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Prolonging the Agony

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Kaiser Wilhelm correctly advised his cousin Czar Nicholas, Britain was not to be trusted and was using Russia as a “cats-paw.” — location: 3523 ^ref-39888

Indebted to them for massive loans, Sultan Abdul Hamid II had granted extraordinary concessions and permitted them to gain a stranglehold on the financial and economic life of the nation by the grossest form of corruption. — location: 3526 ^ref-46464

on 1 August the German ambassador Count Pourtales handed over Germany’s declaration of war on Russia and broke down in tears. — location: 3593 ^ref-35826

Apparently a Russian invasion of Persia would excite religious tensions among Muslims, but a British attack was perfectly acceptable. The hypocrisy was stunning. — location: 4314 ^ref-46876

The Secret Elite never intended that Constantinople would fall to the Russians, but Nicholas II was elated by the news. — location: 4317 ^ref-48948

In terms of grand geopolitical scheming and diplomatic double-dealing the Czar was utterly naïve. — location: 4322 ^ref-52582

There was no objective other than to convince the Russians that the Allies intended to capture Constantinople for the Czar’s benefit. That was imperative. They had to keep Russia believing in the war and their dream of Constantinople – to prolong the agony with a low-cost, under-resourced, ill-planned assault that would fail. — location: 5731 ^ref-63567