Germany, The Next Republic? by Carl W. Ackerman

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Liebknecht's imprisonment was a lesson to other Socialist agitators.
The day after his sentencing was announced there were strikes in nearly
every ammunition factory in and around Berlin. Even at Spandau, next
to Essen the largest ammunition manufacturing city in Germany, several
thousand workmen left their benches as a protest, but the German people
have such terrible fear of the police and of their own military
organisation that they strike only a day and return the next to forget
about previous events.

If there were no other instances in Germany to indicate that there was
the nucleus for a democracy this would seem to be one. One might say,
too, that if such leaders as Liebknecht could be assisted, the movement
for more freedom might have more success.

It was very difficult for the German public to accept the German reply
to President Wilson's _Sussex_ note. The people were bitter against
the United States. They hated Wilson. They feared him. And the idea
of the German Government bending its knee to a man they hated was
enough cause for loud protests. This feeling among the people found
plenty of outlets. The submarine advocates, who always had their ears
to the ground, saw that they could take advantage of this public
feeling at the expense of the Chancellor and the Foreign Office.
Prince von Buelow, the former Chancellor, who had been spending most of
his time in Switzerland after his failure to keep Italy out of the war,
had written a book entitled "Deutsche Politik," which was intended to
be an indictment of von Bethmann-Hollweg's international policies. Von
Buelow returned to Berlin at the psychological moment and began to
mobilise the forces against the Chancellor.

[Illustration: Gott strafe England.]

After the _Sussex_ dispute was ended the Socialist organ _Vorwaerts_,
supported by Philip Scheidemann, leader of the majority of the
Socialists, demanded that the Government take some steps toward peace.
But the General Staff was so busy preparing for the expected Allied
offensive that it had no time to think about peace or about internal
questions. When von Falkenhayn resigned and von Hindenburg arrived at
Great Headquarters to succeed him the two generals met for the first
time in many months. (There was bitter feeling between the two.) Von
Falkenhayn, as he turned the office over to his successor, said:

"Has Your Excellency the courage to take over this position now?"

"I have always had the courage, Your Excellency," replied von
Hindenburg, "but not the soldiers."

In the Reichstag there has been only one real democratic party. That
is the Socialist. The National Liberal Party, which has posed as a
reform organisation, is in reality nothing more than the party
controlled by the ammunition and war industries. When these interests
heard that submarine warfare was to be so restricted as to be
practically negligible, they began to sow seeds of discontent among the
ammunition makers. These interests began to plan for the time when the
submarine warfare would again be discussed. Their first scheme was to
try to overthrow the Chancellor. If they were not successful then they
intended to take advantage of the democratic movement which was
spreading in Germany to compel the Government to consent to the
creation of a Reichstag Committee on Foreign Affairs to consult with
the Foreign Office when all questions of international policy,
including submarine warfare, was up for discussion. Their first policy
was tried early in July. Seizing that clause in the German note which
said that Germany would hold herself free to change her promises in the
_Sussex_ case if the United States was not successful against England,
the Navy began to threaten the United States with renewed submarine
warfare unless President Wilson acted against Great Britain.

Reporting some of these events on June 12th, the _Evening Ledger_ of
Philadelphia printed the following despatch which I sent:

"BERLIN, July 12.--The overthrow of Chancellor von Bethmann-Hollweg,
champion of a conciliatory policy toward the United States, and the
unloosing of German submarines within three months, was predicted by
von Tirpitz supporters here to-day unless President Wilson acts against
the British blockade.

"Members of the Conservative party and those favouring annexation of
territory conquered by Germany joined in the forecast. They said the
opinion of America will be disregarded.

"A private source, close to the Foreign Office, made this statement
regarding the attempt to unseat Bethmann-Hollweg at a time when the war
is approaching a crisis:

"'Unless America does something against England within the next three
months there will be a bitter fight against the Chancellor. One cannot
tell whether he will be able to hold his own against such opposition.
The future of German-American relations depends upon America.'

