mining phrases in the entire White Book, a concise declaration of the German Government beside which all other yellow, grey, blue, orange books on the diplomatic passages that preceded the war and its most immediate causes become absolutely irrevelant and insignificant. Here the Reichstag group had the key to a correct judgment of the situation in hand. The entire social-democratic press, a week before, had cried out that the Austrian ultimatum was a criminal provocation of the world war and demanded preventative and pacific action on the part of the German Government. The entire socialist press assumed that the Austrian ultimatum had descended upon the German Government like a bolt from the blue as it had upon the German public. But now the White Book declared, briefly and clearly: 1. That the Austrian Government had requested German sanction before taking a final step against Servia. 2. That the German Government clearly understood that the action undertaken by Austria would lead to war with Servia, and ultimately, to European war. 3. That the German Government did not advise Austria to give in, but on the contrary declared that an acquiescent, weakened Austria could not be regarded as a worthy ally of Germany. 4. That the German Government assured Austria, before it advanced against Servia, of its assistance under all circumstances, in case of war, and finally, 5. That the German Government, withal, had not reserved for itself control over the decisive ultimatum from Austria to Servia, upon which the whole world war depended, but had left to Austria “an absolutely free hand."
All of this our Reichstag group learned on August 4th. And still another fact it learned from the Government—that German forces already had invaded Belgium. And from all this the Social-Democratic group concluded that this is a war of defense against foreign invasion, for the existence of the fatherland, for "Kultur," a war for liberty against Russian despotism.
Was the obvious background of the war, and the scenery that so scantily concealed it, was the whole diplomatic performance
