f the
Socialist leaders to Stockholm will be remembered. It is true that the
Socialists were not "sent" by me; they went to Stockholm of their own
initiative and on their own responsibility, but it is none the less
true that I could have refused them their passes if I had shared the
views of the Entente Governments and of numerous gentlemen in our own
country. Certainly, I was at the time very sceptical as to the
outcome, as I already saw that the Entente would refuse passes to
their Socialists, and consequently there could be nothing but a "rump"
parliament in the end. But despite all the reproaches which I had to
bear, and the argument that the peace-bringing Socialists would have
an enormous power in the State to the detriment of the monarchical
principle itself, I never for a moment hesitated to take that step,
and I have never regretted it in itself, only that it did not succeed.
It is encouraging to me now to read again many of the letters then
received criticising most brutally my so-called "Socialistic
proceedings" and to find that the same gentlemen who were then so
incensed at my policy are now adherents of a line of criticism which
maintains that I am too "narrow-minded" in my choice of new means
towards peace.

It will be remembered how, in the early autumn of 1917, the majority
of the German Reichstag had a hard fight against the numerically
weaker but, from their relation to the German Army Command, extremely
powerful minority on the question of the reply to the Papal Note. Here
again I was no idle spectator. One of my friends, at my instigation,
had several conversations with Suedekum and Erzberger, and encouraged
them, by my description of our own position, to pass the well known
peace resolution. It was owing to this description of the state of
affairs here that the two gentlemen mentioned were enabled to carry
the Reichstag's resolution in favour of a peace by mutual
understanding--the resolution which met with such disdain and scorn
from the Pan-Germans and other elements. I hoped then, for a moment,
to have gained a lasting and powerful alliance in the German Reichstag
against the German military plans of conquest.

And now, gentlemen, I should like to say a few words on the subject of
that unfortunate submarine campaign which was undoubtedly the beginning
of the end, and to set forth the reasons which in this case, as in many
other instances, forced us to adopt tactics not in accordance with our