July 1914: Countdown to War (46 page)

The French deadline of one
PM
(two
PM
Berlin time), too, passed without reply, other than Viviani’s vague declaration that “France will act in accordance with her interests.” While Bethmann and Jagow could not have seen either this or Sazonov’s declaration as grounds for hope, they agreed to hold back. France, Bethmann wired to Schoen, could have another two hours to answer: until three
PM
(four
PM
Berlin time).
²⁷

There was good reason for the Germans to wait. Whereas both France and Russia were able to mobilize against Germany while
claiming
, at least, that doing so did not “mean war,” the timetable of Moltke’s plan meant that German general mobilization was more serious. If Germany mobilized on Saturday afternoon, troops from the Sixteenth Division at Trier were to move into neutral Luxembourg (although not yet Belgium) overnight, in order to seize control of her railways (already, by treaty, under German management) and deny them to the French. An ultimatum had already been dispatched to the German ambassador in Brussels, demanding that Belgium allow the free passage of German troops, although it would not be presented to the Belgian government until the following night, giving Brussels time to answer before the Germans would cross the Belgian border on M + 3. While no German troops would violate Belgian territory for three days—and French territory for two weeks later still—the move into Luxembourg would be an unambiguous act of war (even if not, in the first instance, against France or Russia). For Germany to mobilize was therefore a decision of tremendous gravity. Perhaps, Bethmann hoped, there was still time for someone in Paris or Petersburg to develop cold feet.

Of course, Bethmann was the author of his own dilemma. It was not simply that his fait-accompli policy vis-à-vis Vienna
had brought things to this pass in the first place. It was also the chancellor’s insistence that German mobilization must be accompanied by declarations of war. The paradox of Moltke’s mobilization plan was that it required immediate action in the direction of France and only a defensive posture on the Russian border. But because Russia was the power providing the casus belli, it was necessary to declare war on her first, before France, even though German troops had no immediate plans to attack Russia. Then, Germany must declare war on France before beginning hostilities against her. Declaring war first was diplomatic suicide, as Bethmann himself realized after the war: “by so doing we appeared as the aggressors,” especially to Britain.
²⁸
In fact, it was worse than this, because, as the naval secretary, Tirpitz, recalled explaining to Bethmann, both Italy and Romania had treaties with Germany, dating back to Bismarck’s time, that obliged them to come to her aid if she were attacked. “By our declaration of war on Russia,” Tirpitz pointed out, the Germans would “give the Romanians the right to leave us alone in the war.” In the same way, a declaration of war on France would allow Italy to go her own way. Moreover, even given the inevitability of war with Russia, by declaring war first Germany would “inspire the [Russian] moujik with the conviction that the kaiser intended to attack the White Tsar.” Tirpitz asked “why the declaration of war had to coincide with our mobilization.” Bethmann’s answer was that mobilization required Germany to “send troops over the frontier,” which was by definition an act of war. In a kind of reductio ad absurdum of Germanic propriety by which diplomacy was made the servant of military necessity, the chancellor thereby reduced the question of declaring war to a tautology. It must be done, because it must be done. Bethmann knew it spelled strategic doom for Germany. But the logic remained unassailable. He would not be budged.
²⁹

As the day wore on without word from Paris or Petersburg, tensions in Berlin grew acute. Crowds were milling about the
city. The air, one journalist observed, “was electric with rumor. People told each other Russia had asked for an extension of time. The Bourse writhed in panic. The afternoon passed in almost insufferable anxiety.”
³⁰

Compounding the anxiety in the General Staff was the latest intelligence from the eastern front. By Saturday, Russia’s mobilization was so far advanced that German reconnaissance could identify specific Russian units in the order of battle.
³¹
At four
PM
, Falkenhayn, the Prussian minister of war, unsure why mobilization still had not been declared four hours after the expiration of Russia’s deadline, sought out Bethmann. He demanded that the chancellor convince the kaiser to mobilize immediately. “After considerable resistance,” Falkenhayn recalled, “he consented and we rang up Moltke and Tirpitz.” The kaiser then summoned everyone to the palace in Charlottenburg. At five
PM
on Saturday, 1 August, Germany’s sovereign signed the order for general mobilization—the last of the four principal belligerents to do so. He gave Falkenhayn a long handshake. Both men, Falkenhayn remembered, “had tears in their eyes.”
³²

Scarcely had this momentous decision been made than Jagow appeared, having raced over from the Wilhelmstrasse to tell everyone that “a very important dispatch had come in from England which would soon be decoded and brought along.”
³³
He was referring to Lichnowsky’s 11:14
AM
telegram, which had been received at 4:23
PM
. Not wanting to give Bethmann and the kaiser another chance to back down, Moltke, his face now “bathed in perspiration,” left with Falkenhayn to transmit the mobilization order to the army, without waiting to hear Jagow’s news from London.
³⁴

Ten minutes later, they were summoned back. To general astonishment, Jagow informed everyone that Sir Edward Grey had promised “that in the event of our not attacking France, England, too, would remain neutral and would guarantee France’s passivity.” The news, General Lyncker, chief of the military cabinet, recalled, “hit everyone like a bomb.” It suddenly appeared that Germany would only have to fight, in Lyncker’s words, “one opponent instead of three.”
³⁵
No wonder Moltke, on his return to the palace, found everyone “in a joyful state of mind.” The kaiser, overcome with relief, exclaimed aloud, “Now we can go to war against Russia only. We simply march the whole of our army to the East!”
³⁶

German mobilization is proclaimed in 1914.
Source: Getty Images
.

