e of
the war has grown to over four milliards; and this money was as
urgently needed as were the German divisions and the German bread.
And, despite this position of dependence, the only way to arrive at
peace was by leading Germany into our own political course; that is to
say, persuading Germany to conclude a peace involving sacrifice. _The
situation all through was simply this: that any momentary military
success might enable us to propose terms of peace which, while
entailing considerable loss to ourselves, had just a chance of being
accepted by the enemy._ The German military party, on the other hand,
increased their demands with every victory, and it was more hopeless
than ever, after their great successes, to persuade them to adopt a
policy of renunciation. I think, by the way, that there was a single
moment in the history of this war when such an action would have had
some prospect of success. I refer to the famous battle of Goerlitz.
Then, with the Russian army in flight, the Russian forts falling like
houses of cards, many among our enemies changed their point of view.
I was at that time still our representative in Roumania. Majorescu was
then not disinclined to side with us actively, and the Roumanian army
moved forward toward Bessarabia, could have been hot on the heels of
the flying Russians, and might, according to all human calculations,
have brought about a complete debacle. It is not unlikely that the
collapse which later took place in Russia might have come about then,
and after a success of that nature, with no "America" as yet on the
horizon, we might perhaps have brought the war to an end. Two things,
however, were required: in the first place, the Roumanians demanded,
as the price of their co-operation, a rectification of the Hungarian
frontier, and this first condition was flatly refused by Hungary; the
second condition, which naturally then did not come into question at
all, would have been that we should even then, after such a success,
have proved strong enough to bear a peace with sacrifice. We were not
called upon to agree to this, but the second requirement would
undoubtedly have been refused by Germany, just as the first had been
by Hungary. I do not positively assert that peace would have been
possible in this or any other case, but I do positively maintain that
during my period of office _such a peace by sacrifice was the utmost
we and Germany could have attained_. The future will show wha