GIFT OF /-/ }n> iA.R 1319 No. II Second Ed if ion. GERMANY'S IMPENDING DOOM Another Open Letter to Herr Maximilian Harden PROM Sir Isidore Spielmann, C.M.G., F.S.A. With Four Cartoons specially drawn by HUGH THOMSON. Germany's War Aims. h of August, 1918. GERMANY'S IMPENDING DOOM Another Open Letter to Herr Maximilian Harden FROM Sir Isidore Spielmann, C.M.G., F.S.A. WITH FOUR CARTOONS SPECIALLY DRAWN BY HUGH THOMSON. CONTENTS. PAGE Germany's " World-wide Offensive " - 4 Germany's Spurious " Peace Offensive " - 6 Germany's " Ambassadors 9 Offensive " - 10 Germany's "Religious Offensive" ; the Piety of the Hun - - 13 Germany's " Frightf ulness Offensive"- - 17 Germany's " Lie Offensive"- - 24 Germany's * Love Offensive " -27 Germany's w Trade Offensive " - 32 Germany's Punishment - 35 4th of August, 1918. i [Copies of Sir Isidore Spielmann's First Letter to Herr Maximilian Harden (August, 1917), " The Germans as Others See Them," may still be had without charge for propaganda purposes upon application to the Author.] 23 room. jV .SirS'u "GOTT MIT TTNS " ; OR, Till? SPIDERS AND THE GERMANY'S IMPENDING DOOM ANOTHER OPEN LETTER TO HERR MAXIMILIAN HARDEN. 56 Westbourne Terrace, London. 4th of August, 1918. SIR, I am glad to think that my last open letter reached you, and that you have acted upon some of the suggestions which were conveyed in it. At the same time, I regret that your reward for telling your countrymen the truth has been that your paper, Die Zukunft, and your public lectures are frequently suppressed. It is, however, gratifying to know that, unlike the unfortunate Liebknecht and others, you still enjoy liberty of the person. It is often said here and in France that yours is a " voice crying in the wilderness" that few of your people give ear to it ; and that they are seemingly indifferent to your crushing indictment of your Government and its methods. If, however, they are still constitutionally unable to appreciate the difference between Right and Wrong, and between Right and Might, they cannot but be influenced eventually if you, ' Herr Harden, continue your efforts, supported as you now are by Prince Lichnowsky with his revelations, as well as by Dr. Wilhelm Miihlon and one or two others. Now is the time that the German people urgently need the lead of such honest men as they still have. They should be pressed to realise that your former Ambassador to England publicly endorses the Allies' contention that " Germany insisted upon War " if I may quote his words when they, the Allies, were doing all in their power to preserve the world's peace. You should continue to warn them against the fables officially invented and cunningly exploited, and repeated with parrot-like persistency by the German and Austrian Press : " We were attacked, and were forced to defend ourselves against our world-enemies " ; " We were compelled to wage a defensive War." As I asked you in my last letter : How can your countrymen believe that four totally unprepared countries could possibly " attack " Germany and Austria, who were well known to be armed to the teeth not only fully prepared for War, but able to crush any military combination against them ? GERMANY'S "WORLD- WIDE OFFENSIVE": Germany versus the World. A few changes have occurred in the general situation since the date of my last letter. Russia and Rumania have fallen out of the War and other nations have come in. Twenty-six Countries are now against you. They comprise three-fourths, if not seven- eighths, of the Civilised World ! France, Great Britain,* the United States, Italy, Belgium, Portugal, Greece, Japan, China, Brazil, Serbia, Montenegro, Cuba, Panama, Siam, Liberia, Guatemala, Bolivia, Honduras, Nicaragua, Hayti, San Domingo, Costa Rica, Peru, Uruguay, and Ecuador are all either at war with Germany or have broken off diplomatic relations with her. If Germany believes that Might is Right here she will recognise the Might and not less the Right of numbers. Your statesmen, when referring to your " struggle against the world," and to your having " a whole world of enemies," are invariably careful to ignore the reason of it. Germany's " world of enemies " has been made in Germany, by Germany, and by Germany only : the reason being that the World decrees that Right shall triumph over Might over Germany's aggression and over her " Destructive Sword." In making war upon the World, Germany does not hesitate to slaughter one portion of her subjects and starve the other for the reason that, as she thinks, there is booty in sight. So long as she can plunder, and take forcibly what she wants from others, she cares little or nothing for human suffering even for the suffering of her own people. Your Kaiser, with his Austrian vassal-colleague and his military disciples, seeks to alter the settled order of the Universe without further interference. * Including her Dominions and Colonies. 5 GERMANY'S SPURIOUS "PEACE OFFENSIVE " The Tragedy of Russia and Rumania. In referring to -Russia in my last letter I said that your Chancellor hoped by a few hard blows, accompanied by Bismarckian trickery to be able to lure her into " an honourable peace." Russia is now out of the War, mainly through your Treachery and Corruption Depart- ment. The " peace " treaty is, however, already " a scrap of paper," and Russia is now being exploited for Germany's benefit. Germany's agents and traitors had introduced dry rot into every corner of Russia. At their instigation the Bolshevists deliberately destroyed their Army, rendered their Navy useless, and generally played the German game. Into the web the Germans spun your two cunning spiders von Kuhlmann and Ludendorff enticed the two foolish flies, Lenin and Trotsky. They walked into your parlour, with the result that the spiders are now sucking life-blood " according to plan." " Beware of the cunning Kiihlmann," wrote Mr. Gerard when United States Ambassador to Germany ! But Russia has already been cheated of her peace, Herr Harden ; and ruined Russia has brought about the ruin of Rumania. Both countries are being exploited for the benefit of the Fatherland for which purpose, among .others, Germany went to War. The Entente say that peace-treaties such as these they cannot, and will not, acknowledge ; and that the peace conditions to be dictated by them will eventually deprive Germany of her ill-gotten gains in both countries. The lesson of Brest-Litovsk has not been thrown away on us. The whole world has taken note of it ; in a way is