Churchill, Hitler, and "The Unnecessary War": How Britain Lost Its Empire and the West Lost the World

by Patrick J. Buchanan

Historian John Laughland describes the Kaiser’s rage and frustration: When the British Lord Chancellor, Lord Haldane, tried to make it clear to the German ambassador in London on 3 December 1912 that Britain would not tolerate “a unified Continental Group under the leadership of one single power,” the Kaiser, on reading the report of the conversation, covered it with the most violent marginal comments. In a characteristic attack of anger, he declared the English principle of the “balance of power” to be an “idiocy,” which would turn England “eternally into our enemy.”67 THE KAISER WAS CORRECT. As long as Germany remained the greatest power in Europe, Britain would line up against her. Britain’s balance-of-power policy commanded it. Britain thus left a powerful Germany that had sought an alliance or entente, or even British neutrality, forever frustrated.