless the policies of Nicholas II. were numerous, and it was not
always easy to reconcile one with the other. But they were all in
keeping with the instincts of Tsarism or with the impulses and
intuitions of its insignificant head, who did not always act with an
intelligible aim and generally went to work without a measured
forecast. The order of intelligence revealed by most of his
international schemes differed nowise from that which was manifested
in his relations with his ministers and courtiers. Most of these
{233} designated it by the name of cunning. A noteworthy
illustration of the policy, which likewise throws a strong light on
the politician, occurred at the close of the year 1896. At that time
the most brilliant, cultured, and easy-going of the Tsar's foreign
secretaries was dead.[6] His successor, M. Shishkin, was one of
those every-day bureaucrats who lived in a world of green tables,
dusty parchments, sere and yellow leaves, and are termed by the
French _ronds de cuir_. His intelligence was absorbed by memory, and
his initiative paralysed by precedent. It was when this colourless
official was acting-Minister of Foreign Affairs that an unqualifiable
conspiracy against international troth and a menace to the peace of
Europe was hatched by the Tsar and frustrated at the last minute by
two statesmen of bitterly hostile camps, of whom each honestly
regarded the other as a scourge of the Russian people. Witte and
Pobiedonostseff alone in this environment joined hands to restrain
Nicholas II. from an act which would probably have plunged Europe in
war, and deserves to stand on record as one of the most damaging
counts in the long indictment against Tsarism.
In that memorable year Russia's star was in the ascendant. For her
prestige was incomparably greater than her power and her specific
gravity enormously overrated by most State chancelleries. She easily
overawed her rivals, all of whom took her at her own valuation.
Witte, the Finance Minister, who had a representative of his own in
every State department and who actually wielded much greater power
than his imperial master, had just sown the seeds from which he might
reasonably expect inexhaustible markets and a flourishing colony in
the Far East. All that he now needed and asked for was peace and
foreign money so that the Tsardom might continue to live on its
prestige without being obliged actually to exercise its military
strength.
Lobanoff during his short-lived activity had made perceptible
progress and established his reputation. He had removed the soreness
between the Tsardom and Bulgaria, struck up a political friendship
with Ferdinand of Coburg, {234} bettered Russia's neighbourly
relations with Austria-Hungary, and maintained in the northern
Balkans her influence well-nigh intact. In the Far East also the
Tsardom towered aloft like a giant among pigmies. Witte had torn up
the treaty of Shimonoseki, deprived Japan of the fruits of her
victory, imposed a ruinous friendship on the Chinese, and obtained
the valuable concession for the construction of the Chinese Eastern
Railway.[7] Li Hung Chang was at the back of the all-powerful
Russian Finance Minister, and Japan was disconsolate at the thought
that Korea had been earmarked for the Tsardom. Witte handled the
Orientals[8] deftly; some of their leaders he drove, others he lured
into the penfold of "protected" peoples of whom the Tsar was the
titular shepherd. All that he wanted for the success of his system
was a firm economic foothold, industrial concessions, the laying of
iron rails, and the forging of golden chains. Count Hayashi writes:
"I could not do otherwise than admire his ability as a statesman.
Had his programme been carried out, as he at first proposed, what
would not have been the result?"[9] To my thinking the result would
have been what it has since become, supremely disappointing. For do
what he might the Tsarist State could not long survive into an era of
law, collective effort, and responsibility. It was foredoomed to
break up. I once likened it to the Bologna phial of unannealed glass
which may be flung to the ground, struck with a hammer, or heavily
pressed without undergoing the least change, yet flies into thousands
of little splinters if scratched with a diamond or a sharp flint.
The surface of the phial, hard as crystal, holds fast the inner
molecules, which tend to fly apart but keep together so long as the
adamantine surface remains intact. And the surface of the Tsardom
would have been scratched by the first {235} democratic institution
and the molecules would have been scattered to the winds of heaven.
The Tsar's ambassador in Constantinople at the time of the story was
M. Nelidoff, with whom I was well acquainted: an average, vigilant,
ambitious diplomatist who managed, together with his German colleague
there, to hit it off with the Sultan. In the previous year he had
fought a fierce diplomatic battle against the British ambassador, Sir
Philip Currie, on the subject of the Armenian massacres, after which
their mutual relations remained strained. As already narrated, Queen
Victoria's representative was persuaded that if the charges brought
against the Sultan were proven by the international commission at
Mush, diplomatic action of a drastic nature would follow as a matter
of course. I had been authoritatively informed in advance that this
was a gratuitous assumption, that nothing was further from the
intentions of the Russian government, and that, whatever the merits
of the question, the French cabinet, ever duly ductile, would follow
the lead of its great ally. And that is what actually happened. A
ridiculous tale was also spread in various parts of Central and
Eastern Europe that the excitement over the Armenians had been
designedly got up by English diplomacy in order to embarrass Russia.
