Growth of German Feeling Against the United States.

AMERICANS became victims of that hatred of Eng

land which dominates all classes in Germany the moment it became apparent that no modification of international law regulating the sale of arms to a belligerent would be accepted by our Department of State during the continuance of the struggle in Europe. This announcement was an immense relief to the British public; but it had the effect of inflaming German sentiment further, because the comments of London dailies on the whole subject were reproduced in the columns of their Berlin contemporaries. Whenever the London Times or the Manchester Guardian praised the fine impartiality of President Wilson, the utterance found its way into some organ of militarism like the Hamburger Nachrichten, which thereupon declared that many a German struck the table with his fist when he read such things. In course of time the reactionary organs began to ask what Doctor Bernhard Dernburg was doing as a conciliator of American public opinion. Another source of bewilderment to the German mind was occasioned by the technical form under which the German protest to the Washington government had been presented. While the German public writhed in its irritation, the British public was edified by this sort of comment in the London Telegraph:

"It may be assumed with confidence that this by no means hasty assertion of a plain point of the law of nations on the part of the United States Government will be denounced with bitterness in Germany. But it is long since it became impossible for any intelligent mind to attach importance to anything proceeding from that quarter on the subject of international obligations. It is no doubt as well recognized in America by this time as it is in Europe, that anything going against the interests of Germany is, to the mind of Berlin, 'contrary to international law,' and anything going in favor of it is unassailably correct. It so happens that the people of the United States are, to a greater extent perhaps than any other nation, interested in legalities; they are acute judges of the strength of arguments; and it is probable that the American mind has been almost as much revolted by the absurdity of German political utterances during this war as the American conscience has been appalled by the barbarism of German military acts. The two things taken together-both of them growing steadily more intolerable

395

A

Official Germany Becomes Unfriendly to this Country.

DIRECT connection can be traced in point of time between the declarations of our Department of State on the subject of neutrality and the adoption of a policy of hostility to Americans by German officialdom. That is, at least, the British impression. American military officers were withdrawn from Germany, according to the London Post, because this growing tension might have involved them in perilous complications. When Gifford Pinchot, altho an agent of the Department of State and employed in relief work in Belgium, was ordered out of that country by the German authorities, the British daily suggested that the Kaiser was showing his personal pique. Efforts were made in Washington official circles to deprecate all talk of friction with Berlin, but the effect upon our British contemporaries was not convincing. On the surface everything remained correct, altho confidential reports to Washington dwelt on the ill feeling of Germany towards this country. Little by little the tone of German press comment in Germany became less friendly until organs like the Kölnische Zeitung became openly antagonistic. On the other hand, more democratic dailies, and those not under official inspiration of one sort or another, like the Frankfurter Zeitung, for instance, altho regretting our conception of neutrality, insisted

the newspapers of Berlin and London. Intense was the indignation of the Kölnische Zeitung. The American is proud, it said, of having founded in the new world an empire free from the traditional burdens of old-world countries, a land in which the peace idea has struck root and borne fruit. He prays for peace. When he goes home from church he sends shot after shot to Europe that the murderous war there may not cease. Why? Just for the sake of money! Thus the indignant daily, said to be the mouthpiece of an influential element in the Wilhelmstrasse. Very good, continued the German daily. Germany has money. She can let America have it, provided our country will stop sending those muniments of war to ravaged Europe. What will it cost, America? Germany will pay. And while the German daily thus scorned us, the London Standard remarked:

"Germany is perfectly at liberty to purchase what she likes in America. The only difficulty is delivering the goods. As she has abdicated all claim to sea-power, she must pay the penalty. She cannot have her cake and eat it. The 'Admiral of the Atlantic' cannot sink to be the Admiral of the Kiel Canal and yet enjoy the freedom of the seas.

"Americans are truly neutral as long as they treat both sides alike in this matter. They would sell to Germany just as readily as they sell to England or France. But they cannot, while remaining neutral, actively assist Germany to warlike munitions or what is equivalent-refuse to sell to the Allies. The latter course would be, as Mr. Bryan says, a 'direct violation of the neutrality of the United States. The legal position is plain. Nor is the moral justification of the American attitude more obscure. A great deal of nonsense has been talked about making money out of instruments of destruction-nonsense nauseous enough when emitted by the sentimentalist, but incredibly sickening from the countrymen of Krupp. In point of fact, it would be a very grave thing if every neutral on the outbreak of war put a stop to the export of armaments. Many a nation rightly struggling to be free would have been enslaved had it had to rely solely on its own capacity to manufacture munitions of war. There could be no greater temptation to a powerful bully than the assurance that a small country which had neglected its own defense could in no circumstances get the means of waging war from outside its own borders.'

