, which all future history will note, that the
very necessity in English eyes of English supremacy at sea, and the
knowledge that such a supremacy was inevitably a provocation to
others, led to the greatest discretion in the use of British naval
strength, and, in general, to a purely defensive and peaceful policy
upon the part of the chief maritime power. It would, indeed, have been
folly to have acted otherwise, for there was nothing to prevent the
great nations, our rivals, if they had been directly menaced by the
British superiority at sea, from beginning to build great fleets,
equal or superior to our own. Germany alone pursued this policy, with
no excuse save an obvious determination to undo the claim of the
British Fleet.

I have called this a blunder, and, from the point of view of the
German policy, it was a blunder. For if the Prussian dynasty set out,
as it did, to make itself the chief power in the world, its obvious
policy was to deal with its enemies in detail. It ought not, at any
cost, to have quarrelled with Russia until it had finally disposed of
France. If it was incapable, through lack of subtlety, to prevent the
Franco-Russian group from forming, it should at least have made itself
the master of that group before gratuitously provoking the rivalry of
Great Britain. But "passion will have all now," and the supposedly
cold and calculating nature of Prussian effort has about it something
very crudely emotional, as the event has shown. From about ten years
ago Prussian Germany had managed to array against itself not only the
old Franco-Russian group but Great Britain as well.

This arrangement would not, however, have led to war. Equilibrium was
still perfectly maintained, and the very strong feeling throughout all
the great States of Europe that a disturbance of the peace would mean
some terrible catastrophe, to be avoided at all costs, was as
powerful as ever.

The true origin of disturbance, the first overt act upon which you can
put your finger and say, "Here the chain of particular causes leading
to the great war begins," was the revolution in Turkey. This
revolution took place in the year 1908, and put more or less
permanently into power at Constantinople a group of men based upon
Masonic influence, largely Western in training, largely composed of
Jewish elements, known as the "Young Turks."

The first result of this revolution, followed as it inevitably was by
the temporary weakening in inter