Could the muscular-ally policy have worked?

Could Holtzendorff's muscular-ally policy have worked for Germany?

Possibly, if Germany had acted as a reliable partner and avoided naval competition: Britain had strategic reasons to welcome help against Russia and little interest in matching the German Army.

The answer is conditional. Britain was unlikely to build a peacetime army designed to compete with Germany, while Germany did not need to challenge the Royal Navy to remain a major power. The Anglo-Russian Convention of 1907 had eased the Great Game, but British anxiety about Russian pressure in Central Asia, China, and India had not disappeared. Japan and, more informally, the United States show how other powers could benefit from cooperating with a British-policed trading system without surrendering their own strength. On that reading, dependable alignment could have let Germany flourish inside the system that Tirpitz chose to challenge.