grateful for it and the Russians themselves are learning the bitterness of it. They now realise that they have thrown off the oppressive Autocracy of their Czar only, thanks to your honourable peace, to assume the yoke of the crushingly rapacious Autocracy of Prussia. Your writers are already boasting that Germany has destroyed Russia and has seized her principal resources, and this is now confirmed by M. Kerensky and by M. Boris Savinkof, the Min- ister of War in the Kerensky Administration, who adds, significantly, that " Lenin returned to Russia via Berlin " ! It is a fact that Germany started with Rasputin, and continued with Lenin's demoralising campaign. There is pro- bably nothing less creditable in the history of Prussia's traditional perfidy. Had Russia continued to perform her share in the War the positions would now be reversed, and Germany would have been lying prostrate at Russia's feet. Before the betrayal, and while Russia was fighting, Germany was singing a very humble tune. She will sing that tune again. Your articles, Herr Harden, upon the hypocrisy of German policy generally, as exemplified by that of your new Chancellor, Count Hertling, have been reproduced by the Times, and have been read with widespread attention here. We have smiled at the Chancellor's invitation to the Allies "to a discussion in an intimate gather- ing which could alone lead to an understanding." The Allies are not to be tricked as he has tricked and cheated Russia. Being neither agents nor dupes, their statesmen will not follow Lenin and Trotsky into the German web. Germany will not succeed at her old separation game of playing off one Ally against the other. Every belligerent henceforward knows Germany's peace pro- posals for insincere, for " the terror of terrors." The " peace " between the Central Powers and Russia and Rumania has been extorted by fraud as well as by Germany's " mailed fist." Such a " peace," which is no peace, we say, cannot last. Nor should it. Count Hertling has recently said, no doubt owing to Germany's increasing difficulties, " that he is willing to examine with scrupulous care any peace proposals the Allies may in all sincerity place before him." The burglar is willing to treat with those he has burgled, if they approach him in what he considers to be "the right spirit." Is it not time, Herr Harden, that an end should be made of this Reichstag fooling, seeing that everyone knows its exact value ? We shall begin to believe in Germany's sincere desire for peace negotiations when Belgium has been cleared and full compensation made. The reverse suffered by Italy was due quite as much to your spurious peace propaganda as to " Germany's sharp sword " perhaps more so. No one knows better than you that your Agents sowed the seeds of treachery by propaganda in the Russian Army. By similar methods they seduced a section of the Italian Army, and so brought about the Italian reverse at Caporetto, whereby the Kaiser was enabled to proclaim " brilliant victories " for his incomparable troops. Pray note the sequel, Herr Harden. When two British airmen, Lieutenant Schaltz and 8 Lieutenant Wookey, were shot down at Cambrai they were charged by the Germans with dropping leaflets behind their lines, and were sentenced by a German court-martial to ten years' penal servitude. Yet they, too, were acting in the interests of an honourable peace, but by straight- forward methods. The world now knows that a German peace means the retention, "by agreement," of what Ger- many has temporarily secured by theft and fraud. Your Government has made desperate attempts to secure such agreements through (a) your Socialists, (b) the Vatican, (c) your unhappy catspaw Austria-Hungary, and (d) even through their friends Lenin and Trotsky. It relies much upon bribery and intrigue. One of our news- papers has stated that your Government officials " show themselves such shameless liars that they will find difficulty in getting themselves believed even if they should speak the truth." Even so, Herr Harden ; Prussian "diplomacy" is now a byword among the nations. Herr David and others, in the Reichstag, openly recognised that confidence in German peace policy has been shaken to its foundations. Your Junkers declare that " We Germans don't care what the World thinks of us." That, surely, is the bravado of the irreclaimable criminal. Your Kaiser in his speeches says he wishes to live in friendship and at peace with neighbouring peoples " but first of all the victory of German arms must be recognised." "It must be a peace of the sort required by the German Empire." That can never be. No friendship for him so long as he lives ; no respect for him when he is dead. Your Majority Socialists change their opinions according to the course of the War. At one time they are doing your Government's work in endeavouring to capture the Allied Socialists at Peace Conferences. When things are going well for Germany they talk of " indemnities," when they go ill they talk of peace and " no annexations." The hypocrisy is duly recognised by the International Socialists, as coming from their Kaiser's humble and obedient henchmen. The German people no doubt are longing for peace; so are the people of the Entente Countries. But the Germans are never going to have peace on their own terms. The sooner your people recognise that simple fact the better for them. THE GERMAN "AMBASSADORS' OFFENSIVE " Even your Ambassadors appear to act as dutifully for your Corruption and Treachery Department as for your Foreign Office, for we find most of them actually scheming against the security of the States to which they are accredited. We even find them associated with Anarchists, with murderers, and other criminals, in Countries which were, or still are, neutral. In America, at a time when Germany and the United States were at peace, Count Bernstorff, with the assistance of Dumba, von Papen, and Boy-Ed, conducted himself in a way that would disgrace anyone save a German diplomat. In Spain Prince Ratibor associated with anarchists and plotted against the King and encouraged revolution, affecting, when discovered, that he did not know the true character of the celebrated Anarchist Pascual ! The successful efforts of Count Luxburg to sink neutral merchant 10 ships " without a trace " resulted in his being expelled from Argentina. How is it that your Ambassadors and your mailed-fist representatives and agents so often meet a violent end ? Herr Kesseler was sent on a plunder-mission