  Price 3 cents per copy in lots of 25 or more A GERMANY'S BLUNDERS, CRIMES BY DR. WILLIAM T. HORNADAY Member Board of Trustees American Defense Society Preparation Pamphlet Series PUBLISHED BY American Defense Society 44 EAST 23d STREET I. The Blunders of Germany. BY WILLIAM T. HORNADAY. Member Board of Trustees American Defense Society. Already in America there are signs of the inevitable "magnanimity" toward the great world criminal of the present world war, and of a movement for a whitewashed peace with "no annexations and no indemnities." There is danger that within six months Americans who do not know Germany will seek to snatch the boon of durable peace and human freedom from the Allied nations who have given their bravest and best men, literally by millions, and their wealth by billions, to protect the rights of man. A German peace means a German triumph, and the certainty of another war in the near future. As an approach toward a settlement, it is now very necessary that every American should know Germany exactly as that bloody military dragon really is. As a means to that end, these three chapters have been written. The blunders, crimes and punishment of Germany are inseparably linked together. The blunders of Germany constitute a spectacle of very much more than passing interest. The questions they raise are by no means academic. The logic of them is as inexorable as Death. They are of vital interest to every freeman, and to every state and nation that sincerely undertakes to conserve the rights of its people. To unhappy Austria, shoved into the war by Germany, they are of life or death interest. A correct view of Germany is now absolutely essential to the future freedom of man! Germany now resembles a rat in a pit, furious from countless defeats, insane with baffled hate and rage, and wild with a fearful certainty of her Finish. All her fine plans, and twenty years of active preparation, have gone awry. Her vast naval and military preparations have brought her only death, poverty, ruin and hatred. Even her own allies now thoroughly hate and detest her, and one and all would break away from her if they dared. All her long years of lying and spying and plotting have been revealed in their naked and hideous ugliness. She stands before the world as a foiled conquestador, a black-hearted murderer of defenseless women, children and old men, and the wholesale ravisher of helpless women. The "skull-cracker" spiked club of Germany, and the deadly "murderer's mace" of Austria, now abundantly shown in Italy's war museum, are used for the murdering of wounded prisoners in the trenches and on the battlefields. And now Germany, like a mortally wounded wolf with the hounds at his throat, undertakes to propose terms of peace to the Allies! With a great show of large-heartedness, the Reichstag now talks very magnanimously of peace with "no annexations and no indemnities." Yes, indeed! A peace on that basis would suit Germany well. Tricky and shifty to the last gasp, she seeks thus to catch the swell-headed "soldiers and workmen" of Russia, the large-mouthed and blatant anarchists and radical socialists of America, and the traitor-pacifists of the world at large. But all honest men who are wide awake know full well that a peace of that nature would spell "victory" for Germany, and as certain as death and taxes another war with her later on! The Entente Allies presently will fix the terms of peace, as they should be fixed, and Germany will accept them; but first there will be another eighteen months of war. With new German-made peace talk streaming out of Berlin, it is now time to post the books for the past three years, and see how the German account stands. Nothing is more conducive to peace and prosperity than a true sense of proportion, and a correct point of view. In all times of danger it is best to know the worst. The debit side of Germany's account quickly resolves itself, first of all, into a catalogue of Germany's blunders, as the reasons for her crimes, and her present state of impotent rage. It is highly necessary that Americans should study this list, in order to judge the case fairly, and to be able to act intelligently when the times comes for the Allies to discuss the peace terms that Germany, Austria and Turkey must accept. It is the natural impulse of high-minded and humane people to be over-magnanimous to beaten enemies, to condone crime altogether too often, and to help the down-and-out criminal to get back upon his feet. It is also a sadly common thing for a confirmed criminal to turn, cur-like, and bite the hand that helps him; and many a criminal has murdered the generous man or woman who gave him a place to lay his head. There are criminals and criminals. Some deserve succor; others merit quick extermination. The confirmed criminal is in a class by himself. He is unfit to live; but as the very smallest measure of self-protection, society should punish him for his crimes, and render him innocuous for the future. In other words, every confirmed criminal should either be killed or segregated, and made to exist in a little hell of his own, while decent people go their respective ways in peace and security. Eight million men, to whom America shortly will add at least two million more, bravely are risking their lives on the battlefields of Europe and Asia in an effort to put two criminal nations,—Germany and Turkey,—into an exclusive hell of their own, and keep them there for the protection of civilization. In courts of law, it is customary to consider the motives of the prisoner at the bar, to search out his lines of thought, and study his methods. An annotated catalogue of the blunders of Germany will afford a clear insight into the present world situation, and the Teutonic frame of temper. It will also serve a good purpose when the time comes to arraign Germany and her allies for sentence. Before we open the door of the German den of mixed wolves and mad-dogs, let us read this marvelously true and prophetic pen picture of Kaiser William as it was published by Harold Frederic, in the New York Times, on April 2, 1888, twenty-nine years ago: "In the same way you look into the face of this young heir of the Hohenzollerns and remember the malignant tales which have been told of his inner nature by those who know him best. Apparently all the women—at least all the English women—who have had to do with the bringing up of Prince William hold him in horror and detestation. I have had numerous proofs of this, although I have never been able to fasten upon any specific reason for it. Their dislike for him is based on a general conception of his character. This view is that he is utterly cold, entirely selfish, wantonly cruel; a young man without conscience or compassion, or any softening virtues whatever. That he has great abilities they all admit, but they stop there. Heart he has none, upon their reckoning.... "It seems very probable that some future Taine a century hence, perhaps, will write to show that William II of Prussia was a mysterious belated survival of the ante-mediaeval Goths and Vandals,—an Attila born a thousand and more years after his time." How many Americans are willing to trust themselves in the power of such a man? 1. THE GREAT BLUNDER OF GERMANY AND HER KAISER IN STARTING THE WAR. By the light of the official documents of Austria, Servia, Germany, Russia, France and England, now open before us, it is an easy task to write the history of the beginning of the war in one paragraph. The most conclusive evidence of Germany's guilt is the official "German white book," dated "Foreign Office, August, 1914." It has convinced many a reader. On July 25, 1914, Servia humbled herself to the dust at the feet of Austria, to appease her for the murder of her crown prince by a crazy and criminal fool; and little Servia conceded everything that giant Austria demanded, save a practical surrender of her national honor. Austria had fully made up her mind to destroy Servia, anyhow; and in that connection Germany and her Kaiser decided the event would serve well for starting the great war of conquest for which the Germans had long and lovingly been