Page:Turkey, the great powers, and the Bagdad Railway.djvu/371

 States may "plunge into national competitive imperialism, with all its profits and dangers, following its financiers wherever they may lead."[54]

The situation is not unlike that which faced the German Empire in 1888. When the Deutsche Bank initiated its Anatolian railway enterprises, it inquired of the German Government whether it might expect protection for its investments in Turkey. Bismarck—who desired to avoid imperialistic entanglements and to limit German political interests, as far as possible, to the continent of Europe—replied with a warning that the risk involved "must be assumed exclusively by the entrepreneurs" and that the Bank must not count upon the support of the German Government in "precarious enterprises in foreign countries." But Bismarck's policy did not take full cognizance of the phenomenal industrial and commercial expansion of the German Empire, whose nationals were acquiring economic interests in Asia and in Africa and on the Seven Seas. William II was more sensitive than Bismarck to the demands of German industrial, commercial, and financial interests that they be granted active governmental support and protection abroad. Bismarck tolerated German enterprises in Turkey; William II sponsored them. It was under William II, not under Bismarck, that Germany definitely entered the arena of imperial competition.[55]

The development of American interests in Turkey puts the Government of the United States to a test of statesmanship. The temptations will be numerous to lend governmental assistance to American business men against their European competitors; to utilize the new American economic position in Turkey for the acquisition of political influence; to use diplomatic pressure in securing additional commercial and financial opportunities; to emphasize the economic, at the expense of the moral, factors in Near Eastern affairs. To yield to these temptations will be to