THE GERMAN EMPEROR AND THE FIRST LORD OF THE ADMIRALTY. (Hansard, 9 March 1908)

§ THE FIRST LORD OF THE ADMIRALTY (Lord TWEEDMOUTH)
My Lords, I understand that there are some Members of your Lordships' House who are inclined to ask some questions about the extraordinary outburst which has taken place in the Press during the last few days. I beg to ask for that consideration which is always given to a Member of your Lordships' House who has to make a short personal statement. I should like to anticipate any questions that may be put in this House. It is a fact that on Tuesday, 18th February, I received a letter from his Imperial Majesty the German Emperor. That letter came to me by way of the ordinary post. The letter was a private and a personal one. It was very friendly in its tone and quite informal. When I received that letter I showed it to Sir Edward Grey. He agreed with me that it should be treated as a private letter and not as an official one. Accordingly, my Lords, on Thursday, 20th February, I replied to His Imperial Majesty the German Emperor in the same sense as his own letter was directed to me— that is to say, in a friendly and informal manner. All I shall say further is this, that I beg to assure your Lordships that I firmly believe the course I adopted was a good one, and that it was calculated to do what we all so much desire, which is to do all that we can to foster a good understanding between the German Empire and ourselves.

§ THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNE
My lords, I think that the First Lord of the Admiralty has done well to come to your Lordships' House this evening and to offer to you at any rate some explanation of the remarkable episode which, during the last few days has engaged so much public attention. If the noble Lord will forgive me for saying so, I would observe that what seemed to us most worthy of attention was not 1073 so much what he called the outburst of opinion in the public Press as the substratum of fact which provided that outburst. The noble Lord has vouchsafed us not much, but, at any rate, some information with regard to this correspondence. We know, in the first place, that these letters actually passed between His Imperial Majesty the German Emperor and himself. We gather from him further that the correspondence began with a letter addressed to him by His Imperial Majesty —a letter, I presume, therefore, which was unsolicited by the noble Lord and did not form any part of a protracted and continuous correspondence. That, I think, is an important fact, and one which should not be lost sight of. Then we learn further that the letter was in character a private and personal letter, that in form it was wholly unofficial, and that in substance it was friendly in tone towards this country. It naturally occurs to one that a letter of this kind would be very much the counterpart of the kind of communication which might pass by word of mouth between a great Sovereign and an English Minister upon those occasions which, as we know, occur from time to time when our Ministers are brought into contact with the rulers of other countries. No one would, I think, regard a conversation of that kind as denoting any impropriety of conduct on the part of the Minister who took part in it. We gather, also, from the First Lord of the Admiralty that his reply followed upon the lines of the communication which he received—that it was private, personal, and informal in its character. There has been expressed in many quarters an earnest desire that this correspondence should be given to the public, but I infer from the statement of the noble Lord that that is not his intention, and I am bound to say that if that is not his intention we —so far as I and my friends who sit near me are concerned — shall not press him to depart from it. But, my Lords, this incident naturally gives rise to many questions as to the propriety of these extra-official communications. I do not think I shall be challenged when I say that they ought to occur only under very 1074 exceptional circumstances. It would be intolerable if alongside of official correspondence, properly recorded, accessible to those whom it most concerns, there should be extra-official correspondence not so accessible, not properly recorded, and hidden away in the private despatch-boxes of Ministers. But, my Lords, I do not wish to suggest that no exception should be allowed to this rule. I think it not improbable that there have been occasions upon which Sovereigns and rulers have found it convenient and useful to unburden themselves privately to the Ministers of other countries, and if these confidences are made, as I believe this confidence was made, with nothing but friendly intentions, I am far from saying that any harm can result from them. But I would venture to lay this down as a principle from which no departure should be allowed, that, if communications of this sort are to take place at all, they should never be allowed to create a diplomatic situation different from the diplomatic situation created by the official and recorded documents.

§ LORD TWEEDMOUTH
nodded assent.