preparing. The Czar begged the Kaiser not to consent to the slaughter of little Servia by the Austrian big bully. The Kaiser replied that Austria should have a free hand. The Czar appealed to England and to France, to help him avert a war; and both those nations did their level best to avert hostilities. No plea that could postpone the clash of armies, or promote a peaceful settlement was omitted. The last telegram of Czar Nicholas to Kaiser Wilhelm (August 1) was a pathetic appeal for delay, and a chance "to negotiate for the welfare of our two countries and the universal peace which is so dear to our hearts. With the aid of God," said the Czar, "it must be possible to our long-tried friendship to prevent the shedding of blood." To this the Kaiser icily replied: "Although I asked for a reply by to-day noon [to his telegraphed ultimatum], no telegram from my Ambassador has reached me," and "I therefore have been forced to mobilize my army." Germany's many statements that France began hostilities with her are one and all totally false. Now, here is a significant fact: On July 14, 1917, in a speech before the Austrian Reichsrath former Minister Praschek (a Czech) cried out: "Must we continue to sacrifice our interests for the expansion of Germany? Must we continue to submit to the German militarism that has drawn us into this war?" Alas! At last the truth is out, officially and openly! We thought as much! Many men have believed that Germany shoved Austria into the war, because Germany was all ready for her great offense, and the murder at Sarajevo served as a convenient excuse. If Germany had not backed up Austria, and Russia had forbidden Austria to attack Servia, there would have been no war! But Germany hailed that murder as her heaven-sent opportunity to begin. It was to her "Der Tag"! All the world knows that if the Kaiser had sent a nine-word telegram to Austria, at a cost of one mark, saying: "Do not begin war on Servia until further notice," Austria would not have dared go on! But no! William and his Germans refused to admonish Austria, or to delay hostilities by Germany. "We can not interfere with the plans of our Ally;" said William, "and we have mobilized." And thus did the German people and their Kaiser begin the war to which they had so long and so eagerly looked forward. 2. GERMANY'S RUTHLESS DEVOTION TO SELF INTEREST. When Rapacity moves into the next house, it is time to lock your cellar door. Yoke up insatiable Appetite with colossal Egotism, and the inevitable runaway is only a question of time. While enjoying the benefits of an industrial prosperity and a world-wide commerce that had won the admiration of the world, the Germans complained about being denied their "place in the sun"; and they reached out after world supremacy. England and the United States were like twin thorns in the side of the Kaiser and the German people at large. The pan-Germanists busily plotted against both those nations. Concerning England, a distinguished German-born citizen of New York, Mr. Otto H. Kahn, wrote to a relative in Germany (June 28, 1915) as follows: "England has not abused her power at sea, ... any more than previous to the present war you have abused your power on land. Not only has she not stood in the way of your development, but on the contrary she has given you fair and free access to her markets, with unparalleled liberality." In fact, it was so "unparalleled" that by August, 1914, German commercial houses had crowded out of Singapore every British house save two! Wherever the British flag went, prior to the war, along with it went the German trader. But, like the horseleech, Germany's cry was for "More"; and to get it "British sea power must be crushed!" Unmitigated rapacity, in men or in nations, ever has been and always will be a colossal blunder. 3. THE BLUNDER OF WORLD-WIDE TREACHERY. While America was sound asleep in the lap of Peace, and England slumbered with only her sea eye open, Germany armed herself to the teeth, and planted throughout England, France, America, Belgium, Holland, Russia and India the most colossal spy-and-traitor system ever developed. She secretly armed her African colonies so that on receipt of the famous "Willie-is-ill" telegram, each one of her colonies instantly was ready to fight. In 1911, while crossing Lake Tanganyika, Central Africa, on a steamer, an American lady said to a German officer who sat beside her at the dinner table, "Have you and your comrade been shooting?" "Not yet!" said the officer, significantly; whereat his brother officer laughed heartily, as if at a good joke. Later it became known that the business of those two officers was the supplying of machine guns to German East Africa. And still later it was learned that those guns were shipped to Dar-es-Salaam in piano-boxes, marked "Pianos." No wonder Dar-es-Salaam was so ready to begin fighting on August 2, 1914! There are times when the blunderings of German "statesmen" are so crude and raw that, when they harm no one, they are comical. Even amid the horrors of war all America is laughing over the wholesale discomfiture and final undoing of Dr. Dumba, Papen, Boy-Ed (an anything-but-precocious Boy), and Bernstorff, by a restless American newspaper man with a taste for amateur detective work after amateur crooks. One would naturally suppose that men officially designated by their wise and honorable government to play dirty tricks on the people of a friendly nation would at least have as much intelligence as ordinary horses and dogs. But, no; not so with that Austro-German galaxy of shining stars. One lonesome and harmless American newspaper man, John R. Rathom, of the Providence Journal, had the gall to plant an employee in a secretarial position at Excellency von Bernstorff's elbow. Also, he put a bright American girl stenographer (with a red pencil) in the office of the Austrian Consul-General in New York. And not content with those outrages, he generously planted an office on each side of the German fake-passport factory in New York, instead of on one side only. And it was a Providence Journal man who with most criminal carelessness changed portfolios with the astute Dr. Albert of Austria, and staged a fight in a street car,—without extra charge,—while that horrible mistake was being made. And the saddest part of it all is that nearly forty-eight long hours elapsed ere the lynx-eyed Doctor noticed the substitution, and made a fuss about it. Mr. Rathom's most delightful story is of his girl stenographer sitting demurely on a big box of incriminating papers, just prior to its shipment to Germany, sharing her frugal lunch with the shrewd Papen, and dreamily drawing two large red hearts on the box-cover, to which the sentimental Von thoughtfully and tenderly added a red transfixing arrow. This spooning led to the cheap and easy identification of the box in Merrie England. It reads like a foolishly impossible romance; but the joke of it is, it is quite true. "Oh, mon! but it was peetiful!" With all their training in treachery, and education in plotting and lying and concealment, Dumba, Bernstorff, Papen, Boy-Ed and Albert were one and all the most stupid donkeys that ever came down the pike. Not one of them knew the first principles of the self-protection system that (temporarily) keeps expert liars and thieves and forgers from being caught. Just fancy keeping check-stubs, and receipts, and copies of letters, in lawless proceedings! Great is "German thoroughness"—in being caught with the goods by an amateur sleuth, acting on his own brass hook. Mr. Rathom, who has enough to laugh over at the expense of Deutschland-Über-alles for the rest of his life, has not shown to the world more than one-twentieth of his mirth-provoking materials. But how we do wish that by hook or by crook William the Witless might be told just how stupid his diplomatic representatives really were, and how much their stupidity helped the Allies. It has been said that liars need long memories; and it can safely be added that they also need as much intelligence as pet monkeys. A rogue who pays his fellow rogues by checks on his bank account is utterly hopeless. The only proper place for him is the cooling room of an asylum for idiots. The playgrounds of the great American schoolboy have produced many a nugget of worldly wisdom. One of them is the unanswerable admonition that "Cheating never thrives." All mankind hates treachery under the cloak of friendship. After Boy-Ed, Papen, Bernstorff, Dumba and Albert, what will we think of the Germans and Austrians who are sent to us after the war, to represent their governments? How can Americans regard them as anything else than spies and traitors of the same brands as their predecessors, who will lie to us, and knife us in the back as often and as deeply as the interests of their governments may seem to require? All such "diplomats" deserve to be hanged by the governments to which they are sent. Fancy the next "His Excellency, the German Ambassador" being presented to the President of the United States a few months from now, shaking hands, and proffering "friendship"! 