That falsehood was circulated and perhaps imagined by the Russian and
German embassies in the Turkish capital. Prince Ukhtomsky's
journal[10] wrote: "England threw obstacles in our path in China and
Japan, in Chitral and Armenia, and now her conduct in Egypt is
growing ever more hostile to Russia. The troubles created by
Englishmen in the Armenian provinces of Turkey were planned in view
of many objects, among others the establishment of direct
communications over land between India and the Mediterranean."
{236}
It was believed, I do not know on what grounds, by well-informed
statesmen that between the German and the Russian ambassadors in
Constantinople something more than a mere harmony of views existed on
the subject of Turkey's future. They were credited with preparing to
play the part of fate. The former, it was asserted, had given the
latter an assurance that if Russia were to look upon this coincidence
of favourable circumstances as her long-desired opportunity to assert
a claim which Germany had never contested, and force a free egress
for her warships from the Black Sea to the Mediterranean, she would
encounter no opposition from the Kaiser's government, and might even
reckon upon its diplomatic support. That was the kernel of the
matter: no opposition and eventual diplomatic support.
In this scheme M. Nelidoff found room for patriotic duty and personal
ambition. The despatches he sent home were described as insistent
and suasive. He deemed the moment opportune, and the levers at his
disposal adequate. He possessed the ear of Abdul Hamid, whose
personal vagaries he had abstained from hindering or blaming and
whose public policy he had steadily if secretly supported. In
general outline his object was to get the Sultan to accept Russia's
friendship, protection, guarantee of integrity, and to pay for these
boons with two strips of territory and free egress from the Straits.
And his method was the creation of an accomplished fact. It involved
the seizure of the coveted territory on either shore of the Upper
Bosphorus, and simultaneously heavy pressure put upon Abdul Hamid.
The Russian fleet would effect the landing and the Russian ambassador
would intimidate the Shadow of God.
To launch a thunderbolt of these dimensions among the pacific nations
of Europe in the midst of profound peace and despite the most solemn
treaties needed an aggregate of qualities and defects, intellectual
and moral, which the reader can enumerate for himself.
The conspirators were well aware of the way in which their onslaught
against Europeanism and morality would be {237} received by the
opinion and sentiment of the world. But it was less this
condemnation than the untoward consequences of premature disclosure
that impelled them to keep the matter dark. Hence, not a single
superfluous person was initiated into it. Herein one recognises the
touch of the imperial hand. Nicholas II. was extremely secretive at
the best of times. One never could tell what schemes he was turning
over in his mind. He often lacked the courage to dismiss a minister
fairly and squarely, and would continue to exhibit his pristine
confidence in him and lead him to believe that he was indispensable,
and then of a sudden would have a statement published in the official
gazette acceding to the minister's "request to be allowed to resign
on account of ill-health." But when he had something in hand which
might, if discovered too soon, stir up national or international
passion, he was as mute as a fish, and on occasion would adopt
grotesque means of ensuring the maintenance of the secret, as he did
in his behaviour towards the minister Birileff when conspiring with
the Kaiser against his ally France at Björke. In the present case of
the Nelidoff-Tshikhatshoff conspiracy the stakes were large. For if
the Sultan should prove insensible to caresses and deaf to
threats--as he certainly would if he got wind of the plot before its
realisation--an armed conflict would be almost unavoidable, and it
might be hard to confine it to Russia and Turkey. Besides, this new
departure would entail a reversal of the system adopted by the
Tsardom in its dealings with the East: to influence and control
without actually annexing or threatening. It was well understood
that England was the one power deeply interested in the strict
preservation of the existing treaties relative to the Black Sea and
the Straits, and it was assumed that a conflict with her might with
Germany's help be averted.
To what extent the Kaiser's government was committed to the Russian
ambassador I am unable to state for lack of evidence. My personal
conviction is that if any such accord existed, which I strongly
doubt, it had been made between the Kaiser and the Tsar. But so far
as I now know the plan {238} was exclusively Russian. I vouch for
the facts that the plan worked out by Nelidoff and Tshikhatshoff was
approved by Nicholas II., that all the preparations for its execution
were made, and that Witte with difficulty stifled the enterprise just
when it was on the point of becoming an international revolution and
an insolent challenge.
