" I had private talks with
men in high command, who acknowledged that the way must be found, and
the British mind prepared for negotiations, because there must come a
limit to the drain of blood on each side. It was to one man in the
world that many men in all armies looked for a way out of this
frightful impasse.
President Wilson had raised new hope among many men who otherwise were
hopeless. He not only spoke high words, but defined the meanings of
them. His definition of liberty seemed sound and true, promising the
self-determination of peoples. His offer to the German people to deal
generously with them if they overthrew their tyranny raised no quarrel
among British soldiers. His hope of a new diplomacy, based upon "open
covenants openly arrived at," seemed to cut at the root of the old
evil in Europe by which the fate of peoples had been in the hands of
the few. His Fourteen Points set out clearly and squarely a just basis
of peace. His advocacy of a League of Nations held out a vision of a
new world by which the great and small democracies should be united by
a common pledge to preserve peace and submit their differences to a
supreme court of arbitration.
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