Page:The guilt of William Hohenzollern.djvu/31

 CHAPTER III GERMAN PROVOCATIONS

the moment, German policy did not mean war with the whole world. It did, however, involve the danger of such a war. The stronger the encirclement, the more complete the isolation of Germany, the more necessary it became, in her own interests, to avoid any provocative action that might entangle her in war.

The Marxist who contends that imperialism would have brought about a war in any case, whatever policy Germany had pursued, is like one who should defend a pack of silly boys for amusing themselves by throwing matches into a cask of gunpowder. The boys, he maintains, are not to blame for the devastating explosion which followed their practices, it is the circumstance that there was powder in the cask. Had there been water in it, nothing would have happened. No doubt. But in our case the boys knew there was powder in the cask—they had put a good deal of it in themselves.

One might indeed say that the greater Germany's isolation, and the more threatening the danger of a world-war, the more her provocations increased.

The growing danger itself had the effect of intensifying the bitterness on both sides; it formed a new impulse towards the increase of armaments and thereby towards the strengthening of warlike influences. It fatally increased the number of those who believed Rh