"Despite this political drive against the man who stood out against a
break with the United States in the _Lusitania_ crisis, Americans here
believe Bethmann-Hollweg will again emerge triumphant. They feel
certain that if the Chancellor appealed to the public for a decision he
would be supported.

"The fight to oust the Chancellor has now grown to such proportions
that it overshadows in interest the Allied offensive. The attacks on
the Chancellor have gradually grown bolder since the appearance of
Prince Buelow's book 'Deutsche Politik,' because this book is believed
to be the opening of Buelow's campaign to oust the Chancellor and step
back into the position he occupied until succeeded by Bethmann-Hollweg
in 1909.

"The movement has grown more forceful since the German answer to
President Wilson's ultimatum was sent. The Conservatives accepted the
German note as containing a conditional clause, and they have been
waiting to see what steps the United States would take against England.

"Within the past few days I have discussed the situation with leaders
of several parties in the Reichstag. A National Liberal member of the
Reichstag, who was formerly a supporter of von Tirpitz, and the von
Tirpitz submarine policies, said he thought Buelow's success showed
that opposition to America was not dead.

"'Who is going to be your next President--Wilson or Hughes?' he asked,
and then, without waiting for an answer, continued:

"'If it is Hughes he can be no worse than Wilson. The worst he can do
is to declare war on Germany and certainly that would be preferable to
the present American neutrality.

"'If this should happen every one in our navy would shout and throw up
his hat, for it would mean unlimited sea war against England. Our
present navy is held in a net of notes.

"'What do you think the United States could do? You could not raise an
army to help the Allies. You could confiscate our ships in American
ports, but if you tried to use them to carry supplies and munitions to
the Allies we would sink them.

"'Carrying on an unlimited submarine war, we could sink 600,000 tons of
shipping monthly, destroy the entire merchant fleets of the leading
powers, paralyse England and win the war. Then we would start all
over, build merchantmen faster than any nation, and regain our position
as a leading commercial power.'

"Friends of the Chancellor still hope that President Wilson will take a
strong stand against England, thereby greatly strengthening
Bethmann-Hollweg's position. At present the campaign against the
Chancellor is closely connected with internal policies of the
Conservatives and the big land owners. The latter are fighting
Bethmann-Hollweg because he promised the people, on behalf of the
Kaiser, the enactment of franchise reforms after the war."

Commenting on this despatch, the New York _World_ said:

"Not long ago it was the fashion among the opponents of the
Administration to jeer loudly at the impotent writing of notes. And
even among the supporters of the Administration there grew an uneasy
feeling that we had had notes _ad nauseam_.

"Yet these plodding and undramatic notes arouse in Germany a feeling
very different from one of ridicule. The resentful respect for our
notes is there admirably summed up by a member of the Reichstag who to
the correspondent of the United Press exclaimed bitterly: 'Our present
navy is held in a net of notes.'

"Nets may not be so spectacular as knuckle-dusters, but they are
slightly more civilised and generally more efficient."

The National Liberal Reichstag member who was quoted was Dr. Gustav
Stressemann. Stressemann is one of the worst reactionaries in Germany
but he likes to pose as a progressive. He was one of the first men to
suggest that the Reichstag form a committee on foreign relations to
consult with and have equal power of decision with the Foreign Office.

For a great many months the Socialist deputies of the Prussian Diet
have been demanding election reforms. Their demands were so insistent
that over a year ago the Chancellor, when he read the Kaiser's address
from the throne room in the residence palace in Berlin to the deputies,
promised election reforms in Prussia--after the war. But during last
summer the Socialists began to demand immediate election reforms. To
further embarrass the Chancellor and the Government, the National
Liberals made the same demands, knowing all the time that if the
Government ever attempted it, they could swing the Reichstag majority
against the proposal by technicalities.

Throughout the summer months the Government could not hush up the
incessant discussion of war aims. More than one newspaper was
suppressed for demanding peace or for demanding a statement of the
Government's position in regard to Belgium and Northern France. The
peace movement within Germany grew by leaps and bounds. The Socialists
demanded immediate action by the Government. The Conservatives, the
National Liberals and the Catholic party wanted peace but only the kind
of a peace which Germany could force upon the Entente. The Chancellor
and other German leaders tried again throughout the summer and fall to
get the outside world interested in peace but at this time the English
and French attacks on the Somme were engaging the attention and the
resources of the whole world.