to China. He was murdered and Germany secured Kiau-chau. Rasputin also was murdered but he had succeeded in sowing Germany's corruption-seed in Russia. Mirbach was sent to gather the fruit Rasputin had sown. He, too, was murdered but Germany has secured, though only temporarily, the plunder she coveted in Russia. Von Eichhorn has met a like fate at Kieff, and your Government is now pondering on the blood-money. By engaging in criminal conspiracies, your Ministers in Sweden, Norway, Switzerland. Brazil, and elsewhere have piled up discredit upon your country. There is, however, one exception PRINCE LICHNOWSKY. In any country governed by the honest representatives of a free people, the disclosures of your Ambassador to Great Britain would have been almost sufficient to end the War. But as your people have no voice in the government of your Country, and your Autocrat and his puppets and disciples do with it as it pleases them, the Lichnowsky Disclosures will probably only end in the punishment of the man who had the temerity to be honest, unless you, Herr Harden, and others can rouse your people in his defence.* For well we know, as you know, * Since writing the above we hear that Prince L,ichnowsky has been expelled from the Prussian Upper House. Quite right it is no place for him. II that truth in Germany at the present time is " streng verboten." Your people should be made to understand the chief points in his Disclosures, as they strike us especially those referring to the Allies' efforts in favour of peace and to Germany's insistence upon War. He says : f< We pressed for War." " Berlin insisted that Serbia must be massacred." " Germany insisted upon War." " We declared War on Russia, and we deliber- ately destroyed the possibility of a peaceful settlement." " In view of these indisputable facts, it is not surprising that the whole civilised world outside Germany attributes to us the sole guilt for the World-War." The chief comment of our Press on this Confession, Herr Harden, is briefly : " It is the blackest story of devilry in the world's history. What has Germany to say of it ? " Her reply so far is similar to that of Austria, when the veracity of her Emperor's letter to Prince Sixte of Bourbon was questioned, viz., " Our blows on the Western Front will reply." A truly characteristic German answer ! The " mailed fist," and nothing but the " mailed fist," striking straight into the mouth of Truth ! as preached by the Emperor William. Accordingly, Germany made War upon Russia and, through Russia, upon the World with indecent haste, for fear of losing so good a chance. There is now no shadow of doubt that Germany deliberately planned this War, and intentionally 12 forced it on Europe as a war of German aggression; and after your people have for nearly four years been told that England was the cause of it, her own Ambassador to England pricks the bubble. He is supported by Dr. Miihlon, the former Krupp Director, whose indictment is equally strong, as well as by Herr von Jago w, the Imperial Foreign Secretary, by Herr Helfferich, and even by Count Reventlow and Professor Scheier- mann. They all agree that the guilt of Germany is proved up to the hilt, and German history will endorse their evidence. Dr. Miihlon adds : " The German people will not be able to repair the grievous crimes committed against its own present and future, and against that of Europe and the whole human race, until it is represented by different men with a different mentality." Herr von Jagow, who at first encouraged malignant and most pernicious lies about England, now bears witness to " England's love of peace and her serious wish to avoid war." Do not your ears tingle, Herr Harden, as you hear the scalding words afresh ? As Bismarck forged a telegram in 1870 to make the War with France inevitable, so in 1914 Germany determined to force France into War by demanding the " loan " of Toul and Verdun Fortresses as a proof of her neutrality a request which she knew would not be entertained. GERMANY'S " RELIGIOUS OFFENSIVE." The Piety of the Hun. Those of us who are old enough to remember the Franco-Prussian War in 1870 will recollect 13 the pious war-telegrams habitually sent by the King of Prussia, William I., to Queen Augusta at Coblentz or Berlin. In them he, somewhat unnecessarily it was thought (in view of the tenor of his private life), invariably introduced Almighty God to share in his successes in the War which he and his scheming Chancellor Bismarck fraudulently planned against France. His grandson, your accomplished actor William II., apes his grandfather but carries blasphemy much farther. And no one in pious Germany protests ! He tells your people that they have in God " an unconditional and avowed ally in this War upon whom they can safely rely/' That he is himself " hand-in-hand with the good old German God," and that in the other he carries " Germany's Destructive Sword." " On- ward with God to fresh deeds," he proclaims. Alas ! what deeds ? Further slaughter of his people to satisfy his personal ambition ? the further ravishing of Belgium and her women- folk ? the renewed devastation of France ? the continued sinking " without a trace " of peaceful merchant ships of all nations ? the foundering of hospital ships, the drowning of wounded soldiers and nurses on the high seas ? securing by theft and fraud plunder for the Fatherland ? In these " fresh deeds " your Imperial paragon claims God as his co-partner ! Does no one in Germany see the horrible humour of it ? Herr Harden, we have learnt in what the piety of the Hun consists, and we know that your War-Lord is a faithful exponent of it. In his revolting statements we hear " the devil quoting Scripture," and we know, too, that the hypocrisy is nothing but an attempt, though a clumsy, theatrical, and a tho- 14 roughly Prussian one, to bleach his blackened character and gild his infamous deeds. As with your Kaiser so it is with the vast majority of your countrymen. " Gott mit uns " is the Prussian motto ; your people are ever repeating it even while they commit or acclaim their most appalling cruelties. The world knows the value of the " pious " Prussian. It is like the Turkish assassin who, having committed a successful murder, casts up his eyes and exclaims devoutly, " How great is Allah ! " The victories of your armies on the battlefield are attributed to the special protection of the " good old German God." And their defeats ? Let me carry you back, Herr Harden, to