Page:Diplomacy and the War (Andrassy 1921).djvu/70

 Even after the Russian mobilization had cut short negotiations peace could still have been secured. The attempts at negotiation were not completed. They had not failed finally as yet. There was still a chance that Austria-Hungary would arrest the advance of her troops and enter into further negotiations. It was still possible that the Entente would allow the defeat of Serbia and be content to save Serbia after a military defeat by securing terms which would ensure the independence and the existence of this country.

It was the mobilization of the Russian Army which put an end to these possibilities. What motives led her to this mobilization? Did the Entente want the war? What do we know concerning the intentions of the members of the Entente? Are not they the criminals we have been looking for?

There is no doubt whatever that France had cause to enter the world war.

Alsace-Lorraine could only be returned to France as the result of a European war. The shame which France suffered during 1870 and 1871 could only be wiped off by German blood. Documents which have only recently seen the light of day prove that, ever since the formation of the Entente Cordiale and after the Moroccan crisis, France had felt the approach of an enormous contest, of an historic reckoning.

During the Moroccan crisis (1911) the French Ambassador in London, Cambon, who was a responsible individual, told the Serbian Ambassador in London that the opposition which existed then would