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Gottlieb von Jagow (22 June 1863 – 11 January 1935) was a German diplomat. He served as the State Secretary of the German Foreign Office between January 1913 and 1916.

Early life

Born in Berlin, Jagow was educated at the University of Bonn. He entered the diplomatic service in 1895 and was first assigned to the German embassy in Rome and then to the Prussian mission at Munich. After he had passed his examination in diplomacy in 1897, he was assigned to the Prussian mission at Hamburg but quickly switched again to Rome, where he advanced to the position of Second Secretary (legation counsellor). After a short interlude with the German mission at The Hague, he returned as First Secretary to the embassy in Rome in March 1901, where he stayed until 1906, when he was transferred to the Foreign Office in Berlin. He first made his mark as private secretary to Bernhard von Bülow, a former Imperial Chancellor. In December 1907, he was appointed Envoy Extraordinary to Luxembourg, in May 1909 he became German ambassador at Rome. During the Italo-Turkish War, he conducted important negotiations with the Italian government and, it is said, prevented a war between Austria-Hungary and Italy at the time.

In 1913, he was appointed Secretary of State (Foreign Minister) for Germany. He played an active part in the negotiations preceding the outbreak of World War I and was, in particular, concerned with the German relations with Austria-Hungary since he been the first member of the German government in Berlin to become acquainted with the terms of the ultimatum of 18 October 1913 to Serbia, the first indication of the crisis of July 1914.

However, Sir Martin Gilbert wrote, "War seemed unlikely in the spring and summer of 1914." The illusion of war debate began with aims of colonial annexation and supremacy in Africa, negotiated neutrality for other states for the effective invasion of France and asserted attempts to compete with the British sea power. On 13 July 1914, Austral-Hungarian Emperor Franz Joseph was persuaded to accept the ultimatum after Serbia had failed to accommodate the Austrian note.

Jagow married Countess Luitgard Ernestine zu Solms-Laubach (Arnsburg, 17 December 1873 - Arnsburg, 24 January 1954) in Arnsburg on 18 June 1914.

Diplomacy towards war

During the July Crisis on 6 July 1914, Jagow was confident that an Austro-Serbian war would be localized and that Russia was not yet prepared for a continental war. That belief was incorrect, and the Chancellor was more sceptical, which indirectly led to the outbreak of World War I. Gerber, by 29 July he was "very depressed" that Austria's note policy of duality had hastened war. After the war, Jagow attributed deeper reasons for the outbreak of war to "this damned system of alliances." He had tried before the war's outbreak to persuade the Chancellor to allow a debate the Reichstag on war aims in 1916, but a veto was imposed, and a ban on all criticism of the government. Long conferences with the Chancellor and Kaiser did nothing to change his mood. He wrongly believed Britain would respect Germany's access to Rotterdam, part of the catalogue of grievances that caused the war. Consequently, he was perceived as "weak" link in a weak government before being replaced. Gerber, he had always been aware of the French alliance with Britain. Furthermore, he made no secret of the racial Slavic nationalism threatened from Russia, which as soon as its railways were complete, would invade. Jagow also indulged in taunting the Austrian Allô as "nervous" and ignored Serbia's pleadings for peace. He attempted to lull Britain into a false sense of security and "cut the lines" of diplomatic communication after it was too late. In fact, the fortnight's delayed response for Austria's commencement of hostilities gave Jagow the opportunity to blame Russia for starting the war. On 24 July the British thought he "quite ready to fall in with suggestion as to the four Powers working in favour of moderation at Vienna and St Petersburg". However, he was already ill and exhausted from his exertions and acknowledged that Serbia was the victim of bullying. He was a member of the Foreign Office team that denied a British offer of a Five-Power Conference and had already had agreed Moltke's plan two days before Austria's declaration against Serbia on 28 July 1914. The following day, Lichnowsky's cable telegram was ignored for hours, which Jagow argued was responsible for Bethmann-Hollweg's "misstep".

Directing wartime foreign policy

The Offensive Plan was revised by Jagow and his Chancellor and delivered to the King of the Belgians the next day as an ultimatum in a sealed envelope with a note demanding "an unequivocal answer" to Germany's demand for its troops to be allowed to march through the country on the way to France.

The diminutive bureaucrat was eternally optimistic by character that German superiority would triumph. When the Ottoman Empire declared war on the Entente in November 1914, Jagow directed Leo Frobenius to try to persuade the government of Abyssinia to join the Central Powers as well. The Tripolitana; as it was known managed by the Mannesmann brothers, was determined by economic realpolitik "to collaborate with Turkey in raising the Sudan in revolt". Stirring revolt dominated German foreign policy in the East; at the heart of which was Jagow's dialogue for the "liberation of Poland". Instrumental was Undersecretary Zimmerman, one of Bethmann's governmental supporters, who ran Agent Parvus Helphand in Constantinople. The aim was "the complete destruction of Tsarism and the dismemberment of Russia into smaller states". Nonetheless, Jagow was naturally cautious and particularly skeptical of the Ottomans' commitment to the alliance. At the same time however, he successfully secured Ottoman sovereign rights over the Dardanelles on 18 April 1915. He was determined to continue the fight in Galicia when Jagow received President Wilson's offer of an international peace congress negotiations, and American mediation was flatly refused. He called it a schwarmerei, but as the war dragged on, he became domineered by Zimmerman's pretensions for the Chancellery. Successes in Russia encouraged him to keep Austria-Hungary in the war by finesse of any possible rapprochement with the Tsarists.