Before these conflicting movements within Germany can be understood one
must know something of the organisation of Germany in war time.

When the military leaders of Germany saw that the possibility of
capturing Paris or of destroying London was small and that a German
victory, which would fasten Teutonic peace terms on the rest of the
world, was almost impossible, they turned their eyes to
Austria-Hungary, Bulgaria, the Balkans and Turkey. Friederich Naumann,
member of the Progressive Party of the Reichstag, wrote a book on
"Central Europe," describing a great nation stretching from the North
Sea to Bagdad, including Germany, all of Austria-Hungary, parts of
Serbia and Roumania and Turkey, with Berlin as the Capital. It was
toward this goal which the Kaiser turned the forces of Germany at his
command. If Germany could not rule the world, if Germany could not
conquer the nine nations which the Director of the Post and Telegraph
had lined up on the 2nd of August, 1914, then Germany could at least
conquer the Dual Monarchy, the Balkans and, Turkey, and even under
these circumstances come out of the war a greater nation than she
entered it. But to accomplish this purpose one thing had to be
assured. That was the control of the armies and navies and the foreign
policies of these governments. The old Kaiser Franz Josef was a man
who guarded everything he had as jealously as a baby guards his toys.
At one time when it was suggested to the aged monarch that Germany and
Austria-Hungary could establish a great kingdom of Poland as a buffer
nation, if he would only give up Galicia as one of the states of this
kingdom, he replied in his childish fashion:

"What, those Prussians want to take another pearl out of my crown?"

In June the Austro-Hungarian General Staff conducted an offensive
against Italy in the Trentino with more success than the Germans had
anticipated. But the Austrians had not calculated upon Russia. In
July General Brusiloff attacked the Austrian forces in the
neighbourhood of Lusk, succeeded in persuading or bribing a Bohemian
army corps to desert and started through the Austrian positions like a
flood over sloping land. Brusiloff not only took several hundred
thousand prisoners. He not only broke clear through the Austrian lines
but he thoroughly demoralised and destroyed the Austrian army as a unit
in the world war. Von Hindenburg, who had been made Chief of the
German General Staff, was compelled to send thousands of troops to the
Wohlynian battlefields to stop the Russian invasion. But von
Hindenburg did not look with any degree of satisfaction upon the
possibility of such a thing happening again and informed the Kaiser
that he would continue as Chief of the General Staff only upon
condition that he be made chief of all armies allied to Germany. At a
Conference at Great Headquarters at Pless, in Silicia, where offices
were moved from France as soon as the Field Marshal took charge,
Hindenburg was made the leader of all the armed forces in Central
Europe. Thus by one stroke, really by the aid of Russia, Germany
succeeded in conquering Austria-Hungary and in taking away from her
command all of the forces, naval and military, which she had. At the
same time the Bulgarian and Turkish armies were placed at the disposal
of von Hindenburg. So far so good for the Prussians.

But there were still some independent forces left within the Central
Powers. Hungary was not content to do the bidding of Prussia.
Hungarians were not ready to live under orders from Berlin. Even as
late as a few months ago when the German Minister of the Interior
called a conference in Berlin to mobilise all the food within the
Central Powers, the Hungarians refused to join a scheme which would rob
them of food they had jealously guarded and saved since the beginning
of the war.

In the Dual Monarchy there are many freedom loving people who are
longing for a deliverer. Hungary at one time feared Russia but only
because of the Czar. The real and most powerful democratic force among
the Teutonic allies is located there in Budapest. I know of no city
outside of the United States where the people have such love of freedom
and where public opinion plays such a big role. Budapest, even in war
times, is one of the most delightful cities in Europe and Hungary, even
as late as last December, was not contaminated by Prussian ideas. I
saw Russian prisoners of war walking through the streets and mingling
with the Hungarian soldiers and people. American Consul General Coffin
informed me that there were seven thousand Allied subjects in Budapest
who were undisturbed. English and French are much more popular than
Germans. One day on my first visit in Budapest I asked a policeman in
front of the Hotel Ritz in German, "Where is the Reichstag?" He shook
his head and went on about his business regulating the traffic at the
street corner. Then I asked him half in English and half in French
where the Parliament was.