Contemplated from the point of view of Turkey's internal condition
the conjuncture seemed favourable enough. The Ottoman Empire--a real
Asiatic state in all its nakedness--was apparently tottering, and
might at any moment go to pieces. Insurrections and risings among
the Christians, massacres by the Kurds and Turks, discontent and
sedition among the Mohammedan elements of the population, scarcity of
money, national humiliations, all impressed Nelidoff as infallible
tokens of the approaching end. At Zeitoun the Armenians had risen,
made a determined stand against the troops, and were finally induced
to surrender by the powers, who guaranteed an amnesty and the
appointment of a Christian governor. A revolt had broken out among
the Druses of the Hauran. In the district of Van a fresh outburst of
religious and racial fanaticism had culminated in the violent deaths
of many Turks and Armenians. The Christian Slavs of Macedonia had
begun their guerilla warfare. In August, Constantinople became the
scene of such bloodshed and cruelty as had not been witnessed there
during the nineteenth century. For thirty hours the Mohammedan mob
had the Armenians at their mercy and slaughtered about 2000 of them
in the houses and streets. In short, Turkey was anarchy incarnate,
and the powers felt that the least they could do would be to present
a collective note to the Porte. This communication was drafted,
delivered, ignored. Another concerted but really drastic measure was
imminent, and it seemed as though in the natural course of things the
last grain of Turkey's sands would soon have run down.
One day the Tsar learned from Nelidoff's despatches that his
long-wished-for settlement of the Near Eastern difficulties was at
last in sight and could be achieved if his ambassador's {239} plan of
campaign were carried out immediately. Well pleased, he ordered
Nelidoff to repair to Petersburg, and Admiral Tshikhatshoff, then
chief of the Odessa general staff, to visit the Turkish capital, and
on the way to take stock of and report upon the strength of the
fortifications of the Bosphorus and the Dardanelles and draw up a
plan for the military descent to be effected in the near future and
under the conditions then prevailing. Carefully though these
ongoings were hedged round with misleading statements, they did not
pass wholly unnoticed; some foreigners alluded to them as ominous
shadows of far-ranging events.
Nelidoff, on reaching the palace on the Singer's Bridge,[11] went
over the whole ground with Shishkin, the Dryasdust of the Foreign
Office. Shishkin informed him that the Emperor desired to have the
subject clearly unfolded in writing, with all the advantages and
drawbacks of the concrete scheme lucidly set forth so that the
members of a very special council, which he would convene for the
purpose, might have adequate data on which to rest their decision.
The ambassador duly presented the memorandum.
That document existed down to the outbreak of the present war, and
probably until the Bolshevik revolution. It may still exist to-day.
It passed through the hands of Witte and others. I never actually
saw it myself, but according to the description of it which was given
to me by those who did, the preamble was devoted to a cursory
description of the internal condition of the Ottoman Empire, of the
growing ferment in the capital, of the anarchy in the provinces, and
of the daily danger of a formidable insurrection. Nelidoff laid
special stress on the Armenian question as an irritant and a
dissolvent. At that moment it held Constantinople in a fever of
excitement with intervals of panic. He had reason to apprehend that
the Armenian revolutionists were hatching another plot which would
infuriate the Mohammedans and cause a more fearful slaughter than any
yet witnessed. Again, the Sultan might be deposed, and in this case
popular riots, perhaps even mutiny among {240} the troops, might
ensue. Abdul Hamid could not be moved beforehand to take action
calculated to dispel these dangers without creating others more
redoubtable. He had no moral influence over the nation.
As for reforms, only a simpleton would build on them. The Porte
could not carry them out, if it would, because they would rob the
Turkish and Kurdish populations of their privileges, and as these
Moslem peoples outnumber the Christians, they would oppose the
application of the reforms tooth and nail. Force employed against
the Mohammedans in order to conciliate the Christians would then
remain the only alternative. And Abdul Hamid was too shrewd a
statesman to commit such a blunder as to have recourse to force for
such a purpose. M. Nelidoff averred that he fully believed in the
seriousness of the threats uttered by the Armenians that they would
rise in arms within a couple of months. In this case Europe would
intervene. The six powers would put pressure on the Porte to have
the reforms practically embodied in institutions. That might be
satisfactory enough from the English point of view, but would it
dovetail with Russia's vital interests? Nowise. Her security in the
Black Sea and her communications with the Mediterranean would be
forfeited for an indefinite span of time. And the more stable the
order established by the powers in the Ottoman Empire, the more
dismal the outlook of the Tsardom. Some other way out of the
difficulty must be devised.
As the early intervention of the powers was thus practically certain,
and fraught with danger, it behoved Russia to determine in what way
she would protect herself against its consequences. Nelidoff held
that it would not answer to allow the other states to send their
warships before Constantinople--without taking precautionary measures
in advance. What he had therefore to propose was that Russia should
seize and keep a firm foothold on the shores of the Upper Bosphorus
and wrest from the Sultan the freedom of the Straits. But the plans
must be speedily drawn up and studied, and then carried out with the
rapidity of a lightning {241} flash. The squadron and the men
requisite for the descent should be got together and held in
readiness to start at a moment's notice. He himself would give the
signal in the form of a ciphered telegram addressed to Sebastopol.