"Women aim at peace"; of course, they'll never hit it.-Washington Post.

The government of Great Britain thinks it can compromize with John Barleycorn. It can't. Nobody ever did.-Wichita Eagle.

GERMANY AND

GERMANY at this moment is described in the press

of the allies as an enormous garrison pent up within a vast area and closely besieged. That conception was set forth somewhat bluntly in a recent speech by the French Premier, M. Viviani. It explained, according to him, why time is on the side of the allies. German military experts favor the world with a totally different analysis, taking their cue from Emperor William's assurance to a Silesian regiment last month that the fatherland has so far been victorious. The allies have even lost at Ypres, altho there is the offset at Neuve Chapelle, where the British insist that a great victory has been achieved by themselves. The French think they have advanced towards Metz and the Germans

say they have won in Champagne. Russia is still confident of making an advance in Hungary; but the Germans tell us that they hold to-day a larger portion of Poland than ever, to say nothing of Belgium and the strip in northern France. Making every allowance for differences of standpoint in regard to details, the fact that Germany is now a besieged nation not only remains patent to the Paris Temps and the London Times, but forces itself more and more upon the neutral press of Europe. The discussion of the month has raged around the problems of breaking through the ring of fortifications and trenches. Can the allies hope ever to accomplish that? The task is the most stupendous ever attempted since men began to war.

Determination of the Allies

to Break Through Into Germany.

397

Where Germany is Weak in Her Defenses.

capacity of their armies to remain indefinitely behind the national defenses, defying the efforts of the allies to advance. The sacrifice of the allies in men would be as enormous as it would be futile, according to the Kreuz-Zeitung. Nevertheless those who have made a study of the German press within the past six weeks will notice a decided change of temper and of tone in regard to England. Columns of vituperation of England continue to fill the provincial dailies of the fatherland, it is true; but newspapers in the capital, especially if they are in touch with the solidly established bureaucratic element and the court circle, tend to modify the familiar gospel of hate. The new attitude causes comment in the neutral press, the Amsterdam Tyd, for instance, attributing it to a growing German conviction that separate peaces with France or with Russia would be futile even if possible. The thing is to settle with England. Nothing is allowed to leak out officially, says this Dutch commentator, which is known to have excellent sources of information regarding responsible German opinion; but it is a fact that statesmen in close touch with Emperor William have convinced him that the war will never end while Great Britain remains disposed to continue it. For some reason or other, his Majesty seems to think he can bring the British to the point of peace. He was never, we are invited to infer, more mistaken in his life.

German Ideas of the Basis of Peace.

WHEN official Berlin has received assurances of

British respect for the national existence of Germany and of the restoration of her colonial possessions,

she will come to terms with the allies. She will even, according to the best-informed Dutch dailies, give up Belgium, or at least she will "discuss" the subject. For the present she will let matters remain as they are on land, while asserting herself where practicable on the seas. Before long the allies will grow weary. This analysis of the German mood finds favor in the Rome Tribuna and in those conservative Italian dailies which deprecate the immediate entry of their country into the conflict. But all these considerations taken together, plausible as they may seem to Berlin, remain preposterous to the more or less inspired Paris press and they are openly scouted in the London Times and the London Post. "Does any one seriously suppose England will break off the encounter? Are the people of France capable of such folly? Is it conceivable that the Russians will throw up the sponge and admit that all their sacrifices have been in vain?" The questions are put by the careful London Spectator and answered by it in the negative. The judgment is endorsed by that of the military experts of the allies. Even if, explains the authority of the Paris Gaulois, the armed line which Germany has drawn around herself were twice its present strength, France, England and Russia would not dare come to terms of peace based upon things as they are. The allies must break through the lines from Belfort to the ocean at any cost, for they would pay more dearly in the future for not doing so than they would pay to-day by achieving the feat. Peace now, unless Germany surrenders all along the line, would, it thinks, be submission by the allies to the Kaiser.

the allies may have to wait some weeks before making an impression there, says the expert of the Paris Débats; but the collapse of Austria must leave Germany exposed to invasion. Because they are so well aware of this, the Germans are instigating the Turks to a furious resistance in the direction of Constantinople. Until the Sultan's capital falls, the pressure upon Austria may not be so severe. When that event drives Mahmoud V. into Asia, the Balkan powers must act, Italy will follow, Austria goes by the board and the Kaiser must look to his own southern frontiers. He must find two million additional men. He must dig hundreds of miles of fresh trenches. The German people may not credit these things, we read, but the allies feel convinced of them. They base their present hopes upon these considerations and for that reason peace is a strategical impossibility. Delusions respecting peace persist in the minds of those only who forget that war is a matter of strategy and tactics, we are told by the military expert in Paris. Financiers imagine that war can not be waged without them; but they are not indispensable, however important.

