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Grey (EDWARD VISCOUNT OF FALLADON)

EDWARD, VISCOUNT OF FALLADON, a British statesman, born in Northumberland in 1862. He received his education at Winchester and at Balliol College, Oxford. His political career began in 1885, when he entered Parliament as the member for Berwickon-Tweed, which constituency he continued to represent thereafter as a Liberal. In 1892 he became Undersecretary of State for Foreign Affairs and held that post until 1895. He was prominent thereafter by his opposition to the continuance of the Liberal party's alliance with the Irish Nationalist group, in which attitude he followed the EDWARD GREY, VISCOUNT OF FALLADON leadership of Lord Rosebery. He was made Privy Councilor in 1902. He became Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs in December, 1905, which position he held until 1916. During his tenure of office he rose, in the estimate of his political intimates and opponents, to a degree of dominance in the field of international diplomacy that marked him as the foremost diplomatist of his day. His continuance in office and the facility with which he pressed his policies to GREY successful conclusion and commanded the confidence of the diverse domestic political factions was effected in spite of an attitude of reticence unknown to the traditions of the Foreign Office previous to his time. No British statesman, since the Crimean War, has commanded such complete influence in the councils of Europe. He united Great Britain, France, and Russia in the Triple Entente, although his efforts to develop more cordial relations between Great Britain and the German Empire definitely failed, due to incompatibility of nation tional aspirations which his diplomacy was powerless to overcome. His action in 1908, when Austria annexed Bosnia and Herzegovina, strained the relations between Great Britain and Austria and subjected his country to a diplomatic defeat in consequence of the failure of other European Powers to acquiesce in his demand that the action of Austria be submitted to a conference of the Powers.

His position became plainer in 1911, during the affair between Germany and France over Morocco, when the firmness of his stand against any expansion of German influence into the region of north Africa led to a definition of the British attitude in response to the protest of the German Foreign Office that Great Britain had no right right to interfere as an interested party to the settlement of the dispute. Hereafter, Great Britain stood committed to the policy of preserving the status quo in so far as concerned those spheres of influence then existing and subject to the control of the leading national states. In 1912 Russia gained some slight advantage in Persia in consequence of the Anglo-Russian entente of 1907. He displayed his mastery as an international diplomatist in the Balkan crisis in 1912 when, as protagonist, he assembled the conference of European ambassadors in London and directed their deliberations to a successful, if temporary peace. Although the strength of his influence had enabled him to avert the European conflict in 1912, he was powerless to prevent the affair between Bosnia and Austria from involving the nations in 1914, and the elaborate diplomacy of years left him, in that event, with only one alternative to commit Great Britain to war against the Central Empires in defense of the declaration of 1911 and the preservation of national limitations. Following the World War, he visited the United States upon a special mission to promote understanding and cordiality between the two nations.