Then the vessels would cross the Black Sea, and before they entered
the Bosphorus Nelidoff would have put the matter pressingly before
the Sultan and asked him to allow the ships to pass and the men to
take possession of the heights on condition that the interests of the
Ottoman Empire would be well looked after. If he refused, he must be
prepared for the consequences. At the same time the other powers
would also receive information of what was being done, and an
invitation to come to the Dardanelles if they felt so disposed.
Should they avail themselves of this invitation, the Russian
Mediterranean squadron would accompany them. And if they landed
troops anywhere, the Russian commander would follow their example.
In this way the Tsardom would have two irons in the fire to one of
the other powers.
The abiding consequence of all this would, in the eyes of the
ambassador, be the permanent occupation by Russia of the Upper
Bosphorus and the neutralisation of the Dardanelles, which would be
thrown open to the warships of all nations. The suddenness of
Russia's action would be justified by her natural apprehensions for
the security of her subjects and her want of confidence in the
good-will and power of the Porte. Nelidoff was very careful to
reiterate and emphasise his belief that not one of the other powers
would venture to offer opposition to the proposed seizure of
territory. Consequently Russia could establish herself permanently
on the Upper Bosphorus and create a Near Eastern Gibraltar there.
That done she might take part with an easy mind in the international
council that would fix the destiny of Turkey. That in outline was
the gist of the _exposé_.
Such was the machination imagined by Nelidoff and the Tsar. It would
be interesting to know how his recent chief, Lobanoff-Rostoffsky,
would have regarded it were he still living. But M. Shishkin, who
had never displayed the least initiative, listened approvingly and
took the needful measures {242} to have the special council convened.
This body resembled all such tribunals formed by the Tsar in this,
that it consisted of members with whose approval he could reckon in
advance. Whenever Nicholas II. wanted to have a pet scheme of his
own stamped with the hall-mark of relative legality he submitted it
to the judgment of a few officials who were certain to make it their
own. It was thus that he had gone to work in dealing with the
various questions that cropped up in connection with Korea,
Manchuria, China, Japan, Persia, Afghanistan, and Germany. And in
this case he conformed to the same rule.
It was in the early days of December, 1896, that the special council
met to talk over the scheme propounded by Nelidoff. Probably no such
body had ever deliberated with greater secrecy during the reign of
Nicholas II. Even the Tsar's alter ego, Pobiedonostseff, was kept in
complete ignorance of what was going on. For some days four or five
persons had the fate of the Turkish Empire, and perhaps the peace of
Europe, in their power, and they came to a decision unfavourable to
both. For the secret council with one dissentient voice commended
the brilliant idea propounded by the Tsar's ambassador. It also
authorised him to gauge the situation in Constantinople and to give
the signal for the descent on the shores of the Bosphorus as soon as
the opportune moment should arrive. The Emperor unhesitatingly
ratified the recommendation of his loyal council, and the technical
part of the scheme was elaborated at once. Shortly before returning
to his post, M. Nelidoff received further instructions, and contact
between himself and Admiral Tshikhatshoff was made closer and
continuous, for the realisation of the plan was confidently expected
to be accomplished by the new year. From this time forward all power
was vested in the Russian ambassador. Whenever he gave the signal
everything else would follow automatically, so to say.
Time pressed. The danger to Europe was imminent. But of that none
of the conspirators recked. What was much more serious was the
effect of the plot on Russia herself. It would undo Witte's slowly
elaborated scheme of pacific {243} penetration, open the door to
foreign competition--diplomatic, economic, and, what was far worse,
military. For if Russia had to make good on the battle-field the
influence she was arrogating to herself in the council chamber, she
would quickly sink to the low level of her own specific gravity. Of
these consequences Witte was painfully aware, and he was quite ready
to protest as energetically as he knew how. But that was not enough.
He had already done all that an influential minister could effect
single-handed, and it fell far short of what was needed. All that he
could still undertake was to enlist the support of his personal
adversary, Pobiedonostseff, and induce him to awaken the Emperor to a
sense of the enormity he was about to perpetrate. Smothering his
personal aversion as he so well knew how, Witte called on his
implacable enemy, the Ober-Procurator of the Most Holy Synod, and put
the matter plainly before him, appealing to his patriotism and sense
of duty to Russia and the Tsar. Pobiedonostseff was astounded. He
had heard nothing of the goings on of Nelidoff, Tshikhatshoff, and
Shishkin. He could hardly believe these officials so utterly devoid
of political sense and so incapable of discerning the mischief they
were about to inflict on their own country. He acknowledged,
however, that in view of such a mad scheme Witte's fears were well
founded and his unusual action justified. He would see the Emperor
without delay and leave nothing undone to have the plot frustrated.
