THE CONSPIRATORS' TASK
The terrain--Lower New York--The consulates--The economic problem
of supplying Germany and checking supplies to the Allies--The
diplomatic problem of keeping America's friendship--The military
problem in Canada, Mexico, India, etc.--Germany's denial.
The playwright selects from the affairs of a group of people a few
characters and incidents, and works them together into a three-hour
plot. He may include no matter which is not relevant to the development
of his story, and although in the hands of the artist the play seems
to pierce clearly into the characters of the persons involved, in
reality he is constructing a framework, whose angles are only the more
prominent salients of character and episode. The stage limits him,
whether his story takes place in the kitchen or on the battlefield.
The drama of German spy operations in America is of baffling
proportions. Its curtain rose long before the war; its early episodes
were grave enough to have caused, any one of them, a nine-days' wonder
in the press, its climax was rather a huge accumulation of intolerable
disasters than a single outstanding incident, and its dénouement
continued long after America's declaration of war. In the previous
chapter we have accepted our limitations and introduced only the four
chief characters of the play. It is necessary, in describing the
motives for their enterprises, to appreciate the problems which their
scene of operations presented.
The world was their workshop. Plots hatched in Berlin and developed in
Washington and New York bore fruit from Sweden to India, from Canada to
Chili. The economic importance of the United States in the war needs
no further proof than its vast area, its miles of seacoast, its volume
of export and import, and its producing power. As a diplomatic problem
it offered, among other things, a public opinion of a hundred million
people of parti-colored temperament, played upon by a force of some
40,000 publications. As a military factor, the United States possessed
a strong fleet, owned the only Atlantic-Pacific waterway, was bounded
on the south by Mexico and the coveted Gulf, and on the north by one of
Germany's enemies. There was hardly a developed section of the nation
which did not require prompt and radical German attention, or one
which did not receive it in proportion to its industrial development.
Washington, as the governmental capital, and New York as the real
capital became at once the headquarters of German operations in the
western world.
Count von Bernstorff directed all enterprises from the Imperial Embassy
in Washington, and from the Ritz-Carlton in New York. An ambassador
was once asked by an ingenuous woman at a New York dinner whether he
often ran counter of European spies. "Oh, yes," he replied. "I used to
stop at the ----, but my baggage was searched by German agents so often
that I moved to the ----. But there it was just as bad." "Didn't you
complain to the management?"--the lady wanted particulars. "No," the
diplomat answered naturally, "for you see every time Bernstorff stops
at the ---- I have his baggage searched, too!"
The strands of intrigue focussed from every corner of America upon
the lower tip of Manhattan. In a tall building at 11 Broadway, which
towers over Bowling Green and confronts the New York Custom House,
Captain Boy-Ed had his office. A long stone's throw to the northward
stood the Hamburg-American building; there Dr. Albert carried on much
of his business. Captain von Papen had offices on the twenty-fifth
floor of No. 60 Wall Street. If we regard 11 Broadway as the tip of
a triangle, with Wall Street and Broadway forming its right angle and
60 Wall Street as its other extremity, we find that its imaginary
hypotenuse travels through the building of J. P. Morgan & Company,
chief bankers for the Allies; through the New York Stock Exchange,
where the so-called "Christmas leak" turned a pretty penny for
certain German sympathizers in 1916; through the home of the Standard
Oil Companies, as well as through several great structures of less
strategic importance. There is more than mere coincidence in this
geometrical freak--Germany held her stethoscope as close as possible to
the heart of American business. Fortunately, however, the offices of
Chief William J. Flynn--until January, 1918, head of the United States
Secret Service--were in the Custom House near by.
After business hours these men met their subordinates at various
rendezvous in the city; the hotels were convenient, the Manhattan was
frequently appointed, and the Deutscher Verein at 112 Central Park
South was the liveliest ganglion of all the nerve centers of a system
of communication which tapped every section of the great community.
[Illustration: _Copyright, International Film Service_
William J. Flynn, chief of the United States Secret Service until 1918,
who led the hunt of the German spy]
In the lesser cities the German consulate served as the nucleus
for the organization. That in San Francisco is conspicuous for its
activity, for it prosecuted its own warfare on the entire Pacific
coast. Wherever it was necessary German sympathizers furnished
accommodations for offices and storage room. Headquarters of every
character dotted the country from salons to saloons, from skyscrapers
to cellars, each an active control in the manipulation of Germany's
almost innumerable enterprises.
Those enterprises may be best outlined perhaps, by recalling the three
phases of warfare which Germany had to pursue. America had shipped
foodstuffs and raw materials in enormous quantities for many years to
Germany. Dr. Albert must see to it that she continue to do so. The
Imperial funds were at his disposal. He had already the requisite
contact with American business. But let him also exert his utmost
influence upon America to stop supplying the Allies. If he could do it
alone, so much the better; if not, he was at liberty to call upon the
military and naval attachés. But in any case "food and arms for Germany
and none for the Allies" was the economic war-cry.
