Prince Lichnowsky's aversion to the old Triple Alliance drew much
caustic criticism, especially from the Pan-German press, and excerpts
from the semi-official Vienna Fremdenblatt and other Austrian papers,
indignantly repudiating the Prince's charge that the Dual Monarchy had
always regarded Germany as a shield under which it could make raids upon
the Near East and otherwise stir up trouble, were eagerly reprinted in
Germany.
The Berlin Vorwärts, speaking for the pro-Government Socialists, said:
"The Ambassador returned with the feeling of a man who had seen his life
work knocked to pieces. No doubt he felt at that time not very different
from us German Socialists who had also worked for reconciliation with
France and England and now, in the face of the unchained elemental
forces, had to recognize our impotence with gnashing of teeth. In
Germany, Prince Lichnowsky, who had believed in the possibility of
agreement as every toiler must believe in his work, was greeted with the
scorn of the Pan-Germans, who asserted that he had allowed himself to be
softsoaped by the English and had never recognized their real
intentions. * * *
"And who can deny that this pamphlet casts a deep shadow upon the German
foreign policy before the war? They can say that everything that
Lichnowsky writes is the result of a diseased imagination and that all
is distorted and badly drawn. But this would merely mean that the most
important Ambassadorial post that Germany had at her disposal was
occupied by a fool and a blockhead. So, if one wishes to spare the
German policy this compromising implication, the only thing to do is to
take the memorandum and its author seriously and argue the points with
him in an expert manner."
The Vorwärts concluded its comment by saying that, no matter how the war
started, the German people were now determined to see that Germany was
not defeated, but if Prince Lichnowsky's article would help the people
of Germany to adopt a more conciliatory attitude toward England and thus
hasten a negotiated peace, it was worth reading. Comment of other
Socialist papers was along the same lines.