NE

German Ideas of the Basis Behind the Kaiser.

EWSPAPERS in Berlin might spare the world their reiterated assurances of the unity of the German people in this crisis of their fate, urges the London Post. Nobody doubts that unity, it says. "It is also true that Germany has considerable reserves of men and abundant supplies of food and ammunition. The fables of a starving Germany were merely meant to ings of experience and the facts of the situation, adds touch the kind heart of America." Despite the teachthe well-informed British daily, in close touch with the diplomacy of Europe at all times, there are still people who talk confidently of an early peace. One might imagine they had "a straight tip" from the German But the war will go on. Emperor himself. Not that Germany has done badly. The organ of the British aristocracy even concedes that so far Germany has been victorious, and that in England there is too confident a belief that the allies must win. The military situation is such that the allies must go on with the war for the simple reason that they want to exist as nations. The military situation must be altered radically before peace will be even in sight:

"The countries at war are playing high. Germany went to war with no less an aim than to dominate Europe, and through Europe the world. The destruction of France as a military Power was merely incidental to the greater design. The second step was to have been the destruction of England, which might have been accomplished with the resources of France and Flanders at Germany's command. . . . The scheme miscarried because it rested on the miscalculation that Britain would remain neutral, standing like the ox in the pen until the German butcher was ready for the work of slaughter. But altho the scheme has miscarried the end remains the same: the destruction of England. . . . This war is being fought by the British Empire for no less a cause than its own existence.

...

"Of France it may be said that she is determined to shed the last drop of her blood rather than remain under the terrible menace which has darkened the life of France for half a century. And to this end there can be no peace for

France without a rectification of frontier which will give our Ally back her provinces and their fortresses. As to Russia, she fights mainly for liberation from the Teutonic yoke for herself and her allied peoples. Russia desires also that stronger frontier which will make her secure from and independent of the German. Thus upon both sides there are great aims backed by tremendous passions: upon the one side the thirst for conquest, upon the other the instinct of self-preservation. It follows that this is no common war, but a fight to the death."

C1

A Suggested Starting Point for Peace. LING as he may to the idea that Great Britain went to war because she dreaded the commercial rivalry of his own country, the German imperial chancellor must ultimately revise his conception, according to the influential organ of Dutch Socialism,, Het Volk. The suppression of articles written for the Berlin Vorwärts has caused the Dutch daily to become the medium in Europe for the expression of German Socialist opinion, its views, in consequence, being widely quoted, especially on the subject of a possible early peace. The endeavor, persisted in by Germany despite all British effort at conciliation, to deprive Great Britain. of command of the sea was the true cause of that Anglo-German rivalry which is tearing civilization asunder, insists the Dutch newspaper. The way to peace is, therefore, not idle talk about holding this territory or that in Europe but a naval pact between these two great powers. Great Britain, it is urged, does not really fear German commercial rivalry, whatever Germans may think. That notion is refuted by the economic development of the last decade. Great Britain did very well side by side with German competition and had no reason to wish to destroy it. Moreover:

"The real origin of this Anglo-German feud is the rivalry respecting the fleets. The keenest economic competition would not have hindered an Anglo-German pact if Germany had not stretched out her hand towards Neptune's trident. Year in, year out, British statesmen have offered Germany an agreement on the subject of the building of warships, a mutual restriction of the expenditure of armaments. Nothing came of it, because Great Britain considered the status quo, her own undisputed superiority at sea, ast the basis of the agreement, while Germany was as firmly determined to upset it. As soon as Great Britain realized this, there could be no further thought of a lasting peace. . .

...

"The nation which made preparations for demolishing this command of the sea was hurrying with open eyes towards war. Great Britain considered that as an island state, with a colonial empire spread over every sea, her position in the world, her economic basis of existence, probably her entire independent existence, could be maintained only while she

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