Repairing to Tsarskoye Selo, he laid the matter before the Tsar who,
naturally enough, conjectured that the Ober-Procurator of the Most
Holy Synod had received his information from Witte. And this act was
mentally filed among the counts of the indictment against the Finance
Minister. Pobiedonostseff's disinterestedness and patriotism were
known to the Emperor. He was a thoroughly honest man, dry, pedantic,
and incorruptible. His motives, therefore, were above suspicion.
And he succeeded in setting the scheme and its effects upon the Tsar,
the dynasty, and the Russian State in such a forbidding perspective
that before he left the palace the monarch suspended the decision and
{244} withdrew the powers of independent action with which Nelidoff
was invested. Thus the imminence of the danger was displaced owing
to the timely intervention of Witte and Pobiedonostseff.
But the Black Sea Squadron and the men told off to occupy the heights
of the Upper Bosphorus were kept in readiness from that day onward
until the outbreak of the war against Japan absorbed all the warships
and fighting men available. Thus from the year 1896 to 1904 the
naval and military contingents and all the accessories of the
expedition remained in evidence awaiting an opportunity to play their
part in realising that criminal plan.
_The Story of Kiao Chow_
Truth and loyalty were so often eschewed in these transactions that
the historian who is acquainted with the subject takes their absence
as a matter of course. At the close of the Chino-Japanese campaign,
immediately after the treaty of Shimonoseki became known, another
illuminating instance of unscrupulous dealing occurred in which,
however, as the Russian saying puts it, the scythe came upon the
rock, and Germany received a coin from her own mint. Witte told me
that the idea of depriving Japan of the main fruits of her victory
had sprung up in his own brain and was executed without opposition
because, although he was only Minister of Finances at the time, his
influence over all Russia's public business was still paramount.[12]
By the Shimonoseki treaty Japan obtained Chinese territory on the
mainland, and this was destructive of Witte's scheme of peaceful
penetration, which pre-supposed the integrity of China. Accordingly
he requested Germany and France to join him in compelling the Tokio
government to let go of its foothold there. Germany regarded the
arrangements as a business transaction and was determined to charge
both China and Russia a reasonable price for the service rendered.
When, therefore, {245} the Tsar's government contemplated the opening
of a Russo-Chinese bank, which, it was anticipated, would acquire the
control of the principal economic and financial resources of the
Celestial Empire, Germany insisted on going halves with her neighbour
and supplying a proportionate part of the capital. Negotiations were
consequently opened with the Russian Foreign Office which gave the
proposals its "careful and favourable consideration." But while
terms were being solemnly discussed between Petersburg and Berlin and
suasion was apparently making a breach in Russia's opposition, it was
suddenly announced that the Russian Ministry of Finances had on its
own initiative furnished the entire capital and was no longer open to
any offers on the subject. That was one of the results of the
"autonomy" of the State departments. The Foreign Office was not, of
course, responsible for thus leaving Germany out in the cold; with
finances Count Lamsdorff had nothing to do, and against an
accomplished fact there was no appeal. That was the gist of the
explanations given. But the German government was not to be thus
cheaply fed on fiction. It was resolved to bide its time and have
its innings before the match was over. And the "leasing" of Kiao
Chow was the result. Driven from the open gate of diplomacy it
sought and found an entrance at another door.
Parenthetically it may not be amiss to reproduce here the broad lines
of Witte's policy in the Far East. He and I talked it over many a
time and I have numerous pages which I wrote at his dictation, "for
the purpose," he said, "of vindicating me one day should that be
necessary." This then is how he once summarised his aims:
"What I have ever striven for is to create and preserve conditions
favourable to the pacific development of Russia. That is and was my
central aim. Within the fairly broad limits which it connotes, there
would have been ample room for our expansion especially in the Far
East. And as you know, I had my eyes fixed on China. But I was
determined that, so far as it depended on me, there should be no
violence, no annexation, nothing to provoke the resentment or arouse
{246} the misgivings of the Chinese, and everything possible to draw
their sympathy and co-operation. Russia was to be their
friend--their intimate and privileged friend--but that is all. And
owing to the place which she occupied and the prestige she enjoyed
among the nations, her paramount position in the Far East, which was
obtained gradually, could have been upheld pacifically. But on no
account did I wish her to risk having to face the necessity of making
good in war the exaggerated estimate of her military strength. This
general conclusion, but not the specific ground for it, I often laid
before Nicholas II.
