It will be noted that von Bethmann-Hollweg
insisted that France began the war in the sentence reading: "There
were bomb-throwing fliers, cavalry patrols, invading companies
in the Reichsland (Alsace-Lorraine). Thereby France, although
the condition of war had not yet been declared, had attacked our
territory." But the Emperor makes no mention of this fact, of
supreme importance if true, in his writing to President Wilson
six days later.
Quite curiously, at this time there was a belief on the part
of the Germans that Japan would declare war on the Allies and
range herself on the side of the Central Powers. In fact on one
night there was a friendly demonstration in front of the Japanese
Embassy, but these hopes were soon dispelled by the ultimatum
of Japan sent on the sixteenth of August, and, finally, by the
declaration of war on August twenty-third.
During the first days of the war the warring powers indulged in
mutual recriminations as to the use of dumdum bullets and I was
given several packages of cartridges containing bullets bored out
at the top which the Germans said had been found in the French
fortress of Longwy, with a request that I send an account of them
to President Wilson and ask for his intervention in the matter.
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