RUNNING WAR WITH PRISONERS

Press, Volume LI, Issue 15393, 25 September 1915, Page 12

RUNNING WAR WITH PRISONERS

GERMANY'S SYSTEM. (ntOM A. CORREfIPOXDEXT.) BERLIN, August 3. Running your war with your prisoners is Europe's latest discovery in belligerency. By making her prisoners work, Germany is feeding her people, reducing tho cost of fighting, and carrying out vast engineering and other works of utility. "Make tho war pay for itself," was tho precept of Frederick tho Great, no carried it to extremes by exacting money from occupied territory; and by enrolling in his forces a captured Saxon army. Germany has enrolled in her services a captured army a hundred times greater in 6izo, but, instead of making the captives tigut lor her, she is making them work for her; and this is enabling her to send more and more of tho male population to tho battle lino.

Germany's enormous economic resisting power; the failure of the hopo of beating Germany financially, economically, or by hunger, is due to the fact that Germany is Ut-ing captured labour. As ono class of Liinusturni men after another is called to the Colours, the number of male hands in factories and farms decreases. The supply of prisoners is unfailing, and these provide substitutes. The Ilague Conference rules permit the compelling of prisoners to work, and also reiuires it. Governments are obliged to provide work, so that prisoners in their years of captivity may not be spoiled. With all her able-bodied men in th 0 field ; Germany reaps an advantage' from the Hague rule. She lias a force of skilled and unskilled prisoner labour which is twice as big as her active army in peace time. The prisoners are just the kind of labour wanted. They are strong, obedient peasants, used to field work. All that German;' wants to carry on tho war is arms and food. Arms can be supplied by keeping at home a small proportion of male workers. Tho food problem is harder. Tho factories havo largely been closed; export trade has ceased; nothing can bo exported to pay for imported food; and tho enemy's superior navies prevent food getting in. The army eats far more than its constituent members eat when they are civilians; and there i- a vast, number of prisoners to feed. This could not bp managed without the labour of prisoners. In neaeo time it takes all tho male and fpnmlr» fnrming population, plus about <100.000 ed Russian and Austrian labourers, to produce enough foo'l to feed five-sixths of Germany's population. Tho amount to be produced now is greater, and all male fa r m labour is enrolled in the army. Yet this year a third more grain is beinir sown, reaped. and garnered than in 1911. and tho harvest this year has boon got in about three weeks earlier. Tbe explanation is: tho prisoners. The prironers do the work. Every prisoner taken is not only ono fighter lost to the onnonent, but is also a civil fighter gained to the Germans. To-day a million prisoners are tilling fields, making roads, digging canals, and building railroads for transport of the increased food supply. All through the winter Germany has been organising her new army.of farmers and navvies. Of the nresrrt- million about c;ght hundred thousand are Russian and two hundred thousand French. Belgians and British count relatively few. Before Christmas there ■were 400.000 prisoners. The first big batches of captives were taken in tho Belgian and French fortresses: late in August. 1014, Hinderburg made his big coup of 90,000 Russians. Since then there have been few French prisoners, tho biggest batch being 5000 token at Soifcsons. The Russians ha%'e prone on multiplying, the battles round Lodz in November 'yielding 100.000: the second battle of the Masurian lakes in February, janothor 100.000: then came the battle of Oorlice-Tarnow. and tho re-corqucst by Germany and Austria of Galicia, which Cikl. Russia 500 000 prisoners, of whom 300,000 fell to Germany. In the early summer, when hard field labour beeins, tens of thousands of healthy Russians, nearly all farmers, were sent around labour-poor Germany, and all were set at once to work. Tho harvest of 1915 is assured; and the futuro is made clear. If the # war continues the prisoners will continue; of tho million prisoners increase, Germany will be able to send her women into tho field, and the prisoners will be sufli"ipnt to supply all tho needs of civil life.

