Page:Diplomacy and the War (Andrassy 1921).djvu/62

 of the general altitude and the previous precedents, no nation has the right to make accusations against us. When the nation greeted the idea of calling Serbia to account with enthusiasm, and flocked to perform their miHtary duty, the nation felt that she was not only justified in her procedure but was also pursuing a purely defensive policy. The attitude which our nation adopted then is no reason why she should be ashamed now.

It is to be hoped that the terrible consequences of the present war will induce all nations to insist on settling international conflicts by peaceable means. If those principles, however, which it is hoped will predominate in the future, do not decide to condemn all peoples which have waged war hitherto, then no accusation can be brought against us, because there was not a single creature in Hungary that desired to go to war for the sake of conquest or aggrandizement. It was almost an axiom that there were sufficient non-Hungarians on Hungarian soil, and that it would be a mistake to risk even the life of a single human being for the sake of conquest. Moreover, we never imagined ourselves to be powerful enough to expect to play an important part in the policy of Europe, even as a result of war.

No one dared to hope for the defeat of Russia, which would have made it impossible for her for a long time to pursue an aggressive Czarist policy. No sensible Hungarian would have been prepared to sacrifice himself in order to force France and England