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?