"Bismarck once said that, in a combination of five players, it is always desirable to be on the side of the three. But since, of the five Great Powers - England, France, Russia, Austria and Germany - France was hostile, Great Britain unavailable due to its policy of 'splendid isolation', and Russia ambivalent because of its conflict with Austria, Germany needed an alliance with both Russia and Austria for such a grouping of three. Only a statesman possessed of Bismarck's willpower and skill could have conceived such a precarious balancing act. Thus, the relationship between Germany and Russia became the key to the peace of Europe."

"Bismarck's goal was to give no other power - except irreconcilable France - any cause to join an alliance directed against Germany. Professing the unified Germany to be 'satiated' and without further territorial ambitions, Bismarck sought to reassure Russia that Germany had no interest in the Balkans; the Balkans, he said, were not worth the bones of a single Pomeranian grenadier. Keeping Great Britain in mind, Bismarck mounted no challenge on the Continent that might trigger a British concern for the equilibrium [= balance of power], and he kept Germany out of the colonial race. 'Here is Russia and here is France and here we are in the middle. That is my map of Africa,', was Bismarck's reply to an advocate of German colonialism - a piece of advice domestic politics would later force him to modify."

Source: Henry Kissinger, Diplomacy (New York: Simon & Schuster Paperbacks, 1994), 139, 146.