A SPY IN THE ENEMY'S COUNTRY

Dominion, Volume 9, Issue 2697, 17 February 1916, Page 6

A SPY IN THE ENEMY'S COUNTRY

ADVENTURES IN MESOFOTAHI&

The following, from th? Svdner "Sun," amplifies by the introduction of new incidents the stories told by the "Daily Mail's" spy—"the man who dined with the Kaiser."

The spy said that the most dangerous part of his work was when travek ling on the Bagdad Railway in oursuance of the "Daily Mail's' 1 instructions to discover German plans in the Near and Middle East. "1 was able to speak German says, "and that enabled me to mingle with whole tribles of Germans en route to Asia Minor. The German military plana are three—First, Bagdad, Persia, and India; second, the Caucasus; and third, Egypt and the Suez Canal. A German said to me, 'If the British and French only knew, the Germans can best bo attacked at Nieuport, in Belgium, and at Mulhausen in Alsace. But owing to inferior staff work and lack of munitions they do not attack.' Too Late! "A Turk told me—'The English were again too late at Bagdad. We were frightened when we heard thev were coming. Our defences were bad, and we had only a few jjuns, but our spies told us that General Townshend's force was small, and we took courage and checked them until reinforced'. Now, thanks to Allah, they will never reach the Holy City. The relief fore? will be too late.'

"The Turks wish, to get the Suea Canal. Turkish sentiment, combined with the German hatred of Endand, desires an immediate advance on the Canal. Englishmen think this .is bluff. My opinion is that unless there are great combined efforts on the Western fumt and in the Caucasus the TurcoGcrmans may achieve their objects. The determining factors arc the British naval pressure and a greater activity on the Western ar.d Eastern fronts.

"Whatever may be the result of the ■war, the Germans are getting such a hold in the Near East that it wii

impossible to drive them out. I travelled by the Bagdad _ Railway from tho palatial German Haiza Pasha station, which is the starting place of all tho great German adventures in the East. The station was spotlessly clean. The time-tables were printed in German. No food was available, She onlv refreshments obtainable being an unlimited supply of German beei\ produced at a local German brewery.

Typical Cermans, "The passengers typified the German invasion of the East. Two Hamburg merchants, who .were going to bring back Persian products, were specially anxious about, copper. Their conversation indicated a Hamburgian fury, l against England. Among the other passengers were German commercial travellers, German engineers, German military men, and German civil servants. It was a remarkable demonstration of pan-Germanism.

"Everywhere on the railroad there > was a general atmosphere of activity; The long trains were full of new railway and telegraph material, lines, small bridges, and new locomotives. Plodding Prussians prodded their Turkish slaves into unprecedented activity, and it is impossible to 'think, as the*'furnish authorities believe, that they will ever shake off the yoke.

"I saw a huge quantity of light rolling stock, and was assured that it was for the construction of light dosert railways to convey the Turks and Germans to the Suez Canal. . I was also informed that tho.combined Turkp-Ger-man army at Aleppo numbered 80,000 and that General von der Goltz was at Bagdad, with a young staff. Constantinople says that the old man is merely a figure-head, but he was. extremely popular. At Konia I thought it advisable to ran no further risks, and so I returned to Constantinople. I saw 300 French prisoners at Konia. They werb totally neglected, had little food, and were dying like flies. The sanitary con. ditions were indescribable."