Edward Grey
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Foreign Secretary · United Kingdom
On the regime page: Asquith government
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“I agree that, if either Government had grave reason to expect an unprovoked attack by a third Power, or something that threatened the general peace, it should immediately discuss with the other whether both Governments should act together to prevent aggression and to preserve peace, and, if so, what measures they would be prepared to take in common.”
A reply to a letter from the French Ambassador about Anglo-French naval and military staff consultations. Grey read the exchange to the House on 3 August 1914 as the starting point of the Government's position on the crisis.
Grey to Paul Cambon, French Ambassador, letter of 22 November 1912, read by Grey to the House of Commons on 3 August 1914, HC Deb vol. 65, c. 1813 Source
“We have great and vital interests in the independence—and integrity is the least part—of Belgium.”
Grey was setting out the Government's position to the Commons on the eve of the German ultimatum to Belgium, after reading the Belgian King's appeal for diplomatic intervention.
Statement by the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, House of Commons, 3 August 1914, HC Deb vol. 65, c. 1822 Source
“If, in a crisis like this, we run away from those obligations of honour and interest as regards the Belgian Treaty, I doubt whether, whatever material force we might have at the end, it would be of very much value in face of the respect that we should have lost.”
Grey was answering the argument that Britain could stand aside from the war and intervene at its end.
Statement by the Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, House of Commons, 3 August 1914, HC Deb vol. 65, c. 1823 Source
“The lamps are going out all over Europe; we shall not see them lit again in our life-time.”
Grey's memoir records a remark he made at a window of his Foreign Office room at dusk in the last week of July or the first days of August 1914. He gives the words as recalled by his friend, who thought the date was Monday 3 August.
Viscount Grey of Fallodon, Twenty-Five Years 1892-1916, vol. 2 (London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1925), p. 20, recalling a remark made on or about 3 August 1914 to a friend Source
“To bind ourselves by rules which we intend to keep and others intend to break is unreasonable, so long as those who break them can do it with impunity. To return to the question of contraband, blockade of Germany was essential to the victory of the Allies, but the ill-will of the United States meant their certain defeat.”
Grey, the Foreign Secretary who handled the contraband and blockade disputes with the United States in 1914-1916, explains in his memoir why Britain pursued the blockade of Germany within limits.
Viscount Grey of Fallodon, Twenty-Five Years 1892-1916, vol. 2 (London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1925), ch. 22 "America and the War", p. 107 Source