§ THE MARQUESS OF LANSDOWNE
I am glad to see that the noble Lord signifies his assent to that doctrine, and I am sure I may take it from him that this particular letter did not have the effect which I suggest. The noble Lord will forgive me for saying that there is another rule which, I think, should be observed in regard to such somewhat irregular communications, and that is, if they are, indeed, to be regarded as and treated as private correspondence, that privacy should be strictly respected. I am afraid that upon this occasion either the noble Lord has betrayed his own secret or has allowed others to betray it for him. At any rate, there seems to me to have been only that amount of privacy attaching to this correspondence which might be considered to attach, let us say, to the private view of the Royal Academy at the beginning of the season. The result has been most unfortunate. Public opinion has been much moved, and I am sure that all those who earnestly desire, as the noble Lord does and as we do, 1075 that the relations between this country and Germany should be of the most friendly description, must greatly regret that this incident should have occurred to excite and disturb the public mind. My Lords, we on this side of the House desire neither to do nor to say anything which can add to that excitement, or which can increase in any way the embarrassment which I am afraid this occurrence must have occasioned to His Majesty's Government.

EARL ROSEBERY
My Lords, I confess I have only one apprehension in regard to this matter, and that is that as a nation we may be making ourselves slightly ridiculous by the fuss which has been made about this correspondence. So far as I know there has been no secrecy about it; in fact, my noble friend complains that there has not been enough. But the facts are sufficiently clear. I gather from the newspapers, which seem to have been singularly well informed of late, that the German Emperor was somewhat disquieted by a letter which appeared in the public prints, in which very pointed note was taken of himself. And if I am still to believe the public prints, he wrote a letter, partly of banter, to my noble friend the First Lord of the Admiralty on this subject, to which my noble friend replied in, I suppose, as near a tone of banter as one in his situation can employ towards as exalted a potentate as the German Emperor. Out of this we have seen a whole world of absolutely insane inferences drawn—that the German Emperor was attempting to influence my noble friend, with a view to cutting down the Navy Estimates, to check the progression of our armaments, to neutralise the defensive activities of our nation, and in some subterranean manner to subvert the whole Constitution of the British Government. Surely that is placing ourselves, our Government, our institutions, in a supremely ridiculous position. The German Emperor is not merely a great potentate, but a potentate of remarkable intelligence, born of an English mother, who has paid many visits to this country, and is intimately acquainted with our political Constitution, and I am quite sure that it never 1076 would have entered his head, or the head of any educated person outside of a lunatic asylum in Germany, that by a private communication to my noble friend he could exercise any influence whatever on the progress of British armaments. Now that is where I am afraid we are likely to make ourselves-ridiculous in this country. There is a section of the Press which seems to make it its object to seek to create bad relations between this country and Germany, and I am afraid—though I am less perfectly acquainted with the subject—that there is a corresponding section of the Press in Germany which also has for its object to make bad relations between the two countries. Futhermore, there seems to be an impression that because we have arrived—and we are all glad that we have arrived—at a friendly feeling with France, it is necessary, therefore, that we should take up an attitude of some asperity to Germany. And those sections of the Press, both in England and in Germany, which foster these ideas, take up every trivial incident—and, though I am full of respect both for my noble friend and for the German Emperor, I cannot consider this as anything but a trivial incident—and are ready to take advantage of every trivial incident to excite morbid suspicion between the two nations which, in my mind, is gradually developing into a danger to European peace. My Lords, there is no earthly reason that I know— it is true, it is long since I had any direct contact with foreign affairs—why our friendship with France should necessarily entail a hostile attitude towards Germany. Our insular position, our great commercial relations with the entire universe, ought to make our foreign policy as nearly as possible a policy of amity all round. We have further to recollect in connection with that policy this important fact, that our enemies of to-day may be our friends of to-morrow, and our friends of to-day may be our enemies of to-morrow. What then is the lesson I draw from the excitement produced by this very slight incident? It is this—that the responsibility of the Press both in England and in Germany should be realised by that Press, and that they should not lash both nations into a state of soreness which some day may amount to exasperation 1077 and may produce the gravest dangers to European peace. There is one consideration that arises from the very constitution of that mighty German Army, numbering some 4,000,000 of men, which should not be overlooked by any thoughtful observer at this time. It is this—that it is an Army which is practically the German nation, and that before any German Government, however powerful it may be, declares war against any country, it must have the support of that nation behind it; and it can only have the support of the German nation in a war against Great Britain when the feelings of that nation have been so exasperated as to render further peaceful conditions impracticable.