[It was] through the ineptitude and stupidity of Bethmann and Jagow [that Germany had] blundered into war [in den Krieg taumelten]. - Bernhard von Bülow

The Auswärtiges Amt of 1914 was the incubator in which the monstrous egg of the ultimatum to Serbia was hatched. This where almost all the terrible mistakes were made through which we came to be involved in war.

You have given [the Austrians] carte blanche – do you realize what you have done? If the late Prince Bismarck could appear here before you, his first words would be: "How could you do such a thing, how could you transform a Germany that was the rider into a Germany that is now being ridden by Austria?"

But they did not want to listen and this nice fellow Bethmann, who has no inkling of the world out there, this miserable Jagow who tries to get by on malicious little tricks and has never even seen France, or Russia, or England, or the Orient, and this Stumm, who is insane, or at least half-mad, they were the ones who brought about this catastrophe.