were doomed to lose World War I, and says: "The world will belong to the Anglo-Saxons, Russians and Japanese." The German role, he wrote, "will be that of thought and commerce, not that of the bureaucrat and soldier. (Germany) made its appearance too late, and its last chance of making good the past, that of founding a Colonial Empire, was annihilated by the world war." The pamphlet heavily influenced the minds of the French and British politicians who promulgated the Versailles Peace Treaty in 1919. Comments In his column in the 11 May 1918 issue of Illustrated London News, G. K. Chesterton would note: And, what is worse, the spirit of this cheerless impudence has sometimes spread and chilled the blood of better men. I have noticed it lately in the last stiff pose of people who still try the stale game of blaming everybody for the war, long after the Lichnowsky revelations and the peace imposed on Russia have quite finally fixed the blame. The latter refers to the harsh terms the Germans imposed on Russia in the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk in early March 1918. Chesterton was reminding his readers that, were Germany to win the war in the west, it would impose equally harsh terms on Belgium and France, in line with the 1914 Septemberprogramm. Professor Murray summarised his 1918 foreword to the pamphlet with: The cleaner our national conscience the keener surely will be our will to victory. The slower we were to give up the traditions of generosity and trustfulness that came from our long security, the firmer will be our resolution to hold out... Lichnowsky was seen as a 'Good German' who had truthfully warned his government but had been ignored at the crucial moment. Lichnowsky's viewpoint was largely followed by the controversial historian Fritz Fischer in his 1961 book Germany's Aims in the First World War. Descendants Wilhelm Dionysos Hermann Carl Max, 7th Prince and 9th Count Lichnowsky (Grätz, Upper and Lower Silesia, Bohemia, Cisleithania, Austria-Hungary, 1 July 1905 – Imperia, Italy, 25 March 1975), married in Cap-d'Ail, France, on 22 May 1936 to Etelka Plachota (Pressburg, Transleithania, Hungary, Austria-Hungary, 12 September 1908 – ?), daughter of Alfred Plachota and wife Maria Adelheid Widlicka, and had three children: Christiane Maria, Countess Lichnowsky (Troppau, Upper and Lower Silesia, Cisleithania, Austria-Hungary, 6 February 1937 – Rio de Janeiro, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, 19 August 1980), married.