We are certainly ready to fulfill our obligations as ally but we clearly must refuse to be drawn lightly into a world conflagration by Vienna without consideration of our proposals.

Letter to Schoen, Pourtales, and Tschirschky (29 July 1914), quoted in Konrad H. Jarauschl, ‘The Illusion of Limited War: Chancellor Bethmann Hollweg's Calculated Risk, July 1914’, Central European History, Vol. 2, No. 1 (Mar., 1969), p. 68