H. M.
M. QUEEN SOPHIA OF GREECE
Sister of Kaiser Wilhelm, and an Ardent Germanophile

HIS HOLINESS BENEDICT XV.

The Entrance of Italy into the War has Increased the Delicacy of the Pontiff's Position

The New York Times

CURRENT HISTORY

A MONTHLY MAGAZINE

THE EUROPEAN WAR

AUGUST, 1915

THE LUSITANIA CASE The American Note to Berlin of July 21 Steps Leading Up to President Wilson's Rejection of Germany's Proposals

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HE German Admiralty on Feb. 4 proclaimed a war zone around Great Britain announcing that every enemy merchant ship found therein would be destroyed "without its being always possible to avert the dangers threatening the crews and passengers on that account."

The text of this proclamation was made known by Ambassador Gerard on Feb. 6. Four days later the United States Government sent to Germany a note of protest which has come to be known as the "strict accountability note.' After pointing out that a serious infringement of American rights on the high seas was likely to occur, should Germany carry out her war-zone decree in the manner she had proclaimed, it declared:

"If such a deplorable situation should arise, the Imperial German Government can readily appreciate that the Government of the United States would be constrained to hold the Imperial German Government to a strict accountability for such acts of their naval authorities and to take any steps it might be necessary to take to safeguard American lives and property and to secure to American citizens the full enjoyment of their acknowledged rights on the high seas."

The war-zone decree went into effect on Feb. 18. Two days later dispatches were cabled to Ambassador Page at London and to Ambassador Gerard at Berlin suggesting that a modus vivendi be entered into by England and Germany by which submarine warfare and sowing of mines at sea might be abandoned if foodstuffs were allowed to reach the German civil population under American consular inspection.

Germany replied to this on March 1, expressing her willingness to act favorably on the proposal. The same day the British Government stated that because of the war-zone decree of the German Government the British Government must take measures to prevent commodities of all kinds from reaching or leaving Germany. On March 15 the British Government flatly refused the modus vivendi suggestion.

On April 4 Count von Bernstorff, the German Ambassador at Washington, submitted a memorandum to the United States Government regarding GermanAmerican trade and the exportation of arms. Mr. Bryan replied to the memorandum on April 21, insisting that the United States was preserving her strict status of neutrality according to the accepted laws of nations.

On May 7 the Cunard steamship Lusitania was sunk by a German submarine in the war zone as decreed by Germany, and more than 100 American citizens perished, with 1,000 other persons on board.

Thereupon, on May 13, the United States transmitted to the German Government a note on the subject of this loss. It said:

"American citizens act within their indisputable rights in taking their ships and in traveling wherever their legitimate business calls them upon the high seas, and exercise those rights in what should be the well justified confidence that their lives will not be endangered, by acts done in clear violation of universally acknowledged international obligations, and certainly in the confidence that their own Government will sustain them in the exercise of their rights."

This note concluded:

"The Imperial Government will not expect the Government of the United States to omit any word or any act necessary to the performance of its sacred duty of maintaining the rights of the United States and its citizens and of safeguarding their free exercise and enjoyment."

Germany replied to this note on May 29. It stated that it had heard that the Lusitania was an armed naval ship which had attempted to use American passengers as a protection, and that, anyway, such passengers should not have been present. It added:

"The German commanders are consequently no longer in a position to observe the rules of capture otherwise usual and with which they invariably complied before this."

To the foregoing the United States maintained in a note sent to the German Government on June 9 that the Lusitania was not an armed vessel and that she had sailed in accordance with the laws of the United States, and that "only her actual resistance to capture or refusal to stop when ordered to do so *** could have afforded the commander of the submarine any justification for so much as putting the lives of those on board the ship in jeopardy."

In support of this view the note cited international law and added:

"It is upon this principle of humanity, as well as upon the law founded upon this principle, that the United States must stand."

Exactly one month later, on July 9, came Germany's reply. Its preamble praised the United States for its humane attitude and said that Germany was fully in accord therewith. Something, it asserted, should be done, for "the case of the Lusitania shows with horrible clearness to what jeopardizing of human lives the manner of conducting war employed by our adversaries leads," and that under certain conditions which it set forth, American ships might have safe passage through the war zone, or even some enemy ships flying the American flag. It continued:

"The Imperial Government, however, confidently hopes the American Government will assume to guarantee that these vessels have no contraband on board, details of arrangements for the unhampered passage of these vessels to be agreed upon by the naval authorities of both sides."

It is to this reply that the note of the United States Government made public on July 24 is an answer.

Germany's reply of July 8 and President Wilson's final rejoinder of July 21which was given to the American press of July 24-are presented below, together