ict, it will always be to the
lasting discredit of Germany and Austria that they were false to this
great duty, and that they precipitated the greatest of all wars in a
manner so underhanded as to suggest a trap. They knew, as no one else
knew, in those quiet mid-summer days of July, that civilization was
about to be suddenly and most cruelly torpedoed. The submarine was
Germany and the torpedo, Austria, and the work was most effectually
done.

This ignorance of the leading European statesmen (other than those of
Germany and Austria) as to what was impending is strikingly shown by
the first letter in the English _White Paper_ from Sir Edward Grey to
Sir H. Rumbold, dated July 20, 1914. When this letter was written it
is altogether probable that Austria's arrogant and unreasonable
ultimatum had already been framed and approved in Vienna and Berlin,
and yet Sir Edward Grey, the Foreign Minister of a great and friendly
country, had so little knowledge of Austria's policy that he

asked the German Ambassador to-day (July 20th) if he had any
news of what was going on in Vienna. He replied that he had
not, but Austria was certainly going to take some step.

Sir Edward Grey adds that he told the German Ambassador that he had
learned that Count Berchtold, the Austrian Foreign Minister,

in speaking to the Italian Ambassador in Vienna, had
deprecated the suggestion that the situation was grave, but
had said that it should be cleared up.

The German Minister then replied that it would be desirable "if Russia
could act as a mediator with regard to Servia," so that the first
suggestion of Russia playing the part of the peacemaker came from the
German Ambassador in London. Sir Edward Grey then adds that he told
the German Ambassador that he

assumed that the Austrian Government would not do anything
until they had first disclosed to the public their case
against Servia, founded presumably upon what they had
discovered at the trial,

and the German Ambassador assented to this assumption.[5]

[Footnote 5: English _White Paper_, No. 1.]

Either the German Ambassador was then deceiving Sir Edward Grey, or
the submarine torpedo was being prepared with such secrecy that even
the German Ambassador in England did not know what was then in
progress.

The interesting and important question here suggests itself whether
Germany had knowledge of and approved in advance the Austrian