“and that certainly the arrow, once sent, Germany could not
     allow herself to be guided except by her duty to her ally.”

This seemed to be the fatal fallacy of Germany, that its duties to civilization were so slight that it should support its ally, Austria, whether the latter were right or wrong.  Such was its policy, and it carried it out with fatal consistency.  To support its ally in actual war may be defensible, but to support it in times of peace in an iniquitous demand and a policy of gross discourtesy offends every sense of international morality.

On the following day Russia proposed to Austria that they should enter into an exchange of private views, with the object of an alteration in common of some clauses of the Austrian note of July 23. To this Austria never even replied. The Russian Minister communicated this suggestion to the German Minister of Foreign Affairs and expressed the hope that he would “find it possible to advise Vienna to meet our proposal,” but this did not accord with German policy, for on that day the German Ambassador in Paris called upon the French Minister of Foreign Affairs, and in reply to a similar suggestion that Germany should suggest to Vienna to meet Servia in the same conciliatory spirit which Servia had shown, the Ambassador answered that that “was not possible in view of the resolution taken not to interfere in the Austro-Servian conflict.”

On the same day England asked France, Italy, and Germany to meet in London for an immediate conference to preserve the peace of Europe, and to this fruitful suggestion, which might have saved the peace of Europe, the German Chancellor replied with the pitiful quibble that “it is impossible to bring our ally before a European court in its difference with Servia,” although it affected to accept “in principle” the policy of mediation.

Germany’s acceptance “in principle” of a policy which she in practice thwarted suggests the law-abiding tendencies of that Maine statesman who was “for the Maine prohibition liquor law, but against its enforcement.”

[English “White Paper,” No. 46.]

Germany’s refusal to have Servia’s case submitted to the powers even for their consideration is the more striking when it is recalled that the German Ambassador at London quoted to Sir Edward Grey the German Secretary of State as saying

     “that there were some things in the Austrian note that Servia
     could hardly be expected to accept,”

thus recognizing that Austria’s ultimatum was, at least in part, unjust.  Sir Edward Grey then called the German Ambassador’s attention to the fact that if Austria refused the conciliatory reply of Servia and marched into that country

     “it meant that she was determined to crush Servia at all
     costs, being reckless of the consequences that might be
     involved.”

He added that the Servian reply