"Well, all these plans and combinations were suddenly knocked on the
head by the Emperor's wilfulness or shyness. As soon as I learned
the contents of the Chino-Japanese Treaty of Shimonoseki, I sought
him out and told him that we must never recognise it, unless we were
prepared to face a war or abandon the markets of the Far East. 'We
cannot,' I went on, 'allow Japan to quit her islands and get a firm
foothold on the mainland. If we do, we shall have wrecked all that
has been accomplished and the still greater things that are yet to be
achieved by the grandiose efforts made by your revered father. I
gave a promise to Li Hung Chang that your Majesty would not permit
Japan to keep Liaotung even if she obtained it by treaty, and China
relies upon you to fulfil that plighted word. I am the first to
proclaim the necessity of redeeming all our promises to Japan and of
making all reasonable concessions to her needs and aspirations, but
we cannot brook the seizure of any part of China. We have to stand
for the principle of China's integrity just as firmly as the United
States stand for the Monroe doctrine. And what is more, we ourselves
must respect China's integrity.' The Emperor looked somewhat scared
and said, 'But don't you think that if we lay plans to have the
treaty changed now, Japan will grow desperate and declare war?' 'No,
sire, Japan will not declare war, were it only because that is
materially impossible. She lacks the wherewithal to-day, and later
on we can square her if she becomes restive.'
"Thereupon the Emperor asked me how I proposed to {247} set the
wheels of diplomacy in motion. I told him I would invite Germany and
France to join us and that I had no reason to fear a refusal on their
part. Then he gave his assent and added his 'most cordial thanks,'
which he reiterated with increased warmth when the crisis was over
and the aim achieved. On each of these occasions I said to him, 'We
must of course play quite fair in all this and respect the integrity
which we are upholding, and resolved to uphold, against all who would
violate it.' And the Tsar assented.
"I then arranged the concerted move of Germany, France, and Russia.
This made me feel quite sure of success. It also served as an
unmistakable intimation to all the great powers that Russia
considered the integrity of China as the ground work of her Far
Eastern policy, and would not allow it to be tampered with; and it
also encouraged me to think that by accustoming all three governments
to combine for European or world objects, I was gradually preparing
them for a closer and less transitory alliance in the future. This
last consideration, however, was a dream rather than a 'plank' in my
political programme. What happened after that and how the Treaty of
Shimonoseki was declared null and void you know.[13] What you don't
yet know is at least equally thrilling.
"One fateful day, when Kaiser Wilhelm was on a visit here, the devil
threw temptation in the way of the Tsar who succumbed to it as he has
done more than once since then. Much water has flowed under the
Palace Bridge since that episode. It was on his first visit to
Russia after Nicholas' accession to the throne. The two potentates
were driving in an open carriage from a review, I think at Peterhof
or Tsarskoye Selo--I forget which. I did not hear a word about what
passed at the time until the consequences became manifest, and then
it was recounted to me somewhat in this way.[14] In the course of
conversation with Nicholas the Kaiser suddenly broke away from the
ordinary topics and exclaimed, 'I want you to do me a favour. You
are in the {248} happy position of being able to help your friends as
well as to punish your enemies. As you know, I am badly in need of a
port. My fleet has no place worthy of the name outside my Empire.
And why should it be debarred? That may, perhaps, serve the purposes
of our covert enemies, but not Russia's. And I know your friendly
sentiment towards me and my dynasty. I want you now to say frankly,
have you any objection to my leasing Kiao Chow in China?' 'What name
did you say?' 'Kiao Chow.' 'No--none. I see no objection
whatever.' The Kaiser thanked his host profusely and the imperial
pair drove to the palace. The head of the Foreign Department was
Muravieff, the most ignorant and least cultured of all Russia's
Foreign Ministers in the course of the nineteenth century. He had
obtained the post solely because, when passing through Copenhagen,
which was the stepping stone to the palace at the Singer's
Bridge,[15] he displayed the faculty of making a certain class of
people of doubtful taste laugh at his farcical jokes told with
somewhat grotesque gestures. He had the temperament of the clown.
Muravieff probably had never before heard of Kiao Chow[16] and knew
no reason which would militate against its being leased to Germany,
and like other and more gifted ministers, he refrained from asking
those who knew. But that is of no importance, as you shall hear
later.
"A few hours afterwards the Emperor met the Grand Duke Alexei
Alexandrovitch who knew a good deal about sea-ports and their value,
and about naval matters generally. The Tsar said, 'I feel put out
with the Kaiser. To-day he has tricked me into consenting to let him
have Kiao Chow. Of course it is not downright annexation that he
aims at. He is only going to lease it. All the same, it is a nasty
trick.' 'You have not given him your consent in writing?' 'No, no.
Only in words. We were in the carriage driving.' 'But surely you
can withdraw from that one-sided arrangement all the more that it
would put us into a very embarrassing {249} position.' 'No, no, I
have given my word and I cannot back out. It is most vexing.'