the first Battle of the Maine. Your armies, fully prepared and armed to the teeth, had hacked their way (according to plan) through innocent neutral Belgium, and in their mad rush through northern France were well on the road to Paris and Calais. They were met by the armies of France, Belgium and Great Britain, all unready and absolutely unprepared for such an onslaught even as they were also unprepared for War. Yet these armies held up your German hosts in the first flush of their success ; they barred the way to their, further progress and drove them back to the Maine ! Do you believe in miracles, Herr Harden ? If not, how do you account for that remarkable triumph of the Allies over your War-Lord's " incomparable troops " ? They were stopped, defeated and driven back ! Was that also the will of the " good old German God " ? May not the Allies claim that it was the 15 will of their God, the great God of the Universe who wills that Right shall triumph over Might ? Wait a little, just a little longer, and see where His Hand will fall. Then will the Universal God have spoken. But it is not yet. The Kaiser as the " Prince of Peace." Your Kaiser, with one of his two voices, is boasting once again that he kept the peace since he came to the throne, viz., for twenty-five years. If true, that is no great virtue, as you will admit, Herr Harden, for his plans were not matured ; what he has done has been to abstain from war until he was quite ready for it. There was no discontinuation of the German policy at least in intention and aim which engineered the war with France in 1870. You may remember that I asked you in my last letter : " How can your Kaiser, who has, as you know, and as all the world knows, a unique and vulgar appetite for self-advertisement, recon- cile his assumed peace-loving tendencies with his everlasting references to the ' Mailed Fist ' of Germany, to his ' Destructive Sword/ and to himself as the ' Knight in Shining Armour ' ? Is this the talk of a man of peace ? He poses as the Angel of Peace while behaving as the Bully of Europe." His recent utterances are even more amazing and startling. He now says, " We Germans will preserve our conception of Christian duty towards the ill and wounded ; we will so wage war that we may be able to recall with a clear conscience and without remorse every day and every act of these hard times." The good German conscience is, as we have reason to know, very elastic, but having regard 16 to the fiendish cruelties practised by your people with his knowledge ever since the War began, on the battlefield and towards your prisoners and civilians, villainies and rascalities which are known to the whole world, one is inclined to ask, after reading this outburst, whether your Kaiser is really mad or whether it is the transparent effort of a self-convicted man. Be that as it may, the declaration was immedi- ately followed by the torpedoing of Hospital Ships and the bombing of Field Hospitals. Of course, we ought to have recognised the claim as a natural introduction to these acts ; but although we should have expected it, each separate deed, when it was perpetrated, filled us and the thrilled world with horror. Oh, the Christian duty and the clear conscience of the German Kaiser ! And not a single abject German Professor to show by philosophy, logic, or scientific deduc- tion that the Imperial view was in any way abnormal ! GERMANY'S " FRIGHTFULNESS OFFENSIVE." A Record of German Crime. In my last letter I asked why, at the bidding of ONE MAN your War- Lord your people, and the people of other nations, should be slaughtered in their millions, and why your countrymen in the mass still approve of brute force only ; why they support the German Government's policy of brutality and treachery. As- to these questions no reply has yet ap- peared, it can be inferred only that Germany is the old Germany still or, rather, is an enlarged synthetised Prussia. On the contrary, as the War proceeds, the Germans show more than 17 ever their utter lack of mercy, of magnanimity, of chivalry, or of the observance of the inter- national rules of warfare hitherto accepted by all civilised nations. Germany disregards them in token of triumphant superiority. Bombing Hospitals. Particulars have lately reached us of one of the foulest deeds the Germans have yet been guilty of in their long list of outrages the riotous onslaught on the Red Cross. Upon our vast Hospitals, far away from the battle area, they have again deliberately dropped a number of powerful bombs, killing in cold blood helpless wounded soldiers and the devoted nurses and doctors in attendance upon them. They then raked the tents and huts with machine-gun fire ! What words are there, Herr Harden, in which to describe to you what public opinion outside Germany says of this last exhibition of German crime ? They recognise in it the conscience and Christian duty of your leader a supreme achievement. What more is to be said ? * Do you still manage to see the British and the Foreign newspapers ? If so, you are aware that this is what is being written of your country- men. Pray let them hear a specimen of it : " This is one of the most horrible episodes of the War, rivalling the sinking of hospital ships or the Lmitania, and as damning of German character and ways of thought as the murder of Miss Cavell or the blackguardly treatment of helpless British prisoners. It is one more of those things by which the Germans proclaim * The German excuse is that they tried to bomb a railway siding in the vicinity of the hospital. If so, why did they use their machine-guns ? 