TOPICS OF THE DAY.
THE GERMAN EMPEROR'S VISIT AND ITS OBJECTS. THE German Emperor lands in England to-day. We desire to treat his Imperial Majesty with all possible courtesy, not only because he is the guest of the King, but also because his is a very interesting and striking personality, and still more because he is so intensely patriotic and so absolutely and entirely devoted to what he believes to be the interests of his own country. We may dislike his autocratic and tyrannical spirit, his restless ambition, and his determination to take from Britain if he can the proud position that is now held by her, but we cannot but admire the eager, active spirit in which he pushes and presses every point to the utmost as long as it is to the advantage of his own Empire. But our admiration for the German Emperor must not prevent us watching him and his designs closely, and endeavouring to make clear what those designs are. What, then, we must ask, is the object of the -Kaiser's visit ? it is clear, to use the expressive American phrase, that "he is not here for his health." It is for some other and more important object than a few days' shooting that he has invited himself to Sandring- ham, and has expressed the desire to meet the chief members of the Cabinet. All the leading Ministers would not have been asked to meet him had he not let it be known that he was specially anxious to see them. No; the Kaiser is not visiting us for his health or for covert-shooting. He is coming, we may be sure, if not like George I. for "all our goods," for the good of Germany. His object is to advance the interests of the German Empire ; of that we may rest assured. And, he does not come with any vague and general idea of creating good feeling between the two countries. He comes, we may feel certain, like the sound man of business he is, to further a specific project, and one not very alarming in itself,—one, too, which he means to urge with all his wonderful personal magnetism, a force which has stood him in good stead on so many occasions, and has got him out of so many difficult places.
Why do we assume that he is going to ask for some- thing? The assumption is perfectly safe, it seems to us, in view of what has been going on of late in Germany and of the trend of German diplomacy. It is always easy to tell when Germany as a State wants something. Her statesmen are far too astute to prepare the ground by making up to the Power of which they want a favour. That is an old-world device through which Bismarck taught them to see long ago. Instead, they begin to bully and indulge in a series of threats and pin-pricks. These cause a certain annoyance. Thereupon it is announced : 'If you want to stop this troublesome hostility, come into an alliance or undertaking with us, and then the Government will be able to guarantee that it shall not go on.' If on this the request is not granted, and the Power whose alliance is desired cannot be bullied into an understanding, an attempt is made to bring her to reason by use of what may be called the diplomatic bogey. It is pointed out by means of divers hints and innuendoes that the Power in question has a terrible enemy in a third party, and that if an agreement is not come to very soon, Germany will have to go to that terrible enemy and make terms with her. Bismarck used this system, or, rather, a modification of it, in the case of Austria. It was tried rather clumsily and not at all successfully in the ease of the United States not long ago. Lately we have seen both the bullying and the " bogeying " set in motion as regards Britain. Germany during the last few months has indulged in a great many pin-pricks. Her diplomacy, has been brutal — witness the monstrous attack on Lord Pauncefote—her statesmen have been insulting—see Count von Billow's references to Mr. Chamberlain and to the British Army— and lastly, her Press has been frankly hostile—note the almost daily diatribes of German journalism. In a word, we have seen the ground being carefully prepared for the Emperor's question: 'Would it not be a good thing to get rid of all this animosity by a better understanding ? ' We have seen the bogey worked with equal assiduity. As the writers of the first article in the November National Review point out, there has been incessant talk of late about "the Russian docu- ment." In other words, the Germans have been letting it be known "in confidence" that they have documentary evidence that the Russians seriously proposed intervention in the Boer War, and it is now even hinted that the actual document will be "put in" by the Emperor while at Sandringham. But the presentment of the Russian bogey is the best possible preface to the question: 'Is it not common prudence when you have such enemies as these to draw nearer to so mighty a Power as Germans- P Unquestionably all the signs point to the fact that 'the German Emperor is going to ask for something.
What will he ask for ? Clearly it will be for something which will be to the benefit of Germany, but will not appear to be injurious to Britain, though committing her to common action with Germany which can be pointed out to other Powers as evidence of a secret understanding. In order to arrive at a sound estimate of what the request is likely to be, we must ask : What does Germany want, —what is just now her most pressing need? No one can doubt that, speaking generally, what she most wants at this moment is to keep Russia and France, and especially Russia, from coming to any understanding with Britain. If such an understanding were to take place, it would hardly be too much to say that the position of Germany would be a desperate one. Germany seems very great and powerful, but in reality she is follow- ing a path which has a precipice on either side, and precipices so terrible that her people will not contemplate them if they can help it. To keep Russia and Britain and France and Britain apart, and further, if possible, to make Russia and France believe that Britain is tied to Germany, and so is incapable of coming to any agreement with those Powers, has become, indeed, the most pressing interest of Germany. The general object, then, of the German Emperor's visit may safely be assumed to be the making of ill-blood between us and Russia and France. This object will be sought to be accomplished by showing how an a with Germany would cure German hostility; and also by urging on our Ministers in confidence the treacherous hostility of Russia. But the German Emperor is nothing if not concrete in his ideas. We may be sure that he will not be content with mere generalities. He will ask for something definite and specific. What will that be ? In our opinion, it is not unlikely to be something connected with the -Baghdad Railway scheme. Our reasons for thinking this are by no means recondite. The German Emperor, as we all know, is deeply interested in the Baghdad Railway and most anxious for its com- pletion. But the German Foreign Office is also in a state of no little trepidation lest the Kaiser has gone too far in his Asia Minor policy, and has brought down on him- self what it and he most desire in the world to avoid,—the