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Rh of colonial powers, would generally be involved; and as the unappropriated portions of the earth’s surface at the beginning

of the period under discussion were to be found chiefly in Africa, it was in the Dark Continent that the conflicts of interests mostly took place. England’s chief competitors were France and Germany. Her traditional policy, except in the south of the continent, where the conditions of soil and climate were favourable to European colonists, had been purely commercial. She had refrained from annexation of territory, as involving too much expenditure and responsibility, and confined her protection to the trading stations on the coast. When France came into the field this policy had to be abandoned. The policy of France was also commercial in a certain sense, but the methods she adopted were very different. She endeavoured to bring under her authority, by annexation or the establishment of protectorates, the largest possible extent of territory, in order to increase her trade by a system of differential tariffs; she encroached on the hinterland of British settlements, and endeavoured to direct artificially the native inland trade towards her own ports. A glance at the map of the African West Coast will suffice to show the success with which this policy was carried out. When the British government awoke to the danger, all that could be done was to prevent further encroachments by likewise annexing territory. The result is shown in the article : § 5. In her dealings with France about the partition of Africa, England was generally conciliatory, but she was always inflexible in guarding carefully the two entrances to the Mediterranean. There was, therefore, a permanent danger of conflict in Egypt and Morocco. When England in 1882 considered it necessary to suppress the Arabi insurrection, she invited France to co-operate, but the French government declined, and left the work to be done by England alone. England had no intention of occupying the country permanently, but she had to take precautions against the danger of French occupation after her withdrawal, and these precautions were embodied in an Anglo-Turkish convention signed at Constantinople in May 1887. France prevented the ratification of the convention by the sultan, with the result that the British occupation has been indefinitely prolonged. She still clung persistently, however, to the hope of obtaining a predominant position in the valley of the Nile, and she tried to effect her purpose by gaining a firm foothold on the upper course of the river. The effort which she made in 1898 to attain this end, by simultaneously despatching the Marchand mission from her Congo possessions and inciting the emperor Menelek of Abyssinia to send a force from the east to join hands with Major Marchand at Fashoda, was defeated by the overthrow of the Khalifa and the British occupation of Khartum. For a few days the two nations seemed on the brink of war, but the French government, receiving no encouragement from St Petersburg, consented to withdraw the Marchand mission, and a convention was signed defining the respective spheres of influence of the two countries.

In Morocco the rivalry between the two powers was less acute but not less persistent and troublesome. France aspired to incorporate the sultanate with her north African possessions, whilst England had commercial interests to defend and was firmly resolved to prevent France from getting unfettered possession of the southern coast of the Straits of Gibraltar. As in Egypt, so in Morocco the dangers of conflict were averted, in 1904, by a general agreement, which enabled France to carry out in Morocco, as far as England was concerned, her policy of pacific penetration, but debarred her from erecting fortifications in the vicinity of the straits. Germany thereafter strongly opposed French claims in Morocco, but after a period of great tension, and the holding of an ineffectual conference at Algeciras in 1906, an understanding was come to in 1909 (see : History).

With Germany likewise, from 1880 onwards, England had some diplomatic difficulties regarding the partition of Africa, but they never reached a very acute phase, and were ultimately settled by mutual concessions. By the arrangement of 1890, in which several of the outstanding questions were solved, Heligoland was ceded to Germany in return for concessions in East Africa. A conflict of interests in the southern Pacific was amicably arranged by the Anglo-German convention of April 1886, in which a line of demarcation was drawn between the respective spheres of influence in the islands to the north and east of the Australian continent, and by the convention of 1899, in virtue of which Germany gained possession of Samoa and renounced in favour of England all pretensions to the Tonga Archipelago.

In Asia the tendencies of the European powers to territorial expansion, and their desire to secure new markets for their trade and industry, have affected from time to time their mutual relations. More than once England and Russia have had disputes about the limits of their respective spheres of

influence in central Asia, but the causes of friction have steadily diminished as the work of frontier delimitation has advanced. The important agreement of 1872–1873 was supplemented by the protocol of the 22nd of July 1887 and the Pamir delimitation of 1895, so that the Russo-Afghan frontier, which is the dividing line between the Russian and British spheres of influence, has now been carried right up to the frontier of the Chinese empire. The delimitation of the English and French spheres of influence in Asia has also progressed. In 1885 France endeavoured to get a footing on the Upper Irrawaddy, the hinterland of British Burma, and England replied in the following year by annexing the dominions of King Thebaw, including the Shan States as far east as the Mekong. Thereupon France pushed her Indo-Chinese frontier westwards, and in 1893 made an attack on the kingdom of Siam, which very nearly brought about a conflict with England. After prolonged negotiations an arrangement was reached and embodied in a formal treaty (January 1896), which clearly foreshadows a future partition between the two powers, but guarantees the independence of the central portion of the kingdom, the Valley of the Menam, as a buffer-state. Farther north, in eastern China, the aggressive tendencies and mutual rivalries of the European powers have produced a problem of a much more complicated kind. Firstly Germany, then Russia, next England, and finally France took portions of Chinese territory, under the thin disguise of long leases. They thereby excited in the Chinese population and government an intense anti-foreign feeling, which produced the Boxer movement and culminated in the attack on the foreign legations at Pekin in the summer of 1900. (See : History.)

In 1899–1901 the relations of the European powers were disturbed by the Boer War in South Africa. In nearly every country of Europe popular feeling was much excited against England, and in certain influential quarters the idea was entertained of utilizing this feeling for the formation of a coalition against the British empire; but in view of the decided attitude assumed by the British government, and the loyal enthusiasm displayed by the colonies, no foreign government ventured to take the initiative of intervention, and it came gradually to be recognized that no European state had any tangible interest in prolonging the independence and maladministration of the Boer republics.

One permanent factor in the history of Europe after the war of 1870–71 was the constant increase of armaments by all the great powers, and the proportionate increase of taxation. The fact made such an impression on the young emperor of Russia, Nicholas II., that he invited the powers to consider whether the further increase of the burdens thereby imposed on the nations might not be arrested by mutual agreement; and a conference for this purpose was convened at the Hague (May 18-July 29, 1899), but the desirable object in view was not attained. (See .)

Though neither the first Hague Conference nor the second, which met in 1907, did much to fulfil the expectations of those who hoped for the establishment of a system which should guarantee the world against the disasters of war, they undoubtedly tended to create a strong public

opinion in favour of peaceful methods in the solution of international problems which has not been without its effect. Any attempt to organize the concert of the powers must always