Seven hundred thousand prisoners are now at work in fields, on roads, and on railroads. They tiro the kind of men Germany needs. She needs rough workers. Skilled directorate she hns. Half of the prisoners comn from the , Blank Earth provinces of Central Rus- J sia: thev are used to growing rye, the chief German crop, nnd are used to much the samp farming conditions Last September tho Imperial Government foresaw that great numbers of prisoners would be taken: and it decided to use them in the way most profitable. It asks every prisoner where he comos from, and what was his occupation. The facts arc registered by a central office. A register is kept 'of the cordition of the labour supplv in every part of the Empire in every industry! A farming ccntro reports that it is short of labour. A day later down come half-a-dozen foremen carpenters „and metal workers; with them a hundred Russians under guard. The Russians are all good men at working wood; thev can do with an adze work for which a German requires hnif-a-dozen tools. _ Under German leading, thev make a prisoner's fenced compound, convert houses ar.d barns into sleeping quarters, and run up sheds. Witflin a week tho carpenters and wood-workers have been sent elsewhere; instead of them down come a couple of hundred moujik farm-hands. They are under three or four sentries. The prisoners are docile, making little trouble, and seldom run away. Every morning thev leavo their compound, and go Tn twos, threes, and fours to different farms; work all day, and return for tho roll-call in tho evening. When farm work is done, the prisoners nro sent back to a central camp, or they go to some other farm. The foremen carpenters and metal-workers come again; the camp is dismantled, and the materials are rc-erccted elsewhere. . Russian prisoners, and with them Frcncti prisoners, are engaged in niak ing roads, railroads, and canala. They help to repair the ravages of war. After the second battle of Masuria. and tho final Russian evacuation if East Prussia, fifty thousand Russians were ?ent to the country east of Konigsberg and Soldau. Ten thousand of them are house-builders; they are restoring tho shattered and burnt houses. Russians arc good hands at all sorts of earth-work. Germany is building new strategical railways. The prisoners are making the tunnels and embankments. They are being ed in reclaiming waste land. When tho land is reclaimed they will be put to cultivating it, so that the supply _ of food will be increased. A suggestion is made that they should reclaim the marshes around the Masurian lakes. Hindenburg put a damper on this programme. He say* the Masurian marshes are worth ten fortresses, and that ho would sooner raze Metz than drain a pint of water out of the Masurian depression." Twenty thousand prisoners are reclaiming the big bogs of Oldenburg, and thirty thousand have started to reclaim the Luneberger Heide, a big sterile heath in Hanover. Before Juno tho prisoners had reclaimed land enough to produco food for a hundred thousand persons. In Central Prussia, prisoners dig canals. It is pro nosed to put them to settle an old Prussian poli-

tical and economical problem. This is the joining of the 11 Kiro and the Elba Itv means of a canal. This "Middlodand, Canal" project was defeated years tm by the Prussian grain-growing landowners, who feared it would injure their interests by helping competitors l in the west. At present traffic between the Rhine manufacturing districts and ' the eastern food-producing district* must go by rail, as the dangers of the" North c>ea are great. If the prisoners dig the canal there will be internal water Communication all across the Empire. Germany will get rich on hor prison* ers. Professor Fischer estimates that - the gain ner prisoner will bo £30 ,a head, which makes for all the prisoners £30.000.000. "It would cost Germany twice as much money as that to hire . labour of equal productive value, and under present war conditions we could not get the lajxuir. Every prisoner taken is n<i addition of twa to our combined military and economic strength. He means a loss of one man to the enemy's army, and he means that one more German may be token from civilian life and sent to the front. The million prisoners taken put. the balance in our favour at two millions. If in the ' coming yonv wo tnke a million prisoners. we shall carry on all our ncn-ieul. tural work with ease, and in addition "■« sbn'l mnrty of nnr factories, : Tt-n w will become easy. Wo shell bare a firnlim of food, ant}' more ic+urcd roods than w# ; u-nnt. "We sKoll, in fn<»t. be able to lcopr> nn n , n«iiif<irtti' , ed roods for trans*' port abroad wTien tbe wnr ends."' ' .