Читаем Berlin полностью

If the Three Emperors’ Meeting in 1872 served as modern Berlin’s debut on the lavishly decorated stage of European high politics, a much larger diplomatic gathering, the Congress of Berlin in 1878, confirmed the German capital’s centrality to the workings of international affairs. For the first time in its history, Berlin welcomed statesmen from around the world to a full-dress multinational conference. This fact alone, wrote Georg Brandes, showed how much Berlin had come up in the world. Of course, Europe’s policymakers did not come to Berlin for its urban amenities, such as they were, but because it was the home turf of Bismarck, who was becoming known as the master of diplomatic arbitration.

Arbitration was called for in 1878 because the so-called Eastern Question—the precipitous disintegration of the Ottoman Empire and the resulting power vacuum in the Balkans—was generating a dangerous pushing and shoving match among the Great Powers. Prodded by pan-Slavs anxious to extend Russia’s influence in the region, Russia had gone to war against Turkey in 1877 after the Porte had brutally put down rebellions by Serbs, Montenegrans, and Bulgarians. Emerging victorious, St. Petersburg had forced the Turks, in the Treaty of San Stefano, to accept a Russian presence in the Straits and the creation of an enlarged Bulgaria, which acted as a Russian client state. This development enraged the Austrians, who had their own interests in the Balkans, as well as the British, who regarded Turkey as a valuable protective buffer between their Russian rival and their colonial holdings in the Middle East and India. London and Vienna insisted that the Treaty of San Stefano be revised, threatening war if it was not. Bismarck, seeing his delicate diplomacy in jeopardy, agreed to try to resolve the dispute in hopes of keeping his eastern partners from each others’ throats, and from a possible embrace with France. In the chancellor’s earthy locution, the problem was simply that “Russia had swallowed too much Turkey, and the powers were trying to get her to relieve herself.” By getting Russia to agree to excrete some bits of Turkey, Bismarck wanted to prevent the British from teaming up with Paris to force St. Petersburg to back down. Yet he took up his role as “honest broker” (his words) with some trepidation, aware that he would undoubtedly be blamed by whichever power felt it had gotten the short end of the stick.

In contrast to the Three Emperors’ Meeting, Berlin did not dress itself up at all for Bismarck’s 1878 conference. Brandes saw this as a sign of maturity: “Berlin has become enough of a metropolis that its citizens are not losing their equanimity by the Congress,” he wrote in his diary. By now, he added, Berliners had seen enough foreigners in their midst that they did not automatically turn their heads and gape at exotic-looking strangers. They did not even bat an eye at the colorfully dressed delegations from Japan, China, and Morocco, though there was considerable bafflement regarding the Moroccans’ practice of slaughtering animals in their rooms at the Hotel du Rome.

Interestingly, the foreign dignitary who aroused the most curiosity was the aging Benjamin Disraeli, who had resumed the British premiership in 1874. (Disraeli, incidentally, would be the last sitting British prime minister to visit Germany until Neville Chamberlain flew to Berchtesgaden in 1938, where he met with Hitler to begin the sellout of Czechoslovakia that culminated in the Munich Conference later that year.) The great English diplomat was known not only for his extraordinary political gifts but also for his somewhat steamy novels. Berliners were impressed that a Jew with artistic inclinations could have reached such astonishing heights (the only German analogue would be the career of Walther Rathenau, who became foreign minister after World War I, only to be cut down by right-wing assassins in 1922). Disraeli’s life, it seemed to the Berliners, might have been the stuff of one of his romantic novels. Everywhere he went in town, ladies pushed flowers into his gnarled hands and men took off their hats. Even Bismarck was impressed: “Der alte Jude, das ist der Mann! (The old Jew, that’s the man!)” he declared. Disraeli, in turn, was charmed by the German capital. When asked by Bismarck how he liked Berlin and the “unlovable” Berliners, the Englishman responded that he found the city “better than its reputation” and the inhabitants exceptionally accommodating.

Перейти на страницу:

Похожие книги

100 великих героев
100 великих героев

Книга военного историка и писателя А.В. Шишова посвящена великим героям разных стран и эпох. Хронологические рамки этой популярной энциклопедии — от государств Древнего Востока и античности до начала XX века. (Героям ушедшего столетия можно посвятить отдельный том, и даже не один.) Слово "герой" пришло в наше миропонимание из Древней Греции. Первоначально эллины называли героями легендарных вождей, обитавших на вершине горы Олимп. Позднее этим словом стали называть прославленных в битвах, походах и войнах военачальников и рядовых воинов. Безусловно, всех героев роднит беспримерная доблесть, великая самоотверженность во имя высокой цели, исключительная смелость. Только это позволяет под символом "героизма" поставить воедино Илью Муромца и Александра Македонского, Аттилу и Милоша Обилича, Александра Невского и Жана Ланна, Лакшми-Баи и Христиана Девета, Яна Жижку и Спартака…

Алексей Васильевич Шишов

Биографии и Мемуары / История / Образование и наука
Афганистан. Честь имею!
Афганистан. Честь имею!

Новая книга доктора технических и кандидата военных наук полковника С.В.Баленко посвящена судьбам легендарных воинов — героев спецназа ГРУ.Одной из важных вех в истории спецназа ГРУ стала Афганская война, которая унесла жизни многих тысяч советских солдат. Отряды спецназовцев самоотверженно действовали в тылу врага, осуществляли разведку, в случае необходимости уничтожали командные пункты, ракетные установки, нарушали связь и энергоснабжение, разрушали транспортные коммуникации противника — выполняли самые сложные и опасные задания советского командования. Вначале это были отдельные отряды, а ближе к концу войны их объединили в две бригады, которые для конспирации назывались отдельными мотострелковыми батальонами.В этой книге рассказано о героях‑спецназовцах, которым не суждено было живыми вернуться на Родину. Но на ее страницах они предстают перед нами как живые. Мы можем всмотреться в их лица, прочесть письма, которые они писали родным, узнать о беспримерных подвигах, которые они совершили во имя своего воинского долга перед Родиной…

Сергей Викторович Баленко

Биографии и Мемуары