18 themselves as lepers outside the pale of civilised nationalities. It is impossible not to wonder when the Germans will awake to the extent to which they are crystallising the world's contempt and hatred of them as a people." Torturing Prisoners. You in Germany continue to treat your defenceless prisoners with cowardly brutality. Are you not aware, Herr Harden, that our prisoners in your hands would starve were it not for the food we send them from here ? When has such a thing occurred before in civilised warfare ? Are you aware that your people having charge of them continue to be guilty of monstrous and unprecedented acts of cruelty to these men who have been fighting honourably for their country ? Can you not raise your voice on their behalf for your own sake if not for theirs ? The mass of evidence of German cruelties to your prisoners exists in voluminous testimonies that cannot be gainsaid, British, French, Belgian, and American. From the latter, letters have come already, saying that the writers " wish they were lying in American cemeteries rather than suffer the cruelties and the indignities heaped upon them by the Germans." They are forced by bayonet-thrusts to work behind the German lines and do forced labour in the mines. Even your friends the Turks treat their prisoners better than you do. But then, they have no Kultur. In my opinion there is Prussian method in the treatment of your prisoners, for in the event of exchanges of prisoners Germany will receive back healthy Germans from us, while we shall 19 get the wrecks of British prisoners, completely broken in health and spirit, and not only useless to us in the War, but useless even in peace. The mark of the Kaiser will be upon them. The foulness of it ! I repeat, Herr Harden, that by the whole outside world the Germans are now branded as specialists in crime and experts in cruelty. Sinking Ships. You have recently celebrated Lusitania day as a victory, when your submarine drowned, on false pretences, 1,500 defenceless civilians men, women, and children, largely neutrals. For that deed of German gallantry the Captain of the submarine received the Iron Cross, and we have copies of the medals you have struck to com- memorate the deed which for all time will cry out to Heaven. In my former letter I asked why your U-Boat Commanders do not exercise their undoubted " right of search " if your suspicions are genuine that our Hospital Ships carry munitions or soldiers. But Germany prefers hastily to indulge her lust for slaughter, lest the humane precept of International Law might make her hold her hand. You continue to sink Hospital Ships and drown wounded soldiers and Red Cross nurses. You occasionally pretend they are sunk by mines or by accidents, but pieces of your German torpedoes proclaim the truth to any who could doubt. You have attacked four British Hospital Ships already this year, the last being the Llandovery Castle. This ship, with 234 doctors, nurses, and crew, was sent down on June 27th, and is the last of eight Hospital Ships you 20 Iltifli Thomson del. " GOTT MIT UNS " ; OR GERMAN KUI/TUR. Rk^sr *%* ' W x MIT UNS " ; OR GERMAN KUI^TUR. Germans have attacked in cold blood. Of these six were sunk without warning. Your U-Boat Commander torpedoed the vessel first and made enquiry of the English Captain (one of the twenty-four survivors) afterwards. It was a simple device to secure a victim. There is only one way to reply to ruthlessness of this kind : it is to place German officer prisoners of high rank in each British Hospital Ship. Your own papers have reported that Berlin crowds surrounded batches of British, French, Belgian, and Italian prisoners cleaning the streets of Berlin, and insulted, hissed, spat upon them, and beat them. " There was no inter- ference by the authorities to protect them," said your papers. What are your feelings, Herr Harden, as you read these words ? Your Government has not lifted a little finger to prevent your friends the Turks from continuing their massacres of the Armenians, massacres at which Germans have actually connived ! Your deputy, Herr Haase, said in the Reichstag : " Soul-stirring appeals for help from the Armenians against the brutal violence of the Turks, who are striving for their complete extinction, passed unheeded by Germany." Your cruelties in France and in Belgium which I have already enumerated are still being practised. Poison Gases. It is universally recognised that when Germany contemplates some fresh barbarity she usually seeks to justify herself in advance by charging her foes with crimes similar to those which her 21 own unaided genius has just invented a menda- cious perversion of facts too transparent to be believed by anyone but your deluded countrymen. In this way she charged the Allies, in 1915, with using poisonous gas-shells at the Front, solely because she was herself about to use them. (The poison gas was one of her well-kept secrets, from which she expected, and indeed realised, so much.) Your civilians are now being advised by your authorities to take special precautions against our airmen's use of poison gas upon them, so that we can but think, from past experience, that your airmen will now commit this additional crime upon our non-combatants. The latest charge is that we use soft-nosed bullets. Woe to your soldiers, Herr Harden, if your High Command acts upon their lie by way of pretended " reprisals " ! Air Raids. In similar fashion your authorities are now impudently stating that the Allies were the first to bomb open towns. The Cologne Gazette has the almost incredible audacity to say that " Germany did not begin aerial attacks in this war " ! No greater German lie was ever told than this. The Berlin Lokalanzeiger says that Germany indulges in town-bombing by way of " reprisals," and that their answer will be " two blows for one." The facts are these, Herr Harden. The Germans were the first air raiders by a very long time ; and before England was able to retaliate your airmen had it all their own way. Going back to the early Zeppelin days, England had no airships or aeroplanes with which to meet their attacks. I have myself been a witness 22 to the bombing and destruction of peaceful English villages when not even an anti-aircraft gun had been set up for their protection. As you know, it was only after much deliberation and discussion here that it was decided to engage in " reprisals," and attack German towns in retaliation. The only difference is that we confine our attacks to works of military importance; whilst your airmen drop bombs promiscuously even intentionally on hospitals as on civilians. Our new policy, Herr Harden, has been to retaliate with vigour, and, as we expected, we find that Reprisals pay. Now that we hold the advantage, and give as good as we get, your Press is shrieking hysterically about " the barbarity of the English." It threatens us with two blows for one. We shall reply, without any doubt, with four blows to your two, and when the American airmen participate it may even be eight of our blows to your threatened two. German hysteria fearsome screams and whimpering will avail you nothing. You will see Berlin bombed. They have taught us that the only way of dealing with Ger- mans, and especially with Prussians, is to act like Germans. It is degrading, no doubt, but you force the horror upon us. " Each fresh