4. THE BLUNDER IN GERMANY'S CONTEMPT OF ENGLAND. Among fighters, only the fool will underrate his adversary. Per contra, it is only the fool who overestimates his own strength. The Germans of Germany made both those blunders. The German navy is a strange mixture, of brave men and cowards, of gallant gentlemen and murderous curs; and all of them are directed by asses. No sooner is a gallant feat of seamanship recorded and acclaimed than it is completely beclouded and besmirched by some act of dirty cruelty which turns admiration into loathing. The history of German naval doings in this war is like a checkerboard of black and white squares; but the few remaining white squares are rapidly turning black. In commerce-raiding the Germans are great; and the U-boat is a wonder. The more humble the prey, the better for the boat. But the U-boat is mighty careful not to tackle a destroyer, and take a sporting chance; and when he finds that his tramp-freighter prey is armed, he feels that he is indeed in hard luck. His favorite warfare is fighting, with torpedoes and guns galore, unarmed fishing smacks and rusty tramp steamers. His favorite order is: "Fire when you see them spit on the bait!" And now he has taken on the habit of shelling life-boats loaded to the gunwales with helpless crews, and sending them all to the bottom. Sometimes the gallant U-boat captain comes close up, and he and his crew come out and jeer at drowning men and women as they struggle in icy waters. The German High Seas Fleet is grand—at running for cover whenever the British get a chance at it. The manner in which the Bluecher was left to its fate while all the other gallant battleships of the German fleet madly scuttled for the Kiel Canal, had its comical side; but it was truly typical of the Kaiser's navy. It is said that after that event Tirpitz provided his naval code with a new signal, reading, "Every man for himself, and England take the hindmost." Germany's bid for the supremacy of the seas was far too low; and it has cost her heavily. 5. BLUNDERING ESTIMATES OF NATIONAL IDEALS. It is natural for a wolf to take a wolf's point of view; but often it is expensive to the wolf. Germany's big men who have been masquerading as "statesmen" have been proven by the logic of events to be the most colossal blunderers the world has ever seen; and of them Kaiser Wilhelm is the chief. They had it figured out (1) that Italy would necessarily cast in her lot with the nation who had robbed her of her Adriatic provinces, and with the other nation who by crafty methods had grasped her commerce, railroads and banks by the throat with a German grip not pleasant to feel. (2).—They believed that Belgium would, for the sake of "peace," submit to being overrun and converted into a German camp, with the ultimately certain seizure and retention of the port of Antwerp. (3).—They believed that because of having no army worth mentioning, and for Irish and Indian reasons, England could be bribed into a state of degrading passivity while Germany completely destroyed her ally, France. And Chancellor Hollweg nearly wept when he could not convince Sir Edward Goschen that a pledge of neutrality was a thing to be ignored at will, and that a solemn international treaty was only "a scrap of paper." In failing to understand that England possesses a sense of national honor to which Germany was a total stranger, which bore no taint of either commercialism or cowardice, and which Britons throughout the world will maintain with all their lives, regardless of cost, the Chancellor and Jagow made a strictly German blunder, which no child with a taste for history ever should have made. On this point the stupidity of the Kaiser and his cabinet looms up like the Pyramid of Cheops. They judged the English by themselves. 6. BLUNDERING WITH AMERICA. Germany's chief blunder regarding America was due to her contempt for this sleepy, easy-going, unarmed, peace-loving nation of Quixotic chivalry toward small nations, or big ones that are weak, and her utterly grotesque worship of riches and luxury. On no other hypothesis is it possible to account for the endless series of insults, injuries and treacheries that were handed out to the United States from the early sinking of the Robert Dollar down to the final declaration of ruthless submarine war on American commerce and American lives. Never in all the history of nations did any strong nation ever endure without war one one-hundredth part of the causes for war that were heaped upon us by Germany between August 1, 1914, and the final severance of relations. For the sake of "peace" with a mad-dog military despotism, we endured insults, injuries and murders until the whole world looked at us in stupefied amazement. Why, in the first year of our Civil War, we came to the very verge of war with England because we halted at sea the British steamer Trent, and took from it, as ordinary prisoners of war, the two Confederate commissioners, Mason and Slidell. But Germany sank scores of American ships, and drowned hundreds of Americans,—and still we went on seeking to avoid the clash of arms. But, always "Beware the fury of a patient man!" Now that we have put our hand to the plough, the furrow will be turned to the uttermost finish, whether it takes one year or ten years. We will not leave a living Pfafner,—a great, stinking German military dragon,—as a heritage for our children. 7. THE BLUNDER OF "FRIGHTFULNESS." There are some blunders that dogs and horses, and even sensible wild animals, do not commit. Of all the stupidities of the German people, the crowning glory of their blundering is their idea that German savagery and "frightfulness" could so appal their enemies that they would be paralyzed by the shock of atrocities, and purchase peace at any price. It is difficult to believe that such fantastic theories as these originated anywhere outside of a madhouse. No words at our command can so well describe this situation as do the words of a once-German, of New York and of Kuhn, Loeb & Company, Mr. Otto H. Kahn. They were written on June 28, 1915, to a relative in Germany, and published in the N.Y. Times of July 4, 1917. "The theory of 'frightfulness' in the conduct of warfare which Germany now preaches and practices is no new discovery. On the contrary, it is a very ancient one,—so old, in fact, that long ago it came to be discarded and superseded in European warfare, and passed into the limbo of forgotten things. There, until resurrected by your countrymen, it lay for generations, along with much else that the human race had overcome and left behind in the progress of culture and humanity,—a progress achieved by strenuous toil, sacrifices and suffering in the course of many centuries. "And what have you gained from your 'frightfulness'? Your victories have been due to quite other qualities. By your 'frightfulness' you have steeled your enemies to the utmost limit of sacrifice; you have embittered neutral opinion; you have disappointed and grieved your friends, and sown dragon's teeth, the offspring of which will arise against you many years, even after the conclusion of peace." These are indeed words of wisdom and truth. Even after the conclusion of peace, the