Wilhelm then returned to Berlin and despatched a squadron to the Far
East to obtain satisfaction for the murder of a couple of German
missionaries which had been committed there. He demanded amends and
his warships having entered the port he refused to withdraw them.
"Thereupon a council was convoked in Petersburg under Muravieff.
After some preliminary expressions of opinion Muravieff, calling to
mind a warning of mine against allowing any power to occupy Chinese
territory, moved that Port Arthur should be taken by us as a set-off
against Kiao Chow. I at once opposed the notion vehemently. For I
resented both the remedy and the folly that had rendered a remedy
necessary. I said, 'We should immediately adopt one of two courses:
acquiesce in what has been done and abide by the consequences or else
insist on Germany's withdrawal from Kiao Chow and take our stand on
the ground of the integrity of China. There is no third way out of
the difficulty--at least none that I can approve. I certainly cannot
perceive the logic of seizing Port Arthur as an answer to the leasing
of Kiao Chow. Are we not on good terms with China? Why spoil these
relations? Have we not a treaty with China? Why violate it? If we
take either of these courses we put ourselves in the wrong. But if
we decide to advise Germany to quit or else fight her, we should have
reason and morality on the side of our political and economic
interests, and I feel convinced that she would give way.'
"I think the members of the council were impressed, for they passed a
resolution that Port Arthur should not be taken. I myself drew up
the minutes of that sitting and, what is more, the resolution was
approved by the Tsar. I breathed freely again, for I had had
misgivings about his attitude. Now he dispelled them entirely. But
a few days later, to our amazement our common friend Admiral
Dubassoff entered Port Arthur.[17] I was furious. This slyness and
double dealing irritated me. I at once sought out the Tsar {250} and
showed him that I felt very keenly what had happened, because I had
worked so long and so hard on lines incompatible with the policy on
which he was now launching out and the results of this policy were
now endangered. In conclusion I said, 'The council decided not to
take Port Arthur and your Majesty ratified the decision of the
council.' The Tsar replied, 'Yes, but are you aware that an English
squadron was about to take the port and that the only alternatives
open to us were to abandon it to the English or else to go back on
the decision of the council and take it ourselves? It was not until
the Minister of Foreign Affairs told me this that I gave my assent to
his proposal. In my place you would have done the same.'
"I ought to have said that from the council I went straight to the
German Embassy. Von Tschirschky was there instead of Radolin. I
said, 'When Kaiser Wilhelm was last here, he was very gracious
towards me and authorised me to appeal to him direct if ever I wanted
anything. Well, now I do want badly to petition him for a great
favour. He is taking Kiao Chow. I know he wants to chastise certain
Chinese criminals and to mete out punishment for their crimes. This
is a most legitimate desire. I sympathise with him. If he were to
call for the heads of a hundred or a thousand Chinamen I would not
say a word. But if his Majesty takes a Chinese port, Russia will be
constrained to do likewise although nothing would be more distasteful
to her. Will you kindly telegraph in cipher what I have just said,
so that the Kaiser may see it at once?' Von Tschirschky promised.
The telegram was duly sent to Von Bülow who laid it before the
Emperor. A few days later Von Tschirschky called on me and said,
'His Majesty the Kaiser thanks you very warmly for your frank
_exposé_ and wishes me to say that from the wording of your message
he concludes with some surprise that certain important conditions
governing this matter of Kiao Chow are unknown to you.'[18]
{251}
"I was unspeakably angry with Muravieff and I made no secret of my
feelings towards him. Noticing this he spontaneously offered me
explanations. He said, 'I should like you to bear in mind that this
business was not inaugurated yesterday nor to-day. It was during the
Kaiser's first visit here that he received the Tsar's consent to
lease Kiao Chow, and on his return to Berlin he got the people of the
Wilhelmstrasse to formulate the one-sided arrangement and to transmit
it at the fitting moment to our Foreign Office. The whole scheme was
the handiwork of the Kaiser or, if you like, of the two monarchs. So
please don't blame me. I have enough to answer for without that.' I
rejoined that I accepted the explanation which I did not know before,
and then I insisted, 'That is all very well for Kiao Chow. I can see
that you had no voice in that matter at all and are not therefore
blameworthy. But surely, surely, you could and should have hindered
the seizure of Port Arthur. Not to have vetoed that piece of folly
was a grave omission for which I cannot but blame you. And history
will be more severe towards you than I can ever be.' 'But, my dear
Serghei Yulievitch,' he shouted, 'you have missed the point of what I
have just been telling you. Please understand that the taking of
Port Arthur was none of my doing. Let me impress on you the
fact--you may think what you like of it, but it is the fact--that his
Majesty had arranged everything--Kiao Chow and Port Arthur--long ago
when he acquiesced in the proposals of the Kaiser. That was the
fruit of Wilhelm's first visit to Russia. As for me, I was not of
course consulted and knew absolutely nothing about it. The seizure
of Port Arthur was the direct consequence of the leasing of Kiao
Chow. And it was entirely an imperial deal. Is the matter clear
now?'[19] It was clear and made much else clear. I {252} trembled
for Russia's future when looking back upon her recent past. I could
hardly realise that the young Tsar, with no experience, little
reading, and only modest intellectual gifts, should have launched
forth into acts of that magnitude almost before he had taken stock of
his Empire or realised the duties which its governance imposed. As
for Muravieff, one could never believe anything he said, unless it
was confirmed by trustworthy evidence. In this case confirmation was
forthcoming."