Jagow subscribed to the school of thought that Russia had to be pushed back deep into its hinterland. The irredentist solution was one of the Polish Kingdom's independent enfranchisement to prevent the sullied blood to dilute German racial superiority. He told Baron Burian that the state must be ruled by Dualism and "very extensive autonomy" Austrian suzerainty. However, as in Belgium, he sought "Pan-Germanisation", and a customs area from Austria-Hungary to safeguard German exports. More sinister was a program for the ethnic cleansing of Poles and Jews conditional on an Austro-German military alliance. Jagow himself favoured the latter policy of annexation and Germanisation. He sent a Memorandum on 11 September to Falkenhayn, who rejected any possibility of an alliance with Austria's "slipshod" army. By 30 October, Jagow had developed the idea that Courland and Lithuania should be annexed in return for Austria-Poland "chaining" the Dual Monarchy's destiny to Germany's.

An able and skilful diplomat, he persuaded the General Staff to drop objections to the political proposal to impose Mitteleuropa on Vienna. The threat in Jagow's mind was Slavic nationalism.

Wilson's aide, Colonel House, reassured Jagow that US policy in 1916 was not designed to blame the civilian politicians but only the military. According to Friedrich Katz, Jagow was the principal supporter of a failed plan designed to involve the United States and Mexico in a war. The Mexican Revolution was creating rising tensions between both countries. As a result, Jagow expected that the United States would not enter World War I if it was militarily involved with Mexico. Nonetheless ,Jagow was responsible for the Longwiy-Breiy Plan to occupy the plateau that overlooked the city of Verdun made possible by Baron Romberg's visit to Berlin, but that was merely a pretext for a new extension of German strategy more deeply into France proper.

Jagow remained steadfastly anti-Russian to the extent he sacked staff to get a putative alliance with Ushida, the Japanese ambassador. His meddling with Ushida in Saint Petersburg got him 'discardedc too for attempting a separate peace with Russia on Germany's behalf; he even confessedly admitted on 17 May 1916 that the "whole swindle ceases to matter". Any diplomatic rapprochement was broken as it was unplanned when Russia launched the Brusilov Offensive that summer. Jagow's policy had woefully failed: he was scheming to introduce a Grand Duchy of Poland as Germany conspired to divide the country in two and adopted Falkenhayn's policy idea of a Germano-Polish Kingdom, which was declared on 5 November 1916, and a Flamenpolitik for the Poles, the Klub des polnischen Staatswesens. He recognised that Austria's defeat had collapsed the front to Germany's detriment. but Germany ignored Jagow's former policy of a 'preventive war' now discredited; for he had to do something that (assures our future'. The new Ludendorff alternative would make Poland "also completely dependent on her economically".

Jagow retired in November 1916. A quiet, unassuming and scholarly man, he was one of the worst speakers in the Reichstag. James W. Gerard, United States ambassador to Germany at the time, in his book My Four Years in Germany, said that Jagow was forced out of office by an agitation against him on account of his lack of force in defending government policy in the Reichstag.

Jagow wrote a defence of German policy, Ursachen und Ausbruch des Weltkrieges (“Causes and the Outbreak of the World War”), which was published in 1919.

He died in 1935.

Honours

• Knight Grand cross in the Order of Leopold, 1913.

Notes

1. Austria-Hungary was divided between the Magyars and Germans, as defined by the Treaty of 7 October 1879 and revived for the Kaiser's government.

References

1. ^ This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Rines, George Edwin, ed. (1920). "Jagow, Gottlieb von" . Encyclopedia Americana.
2.  One or more of the preceding sentences incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1922). "Jagow, Gottlieb von". Encyclopædia Britannica (12th ed.). London & New York: The Encyclopædia Britannica Company.
3. Gilbert, First World War, p.11
4. "Gottlieb Von Jagow Weds. German Foreign Minister Marries a Countess". New York Times. June 9, 1914. Retrieved 2013-12-01.
5. Stevenson, First World War and later Politics, p.27
6. Austrian Red Book, II, p.461
7. British Foreign Policy Documents, 1861-1914, (London 1920), no293
8. R B Asprey, Hindeburg & Ludendorff on the First World War (London 1991)
9. Deutsche Telegrams, I, no.214, Jagow to charge d'affaires, Bucharest, 26 July 1914
10. Jagow to Tschirsky, 24 July 1914; Norddeutsche Allgemeine Zeitung, 23 July 1914
11. Rumbold to Grey (3:16 pm), 24 July 1914, no.122, British Documents, vol.11; McMeekin, p.205-6.
12. Sazonov Telegram to Russian Embassy, London, Foreign Policy Documents, p.362
13. Newton, Darkest Days, p.86
14. Tuchman, p. 112
15. Fischer, p. 131
16. Fischer, p. 132
17. Fischer, p. 147
18. Fischer, pp. 186–7
19. Letter from Jagow to Wangenheim, June 1915; Fischer, p. 195
20. Fischer, pp. 202–8
21. Gilbert, p. 296
22. Letter from Jagow to Tchirschky, 19 June 1916
23. Burian to Andrian, 14 August 1916; Ludendorff, pp. 298

External links

• Newspaper clippings about Gottlieb von Jagow in the 20th Century Press Archives of the ZBW

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