exponents of "frightfulness" and the knights of the "skull-cracker" will be accorded a hell of their own. 8. THE BLUNDER AS TO AMERICANS OF GERMAN DESCENT. One of Germany's colossal blunders was her estimate of the sentiments and principles of German-born people who have made their homes in America, and the American sons and daughters of German-born parents. German statesmen whose criminal wishes shaped their thoughts sincerely believed that the admiration and love of the Kaiser's despotism, including even the military iron heel, was so great that the influence of American liberty, open-hearted hospitality and vast opportunity would count for naught when the Kaiser cracked his whip. The Simple Simons of Wilhelmstrasse actually believed that in any struggle with America, all Americans of German ancestry necessarily would be traitors to their own hearthstones, and would rise en masse, fully-armed, cobra-like, to strike the government of the United States. Being themselves ruthlessly devoted to the idea of might and conquest, and the merciless subjugation of small and weak nations, they judged their kindred in America by their own rotten standards. They foolishly assumed that a German forty years in America would willingly become a black-hearted traitor to the land that for years had sheltered him, and made much of him,—simply because the ruthless builders of modern Germany had endeavored to keep a grip on him, and had willed that he should obey their orders. But the people of America made no mistakes of that kind. They recognized that so long as the United States was not at war with Germany, the sympathy of all Americans of German descent would be against the Allies. That was as natural as it is for water to run down hill. But when war with Germany was declared, after a multitude of insults and injuries and too many efforts at avoidance, the native American felt no serious misgiving regarding the great body of Americans of German ancestry. All that they did fear was the crazy possibilities of individual hot-heads; and it was pointed out to German-Americans that the insane and treasonable acts of such irresponsibles might easily involve great masses of perfectly innocent people. The Americans of German descent sternly forbade all such folly by their people, and it will be a pleasure for the historians of these times to record the fact that the German-born Americans have, as a mass, elected to be Americans first, and the others have wisely feared to be openly hostile to the United States. Except the Anarchists, Socialists and I.W.W's., American ideals have made lasting impressions upon many of our people whose veins contain foreign blood, though not upon all. Young Ernest and Heinrich are in the National Guard, and lads August and Herman are in the Boy Scouts, busy saluting the flag; and all are quite ready to fight for the only home country that they know. They are not in the ranks of the alien malcontents who are organized to fight all American efforts at national defense. But we will deal with that element. The brutal German government, and the odious Junkers, now frantically lying to the people of Germany and ruthlessly concealing the truth from them, have few allies in the United States save the spies and traitors planted here for spy purposes. There will be no "uprising of Germans" here. The extinguishment by the Providence Journal of the reptilian Bernstorff, the chuckleheaded Boy-Ed, the blundering Papen, and Dumba the easy mark, effectually ended the treasonable plots that aided very materially in opening the chasm between the United States and Germany, and driving the United States whole-heartedly into the war. Dumba has been decorated for his part in all this, and we hope his fellow plotters will be equally appreciated. But there are some capital blunders that Germany never makes. Her people are an absolute unit, in body, spirit and resources, in backing up the leaders of the nation in the hour of strife and danger. She does not make the mistake of tolerating traitors and assassins at home. If her soldiers mutinied on the firing line, and refused to fight the enemy, as some rotten-hearted Russian soldiers recently have done most disastrously, Germany would not make the mistake of letting one of them live to tell it. In solidarity, unity of purpose and devotion to the nation's policy, the German people are a shining example to America. They are more devoted to a bad cause than our slackers and traitors are to a good one. It is high time for us to teach our traitors some severe lessons; and I warn them, one and all: Beware! And now what about Germany's crimes? In the next chapter, let us see. II. The Crimes of Germany. In the affairs of the individual and the state, we hear a lot about "crime" and "criminals"; but it is an idiotic fact that the greatest of all crimes, those committed by nations on a vast scale, rarely are spoken of as crimes, and easily are condoned after the fighting stops. The world calls them either "wars" or "atrocities"; and the men who instigate them never are spoken of as criminals, and never are punished as such. Is it not curious? Still less is the author of an inexcusable war, or a series of brutal atrocities, hanged, or shot, or even permanently imprisoned for his crimes. What fools these mortals be! In our civilization, a wife who ends long years of torture by killing a brutal husband, always is tried, sentenced, and either imprisoned for life, or executed. This asinine world is most virtuous in the punishment of weak individuals; but we notice that it rarely tackles the job of meting out real justice to the greatest of all criminals. After this war is over, will any criminal, either at Berlin or Constantinople, be hanged or shot for the deliberate slaughter of 1,500,000 helpless Armenians, or for any of the hideous crimes committed in this war? Not on your life. Mushy-hearted individuals will advise that they be treated "magnanimously," and will urge that we "become friends." The world has grown hardened to the habit of lumping the crimes and atrocities of organized conflicts together under a short and easy word. "War" is made to cover and gloss over millions of the bloody and malicious crimes of millions of men who ought to be punished according to their deserts. I am thinking of the Kaiser, Stenger, Tirpitz and Hindenberg, and the Young Turks en masse. The Hague conventions did their utmost to reform the world's war practices, establish an international code of war ethics, and thereby reduce the horrors of armed conflict. But with what results? Closely following those well-meant and humane efforts, two nations, Germany and Turkey, have given the world a continuous performance of wholesale murder, rape, burnings, drownings and starvation such as the world never before saw, even in the bloodiest days of barbarism. The Turkish crimes in Armenia must be computed in millions, and the wanton murder of a million Armenians is directly chargeable to the rulers of Germany, who deliberately permitted it to be done. And even now, many good people who refuse to concern themselves with the woes of men and women who are far away, will decry all attempts to punish the Germans and Turks for their crimes. They will talk about "magnanimity in peace terms," and a quick return to ante-bellum friendships. Think of a treaty of friendship with ravishers, and with the murderers of women and children and prisoners! All sensible men know that the proper punishment of criminals is necessary for the protection of society from wolves and dragons, and for the general welfare of mankind. Unpunished crime always encourages and produces more crime. The world must not mistake softness of head for soundness of heart. It is indeed high time that criminal nations should be punished for their crimes. Are any nations before the bar of the Court of Nations charged with deliberate and premeditated crimes against helpless humanity? Yes; two. Germany and Turkey are so accused; and no power on earth can stop the trial! Austria comes next. Let us call first the case of Germany. In opening the worst of these two cases, we distinctly leave out of our specifications