To-day we are better able to estimate the effect of that personal
intervention in momentous affairs of State which was one of the most
baleful and least known characteristics of the last Emperor's reign.
As the result of a sudden mood, in answer to a sweetly uttered
request, or by way of realising the wish of a near relation, he would
make a sudden descent into the statesman's workshop and by the
graceful waving of his hand tear the web of the deftest combinations
into shreds. The further we penetrate into the archives of Russia's
foreign policy, even during the enlightened period which extends over
the last two reigns, the more irresistibly are we forced to admit
that the root principles which presided over the foundation of the
Tsarist State and determined its predatory character remained active
and vigorous to the very last. We may judge Nicholas II. as severely
as we please, but we cannot deny that however puerile or preposterous
some of his methods may have been, his aims dovetailed with the
tendencies that never ceased to accompany the political activity of
the Tsardom. In the nineteenth century there were two predatory
powers in Europe, Germany and Russia, and the latter was still a
clumsy theocracy from which law as a real restraint, religion as an
emanation of the individual conscience, education as a State
function, and social co-operation as a means of latter-day progress
had not disengaged themselves.
[1] It did them great harm. Soon after I left Armenia most of my
Armenian friends were massacred, and not my friends only.
[2] Cf. _Contemporary Review_, July, 1904.
[3] Cf. _Contemporary Review_, June, 1904, p. 803.
[4] _Op. cit._ p. 812.
[5] _Ibidem._
[6] Lobanoff-Rostoffsky died suddenly in August, 1896.
[7] September, 1896.
[8] It may not be superfluous to repeat what I said before: that I do
not include the Japanese in these allusions to Eastern or Asiatic
races. They stand in the forefront of civilised peoples of the
world, and whatever changes may yet be in store for humanity, are
practically certain to be among the most influential factors of
ordered progress.
[9] Cf. _Secret Memoirs of Count Hayashi_, p. 94.
[10] Ukhtomsky had travelled with Nicholas II. round the globe when
that prince was heir-apparent, and the two were mistakenly supposed
to be still on special terms of friendship. He was proprietor and
editor of the oldest newspaper in St. Petersburg, the _St. Petersburg
News_ (_Vedomosti_), of the staff of which I had been a member in the
days when it belonged to the Imperial Academy of Sciences and was
edited by Komaroff.
[11] The Petersburg Foreign Office.
[12] Count Lobanoff-Rostoffsky acknowledged this to every one who had
a right to talk to him on the subject. He said so quite plainly to
the British ambassador at St. Petersburg, Sir Nicholas O'Connor.
[13] Japan was constrained to retrocede the Liaotung Peninsula in
return for an indemnity of thirty million taels.
[14] The Tsar himself told the story to several of the grand dukes.
[15] The Russian Foreign Office.
[16] When negotiating with a British diplomatist Muravieff confounded
Dairen (Dalny) and Port Arthur, and the result was a very unpleasant
quarrel. Of geography the Foreign Secretary had not an inkling.
[17] Dubassoff himself told me the outlines of the story afterwards.
Port Arthur was leased to Russia by a deed signed on 9th April, 1898.
[18] The supposition to which the late Count Hayashi gave
circulation, that a secret agreement existed all along between
Germany and Russia about Kiao Chow and Port Arthur, is, so far as I
know, groundless. I can state positively that neither Witte nor
Muravieff nor Lamsdorff knew anything about it, and it runs counter
to several well-established facts.
[19] It would be unfair to pass over in silence another story which
is absolutely authenticated and which casts a doubt on Muravieff's
plea of justification. He met the Russian minister to Hesse at
Darmstadt soon afterwards and boasted he had had his way about Port
Arthur in spite of the omnipotent Witte, and he added: "Things are
not, however, going as I hoped they would. My intention was not to
fortify Port Arthur, but only to hoist the Russian flag over it and
leave a sentry in a sentry box to guard it. Nothing more." But
Muravieff was one of those misers who grudge the truth to everybody.
To a foreign diplomatist who hinted that he had not spoken his
thought to the British government in the matter of Port Arthur he
answered, "Perhaps not--but I gained a fine port for Russia thereby."
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