Franklin Knight Lane to Woodrow Wilson

I had a talk yesterday with Colonel George Harvey, who seemed greatly disturbed over Lord Lansdowne's letter. He said that it was a call from the Tories of England to the Tories of Germany, from Junker to Junker, to stop the war in the interest of their class; that Lansdowne felt that liberalism, and even socialism, would result from a continuance of the war both in England and in Germany, that the war was now being fought for ideals that were as antagonistic to the Tory spirit of England as to the autocratic spirit of Germany, and that therefore the property-owning classes of England were, in effect, serving notice that they wished the war to end, England relying on her diplomats to win a victory for them in conference, rather than on the soldiers in France.Harvey thought that a new statement of the war aims of the Allies should probably be made, but that you would have to make this statement and that you alone could make it. He says that the Tories of England expect a Cabinet crisis within the next three months and hope to be restored to power and to put the Lloyd GeorgeLord Northcliffe combination out of business, and that the Tories also hope to get the credit of having stopped the war. I asked him for his authority, and he said that it was his knowledge of English politics and English politicians, of whom he says Lansdowne is the most shrewd and far-sighted.