addition to the pile of Prussian crime and hypocrisy, each time that London, Paris, or Venice is raided, each time that a Hospital is bombed or a Hospital ship is sunk, our belief is that the only way to put a stop to it and end the war is by a decisive military victory, and this decision grows stronger instead of weaker." You remember the English- man Shakespeare ? ' The villany you teach me I will execute, and it shall go hard but I will better the instruction." Your Press occasionally endeavours to wriggle out of the world's condemnation of Prussian atrocities, but the facts remain. Thousands of books record them in every language and in every country of the civilised world. And they will be taught in schools. The Germans are regarded outside Germany as the most bloodthirsty nation the World has known, and their Kaiser the greatest criminal. Some of your best-known writers have declared their satisfaction at being termed " barbarians." Germany's dry-rot surpasses that of Russia. One day the tinder will catch fire. And then .Y.I Of this you may be sure. The cruelties of Germany and her treatment of Russia have destroyed any seeds of a serious " peace offen- sive " that may have taken root here. GERMANY'S "LIE OFFENSIVE." Lie Upon Lie. It appears, Herr Harden, that as your statesmen cannot run the risk of depressing your people still further by telling them any un- palatable truth, they systematically lie to them a policy, indeed, which they have pursued from the beginning of the War : They first said that "the Central Powers were attacked," and had to defend themselves. That was false. To justify their violation of Belgian territory, they said " the French were about to march their armies through Belgium to attack Germany." That was false. 24 Germany made a promise to defend Belgium. That was false. Germany proceeded instead to violate her and intentionally to ruin her, but gave a promise of compensation for " the wrong she was about to do." That was false. Germany, in order to annul this promise, said that Belgium's neutrality was not genuine. That was false. Germany, when about to use poison gases, affirmed that the Allies were the first to use them ; and after she had been bombing " open towns " with impunity for nearly two years she said the Allies were the first to do so. Both statements were false. After sinking the Lusitania without exercising her " right of search," Germany pretended justification, and said the ship was a " cruiser," and had munitions on board. Both statements were false. Similarly with Hospital Ships full of wounded soldiers, nurses, etc. ; Germany sank them at sight, and said they carried munitions.* That was false. Germany, in order to justify her brutal treat- ment of prisoners, says that German prisoners are similarly treated by us. That is false. Germany gave an undertaking to keep her unarmed English prisoners from the firing-line. The undertaking was false. * The Spanish Government has certified that our Hospital Ships sail in a perfectly correct manner, exclusively for the transport of sick and wounded. 25 Germany gave her undertaking to conform to the agreement with Russia at Brest-Litovsk that there should be "no annexations and no in- demnities." The undertaking was false. Germany gave her undertaking at Brest- Litovsk not to transfer her troops from the Eastern to the Western Front. The undertaking was false. Count Hertling said, on the twelfth of July last : " Wilson and the Allies want war until we are destroyed." That is false. Your people are told to believe that the whole World is against you because it is jealous of your " Kultur," your prosperity and your virtues. That, Herr Harden, is the greatest lie of all. What a charge-sheet against your country, Herr Harden ! We have noted the statement of the Frank- furter Zeitung of the seventeenth of July : " The world must come to the conclusion that the German political system is a system of false- hood." And the remark of Herr Scheidemann in the Reichstag : " Let us make an end of the system of lying and try an offensive hitherto unattempted, the offensive of Truth." I would remark, Herr Harden, upon the monstrous yet futile feature in your Foreign Office the establishment of a " Tu Quoque " de- partment. Its object is obviously to charge the Allies with the cruelties, the War-aims and other foul things of which Germany herself is convicted and proved guilty, so as to excuse her own crimes 26 and thereby to call quits. Here is a fair example of it : In his speech on the I5th June the Kaiser said : " Either the German principles of Right, Freedom, Honour and Morality must be upheld, or the Anglo-Saxon principles with the idolatry of mammon must be victorious." The Kaiser has here repeated a sentence in a speech of an English statesman by the childish artifice of interchanging the words German and Anglo- Saxon. GERMANY'S "LOVE OFFENSIVE." Your Kaiser has recently been saying that Germany's most ardent desire and his own burning wish is to live in peace with his neigh- bours, for whom he entertains feelings of real affection and regard. All that he asks is that they should respect Germany's necessities, mili- tary, political, and economical. This she demands from her friends and foes alike, holding her de- mands to be most reasonable, because Germany is Germany. " We Germans are the salt of the earth," and those who oppose us will forfeit our love and feel the " German sharp sword," which, he says, in the same breath, " shall always be kept sharp." The constant allusions to the sharp sword are merely reminders of Germany's neighbourly love. On what kind of " neighbourly terms " has Germany lived during the last fifty years, bullying her neighbours and browbeating them upon every possible occasion in true Prussian style ? In 1864 Prussia wanted Schleswig- 27 Holstein from Denmark. She did not allow neigh- bourly affection to stand in the way, but made war upon her and took it. Do the Danes feel any neighbourly love for Germany to-day ? In 1866 Prussia made war upon her neighbour Austria in order to obtain German supremacy. Does Austria really love Germany to-day ? In 1870 Prussia provoked war with France in order to obtain supremacy and secure the French provinces of Alsace and Lorraine. Has any neighbourly feeling in consequence been promoted between the two countries during the last 48 years ? In 1914 Germany wished to fly quickly at the throat of France once more, but she did not permit her neighbourly friendship with neutral Belgium, whom she had promised to protect, to stand in the way either : she proceeded to ruin her little neighbour wickedly and inten- tionally. The little Duchy of Luxemburg is even now in full enjoyment of German neighbourly friendship : Heavens ! how she is enjoying it and how she loves you ! Count Hertling tells us that all that Germany wants is that Belgium should live with her in good and friendly relations after the war. Can you doubt that she will regard you for ever with any feelings but loathing, detestation and con- tempt beyond the power of words to express, almost beyond the power of feelings to record ? As President Wilson says, " The blind rulers of Prussia have aroused forces they knew little of, forces which once roused can never be crushed they are deathless." Upon what terms has Germany lived with England ? 