all those acts which may be put down as chargeable to the ordinary and inevitable horrors of war. At the same time we must remember that even the most brutal prize ring has its rules and its ethics, which are rigidly enforced. Even a fighter whose face is being beaten to a pulp may not bite, kick, gouge, or strike below the belt; no, not even when defeat and ruin stare him in the face. The fighting must be "fair," or the decision is at once given to the recipient of the "foul" act. Until Germany invaded Belgium, and Turkey went to work to exterminate the Armenians, the world supposed that the Christian nations had reformed, that all civilized nations recognized the latest international code of ethics in war, and would live up to it. It was then against the rules of civilized warfare to shoot, stab, burn or beat to death the civilian populations of captured territory, to starve prisoners, to kill prisoners and wounded men, to use expanding bullets, to rape women, to force women to become soldier's prostitutes, to poison wells, to use poison in any form, to destroy maliciously works of art, science and literature; to sink merchant ships at sea without assuring the safety of passengers and crew, and to bombard cities from the air for the slaughter of their helpless civilian inhabitants. According to a great mass of official records, all of those barbarous, cruel, inhumane and wild-animal acts have been done by Germany, on well-nigh countless occasions. The evidence is thoroughly conclusive. The German soldiers and sailors, both officers and men, are the most cruel and brutal criminals of all the world. In Servia the Austrian record is almost as rotten. In 1898, Count Goetzen said, regarding the treacherous designs of Germany on France, England and America: "If you do speak of this, no one will believe you, and everyone will laugh at you!" To-day, the American people as a mass do not know more than one one-hundredth part of the crimes of Germany during the past three years. The reason is that it is impossible to place before them the great mass of publications and documents, such as that which now lies before me, that is necessary to convey full knowledge of this ghastly subject. Without this evidence, or at least a lengthy digest of it, the utter depravity of the German Germans is, to a clean and humane American, absolutely incomprehensible. It takes strong nerves to go through these thousands of pages of printed documents, and scores of ghastly pictures, without becoming thoroughly shaken. It is not a pleasing task to set forth the details of revolting crimes, but it now has become very necessary that all Americans, of South America as well as North, should be shown the true character of the soldiers and civilians of Germany, and the men in high places who have ordered and fostered the high crimes of the past three years. This is no time to side-step the truth regarding the deadliest foes of human liberty and the rights of man. By way of illustration. Consider the character of the German crown prince,—the hero(?) of Verdun. When in Zabern the highborn German Captain Forstner beat a lame Alsatian shoemaker with his sword, for being "short" in love for his German masters. When a great outcry was raised outside of Germany, the precious crown-princeling telegraphed the brave and gallant Forstner, "Fester d'rauf!" which means "Hit him again!" Forstner was promoted, for gallantry on the field, of course. (New York Times, July 15.) In making up this all too brief exposition, I shall set down neither facts nor conclusions save those that are supported by an abundance of evidence such as might well be offered in any court of law. The most damaging evidences of German crimes and atrocities are those that have been collected from German sources! The "peace resolutions" introduced in the German Reichstag say: "Germany took up arms in defense of its liberty and independence, and for the integrity of its territories." All the world now knows that both those statements are brazen lies, and that the people of Germany started the war as a war of conquest, and nothing else. But the lying leaders of Germany, including the 70 men of science who signed and sent out their now famous manifesto late in 1914, have for three long years been injecting that falsehood into the ignorant masses of Germany, to make them feel like fighting and going hungry. No. Germany's whining plea that she is "fighting for her very existence" is no excuse whatever for her diabolical crimes. No one is, or has been, seeking to "destroy" Germany, or anything German, save only her domineering, dangerous and thoroughly accursed military power. Even in the prize ring all such excuses as that are ruled out; and the fear of being beaten in a fight is no excuse for crime, nor even for brutality in method. One curious psychological fact is to be noted at the very outset. It is this: The moment the average German dons a military uniform, and becomes a soldier, with deadly weapons in his hands, he is at once transformed as if by magic into a cruel monster. Frequently he becomes a savage and bloodthirsty dragon; and it would be a gross libel on the lower animals to call him a beast. He becomes a stranger to the feelings of the home-loving husband, father, son or churchman. In the name of "Germany," and "war," he is ready to commit any atrocity and write it down, exultingly, in his diary. Ah! those soldier diaries! There is where German efficiency unwittingly provided instruments for the punishment of German crimes. But the German in uniform is not the only agent of hate and brutality. "The people of Germany" are only one short step behind him. Let every person who doubts this send five cents to the Saturday Evening Post, Philadelphia, for its issue of July 14, 1917, and on page 16 read "Englander Schwein" ("English Swine") the diary of Corporal Edwards, of Canada's top regiment, the Princess Patricia's C.L.I., who was captured by the Germans. Read it, if you have in your heart even one soft spot for "the people of Germany." It is a story of revolting filth inflicted upon refined gentlemen, of three days utterly needless hunger torture inflicted on half-starved men taken out of their cars three times a day, lined up and compelled to watch German soldiers stuffed with food by German women, with "Nein!" "Nein!" to them when they begged for food. It is a story of horribly neglected wounds, arms rotting off, slow starvation in the prison camp on food consisting of 200 gallons of water to one small bag of potatoes, and so forth. Of the murders and mutilations in the trenches there is not time to speak. But read this account of the treatment the Canadians received along the railway from the women of Germany,—even "gentlewomen": "The mob surged around us, heaping on us insults and blows; particularly the women. They spat on us, with hate in their eyes. We had to take that, or the bayonet. These were the acts not only of the rabble, but also of the people of good appearance and address. One very well-dressed woman came rushing up. Under other circumstances I would have judged her to be a gentlewoman. She was screaming invectives at us as she forced her way through the crowd. 'Schwein!' she screamed, and struck at the man next me. Then, drawing deep from the very bottom of her lungs, she spat the mass full in his face." In essaying to give in one article even an outline sketch of the crimes of Germany, one is perplexed by the many different kinds of atrocities, and the great mass of instances and proofs bearing upon them. Out of it all there thrusts up the ugly fact, like a spear from a pile of corpses, that many of these crimes were committed intentionally, with malice aforethought, and often were deliberately ordered by German officers, both high and low. For example: General Stenger issued a printed order to kill all the wounded; Bissing was the refined torturer of all Belgium, in many orders; Manteuffel was the chief murderer at Louvain; Bulow and Schonmann were the wild beasts of Ardenne; And it was Bayer at Dinant, Bohn at Sommerfeld and Termonde; Nieher at Wavre; Wittenstein at Clermont-en-Argonne, and so on until you are tired. 