American supplies must be purchased for Germany and shipped through
the European neutral nations, running the blockade. If capital
proved obstinate and the Allies covered the market, it would be well
to remember that labor produced supplies; labor must therefore be
prevented from producing or shipping to the Allies. If labor refused to
be interfered with, the cargoes should be destroyed.
His enormous task would depend, of course, very much upon the turn of
affairs diplomatic. The State Department must be kept amicable. The
Glad Hand was to be extended to official America, while the Mailed Fist
thrashed about in official America's constituencies. Thus also with
Congress, through influential lobbying or the pressure of constituents.
Count von Bernstorff knew that the shout raised in a far-off state by a
few well-rehearsed pacifists, reinforced by a few newspaper comments,
would carry loud and clear to Washington. Upon his shoulders rested
the entire existence of the German plan, and he spent a highly active
and trying thirty months in Washington in an attempt to avoid the
inevitable diplomatic rupture.
The military problem quickly resolved itself into two enterprises:
carrying war to the enemy, and giving aid and comfort to its own
forces--in this case the German navy. As the war progressed, and the
opportunity for strictly military operations became less likely, the
two Captains occupied their time in injecting a quite military flavor
into the enterprises Bernstorff and Albert had on foot. As a strategic
measure Mexico must divert America's attention from Europe and remove
to the border her available forces. Meanwhile, German reservists
must be supplied to their home regiments. Failing that they must be
mobilized for service against Germany's nearest enemy here--Canada.
German raiders at sea must be supplied. German communication with her
military forces abroad must be maintained uninterrupted.
Long after the departure of the principals for their native land the
enterprises persisted. It may be well here to extend to the secret
agents of the United States the tribute which is their due. To Chief
Flynn, of the United States Secret Service of the Treasury Department,
to A. Bruce Bielaski, head of the special agents of the Department of
Justice, to W. M. Offley, former Superintendent of the New York Bureau
of Special Agents, to Roger B. Wood, Assistant United States District
Attorney, to his successor, John C. Knox, (now a Federal judge), to
Raymond B. Sarfaty, Mr. Wood's assistant who developed the Rintelen
case, to former Police Commissioner Arthur Woods of New York, his
deputy, Guy Scull, his police captain, Thomas J. Tunney, and to the
men who worked obscurely and tirelessly with them to avert disasters
whose fiendish intention shook the faith if not the courage of a
nation. Those men found Germany out in time.
[Illustration: Inspector Thomas J. Tunney of the New York Police
Department, head of the "Bomb Squad" and foremost in apprehending many
important German agents]
Germany was fluent in her denials. When the President in his message
to Congress in December, 1915, bitterly attacked Germans and
German-Americans for their activities in America, accusing the latter
of treason, the German government authorized a statement to the Berlin
correspondent of the New York _Sun_ on December 19, 1915, to the effect
that it
"naturally has never knowingly accepted the support of any person,
group of persons, society or organization seeking to promote the
cause of Germany in the United States by illegal acts, by counsels
of violence, by contravention of law, or by any means whatever
that could offend the American people in the pride of their own
authority. If it should be alleged that improper acts have been
committed by representatives of the German Government they could
be easily dealt with. To any complaints upon proof as may be
submitted by the American Government suitable response will be
duly made.... Apparently the enemies of Germany have succeeded
in creating the impression that the German Government is in some
way, morally or otherwise, responsible for what Mr. Wilson has
characterized as anti-American activities, comprehending attacks
upon property in violation of the rules which the American
Government has seen fit to impose upon the course of neutral
trade. This the German Government absolutely denies. It cannot
specifically repudiate acts committed by individuals over whom it
has no control, and of whose movements it is neither officially
nor unofficially informed."
To this statement there is one outstanding answer. It is an excerpt
from the German book of instructions for officers:
"Bribery of the enemy's subjects with the object of obtaining
military advantages, acceptances of offers of treachery,
reception of deserters, utilization of the discontented elements
in the population, support of the pretenders and the like are
permissible; indeed international law is in no way opposed to
the exploitation of the crimes of third parties (assassination,
incendiarism, robbery and the like) to the prejudice of the enemy.
Considerations of chivalry, generosity and honor may denounce in
such cases a hasty and unsparing exploitation of such advantages
as indecent and dishonorable, but law, which is less touchy,
allows it. The ugly and inherently immoral aspect of such methods
cannot affect the recognition of their lawfulness. The necessary
aim of war gives the belligerent the right and imposes upon
him, according to circumstances, the duty not to let slip the
important, it may be decisive, advantages to be gained by such
means."
("The War Book of the German General Staff," translated by J. H.
Morgan, M.A., pp. 113-114.)