28 I have already reminded you that the Kaiser, the Crown Prince and your statesmen have care- fully and coldly fostered the doctrine of hate of England in Germany for many years past in school and college not less than in the Services, in prepara- tion for " The Day." It has been part of their policy as of their training and education. In this connection did not your Imperial Chancellor, Count von Biilow, go out of his way to insult the British Army in South Africa as far back as 1902 ? And do you not remember the spirited reply of Joseph Chamberlain which astonished the bully von Billow ? Yet Chamberlain did not retract ; on the contrary he retorted in words that have become historical : " What I have said, I have said. I withdraw nothing. I qualify nothing. I defend nothing. . . . I make allowances for foreign criticism. I will not follow the example that has been set me. I do not want to give lessons to a Foreign Minister and I will not accept any at his hands." Before the War, when Germany was giving play to her "neighbourly affection," she referred to our Volunteer Army as " an Army of mercenaries/' When England entered the War she referred to it as "a contemptible little Army." Now that England has Conscription, as in Germany, she sympathetically grieves for " England's sacrifice of liberty." So all countries that have the misfortune to be Germany's neighbours, basking in the warmth of her affection and regard, have either been the victims of her brutality or live in continual fear of her embraces. Yet your War-Lord, in his comic role of " Prince of Peace," is always graciously pleased to offer a bloodstained hand of brotherhood to his neigh- bours, and even to his enemies, after his wars with them wars outrageously devised and foully conducted. Who do you think will grasp that hand, Herr Harden ? The very suggestion he makes has been received by the countries of the world either with shouts of laughter or with the amazement which the audacity evokes. But your Kaiser has not suf- ficient humour to know what a buffoon he makes of himself in the eyes of the world, and the ridicule very naturally reflects upon his subjects. As a nation, you Germans afford an entertaining psychological study, sometimes a puzzle, too often absurd. You may know the saying that " an un whipped dog knows not how to behave." Mr. Rudyard Kipling tells us that "God created humanity and the Germans " ; this distinction is the pitiful measure of your unfortunate educa- tion and worse training. No wonder you have no word for " gentleman " in the German language. For generations your people have, as I have said, been born, weaned, and trained in the principles of Prussian militarism the lowest and most insolent school in the world conceivable. They have been taught that their highest aim in life is to cringe and ill-treat and fight and kill and profit by it. This teaching is peculiar to Germany. It accounts for your Kaiser, your statesmen, your professors, and even your clergy being the bloodthirsty crew they show themselves to be. Until this system of 30 education is changed at its very root no im- provement is to be expected, and yours will really be a voice crying in the wilderness. That change of education, the result of a new and higher conviction, can only come from a defeat of the German arms, and that we must all pray for, not for our sakes alone. I have told you, with plain directness, what is thought here of your Kaiser's " most ardent desire/' Now I would ask you to note what Germany's Allies are saying on this subject. Bulgaria and Turkey, contending for their share of plunder, each charges Germany with breach of faith. In the Hungarian Parliament, Herr Sandor, Chairman of the National Association of Mer- chants, said on June i8th : " The Germans have a queer notion of loyalty. They lay hands on the property of their own ally. They do not fulfil their treaty obligations. They do not act in a friendly way towards us. They were mostly responsible for the hostilities with Serbia," etc., etc. This speech was frequently interrupted by cries such as " They have robbed Transylvania and sucked it dry." So the Austrians charge their ally with breaking her promises in respect to foodstuffs and attribute their state of semi-starvation to her. This is the neighbourly love Germany has for her own dear allies. Please watch the sequel, Herr Harden, when Germany comes to square accounts with them ! Germany must understand that her spurious " Love Offensive " raises our gorge. If possible, it embitters our hatred. Do not think I exag- gerate ; do not hope that I speak for the minority. If there are many who believe that Hell itself is situate in Berlin, it is Germany who instilled that enlightened faith. GERMANY'S "TRADE OFFENSIVE." Germany's Punishment. You must take it for certain, Herr Harden, that Germany will lose the War, and it is as well that you should warn your countrymen of the fact. The final blows will be dealt by the Allied Armies in the West in conjunction with the vast American forces now arriving. Even were the German troops to reach Paris and the Channel Ports, in what way would Germany be better off or nearer peace than she is now ? The Allies would still continue the war on land as well as on sea. If all the Allied armies had to retire or were completely beaten an unthinkable possibility how could the Central Powers be triumphant when all the powerful Navies of the world are arrayed against them ? Do your people think that Germany, Austria or Turkey can send a single ship to sea while the all-powerful combined fleets of Great Britain, France, and the United States, Italy, Japan, and