Graf E. Reventlow

“ The Continent grew ever poorer, and England ever richer. With characteristic English hypocrisy could Pitt say, on the occasion of the reception of some expelled French priests: “The country that has welcomed those priests, is a country which Heaven has blessed. In the midst of the universal distress which has befallen other nations, Providence has permitted Great Britain to cover herself with glory and honor. Peace reigns in her palaces, her barns are full. All parts of the globe pay tribute to her industry, all the seas are marked with the sign of her victories.” ”

“ The great merit of Count Reventlow’s work is that of showing us the history of Europe in its true light. Pitilessly has the historian here torn to shreds the garment of hypocrisy in which the English seek to clothe themselves; spurred on by the sole desire of impartiality searching for the truth, he has rent asunder the veil which they have thrown over the real history of the world with a cleverness equalled only by their unscrupulousness. England is here exposed to the reader in all her hideous nakedness, with not even a rag to cover her sores ”

“ The German Empire had, on the contrary, invariably acted in pure self-defence, whether from a political or from an economic point of view. History has never known a policy more peaceful than that pursued by German statesmen. The German fleet could not possibly, either in its conception or in its development, constitute a danger for Great Britain. None the less Germany was a great Continental Power, her trade and industry flourished, she claimed the right of protecting her national production, she tried to build herself a fleet: therefore must she be destroyed. ”

“ If that war had taken place in our days, Dutch statesmen would probably have said, on the eve of its outbreak: “Not a single question can arise between Holland and England, capable of causing a war between two civilised nations who are also bound to each other by links of blood.” A crowd of people unable to form a judgment of their own would have accepted such cheap wisdom with enthusiasm, and would have abundantly denounced all those who held different opinions as jingoes, super-patriots, and so forth. ”

“ As matters stand to-day, there is no doubt that the population of England would form a single vast body of franc-tireurs, who would carry on the war against the invading army by all the means available, and to the bitter end. These necessarily brief reflections show us that a landing of troops in Great Britain is possible only if the invading Power possess, in one way or another, effective command of the sea. If this be not the case, then all plans of invasion are illusions—and illusions that are liable to become a source of danger. ”

“ The more greatly Europe was impoverished, the more did England’s wealth increase. Therefore has England stirred up wars innumerable, in which she has herself taken practically no part, in order to ruin Europe economically, morally, and politically. Therefore has she always sought to prevent by all means the rise of any prosperous European State capable of competing with her in the markets of the world. She knew that, as long as she ruled the seas, Europe was helpless, and that the monopoly of the oversea trade belonged to her. ”

“ Who could tell whether the entente between Russia and Germany, on the one hand, and France and Russia, on the other, might not lead to a Franco-German-Russian Alliance? For Great Britain, no spectre more uncanny than that of a co-operation—to say nothing of a real union—between the leading Continental Powers could possibly be conjured up. As long as Bismarck was there, English statesmen had found no opportunity of driving a wedge in between Russia and Germany. ”

“ England is in the habit of addressing the world in the following terms: “Our policy aims at securing a balance of power on the Continent, in order that peace may reign there, and that no European State may develop at the expense of another.” In the course of many centuries of struggle for justice and liberty, Great Britain has acquired the privilege of styling herself the legitimate protectress of these ideals, common to the whole of humanity. Such is the English contention! ”

“ As soon as the great phrase had been coined, England appeared suddenly as the leader of the European anti-German coalition, and proclaimed: Germany must be annihilated, militarily, politically, economically. And, all over the world, deeds immediately followed words. The definitely fixed, carefully planned-out programme had only to be followed. It was followed, and yet are there still to-day people in Germany who maintain that England was led astray by the wicked diplomatists of France and Russia, and was driven against her will into war. ”

“ The position of England, alike as an European and as a World-Power, was indeed, at the time of the War of Liberation, an unique one. The Continent, to a large extent a mere series of battlefields, had been completely ruined by loss of life, by economic impoverishment, by political anarchy. An extraordinary wave of idealism had permitted the poorest of all continental countries, Prussia, to accomplish the most difficult of all tasks. ”

“ Holland and Hanover became the outposts of Great Britain in Europe; a part of the coasts of the North Sea and the Channel became de facto British. Such outposts possessed vast importance for England’s continental trade, and were also admirable political trump-cards. As for the participation of England in the continental wars, it was a fundamental principle of British policy not to allow the precious blood of Albion’s sons to be shed. But the British Government was consequently all the more generous with the blood of its continental mercenaries. ”

“ Nothing was left undone, either by the British Government or by its accredited and unaccredited agents, in order to fight and to intrigue against the proposed Union in every German State. There are certainly few things which can be more legitimately included in the category of a country’s “internal affairs,” than the settlement of their mutual economic interests by the German States. But England had, in the most cunning manner, arranged, at the Congress of Vienna, for Germany to become an object of economic exploitation, and had imagined that matters would always remain thus. ”

“ The English commenced by robbing the Spanish treasure-ships—acts of murderous and dastardly brigandage which are held up to Englishmen to-day as deeds of prowess. They continued by robbing Canada and the States from the French, Gibraltar from the Spaniards, India from the French and the Portuguese, South Africa from the Dutch, Egypt and Cyprus from the Turks, Malta from the Italians—and last, but not least, Ireland from the Irish. Over the whole world we can follow the trail of the venomous serpent, which has fastened its deadly fangs into so many victims. ”

