general war-guilt.
Theretofore he had certainly always differentiated between the
autocracy, as also Militarism, on the one hand, and the German
people on the other. At Versailles he suddenly advanced the theory
that the Germans must be punished for their crimes, and not only
those among them who were responsible, but also the innocent German
people, who neither desired the breach of Belgium's neutrality,
nor understood the moral consequences of the U-boat war, nor were
aware of Mr. Wilson's mediation for peace.

The above dialogue is also interesting from the standpoint that
the President is most clearly convinced that the Entente could
not have conquered without American help. If to-day he concludes
therefrom that America would have been obliged ultimately to join
in the war, in order to punish Germany, in former days he concluded
that his duty was to bring about a Peace without victory. If he had
succeeded in doing this, all of us, friend and foe alike, would
now be living in a better world than the present one. It would be
the world as we had been shown it in a vision of the future on the
22nd January, 1917, and not the world of the Peace of Versailles,
blooming with starvation, Bolshevism and nationalistic hatred.

In his Memoirs, Herr von Tirpitz says that of all the practical
advantages which I declared would follow from a compliant attitude
on our part, not one had fallen to our lot. But I must confess, I
was not aware that the U-boat war had brought us any advantages
either. Its results have been a heavy moral debt and a huge bill
of costs that the German people must pay. And how could the policy
which I recommended have yielded practical results, seeing that I
was never able, or even allowed, to carry it through? Never at any
time was the U-boat war really given up. Every time a diplomatic
success was in view, an incident occurred which made it necessary
to start one's labors all over again.

Other people have said that as I was not in agreement with the
policy of the Imperial Government, I ought to have resigned my
office. This view does not take into account all the facts of the
case. As long as Herr von Jagow was Secretary of State for Foreign
Affairs, I worked in complete harmony with him. We both worked
together in trying to avert war with the United States. I knew as
little as Herr von Jagow himself did, whether we should succeed
in scoring every point in the policy we pursued, for the Secretary
of