As bellicose bourgeois once again preach war, we consider this New Year’s Day a moment opportune to hear our forebears in struggle.
Citizens,
I want to tell you this evening that we have never been, that not for forty years has Europe been in such a threatening, terrible situation as we are at this very hour, as I take up the responsibility of speaking to you. Ah! Citizens, I do not want to coat the canvas black, I do not want to say that the diplomatic rupture of which we have been informed half an hour ago between Austria and Serbia necessarily means that war between Austria and Serbia will break out and that this conflict will necessarily spread to the rest of Europe. Yet I say that we have against us, against peace, against the lives of men at this very hour, terrible odds against which proletarians of Europe must take every possible effort they can in supreme solidarity.
Citizens, the Austrian ultimatum to Serbia is full of threats and if Austria invades Slavic territory, if the Germans, if the Germanic race of Austria assaults these Serbs, part of the Slavic world and with whom the Slavs of Russia deeply sympathize, one must fear and foresee that Russia will enter the conflict. And if Russia intervenes to defend Serbia, Austria will have before her two adversaries—Serbia and Russia—and invoke her alliance with Germany which has already pledged solidarity with Austria. And if the conflict does not remain between only Austria and Serbia, if Russia joins, then Austria will see Germany take her place on the battlefield beside. Yet it is not only the treaty of alliance between Austria and Germany that is in play, but the secret treaty—of which we know the essential clauses—that binds Russia and France.
And Russia will say to France: “I have against me two adversaries—Germany and Austria—I have the right to invoke the treaty that binds us, and France must take her place beside me.” At this very hour, we are perhaps on the eve of the Austrian lunge at Serbia and therefore Austria and Germany hurl themselves upon the Serbs and Russians, it is Europe on fire, the world on fire.
At such a grave hour, so full of peril for us all, for all our fatherlands, I will not get bogged down in a long research of responsibilities. We have ours, as Moutet said, and I testify before History that we foresaw them and that we announced them: when we warned that to violate Morocco by force of arms would open the era of ambitions, avarice, and strife we were denounced as bad Frenchmen when it was we who cared for France.
There, alas, is our share. Our responsibility becomes clear if you consider that the question of Bosnia-Herzegovina occasions the struggle between Austria and Serbia. And we Frenchmen—when Austria annexed Bosnia-Herzegovina, we had neither the right nor the means to raise the slightest objection because we were meddling in Morocco and we found it necessary to pardon our own sin by pardoning the sins of others.
And therefore our minister of foreign affairs said to Austria: “We hand Bosnia-Herzegovina over to you on the condition that you hand us Morocco” and we paced around with our penitential offerings from power to power, from nation to nation, and we said to Italy, “You can go to Tripoli, for I am in Morocco, you can steal from that side of the street, for I stole down the way.”
Every people appears across the streets of Europe with their little torch in hand and now behold the fire. Well! Citizens, we have our share of the responsibility but this cannot obscure the responsibility of others. It is our right and duty to denounce on the one hand the guile and brutality of German diplomacy, and on the other hand the duplicity of Russian diplomacy. The Russians who may side with the Serbs against Austria and will say "My heart, the heart of the great Slavic people cannot bear to witness violence against the little Slavic people of Serbia.” Yes, but who struck the heart of Serbia?
When Russia intervened in the Balkans in 1877 and created Bulgaria, allegedly independent, plotting to control her, Russia said to Austria: “Let me go on and I will entrust you the administration of Bosnia-Herzegovina." By “the administration” you should understand that between diplomats this means that the day Austria-Hungary got the order to administer Bosnia-Herzegovina that she had only one thought: how to best administer her own interests.
During the interview between the Russian and Austrian foreign ministers,[1] Russia said to Austria: “I will authorize you to annex Bosnia-Herzegovina if you will permit me to advance beyond the Black Sea towards Constantinople.” Aehrenthal made a sign, Russia interpreted it as a “yes”, and let Austria take Bosnia-Herzegovina. When those lands were securely in Austria’s pocket, Russia said, “It’s my turn for the Black Sea.” The response? “What? What did we promise you? Nothing!” and ever since tensions boiled between the two ministers, Izvolsky and Aehrenthal. Yet Russia was complicit, delivering the Slavs of Bosnia-Herzegovina to Austria-Hungary and wounding the Serb heart.
That is what has driven us to this point.
If for thirty years, if the Austrian administration of Bosnia-Herzegovina has been good for these peoples there would be no difficulties today in Europe; but clerical Austria tyrannized Bosnia-Herzegovina. She wanted to convert the people to Roman Catholicism by force. She persecuted the faithful there, she provoked these peoples’ discontent.
French colonialism, Russian deception, and the brutal will of Austria all contributed to this horrible moment, our present distress. Europe is twisting in a nightmare.
Oh well! Citizens, with this gloom all around us, where we know not what comes tomorrow, I will not speak with temerity. I still hope that despite it all—given the enormity of the disaster we face—at the last minute the governments will reconsider. I hope that we will not have cause to tremble, horrified, before the brewing cataclysm as men are sent to war across Europe.
You have seen the Balkan war. Nearly a whole army fell on the battlefield, or in hospital beds. An army left numbering three hundred thousand men, and left upon the battlefield, in roadside ditches, or in hospital beds infected with typhus one hundred thousand.
Consider what disaster awaits Europe: it will not be like in the Balkans, an army of three hundred thousand but four, five, and six armies of two million men. What massacre, what ruins, what barbarity! And see why, amidst the stormclouds encircling us, why I yet hope that this crime will not be committed. Citizens, if the tempest erupts, everyone, we socialists, we will have the task to save ourselves as quickly as possible from the crime that the rulers will have begun—and, even now, what remains for us, if a few hours yet remain to us, is to redouble our efforts to prevent the catastrophe. Already in the Vorwärts,[2] our socialist comrades in Germany have risen in indignation against the Austrian ultimatum. And I believe the bureau of the Socialist International has been called to meet.
Whatever comes, Citizens—and I say these things with a certain despair—there is no better chance to keep the peace and save civilization at this moment when we are threatened with murder and savagery than for the proletariat to assemble all its forces, including all our brothers: French, English, German, Italian, and Russian alike. And we ask these thousands of men to unite, that the beating of their hearts together drive back this horrible nightmare.
I would be ashamed, Citizens, if among you there was even one who could believe that I seek to turn this drama to some electoral victory, precious as that may be. Yet I have the right to tell you that it is our duty—all of your duty—not to neglect a single occasion to show that you stand with the international socialist party that represents at this hour, in this storm, the only promise for the possiblity of peace.