With a broad smile he said: "Ah, Monsieur, voila, this street your
right, vis a vis." Not a word of German would he speak.

After the Allied offensive began on the Somme the old friends of von
Tirpitz, assisted by Prince von Buelow, started an offensive against
the Chancellor, with renewed vigour. This time they were determined to
oust him at all costs. They sent emissaries to the Rhine Valley, which
is dominated by the Krupp ammunition factories. These emissaries began
by attacking the Chancellor's attitude towards the United States. They
pointed out that Germany could not possibly win the war unless she
defeated England, and it was easy for any German to see that the only
way England could be attacked was from the seas; that as long as
England had her fleet or her merchant ships she could continue the war
and continue to supply the Allies. It was pointed out to the
ammunition makers, also, that they were already fighting the United
States; that the United States was sending such enormous supplies to
the Entente, that unless the submarines were used to stop these
supplies Germany would most certainly be defeated on land. And, it was
explained that a defeat on land meant not only the defeat of the German
army but the defeat of the ammunition interests.

From April to December, 1916, was also the period of pamphleteering.
Every one who could write a pamphlet, or could publish one, did so.
The censorship had prohibited so many people and so many organisations
from expressing their views publicly that they chose this method of
circulating their ideas privately. The pamphlets could be printed
secretly and distributed through the mails so as to avoid both the
censors and the Government. So every one in Germany began to receive
documents and pamphlets about all the ails and complaints within
Germany. About the only people who did not do this were the
Socialists. The "Alt-Deutsch Verband," which was an organisation of
the great industrial leaders of Germany, had been bitterly attacked by
the Berlin _Tageblatt_ but when the directors wanted to publish their
reply the censors prohibited it. So, the Alt-Deutsch Verband issued a
pamphlet and sent it broadcast throughout Germany. In the meantime the
Chancellor and the Government realised that unless something was done
to combat these secret forces which were undermining the Government's
influence, that there would be an eruption in Germany which might
produce serious results.

Throughout this time the Socialist party was having troubles of its
own. Liebknecht was in prison but there was a little group of radicals
who had not forgotten it. They wanted the Socialist party as a whole
to do something to free Liebknecht. The party had been split before
the advance of last summer so efforts were made to unite the two
factions. At a well attended conference in the Reichstag building they
agreed to forget old differences and join forces in support of the
Government until winter, when it was hoped peace could be made.

The Socialist party at various times during the war has had a difficult
time in agreeing on government measures. While the Socialists voted
unanimously for war credits at the beginning, a year afterward many of
them had changed their minds and had begun to wonder whether, after
all, they had not made a mistake. This was the issue which brought
about the first split in the Socialists' ranks. When it came time in
1916 to vote further credits to the Government the Socialists held a
caucus. After three days of bitter wrangling the ranks split. One
group headed by Scheidemann decided to support the Government and
another group with Herr Wolfgang Heine as the leader, decided to vote
against the war loans.

Scheidemann, who is the most capable and most powerful Socialist in
Germany, carried with him the majority of the delegates and was
supported by the greater part of public opinion. Heine, however, had
the support of men like Dr. Haase and Eduard Bernstein who had
considerable influence with the public but who were not organisers or
men capable of aggressive action, like Scheidemann. As far as
affecting the Government's plans were concerned the Socialist split did
not amount to much. In Germany there is such a widespread fear of the
Government and the police that even the most radical Socialists
hesitate to oppose the Government. In war time Germany is under
complete control of the military authorities and even the Reichstag,
which is supposed to be a legislative body, is in reality during war
times only a closed corporation which does the bidding of the
Government. The attitude of the Reichstag on any question is not
determined at the party caucuses nor during sessions. Important
decisions are always arrived at at Great Headquarters between the
Chancellor and the military leaders. Then the Chancellor returns to
Berlin, summons the party leaders to his palace, explains what the
Government desires and, without asking the leaders for their support,
tells them _that_ is what _von Hindenburg_ expects. They know there is
no choice left to them. Scheidemann always attends these conferences
as the Socialist representative because the Chancellor has never
recognised the so-called Socialist Labour Party which is made up of
Socialist radicals who want peace and who have reached the point when
they can no longer support the Government.

