Theodore Rex - Edmund Morris [397]
67 He did not Beale, Theodore Roosevelt, 425. “The friend of peace cannot do anything but pray for you, Mr. President.… Cablegrams which I have received yesterday and today convince me that the excitement in Germany has gone to an absolutely unreasonable degree” (Hugo Münsterberg to TR, 24 Jan. 1903 [TRP]). Münsterberg, a professor at Harvard, was a member of TR’s secret du roi. He had useful private contacts on the Wilhelmstrasse.
68 BARON VON STERNBURG Blake, “Ambassadors at the Court.” Technically, von Sternburg was not yet credentialed to the United States. He was obliged to play the face-saving fiction that he was deputizing for the “sick” von Holleben. His proper accreditation did not arrive until the spring. Beale, Theodore Roosevelt, 429–30.
69 After his first Gooch and Temperley, British Documents, vol. 2, 168; Gelber, Rise of Anglo-American Friendship, 123; Herwig, Politics of Frustration, 81.
70 Von Sternburg sent Parsons, “German-American Crisis,” 445. See also John Hay to Sir Michael Herbert, draft, 5 Feb. 1903 (JH). This was a much milder version of an earlier Hay-Roosevelt draft expressing “profound regret” at the slowness of the negotiations, and warning that “a state of unrest and anxiety exists throughout the Western Hemisphere, which if suffered to increase might bring about results which would universally be deplored” (JH).
Historical Note: On 5 Feb. 1903, TR requested a comparative analysis of United States and German naval strength in the North and South Atlantic “and the seas contiguous thereto.” The answer, supplied by the Office of Naval Intelligence on 11 Feb., showed that his current temporary advantage in the Caribbean would not last long in a full war. In table form, the all-out opposition would be as follows:
United States Germany
Ships
Battleships, 1st class 7 10
Battleships, 2d class 1 2
Monitors/gunboats 4 13
Guns
Very big 32 0
Big 0 50
Smaller 110 144
From this it will be seen that TR’s Big Stick was more psychological than actual. Its efficacy derived from the speed and power with which he threatened to use it.
71 Whether it was Dana G. Munro quotes TR as complaining about Germany’s “impossible stand” as late as 9 Feb. Intervention and Dollar Diplomacy in the Caribbean, 1900–1921 (Princeton, N.J., 1964), 73. But J. Fred Rippy shows that acquiescence began around 4 Feb.—i.e., the day after von Sternburg’s urgent telegram. Caribbean Danger Zone, 191.
Historical Note: This brief resurgence of the Venezuela crisis provoked a purge of former von Holleben aides at the German Embassy. Albert von Quadt was recalled in mid-Feb., the chargé Baron von Ritter given just “forty-eight hours” to follow him a week later, and two other staffers reassigned. Jules Jusserand reported that they were all clearly being punished for the Kaiser’s loss of “face.” To Théophile Delcassé, 20 Mar. 1903 (JJ).
72 “I am not for” Jusserand to Théophile Delcassé, 7 and 11 Feb. 1903 (JJ).
73 Relaxing in the TR to James Connolly, 29 Sept. 1902 (TRP); TR, Letters to Kermit from Theodore Roosevelt, 1902–1908 (New York, 1946), 27; Cassini, Never a Dull Moment, 180; Alice Roosevelt Longworth interview, 22 June 1975.
74 The Ambassador’s own Jusserand, What Me Befell, 217; Jusserand to Théophile Delcassé, 11 Feb. 1903 (JJ).
75 Beaming like a TR to Pierre W. Coubertin, 6 Oct. 1902 (TRP); TR, Letters to Kermit, 27; Jules Jusserand to Théophile Delcassé, 11 Feb. 1903 (JJ). Lloyd Griscom recorded another description of TR’s flooding conversational energy at this time. “He started to volley questions at me about Persia [over breakfast], but before I could answer, he launched into a monologue of the Great Empire from the rise of Genghiz Khan. He paused long enough for me to begin an account of ibex shooting, but interrupted to send for the rifle with which he had hunted in the West; he wanted to show us the marks of a cougar’s fangs on its butt. Then suddenly he switched to Japan.…” Griscom, Diplomatically Speaking, 221–22.
76 Already, almost Thorelli, Federal Antitrust Policy, 531; Strouse, Morgan, 452–53. The Expedition