1. THE MURDER OF CIVILIANS. This flourishing German industry began at Louvain, at the very outbreak of the war, and has continued right down to the present. It is astounding to see how quickly murders began, with the most revolting brutality, immediately after the Germans entered Belgium! Sometimes the excuse was made that "Mann hat geschossen",—that "civilians have fired";—and then the indiscriminate slaughter began. The thick volume of "Evidence" taken by the Bryce Commission on the German Atrocities is crowded full of testimony; and so are many subsequent publications of the British and French governments. The stories written down in their diaries by German soldiers are both terrible and amazing. In an uncountable number of villages old men, old women, boys, girls, women and children were shot by dozens and by hundreds; and hundreds were stabbed to death by bayonets. There are sickening accounts, from eye-witness testimony, of German soldiers bayoneting children and girls, but the most spectacular crime of that kind was committed at Malaines (d4, Bryce Evidence), when a German soldier walking down the main street, singing, "drove his bayonet with both hands through a living child's stomach, lifting the child into the air on his bayonet, and carrying it away on his bayonet, he and his comrades still singing." (Page 82.) In the village of Sempst, an Uhlan cut off the breast of a woman with his sword; and a little boy was burned to death in an attic. (K. 33.) At Aerschot a girl of 18 or 20 was found "absolutely naked, with her abdomen cut open", and "her body covered with bruises, showing that she had made a struggle." Jack the Ripper in a spiked helmet! And again at Aerschot (C. 38) did the German Jack get in his work on another girl of 18. She was found (dead) with "her arms nailed to the door in extended fashion, ... her left breast cut away, and numerous bayonet wounds in the chest, some piercing through to the back." (Told by a Belgian soldier, who helped to recapture the place.) A British subject saw on September 15, 1914, in the Wetteren Hospital, a girl of 11 from Alost with 17 bayonet thrusts in her back, "practically flayed, and at the point of death." (F. 13.) "Out of the 1300 inhabitants of Noumeny, at least 150 were killed (murdered) by the Germans." (French Police Report, Aug. 24, 1914.) This list could be extended by hundreds of other cases; and a long chapter could be filled with such instances as the above. Geographically they reach all the way from Louvain to the beginning of the great German defeat before Paris. In order to form estimates of what the quiet little country villages of New England might expect if the armed wolves and mad dogs of Germany ever gained a foothold here, let us consider a few figures compiled from official reports and published by the Illustrated London News. They relate solely to the murder of unarmed, inoffensive civilians—old men, women, girls, boys and children.
—and so on, indefinitely. On the most trivial pretexts, or none at all, the Germans slaughtered unresisting non-combatants who were in their power. Out of a lot of 40 German soldier diaries, only 6 express disapproval or disgust, and at least 30 diaries treat murders either exultingly or as being merely a part of the day's work. The slaughtered innocents of Belgium, France, Servia and Poland would, in each of those countries, undoubtedly run far up into thousands if it were possible to count them. Thanks to the diligence of the British and French governments in collecting evidence now while evidence is procurable, there is already enough printed testimony to damn Germany in the eyes of the world for at least two centuries. 2. KILLING OF PRISONERS AND WOUNDED MEN BY GERMANS. The crimes of Germany under this head have been literally innumerable. Judging by German, French, Belgian and English evidence, it seems as if German soldiers have slaughtered probably 100,000 defenseless prisoners and wounded men. Prof. J.H. Morgan states that von der Goltz, the evil genius of Turkey, "predicted some years ago that the next war would be one of inconceivable violence"; and he declares that "the Germans have no sense of honor in the field." He was hideously correct. German prisoner murder began before Antwerp on October 6, 1914, when the Captain of the 85th Regt. IXth Corps, 4th Company, said to his men: "I do not want to see any Englishmen prisoners in the hands of this company!" To which the company cried, "Bravo!" And Richard Gerhold, 71st Regiment Reserve, 4th Army Corps (killed in September, 1914), wrote in his precious diary thus: "Great atrocities are of course committed upon Englishmen and Belgians. Every one of them is now knocked on the head without mercy." The famous Stenger order of August 26, 1914, brings us to a capital case. A German Brigadier-General, Stenger by name, issued this written order to his brigade: "To date from this day, no prisoners will be made any longer. All the prisoners will be executed. The wounded, whether armed or defenseless, will be executed. Prisoners, even in large and compact formations, will be executed. Not a man will be left alive behind us." The instances of the murder of helpless prisoners by Germans are far too numerous to be cited in detail. Beyond reasonable doubt, a hundred thousand soldiers were murdered on the Stenger basis. And after the war is over, if we resume friendly "relations" with Germany, we may see Stenger in Washington as Military AttachÉ to his Excellency the German Ambassador, shaking hands with the President of the United States. 3. THE BOMBING OF CIVILIANS IN LONDON AND ELSEWHERE. The Kaiser and Zeppelin, and the German people, have spent many millions of dollars in deliberate attempts to slaughter the unarmed inhabitants of London, and strafe England. All the German talk about attacking "the fortress of London" is beneath contempt. Rarely indeed has a soldier been injured in London, or any other English city, by a Zeppelin or an airplane bomb. It has been the helpless women, school-children and other non-combatants who have been blown to pieces. These murders of civilian men, women and children have served only to send furious Englishmen rushing to the trenches in droves, for vengeance! Had the square-heads deliberately attempted to stimulate British enlistments, the dropping of bombs on London would have been the ideal plan. At last the British public demand reprisals, on the basis of an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth; which would be absolutely right. But thus far the statesmen of England firmly say: "No! We will not descend to the low level of the Huns of Germany." Nevertheless, Zeppelin died of a broken heart. From a military point of view his campaign has proven a complete fiasco,—just as Americans long ago predicted that it would, and his "frightfulness" gas bags are now on the scrap-heap. 4. TIRPITZ AND THE SUBMARINE MURDERS. For a submarine to sink a war vessel with all on board is merely war, no more and no less. No one whines about atrocities of that sort. All the world does object, however, and very strongly, too, to the sinking of unarmed passenger steamers, hospital ships, and Belgian relief ships. All such acts of murder as these are the acts of monsters, not of men. Of course we know that Germany sees her doom, and her people are wild over the certainty of defeat. But even a 90 per cent. defeated prize-fighter must not deliver a foul blow. The submarine murders are so well known to Americans as to require no comment; but a few murder statistics will be worth while, lest we forget.
Hospital Ships Maliciously Destroyed by the German "Navy."
