In Turkey the government, helped again by the personal interest of the emperor, who himself visited the sultan at Constantinople, gained important concessions for German influence and German commerce. The Turkish armies were drilled and commanded by German officers, and in 1899 a German firm gained an important concession for building a railway to Baghdad. In Brazil organized private enterprise established a considerable settlement of German emigrants, and though any political power was for the time impossible, German commerce increased greatly throughout South America.
Encouraged by the interest which the events in China had aroused, a very important project was laid before the Reichstag in November 1897, which would enable Germany to take a higher place among the maritime powers. A completely new procedure was introduced. Instead of simply proposing to build a number of new ships, Naval programme, 1897. the bill laid down permanently the number of ships of every kind of which the navy was to consist. They were to be completed by 1904; and the bill also specified how often ships of each class were to be replaced. The plan would establish a normal fleet, and the Reichstag, having once assented, would lose all power of controlling the naval budget. The bill was strongly opposed by the Radicals; the Centre was divided; but the very strong personal influence of the emperor, supported by an agitation of the newly-formed Flottenverein (an imitation of the English Navy League), so influenced public opinion that the opposition broke down. A general election was imminent, and no party dared to go to the country as the opponents of the fleet.
Scarcely had the bill been carried when a series of events took place which still more fully turned public attention to colonial affairs, and seemed to justify the action of the government. The war between the United States and Spain showed how necessary an efficient fleet was under modern conditions, and also caused some feeling of Hostility to England. apprehension for the future arising from the new policy of extension adopted by the United States. And the brewing of the storm in South Africa, where the Boers were preparing to resist British suzerainty, helped to make the nation regret that their fleet was not sufficiently strong to make German sympathies effective. The government used with great address the bitter irritation against Great Britain which had become one of the most deep-seated elements in modern German life. This feeling had its origin at first in a natural reaction against the excessive admiration for English institutions which distinguished the Liberals of an older generation. This reaction was deliberately fostered during Bismarck’s later years for internal reasons; for, as Great Britain was looked upon as the home of parliamentary government and Free Trade, a less favourable view might weaken German belief in doctrines and institutions adopted from that country. There also existed in Germany a curious compound of jealousy and contempt, natural in a nation the whole institutions of which centred round the army and compulsory service, for a nation whose institutions were based not on military, but on parliamentary and legal institutions. It came about that in the minds of many Germans the whole national regeneration was regarded as a liberation from British influence. This feeling was deliberately fostered by publicists and historians, and was intensified by commercial rivalry, since in the struggle for colonial expansion and trade Germans naturally came to look on Great Britain, who held the field, as their rival. The sympathy Pro-Boer movement. which the events of 1896 and 1899 awakened for the Boers caused all these feelings, which had long been growing, to break out in a popular agitation more widespread than any since the foundation of the empire. It was used by the Nationalist parties, in Austria as well as in Germany, to spread the conception of Pan-Germanism; the Boers as Low Germans were regarded as the representatives of Teutonic civilization, and it seemed possible that the conception might be used to bring about a closer friendship, and even alliance, with Holland. In 1896 the emperor, by despatching a telegram of congratulation to President Kruger after the collapse of the Jameson Raid, had appeared to identify himself with the national feeling. When war broke out in 1899 it was obviously impossible to give any efficient help to the Boers, but the government Navy Bill, 1900. did not allow the moment to pass without using it for the very practical purpose of getting another bill through the Reichstag by which the navy was to be nearly doubled. Some difficulties which arose regarding the exercise by the British government of the right of search for contraband of war were also used to stimulate public feeling. The Navy Bill was introduced in January 1900. There were some criticisms of detail, but the passing of the bill was only a matter of bargaining. Each party wished in return for its support to get some concessions from the government. The Agrarians asked for restrictions on the importation of food; the Centre for the Lex Heinze and the repeal of the Jesuit law; the Liberals for the right of combination.
The murder of the German ambassador, Baron von Ketteler, at Peking in 1900 compelled the government to take a leading part in the joint expedition of the powers to China. A force of over 20,000 men was organized by voluntary enlistment from among the regular army; and the supreme command was obtained by the emperor for Von Bülow, chancellor. Count von Waldersee, who had succeeded Moltke as chief of the staff. The government was, however, sharply criticized for not first consulting the Reichstag in a matter involving the first military expedition since the foundation of the empire. It was desirable in such circumstances that a younger and more vigorous statesman than Prince Hohenlohe should be placed at the head of affairs before the Reichstag met; and on the 17th of October he resigned, and was succeeded as chancellor by Herr von Bülow, the foreign secretary. (J. W. He.; W. A. P.)
It remains only to sketch the main features of German history in later years. In spite of the denunciation by the Social Democratic leaders of what they stigmatized as a “policy of brag,” the general popularity of the idea of establishing a strong sea power was proved by the rapid extension of the Navy League, which in 1904 had already 3595 Naval progress. branches. For an increase in the navy there was, indeed, sufficient excuse in the enormous expansion of German oversea commerce and the consequent growth of the mercantile marine; the value of foreign trade, which in 1894 was £365,000,000, had risen in 1904 to £610,000,000, and in the same period the tonnage of German merchant shipping had increased by 234%. In the session of 1901 Admiral von Tirpitz, the minister of marine, admitted in answer to a Socialist interpellation that the naval programme of 1900 would have to be enlarged. In 1903 Count Bülow declared in the Reichstag that the government was endeavouring to pursue a middle course between “the extravagant aspirations of the Pan-Germans and the parochial policy of the Social Democrats, which forgets that in a struggle for life and death Germany’s means of communication might be cut off.” At the same time the emperor presented to the Reichstag a comparative table, drawn up by his own hand, showing the relative strength of the British and German navies. An inspired article in the Grenzboten declared the object of this to be to moderate at once the aggressive attitude of the Pan-Germans towards Great Britain and British alarms at the naval development of Germany. This gave a fresh impetus to the naval agitation and counter-agitation. In 1904 Count Bülow again found it necessary, in reply to the Socialist leader Bebel, to declare that the German naval armaments were purely defensive. “I cannot conceive,” he said, “that the idea of an Anglo-German war should be seriously entertained by sensible people in either country.” On the 16th of November 1905 a new Navy Bill amplifying the programme of 1900 was accepted by the Federal Diet. The Navy League, encouraged by its success, now redoubled its exertions and demanded that the whole programme should be completed by 1912 instead of 1917. Bebel denounced this agitation as obviously directed against England; and the government thought it expedient to disavow the action of its too zealous allies. A telegram addressed by the emperor William to the presidents of the League, Generals Keim and Menges, led to