Moltke was speechless. His plan had no provision for reversing the direction of German mobilization 180 degrees from west to east. His intricate timetable, which one historian elegantly described as “precise down to the number of train axles that would pass over a given bridge within a given time,” would be wrecked.
³⁷
“Your Majesty,” Moltke protested after recovering himself, “the deployment of an army of a million men cannot be improvised. . . . If Your Majesty insists on leading the whole army to the east it will not be an army ready for battle
but a disorganized mob of men with no arrangements for supply.” Besides, France would remain fully mobilized on Germany’s western frontier and she would hardly leave Germany alone if she struck Russia. “Your uncle,” Kaiser Wilhelm II replied angrily, “would have given me a different answer!” This remark “wounded me deeply,” Moltke later remembered: as he told the kaiser sheepishly, he had never considered himself “to be the equal of the field marshal.” Over Moltke’s strenuous objections, the kaiser insisted that his chief of staff sign an order to the commander of the Sixteenth Division in Trier to halt his imminent march into neutral Luxembourg. Moltke refused to sign, but an unofficial order was given by aides over the phone at 6:40
PM
.
³⁸

Meanwhile, the heated discussion over the British proposal continued. Falkenhayn pulled Moltke aside to assuage his hurt feelings. He agreed with the chief of staff that there was no way to reverse the mobilization against France, but he insisted that they humor the kaiser so long as England’s offer was on the table. Moltke, though chastened, agreed to consider it. Tirpitz pointed out to everyone that, whether Grey’s proposal “was a bluff or not a bluff,” if the Germans refused to parley, their refusal would be published in London, “putting us flagrantly in the wrong.” The kaiser agreed. Whether or not Grey was sincere, it seemed imperative to reply, to show good faith.
³⁹

And so Bethmann and Jagow, with input from Moltke and Falkenhayn, began writing up urgent pleas to London on the basis of Grey’s offer. The first was a sovereign-to-sovereign appeal in which Kaiser Wilhelm II informed King George V that he had “just received the communication from your Government offering French neutrality under guarantee of Great Britain. Added to this offer,” the message continued, “was the enquiry, whether under these conditions Germany would refrain from attacking France.” The kaiser confessed that Germany’s mobilization against France and Russia could no longer,
“on technical grounds,” be halted, but he promised that “if France offers me neutrality which must be guaranteed by the British fleet and army I shall of course refrain from attacking France and employ my troops elsewhere.” As a pledge of German good faith, the kaiser assured King George that “the troops on my frontier are in the act of being stopped by telegraph and telephon[e] from crossing into France.”
⁴⁰

This was untrue. German troops were not expected to cross the French frontier for nearly two weeks, and so there was no need to “stop” them from doing so now. Bethmann tacitly admitted this in his own telegram to Grey, which, in order to give England time to negotiate with Paris, promised that German troops would refrain from crossing the French frontier until Monday, 3 August, at seven
PM
.
⁴¹
(This, too, was misleading—it was
Belgium
’s frontier they would cross on Tuesday morning, not France’s.) Because this telegram was sent almost simultaneously with the kaiser’s, the intention was obviously to connect the idea that German troops were “being stopped by telegraph” with the pledge that they would not enter France. In fact these promises meant nothing, as they simply reflected the prerogatives of Moltke’s mobilization plan.

The kaiser had, of course, already taken steps to “stop troops” from crossing frontiers—the Sixteenth Division, slated to move into Luxembourg—but he could hardly reveal this to the British, as it would betray Germany’s intention to violate neutral territory. Nor could he get his chief of staff to sign the order (although instructions had already been given over the phone). Failing to receive satisfaction from Moltke, the kaiser dismissed him just before eight
PM
. The chief of staff was “crushed” as he left the palace; he “burst into tears of abject despair.” He went home, sat on his bed, and pouted.
⁴²

Moltke might have taken solace if he had stuck around for the next twist. A second telegram from Lichnowsky was delivered just minutes after the chief of staff left, this one even more
astonishing than the first. Sir William Tyrrell had come by the embassy early on Saturday afternoon, ostensibly to report on the cabinet meeting, and informed the German ambassador that “Sir E. Grey has made an offer this afternoon for the neutrality of England,
even in the case that we make war with Russia as well as with France
.” Hearing this, the kaiser ordered champagne for everyone. Britain would remain neutral no matter what Germany did!
⁴³

Of course, there were still France and Russia to worry about. At eight forty-five
PM
, Jagow wired Schoen in Paris, passing on Grey’s offer, “whereby England would guarantee France’s neutrality, if we do not attack France.” Jagow promised that “from our side no hostile action against France was in view, aside from mobilization,” and asked that Schoen give this assurance to Viviani in order to “keep the French quiet for the time being.”
⁴⁴

The situation with Russia was stranger still. After the twelve-hour ultimatum deadline had expired, Germany’s declaration of war had been sent to Pourtalès at 12:52
PM
, although his instructions were not to deliver it until 5
PM
Central European time (6:30
PM
in Petersburg). So a state of war between Germany and Russia almost certainly existed when Grey’s neutrality offers were being digested in Charlottenburg—although, failing any new report from Pourtalès, no one could be quite sure of this. The most recent news from Russia was the latest “Nicky-Willy” telegram, which had been received in Berlin just after 2
PM
. In it, the tsar had said that he understood the kaiser was “obliged to mobilize,” but asked for “the same guarantee from you as I gave you, that these measures do not mean war and that we shall continue nego[t]iating.”
⁴⁵
Germany’s sovereign had, in effect, already answered this question in the negative by having a declaration of war sent to Petersburg, although he was not sure it had been delivered. Seeking to cover all possible bases, Bethmann had a reply written up in the kaiser’s name, which was wired to Pourtalès at 9:45
PM
.