On a very few occasions, a few German submarine captains have acted humanely, and some even gallantly; but all these acts have been besmirched by the acts of cowardly and brutal men who have deliberately fired upon hospital ships and open life-boats loaded with men attempting to save themselves from drowning. In one celebrated instance a U-boat captain and his crew came out upon their deck, and at close range jeered at drowning men and women who were struggling in icy water. And here is the latest feat of the brave and gallant German "navy": On July 31, 1917, 200 miles from land a German submarine engaged in combat and sank the unarmed British freighter, Belgian Prince. They assembled the entire crew of 40 men on the submarine's deck, stripped from them their life-belts, and smashed all their life-boats, with axes. Then the brave Germans went below, closed their hatches, ran on the surface for two miles, then suddenly submerged. Thirty-eight were drowned, but two lived to be picked up and tell the story. A new trick. Look for frequent repetitions. 5. POISON GAS, LIQUID FIRE AND POISONED WELLS. Early in the war the much-vaunted German "men of science" invented poisonous gases (chiefly of chlorine), liquid fire apparatus, and other forms of deviltry forbidden in civilized warfare. The "flammenwerfer" is now a favorite German institution; but occasionally it gets into trouble by being exploded by shell fire, in the hands of the men using it. One result of poison gas and liquid fire is the everlasting odium that it has fastened upon the German army. The British soldiers say that "the Germans are dirty fighters"; and the name will stick forever. In German South-West Africa, when the Boer General, Louis Botha, captured Swakopmund he found that all six of the wells had been poisoned with arsenical cattle-dip. Bags of the poison hung in the wells; and the crime was acknowledged and defended in writing by Lieut.-Col. Franke, commander of the German forces. Previous to that time, the new German governor had murdered in cold blood 208 of the leading natives of the capital town, to teach the surviving Hereros the advantages of life under the black vulture of Germany. 6. BACTERIA OF GLANDERS AND ANTHRAX SENT INTO RUMANIA. "The world owes much to German science." This remark is not original. We have heard it about 147,500 times; but the world has not heard quite so often how the worthy "scientists" of Germany sent large collections of living and active bacilli of glanders for horses, and anthrax for cattle, into Rumania, under the German diplomatic seal, just before war was declared by Rumania! The precious cultures were found buried in the garden of the German consulate; and in their usual blundering way, the dunderheads did not know enough to destroy the evidence of their newest species of crime. All this has been set forth by the Rumanian government in a neat little pamphlet, very useful to students of criminology and degeneracy. 7. THE MURDER OF EDITH CAVELL. Not in two hundred years will the world forget or forgive this dastardly crime. If Bissing is not now in hell for it, then there is no such place. The cities of civilized countries should erect Cavell monuments, and name streets Cavell, lest we forget. Only Germans or Turks could have done a deed so unnecessary, so brutal and unchivalrous. But it seems that the German Germans stick at no atrocity. 8. THE MURDER OF CAPTAIN FRYATT. This crime was committed in cold blood, unchecked by the criminal Kaiser, because on March 28, 1915, Captain Fryatt escaped from a German submarine by attempting to ram it. On June 23, 1916, he was captured, taken to Zeebrugge, and by a naval court martial sentenced to death. Great "sports" were those German naval officers! They have in their veins about as much sporting blood as so many hyenas, but no more. On several occasions the British have actually honored the fine seamanship and daring and skill of German sea raiders, even after great destruction while at sea. But the British navy men are good sports, while the men of the German navy do not seem to recognize a bold and capable seaman when they see one; and they have no sense of sportsmanship. When did the German navy ever rescue a British or French sailor from drowning? But British sailors have saved many Germans. The murder of Captain Fryatt brands the whole German navy with a mark that it will wear forever. 9. THE GERMAN OUTRAGES UPON WOMEN. It is here that the pen falters, and the heart turns sick with horror and loathing. Thus far the newspapers of the United States have shrunk from printing the awful details that have been available on this subject. For fifty years we have been reading of the wars of nations,—white, black, red, brown and yellow,—but never in modern times have we seen such ghastly, such loathsome, such shocking and sickening brutalities of lust as German officers and soldiers inflicted, wholesale, upon the women of Belgium and northern France. At present we will say little of Poland, for the subject is too vast. I shall not give instances, even though there are hundreds at hand, well authenticated, and undoubtedly true. But let all Americans remember this: Never within the last four hundreds years or more have any women ever been so brutally abused, so extensively raped by violence, often accompanied by murder in Jack the Ripper fashion, or so disgustingly maltreated before the eyes of fathers, mothers, sisters, brothers and groups of men as were the wretched women of Belgium and northern France. The rage of the German brutes whose great conquest of France was balked seemed to be visited with particular fury and cruelty upon the women of the captured territory between fourteen and forty years of age. I have before me one instance so awful and so revolting that the woman upon whom it was inflicted immediately went mad. The details are published only in French, in order that only a few English-speaking persons may read them. No wonder that when the armies of General Joffre and General Foch were chasing the German ravishers back to the banks of the Marne, that the French women of the recaptured towns and villages dragged themselves to their windows, leaned out, and begged the French soldiers to "Take no prisoners! Kill them,—all!" The total number of women who have been cruelly abused by German officers and private soldiers never will be known; but it must run up into hundreds of thousands. Only the devil himself knows how many miserables have been "given to the soldiers," just as was the Polish maid of an American lady, Madame Turczynowics, now in New York, who tells about it in her book, "When the Prussians Came to Poland" (page 138). This is the passage:
10. GERMANY'S COLOSSAL CRIME IN ARMENIA. A little pamphlet of 24 pages, obtainable from the G.H. Doran Company, New York, for five cents, is quite enough to damn Germany, past all forgiveness, from now to the end of Time. It is entitled "The Horrors of Aleppo. Seen by a German Eyewitness," and it is "A Word to Germany's Accredited Representatives, by Dr. Martin Niepage, Higher Grade Teacher in the German Technical School at Aleppo." The enormous extent, and the extreme savagery, of the slaughter of Armenian Christians by the Turkish allies of Germany literally stagger the imagination and sicken the heart. The mind can scarcely grasp the idea of men, women and children being massacred en masse, in 1916, literally by the thousand! But let me quote a few lines of strictly German testimony: Page 14. "It is utterly erroneous to think that the Turkish government will refrain of its own accord even from the destruction of the women and children unless the strongest pressure is exerted by the German government. Only just before I left Aleppo last May (1916) the crowds of exiles encamped at Ras-el-Ain on the Bagdad Railway, estimated at 20,000 women and children, were slaughtered to the last one." Page 11. "Many more appalling things were reported by the engineer of the Bagdad Railway ... or by German travelers who met the convoys of exiles on their journeys. Many of these gentlemen had seen such appalling sights they could eat nothing for days. One of them, Herr Grief, of Aleppo, reported corpses of violated women lying about naked in heaps on the railway embankment at Tel-Abiad and Ras-el-Ain. Another, Herr Spiecker, of Aleppo, had seen Turks tie Armenian men together, fire several volleys of small shot with fowling pieces into the human mass, and go off laughing while their victims slowly perished in frightful convulsions. "The German Consul from Mosul related, in my presence, at the German Club at Aleppo, that in many places on the road from Mosul to Aleppo