Grey proposes an international conference to prevent war

On 24 July 1914, the day after the Austro-Hungarian ultimatum was handed over in Belgrade, the British Foreign Secretary, Sir Edward Grey, put forward the first proposal meant to halt the crisis before it turned into a war between the Great Powers. He proposed that four states not directly involved in the dispute over Serbia – Great Britain, France, Germany and Italy – should mediate jointly between Vienna and St Petersburg. Two days later this idea grew into the formal proposal of a conference of ambassadors in London.

“A document of so formidable a character”

The text of the note to Serbia was given to Grey by the Austro-Hungarian Ambassador, Count Albert Mensdorff. Grey did not hide his impression. As he wrote in a telegram to the ambassador in Vienna, he had never before seen one state address to another independent state a document of so formidable a character. He regretted that Vienna had set a time limit, and such a short one, and he considered the fifth demand, which provided for Austro-Hungarian officials taking part in proceedings on Serbian territory, hard to reconcile with Serbia’s sovereignty. At the same time he made clear that the merits of the Austro-Serbian dispute were no concern of the British government. He was interested solely in the peace of Europe.

The same day a report arrived from the ambassador in St Petersburg, George Buchanan. The Foreign Minister, Sergey Sazonov, had called the conduct of Austria-Hungary provocative and immoral and demanded that London proclaim its solidarity with Russia and France. Buchanan replied that Great Britain would not bind itself by an unconditional engagement, and suggested first persuading Vienna to extend the time limit.

The plan of the four powers

In the afternoon Grey put his idea to the French Ambassador, Paul Cambon. If tension arose between Austria and Russia, the four powers that had no direct interests in Serbia should act together and simultaneously in Vienna and St Petersburg. Should Austria march into Serbia and Russia mobilise its army, they would jointly urge both sides to stop while mediation took place. Cambon promised the support of Paris but warned that once Serbia had been attacked it would be too late. He advised instead that Germany should propose mediation between Vienna and Belgrade.

Grey then received the German Ambassador, Prince Karl Lichnowsky, who brought a note from his government: Berlin backed the ultimatum and demanded that the dispute remain a matter for Austria-Hungary and Serbia alone. Grey replied that as long as the ultimatum did not set Austria against Russia, it was no concern of his, but no power could act in St Petersburg on its own. The only chance he saw was joint action by the four states, and the most urgent thing was an extension of the time limit, which he was ready to press for in Vienna together with Germany. Nothing could be achieved, however, unless Berlin itself proposed it. According to Lichnowsky’s report, Grey warned that a war of four states – Russia, Austria-Hungary, Germany and France – would bring total exhaustion and impoverishment, the ruin of industry and trade, and revolutionary movements like those of 1848.

Grey also instructed his representative in Belgrade to advise the Serbs to express regret, not to reject the note as a whole, and to reply favourably to as many points as time allowed.

Berlin’s answer

Lichnowsky’s report reached Berlin after midnight. On 25 July the Secretary of State, Gottlieb von Jagow, wrote back that he had passed the proposal on to Vienna, but since the time limit expired that day and the Foreign Minister, Leopold Berchtold, was at Bad Ischl, an extension no longer seemed possible. Emperor Wilhelm II, who read the report on 26 July, wrote in the margin beside the mediation plan that it was superfluous, since Austria had made matters plain to Russia, and that he would not join in unless Austria expressly asked him to.

The proposal of 24 July already contained every element of the later British efforts: mediation by uninvolved powers, the pressure of time, and the conviction that the key to peace lay in Berlin. That was precisely the key Germany had no intention of using.