One night at the invitation of an editor of one of Berlin's leading
newspapers, who is a Socialist radical, I attended a secret session of
the Socialist Labour Party. At this meeting there were present three
members of the Reichstag, the President of one of Germany's leading
business organisations, two newspaper editors, one labour agitator who
had been travelling to industrial centres to mobilise the forces which
were opposed to a continuation of the war, and a rather well known
Socialist writer who had been inspiring some anti-Government pamphlets
which were printed in Switzerland and sent by mail to Germany. One of
the business men present had had an audience of the Kaiser and he
reported what the monarch told him about the possibilities of peace.
The report was rather encouraging to the Socialists because the Kaiser
said he would make peace as soon as there was an opportunity. But
these Socialists did not have much faith in the Kaiser's promises and
jokingly asked the business man if the Kaiser did not decorate him as a
result of the audience!

The real object of this meeting was to discuss means of acquainting the
German people with the American organisation entitled the League to
Enforce Peace. An American business man, who was a charter member of
the American organisation, was there to explain the purposes of the
League. The meeting decided upon the publication in as many German
newspapers as possible of explanatory articles. The newspaper editor
present promised to prepare them and urged their publication in various
journals. The first article appeared in _Die Welt Am Montag_, one of
the weekly newspapers of Berlin. It was copied by a number of
progressive newspapers throughout the Empire but when the attention of
the military and naval authorities was called to this propaganda an
order was issued prohibiting any newspaper from making any reference to
the League to Enforce Peace. The anti-American editorial writers were
inspired to write brief notices to the effect that the League was in
reality to be a League against Germany supported by England and the
United States.

Throughout the summer and fall there appeared in various newspapers,
including the influential _Frankfurter Zeitung_, inspired articles
about the possibilities of annexing the industrial centres and
important harbours of Belgium. In Munich and Leipsic a book by Dr.
Schumacher, of Bonn University, was published, entitled, "Antwerp, Its
World Position and Importance for Germany's Economic Life." Another
writer named Ulrich Bauschey wrote a number of newspaper and magazine
articles for the purpose of showing that Germany would need Antwerp
after this war in order to successfully compete with Holland, England
and France in world commerce. He figured that the difference between
the cost of transportation from the Rhine Valley industrial cities to
Antwerp and the cost of transportation from the Rhine Valley to Hamburg
and Bremen would be great enough as to enable German products to be
sold in America for less money than products of Germany's enemies.

These articles brought up the old question of the "freedom of the
seas." Obviously, if the Allies were to control the seas after the
war, as they had during the war, Germany could make no plans for the
re-establishment of her world commerce unless there were some
assurances that her merchant fleet would be as free on the high seas as
that of any other nation. During the war Germany had talked a great
deal about the freedom of the seas. When the _Lusitania_ was torpedoed
von Jagow said in an interview that Germany was fighting for the free
seas and that by attacking England's control, Germany was acting in the
interests of the whole world. But Germany was really not sincere in
what she said about having the seas free. What Germany really desired
was not freedom of the seas in peace time because the seas had been
free before the war. What Germany wanted was free seas in war
time,--freedom for her own merchant ships to go from Germany to any
part of the world and return with everything except absolute
contraband. Germany's object was to keep from building a navy great
enough to protect her merchant fleet in order that she might devote all
her energies to army organisation. But the freedom of the seas was a
popular phrase. Furthermore it explained to the German people why
their submarine warfare was not inhuman because it was really fighting
for the freedom of all nations on the high seas!

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