jealousy and hostility of Russia. He is therefore looking about most anxiously for some sort of a shelter.mound behind which he may find protection, and yet continue to press on his scheme of a railway to the Persian Gulf. The need for drawing Russian attention away from his Baghdad Railway policy must be a constant preoccupation with him. How can he shelter himself behind Britain ? must be a most natural corollary to his fears. If he could manage to make Britain appear interested, not merely commercially but officially, in the railway, he would obviously have gone far to secure the protection he needs for his scheme. The Russians are quite as sus- picious of us as we are of them, and if Germany could only show Britain to be implicated, we should " draw all the fire" and leave Germany to go on with the rail- way free from protest. But how is the Kaiser to us implicated in the Baghdad Railway scheme ? W.6 do not, of course, profess to be able to divine what IS in the Kaiser's mind, and very likely his whole schema is as yet known to no one. Again, we cannot pro- fess to say definitely that the Baghdad Railway ill: the specific scheme chosen for diplomatic action .012 England. It is, however, worth while to molt' a proposition which William II:might conceivably bmecakte; and a proposition which would certainly secure the o .s, he has in view. Suppose he were to say to the B...riti,o.n Government I don't ask you to give funds or clipi3 matic help to the railway. I merely ask you to enga,,os..ths ", " when the railway is made you will send the Indian wag the Baghdad route, and will guarantee a payment ef,saY £100,000 a year in respect of the services rendered.' Granted that this request were made and agreed to, it is not difficult to see how greatly Germany would benefit. In the first place, the knowledge of a British postal subsidy would make it possible to raise capital for the railway among British financiers. Next, the grant of a subsidy, as it would be called, could be used as a proof that Britain was not only officially implicated in the railway, but had come to some understanding with Germany. Britain, the Russians would argue, would never have entered on such a policy unless she meant in case of need to guard her mail route to India with her armed forces. The postal subsidy, that is, would at once come to be regarded by the Continent as a sign that the line would be watched and protected by the British Government. But the Russians would certainly be deeply chagrined by such a result. They would contend that Britain had altered the status quo on the Persian Gulf in her own favour, and animosity with this country would be sure to be the result. Prompted no doubt from Germany, the Russians would argue that they were in the wrong in beinc, annoyed with the German Emperor about the Baghdad Railway, because it turned out after all that the real political principal in the affair was Britain, and not Germany. Of course, we cannot feel sure that this particular proposition will be made, but even if the subsidy for carrying mails is not actually suggested, it may at any rate serve very well as an example of the kind of suggestion that is likely to be made. If the notion of asking British help in regard to the railway should be abandoned, the fact will remain as cogent as before that the German Emperor is desperately anxious that we should not come to any under- standing with Russia and should come to one with him.
It may be said that our statesmen when they meet the German Emperor will have no difficulty whatever in showing him that they understand the situation, and that the time for an agreement with Germany has gone by,—if, indeed, it ever existed. We fear, however, that they will not find standing up to the German Emperor so easy as it sounds to the newspaper reader. He will, no doubt, be not in the least moved or annoyed by any plain things which may be said to him by our Ministers as to official and Press hostility. He will probably admit them fully, but will point out that the way to stop them is to make a German alliance. He cannot now, he will perhaps argue, hold in his officials or his Press, but if once we became recog- nised friends they could be made to abandon their hostility. Again, he may point out most sympathetically the perils which we run from Russian animosity—of which proofs will be forthcoming—and demonstrate how essential it is that we should insure against those perils. Un- questionably the magnetism of the Emperor's address —a personal magnetism which enabled him to convince both the Americans and the Spaniards that he was personally on their side during the war—will make it for the moment appear very difficult to find a sound answer to his advances. Yet a little reflection should surely enable our statesmen to answer in effect : —` We do not want an agreement with Germany. Whatever their Emperor may be, we see that the German people are deeply hostileto Britain, and, what is more, must, in their desire for sea-power and a world-Empire, remain so. Again, we are of opinion that the Russian and. French hostility which our friendship with you must create would be infinitely more inconvenient and dangerous to us than your continued ill-feeling. At the price proposed by you we would not, if we could, come to an agreement with you. Our object is not by any means to strengthen Germany, though we quite understand that it is a vital object with Germany not only to gain, but to be able to parade, our goodwill. On the whole, then, we would much prefer to come to terms with Russia or France than with Germany, our mercantile rival and probable enemy.' Will our Ministers have the fortitude to make a stand against the German Emperor on some such grounds as these, or will they yield to his importunities and to the undoubted fascination of his personality so far as to give, or rather appear to give, encouragement to his schemes ? If they do, and even if in only a very small and perfunctory Way, they will still run no little risk of injuring our rela- tions with Russia and France. Remember the kind of use Cu will instantly be made of such an appearance of encouragement by the German Foreign Office in St. Peters- burg and Paris. Before twenty-four hours are passed "English documents" will be adduced to show how much we hate Russia and. France, and how very far we are prepared to go in order to withstand those Powers. Depend upon it, if we are wise we shall let the Kaiser with the best possible goodwill in the world shoot the King's pheasants and delight all he comes across by the fascination of his talk ; but as soon as he makes any political or diplomatic propositions, we should inform him politely but firmly that we think that the history of the past three years has shown that the less we have to do with Germany as a nation the better for all parties. Lord Salisbury, it is said, always sought safety in flight when the German Emperor came to England. Let us hope that Mr. Balfour will be able to contrive some equally effective way of avoiding the Kaiser's attempts to embarrass us with the perilous friendship of his Empire.
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