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ANGLO-GERMAN RELATIONS.

TlU£ KAISER'S INTERFERENCE. GERMAN" PRESS VIEWS. A REPLY' TO ALARMIST VIEWS. Revived March 10. 0..'{0 a.m. Berlin, March 11. The lion. Mr. A-ipiith's statement I dealing with the Kaiser's letter inci- | dent lia- readied ollieial circles. The lSerlin newspaper comments I hereon are partly wholesale abuse <»f. tin' lime* and partly an attempt t,> niiniini-e the letter; but the Berliner Tageblatt, recalling the Kaiser's famous telegram to the Jate President Kruger during the Doer war and other inoi--1 dents, argues that vigilance ought to have been exercised, lint apparently Prince von Buelow, like others, was I taken by surprise. London. March !). flie Standard's Berlin correspondent reports that as a result of an informal exchange of views by the British anil Herman (iovcmmeiiK the mutual eoi-vii-tiim ha- U'en recorded that the incident ought not ill any way to exercise an unfavorable influence upon AngloGrriuan relation*. !

Tlie Standard adds that tile Kaiser's letter is a general reply to the alaruii.-f views expressed in Parliamentary and otlier utterances, and to the articles in British reviews and new-paper-, the attacks on either tide being a secondary, Icature.

The Horning Post's Berlin correspondent says that the leading newspapers express great satisfaction at the general attitude of the English Press.

Air, W. T. Stead Ins written to the London Daily Mail:— Sir,—May 1 venture to deprecate the prominence which you have given to me in the discussion ou the Genuau naval programme.

To »peak of "ilr. Stead's Mailed Fist,'' for instance, merely because 1 stated, with the utmost moderation and good temper, a truism universally recognised by ail Englishmen, with the exception of a small handful of idealists, is to mislead the foreign public by suggesting that the convictions which I expressed are peculiar to myself, instead of being common to ail of us, to whatever school of politics we may belong. Self-preservation is a law of nature. The instinct to keep one's head above I the water u not dependent upon the political theories of the swimmer, lie must do it or perish. And from Cobden downwards the maintenance of su premacy of the sea has always been revogni-ed as the indispcn-able condition of our national existence. It has been occasionally challenged since it was established at Trafalgar, but it lias always been reasserted, until it has come to be regarded as a fundamental factor in the European equilibrium. To identi fy this axiom with the personality of any individual, let alone so insignificant a person as myself, is misleading and may be mischievous. You might as well speak of "ilr. Stead's Rule of Three," or "Mr. Stead's Law of Gravitation. 1 ' -it the same time there is one counterbalancing advantage about the undue advantage you have thus thrust upon me. 1 am probably the last man in the British Empire who can be accused of any animosity to the Germans. My record as a publicist dates back to the year 1870, when in the days of my hot youth I was one ol the most vehement pro-Germans on the English pre-". Thirty-seven years of steady all l unswerving devotion to the cause of Angio-German friendship render it impossible for the most malevolent critics to attribute to me any underlying motive of ill-will, of jealousy, or of fear when for the hundredth time I state in frank, straight-forward fashion the immutable resolve of all Englishmen to maintain the naval status quo which they have inherited from their ancestors.

The comments of a couple of German papers which you quote in yesterday's Usue do not contribute much to the discussion. The picture which one of mv good friends on the German Press draws of me as "a cold, calculating English Chauvinist" must have amused your readers who have not hitherto been accustomed to regard me exactly in that light.

It is not. however, historically corrc.t that I invented the Peace Crusade of ISW in order to secure the fruits of tli; campaign begun by the publication of "The Truth about the Navy" in 1884. The fact was that in 1884 the Britisa Navv had been allowed to fall below its normal standard of superiority to thai of France, and no one was Ijetler pleased With the efforts made in that veir to restore our strength at sea than l'rince Bismarck and the German patriots of that ,|ay.

As for the Peace Crusade oi IBSW. that was preceded six years earlier by a German movement in favour of a conference for a diminution of the cost of armaments, which, as the Crispi memoirs lately reminded us. the Kaiser him-elf pressed upon Leo XIII. on his visit to the Vatican. Both in ISB4 and in IHtV.t I but '" i ■ lowed with unequal steps policies previously stamped wjth German approval. There was no Chauvinism about it. Everything was open and almve-board, and never a German in the world until to-day ever hinted that my action was directly or indirectly motived by a desire to alter, to the detriment of the German Empire, the normal naval status quo. Another of my good friends in lierliu wishes "decisively to protest against my idea of rivalry." This idea, he says.

"exists solely in the imagination of Englishmen." Let us dismiss, then, once for all the term rivalry. I do this the more readily because it is an odious term, suggesting an impossibility. But this self same critic, who rightly repudiates a rivalry which he seems to regard as involving the creation of a German fleet equal or superior to that of Great Britain, proceeds to demand "an »v----pan-ion of the German fleet." which, he tells »s. i- ■■ f ar f roln strong enough to defend German coasts and harbours " i" war time

I make no complaint of this. Goriii my'- nfl-i- and harbours have irj! liecoiue either more vulnerable or more cxt'-ndcd of late: but it is for the Germans themselves to judge whether they feel safe and what measures they ought to take to protect themselves. But as it is a truism of warfare tha:

•i vigorous offensive is the most effective defence, they cannot complain if on our side every attempt on their part to t lie naval status quo to their advantage is met by corresponding measures to prevent such expansion operating to our

detriment. Our po-ition is very simple. We say about rivalry. We merely -land by the -tatu- ipio. It is our dutv to - to it that the relative propor!ion f-f ii.ival now existing i- noi iHereil t.i our ili-.idv:intaj,'o. \W -oujrlit to -ecure thi- at the tbi^u.-

in lijlV anil in H*o7 by an international .»«.Teement. We failed. and we have

now to retain Jt in tin* mture as in the past by each doinjf tho best we can far ours*dv»> in a cut-throat competition. for which we are not responsible tnd which we are willing to terminate to-morrow if Oernianv will but consent.

But. instead of or reducing l:er armaments. fiermanv has responded to our reduction nf naval expenditure, •inieunting to five millions between 1004 and lfXt". bv increasing hpr expenditure in tho >inio period by three and a-half millions, and she now proposes to init by three million* more next year. When tlio first Hajnie Conference wa- held, Germany spent annually six and a-half millions on her Xavv. iii l!»l! sli" will, by Iht new p,*o«rannnr', !w* -pi'ndiiij! twonty-fhrce million?. There i« no mistaking the significance of thrj.fi figures. "William T. Stead.

Permanent link to this item
Hononga pūmau ki tēnei tūemi

https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/newspapers/TDN19080310.2.22.16

Bibliographic details
Ngā taipitopito pukapuka

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LI, Issue 68, 10 March 1908, Page 3

Word count
Tapeke kupu
1,240

ANGLO-GERMAN RELATIONS. Taranaki Daily News, Volume LI, Issue 68, 10 March 1908, Page 3

ANGLO-GERMAN RELATIONS. Taranaki Daily News, Volume LI, Issue 68, 10 March 1908, Page 3

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