Brazil are in existence ? Do they expect the German and Austrian Navies to beat them ? Do they imagine that the Central Powers can long exist without the use of their Mercantile Marine ? Do they think it possible that the Central Powers can successfully engage in the commerce 32 of the World with the money-markets of the richest countries Great Britain, America, and France combined against them ? Do your people think that the Central Powers can compete successfully with the combined resources of the Allied Powers ? Do they think that they will recover the trade which they have lost with the twenty-five countries at war with you or who have severed relations with you, regarding you as they do ? Do they imagine that, even in the absence of an official economic boycott of Germany and all things German, your " trade offensive " can succeed when the very name of Germany stinks in the world's nostrils and will never again be heard without a shudder for generation; to come ? Do you think they will suffer German products or manufactures to be in their houses, whether you cut prices or not ? Do your countrymen really think that " peace conditions " can compel unwilling and resentful peoples to have trade relations with them again ? Do they realise that your Attila and his Govern- ment must, by their conduct of this war, reap the punishment they have so recklessly brought upon themselves, by being ostracised commercially as well as socially ? Do they realise that no country will trust Germany or Germany's word again ; and that all equally pray for her defeat ? Herr Harden, you, being different from most Germans, will agree that Honour is of greater consequence than commercial success- 33 When a man is convicted of fraud he is despised and ostracised, his riches and his muscular strength avail him nothing. So it is with nations. For commercial advantages and for plunder Germany did not hesitate by fraud and crime to plunge the World into the most terrible of all wars at the complete and final sacrifice of her German honour. She does not hesitate to sacrifice all in order to satisfy the personal ambition of her Hohenzollerns and secure commercial advantages and plunder for the Fatherland. History will record the total absence of all principles of honour and the absolute indifference which Germans have for Germany's good name. Germany has not even now declared her War aims ; she has so far wriggled out of replying to the question and stubbornly refuses to an- nounce them, as we have declared ours. Why ? Because her aims are elastic and she intends to loot what and where she is able. Her " sharp sword " is to hack its way through the rights of others, and her " trade offensive " and her "" trade policy " are to follow in the wake. Official action has been taken here which must hit Germany very hard after the War. She will no longer get her raw materials which she has hitherto had from Great Britain and her Domin- ions, and Germany's dyes, etc., are no longer to come here. But the unofficial action of the peoples themselves will tell quite as severely on Germany's pocket, in the recesses of which her honour dwells. Germany's greatest punishment, after the War, will be that her " trade offensive," except with her friends the Turks and Bulgarians, and perhaps her friends the Bolshevists 34 " GOTT MIT UNS " ; OR, GERMANY'S WAR AIMS. if any survive all on a par in the ethical scale, will have proved an utter failure, and will remain a failure. Her commercial agents, should they come here, will find they are not wanted. They will, in all likelihood, see in every shop-window in Great Britain, France, Belgium, Italy, the United States, and in other countries, " No German goods sold here," " No Germans need apply." That is the certain result of this German- planned War. If Germany fears one thing more than another, it is the economic result of this War. The very natural feeling of revenge on the part of Ger- many's enemies is intensely strong, and is likely to remain so. It is a plant of powerful growth, and will continue to flourish as Germany's outrages have grown, for Germany planted the seed with her own hands and watered it with innocent blood. This sentiment Germany cannot live down. No peace stipulations and no "peace offensive " on her part can possibly efface the memory of her actions. It cannot be suppressed, and she may well fear the result. To-day we enter upon the fifth year of the German-made War, and we find Germany's diffi- culties and those of her allies accumulating ; but however long the War may last, you may rest assured, Herr Harden, that Germany's punishment is as certain as that of her Kaiser. Germany will be defeated. She will find her honour gone, her former prosperity melted away, her trade lost, her industries ruined, and the German name a byword among the nations. Your Kaiser, unable to face the ruin he has 35 brought about, will have to make way for a more sane and a more civilised ruler and Government- It is for you to find enough honest and capable men in Germany proper for the task. Until that day dawns, keep your motto, " Gott mit uns " ; for the just God will not quit you until you have tasted of Divine retribution, for ' Vengeance is mine, saith the Lord." Yours, etc., ISIDORE SPIELMANN. POSTSCRIPT. You may perhaps wonder why I address these " Open Letters " to you why I engage in Anti- German propaganda. It is because, with the rest of the rightly-informed world, I hold your Kaiser and his Govern- ment personally responsible for the death of hundreds of thousands millions, alas ! of the Youth of four Contin- ents, sacrificed to your nation's ambitions, in the springtime of their days. It is because I regard your Kaiser as my own son's murderer, the cynical author of the world's misery and sorrow and ruin, as these have been recklessly flung broadcast over the earth to-day. It is because I seek to assist in the enlightenment of their dupes and in the exposure of the knaves, that your people may learn where and on whom to fix the blame. May this small ray, added to the flood of the light of truth now being shed by the universal conscience and reason of man, help to pierce the smoke-screen of falsehood by which your Rulers and their fellows have sought to obscure alike their appalling crime and the baseness of its motive ! W. Speaight & Sons. Ltd.. Printers. Fetter Lane, London. B.C. 4. NOV 30 B j, D 21-100m-7,'40(6936B) 392684 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LIBRARY