he had seen children's hands hacked off in such numbers that one could have paved the road with them.... The Arabs of the village declared that they had killed the Armenians by the Government's (Young Turks) orders." —And so forth, and so on, until you are sick! Thus do the "Young Turks" of Turkey (on whom may all the curses of Allah alight) who are determined to Turkify all Asia Minor. Thus have 1,500,000 Christians perished, at the hands of Germany's ally,—an ally absolutely under German control, and without one protest or prohibition from the arch-criminals of Potsdam and Berlin. And this under "our dear, good, kind Emperor" William! The crimes of Germany were not committed by the officers of the Army or the Navy, or of the State, alone. They were perpetrated partly by the common people of Germany, as represented by the fathers, sons and husbands making up the army and the navy. The officers are not alone to blame. Therefore, the curses of mankind, and the punishment of the ages, should fall and will fall upon all the Germans of Germany, and their children unto the tenth generation. To them the Germans of to-day will bequeath a vast legacy of world scorn and world aversion. Americans should be the last people on earth to talk to outraged England, France, Russia and Servia of "magnanimous" terms to Germany, and peace "without annexations or indemnities." Germany must Pay for her war and her crimes. III. The Punishment of Germany. Without stopping to give any serious thought to the matter, some people assert, "You cannot punish a nation." If not, why not? Ask a student of history, and he will tell you, without hesitation, "Decidedly, yes. Ever since the days of Sodom and Gomorrah, countless tribes, cities, states and nations have been soundly punished for their crimes." To-morrow, or soon after, Germany, the arch-criminal of nations, will be up before the bar of Christian Civilization for sentence. In courts of justice it is customary to review the criminal record of the accused before judgment is pronounced. It is now a case of Germany to the bar, to face her police record. Guilty nations are no more immune from punishment for their crimes than are individuals guilty of high crimes. By their acts the German people now are heaping up dire punishment for themselves. The world is losing, with tremendous rapidity, its original and totally erroneous impression that "the German people" are innocent of the crimes that have been committed under the German uniform and the black-vulture flag. The mental attitude of President Wilson as it was expressed in his message to Congress as late as April 2, 1917, is not the mental attitude to-day of the American people at large. He said: "We have no quarrel with the German people. We have no feeling towards them but of sympathy and friendship. It was not upon their impulse that their government acted in entering upon this war." All the world outside of Germany now knows full well that Kaiser Wilhelm, representing the whole German people, is the man who started the war, who keeps it going, and who brought the war's consequences upon Germany. He pressed the button, with the united and enthusiastic approval of "the German people." It is an undeniable fact that from the very beginning until now the people of Germany have gloried and exulted in the war, and steadily have acclaimed the ruthless leaders who have directed it,—Wilhelm, Bissing, Hindenberg, Tirpitz and Zeppelin. In spite of all their losses and miseries, even to-day the "German people" are absolutely devoted to the Kaiser, and cheerfully swallow all the lies that his cabinet and the Reichstag hand out to them. Why should even one American deceive himself about the millions of Germans who are at heart as mean and as cruel as Tirpitz and Zeppelin? Remember that German women hawk and spit in the faces of heroes who happen to be their prisoners! There is much idle talk in newspaper correspondence about "unrest in Germany," and a "demand for a change." All that empty talk is only an effort to throw dust into the eyes of the world, and deceive the enemies of Germany. There has been no change of heart at Berlin, and there never will be. Beyond a doubt, Arthur S. Draper is absolutely right when he assures us that the German people are devoted to the Kaiser and kaiserism, and that under no circumstances will Wilhelm and the Hohenzollerns be kicked off the throne. Mr. Draper says that even if a change is made, it will be to a "constitutional monarchy" under the Kaiser; which we know would be no change whatsoever! We know what Germany will be like under the Chinless Hero (?) of Verdun. Americans must now be very careful not to fool themselves in measuring out sympathy for "the German people"; for every particle of it will be wickedly misplaced. At least let us not make ourselves a laughing-stock for Hans and Gretchen. With all due regard for our war President, we respectfully claim that in the minds of many millions of Americans both his premises and his conclusions are wrong. Once,—three full years ago,—many Americans (like ourselves) felt sympathy for "the German people"; but by outrage upon outrage the fact has been driven home to Americans that all such sympathy is utterly misplaced. The official publications of the war have opened our eyes. The great mass of the German people are guilty of an unprovoked war, and of wholesale and retail murder, rape, destruction and tortures unparalleled even among the lowest savages of modern times. For forty years the swell-headed pan-germanists and the odious Junkers deliberately have educated the German people into this fearful war of attempted conquest. The millions of Germany smilingly kow-towed to the war lords and approved colossal annual expenditures in preparing for this very war! The man who says that the conquest of France and England was not ardently desired and deliberately planned by "the German people" is very ignorant of current history. Excepting a few Socialists, all Germany was ready "to the last gaiter button" on August 1, 1914, and feverishly eager for the war to begin! Was the great Kiel Canal built for commercial purposes? Not on your life! Every German knows that it was built as a means for the vanquishment of England on the sea; and one German friend who claims much inside knowledge has solemnly assured me that Germany had long intended to strike France and England just as soon as the Canal was finished. Never in the history of the world was any war ever planned and developed through so long a period, or with such loving pains and thoroughness, as Germany's present war. Its construction covered thirty years, and throughout that period German newspapers, lectures, books and speeches were full of it. It was taught to the children of Germany, for at least twenty years. For at least ten years the officers of the German navy had been drinking to "Der Tag,"—"The Day" when they would attack the British navy and crush it. Bismarck was a very shrewd statesman, as well as a ruthless conquestador and a changer of telegrams. But he left Germany in peace and friendship with England and Russia, while William the Egotist, hungry to be the boss of all Europe, promptly estranged both. William alone created the Triple Entente! Outside the British Army and Navy, there were practically no British statesmen who realized the real trend of Germany's ambitions. That is why the outbreak found England without a powerful army. Let no American think for a moment that the press and the people of Germany were ignorant of what was coming, or opposed to it. The whole nation, Socialists and all, had become afflicted with acute megalomania, and a real elephantiasis of egotism. They thought that by being sufficiently prepared, and sufficiently treacherous and cruel, they could bring all Europe under the German heel, to toil forever in the German yoke. To-day even the German Socialists support Kaiserism; and while they vociferously are shouting for "peace," remember that they wish only a German-made peace that will leave Germany in the saddle! Let all other Socialists make due note of this. |
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