“ They neglected their fleets; only too late did they perceive that in the North of Europe a nation had arisen, which instinctively recognised in piracy on the high seas the instrument adapted to its need of expansion. That nation was England.
Not a single Englishman is to be found among the pioneers who prepared the way for the great discoveries of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. Neither do we find among the English any record of journeys like those accomplished by the Vikings of old—journeys undertaken for the sole pleasure of adventure, and of exploring unknown and distant regions. ”

“ A Christian people which should be stupid and criminal enough not to grovel in the 18dust before the Chosen Nation—which should even push such criminal folly to the extent of competing with that Chosen Nation on the sea: such a people deserves nothing else but annihilation. The God of the English commands it!
It was not a mere accident that precisely those pious men should have waxed ever more indignant at the spectacle of Holland’s prosperity, who were always ready to commit every crime calculated to ensure the glory of God and of England. ”

“ British statesmen have always been well aware of the fact that every important railroad which is withdrawn from British control, diminishes British sea power and British maritime trade. The mistress of the seas controlled all the waterways of the world, which she could shut or open as she pleased. The “world’s carrier” had at her disposal a trading fleet vastly superior to all others, an immense quantity of harbors owned by herself, to say nothing of all the other harbors in the whole world. Through these harbors British goods find their way into the markets all over the globe ”

“ The protection of European markets against English industry is, according to English conceptions, the most hostile and outrageous act which a nation can possibly commit against the Chosen People. If England had found herself at that time in a more advantageous political position and if Bismarck had not been there, it is probable that Germany’s conversion to Protectionism would have had much more important effects on Anglo-German relations than it did. ”

“ As soon as England, during the Seven Years’ War, had reaped her own abundant harvest and was certain that the conclusion of peace could not in any way diminish her profits, she at once sacrificed without hesitation the interests of Prussia, and broke the treaty she had signed with Frederic. And yet, without Prussia and Frederic, England would never have been able to drive France either from North America or India! Had France not been weakened by the war with Prussia, the former would have been able to play a very different part on the seas. ”

“ Napoleon had failed in Egypt, but his determination to protect the position and interests of France, at home and abroad, by all the means in his power, against Great Britain—this determination was stronger than ever. Never has a Continental monarch or statesman recognised so clearly and completely the essence and the methods of English policy, as Napoleon. He knew that, for England, trade is the beginning and end of everything. ”

“ How could any reasonable person believe that methods systematically and successfully adopted during centuries—that 57the fundamental instincts of the English nation and the underlying principles of English policy: that all this would suddenly be abandoned, annihilated, simply because the Continental States hoped that it would be so, and talked about the possibility of it happening? In England people spoke a lot, and eloquently, about humanity and civilisation. But for every English statesman and admiral it was self-evident that, in war, everything would remain exactly as it always had been. ”

“ England’s industry did the work. It must also be observed that the capital wealth of Great Britain had immeasurably increased, and had assumed ever more and more the aspect of an octopus sucking the life-blood of the other European nations. The more numerous the wars which those nations were compelled to wage for England, the more crushing did England’s superiority in this respect become. Ever less and less grew the competition capable of exerting an influence either on the selling or on the purchasing prices of English industry. ”

“ We fear the truth is only just beginning to dawn. France at any rate does not yet perceive that she is being bled to death for the sake of England, who employs her to-day against Germany, even as she employed Germany against Louis XIV and Napoleon in former centuries. France, Belgium, Russia, Italy, are to-day England’s instruments. By means of them does she hope to destroy Germany and Austria-Hungary ”

“ The history of the war up to date has proved that the British admirals were well informed. It is true that the rank of an admiral would not have been necessary for that; for it is an old habit of British Governments to announce in the most pathetical tone of voice their readiness to enter into negotiations, and to sign conventions, of this sort. England was always enthusiastic about right and justice in maritime warfare—provided she could by these means bind the hands of other nations without committing herself to anything. ”

“ The great day of liberation will surely come, sooner or later. The conditio sine qua non of that liberation is the destruction of England’s maritime supremacy. For as long as England rules the waves, humanity must remain her slave. This is a fundamental truth. And another fundamental truth is that England’s maritime supremacy cannot be destroyed until IRELAND IS A FREE COUNTRY.
The one criticism which can be levelled against Count Reventlow’s admirable work is that it has not sufficiently insisted on this second great truth. ”

“ In reality the English policy of the balance of power means simply the stirring up of as many European Powers as possible against the nation which Great Britain, at any given time, considers as her most dangerous competitor. This nation is, of course, always the one which, thanks to its strength and prosperity, threatens to destroy the commercial monopoly of the Chosen People. ”

“ It is the first systematic attempt to go to the root of things, to lay bare the developmental forces in question that have escaped the attention of partial or insufficiently clearsighted historians up till now. With rare penetration and skill does Count Reventlow show all such forces to find their synthesis in England’s Will to Power—to use an expression coined by Nietzsche—in England’s insatiable greed, in her limitless craving for the riches of this world. The center-point of European history during the last 350 years is to be found in London. ”

“ The crime in question must be laid to the charge of the pious and free English people—of the same nation which, in its virtuous indignation at the murder of Louis XVI, plunged Europe into a series of wars lasting 22 years. The assassination of the Czar and the bombardment of Copenhagen took place at such admirably calculated intervals, that the former could be made known in Copenhagen at the very moment when the British guns were opening their fire on the city. Denmark gave in, the Armed Neutrality of 1800 was at an end, and Russia concluded a separate agreement with Great Britain. ”