The Imperial Government, therefore, does not doubt that the Government
of the United States will understand the situation thus forced upon
Germany by the Entente Allies' brutal methods of war and by their
determination to destroy the Central Powers, and that the Government
of the United States will further realize that the now openly
disclosed intentions of the Entente Allies give back to Germany the
freedom of action which she reserved in her note addressed to the
Government of the United States on May 4, 1916.
Under these circumstances Germany will meet the illegal measures
of her enemies by forcibly preventing, after February 1, 1917,
in a zone around Great Britain, France, Italy, and in the eastern
Mediterranean all navigation, that of neutrals included, from and
to France, etc. All ships met within the zone will be sunk.
I think that you will agree with me that, in view of this declaration,
which suddenly and without prior intimation of any kind deliberately
withdraws the solemn assurance given in the Imperial Government's note
of the 4th of May, 1916, this Government has no alternative consistent
with the dignity and honor of the United States but to take the course
which, in its note of the 18th of April, 1916, it announced that it
would take in the event that the German Government did not declare and
effect an abandonment of the methods of submarine warfare which it was
then employing and to which it now purposes again to resort.