TREASON IN SOUTH AFRICA

Evening Post, Volume LXXXVIII, Issue 92, 15 October 1914, Page 6

TREASON IN SOUTH AFRICA

The valuable work which the Kaiser has been doing in tho consolidation of the British Empire seems to have been suddenly marred by a very serious exception. Hitherto the surprises which he had prepared for us were almost all of a very pleasant character. When the people of the United Kingdom were contemplating civil war as the only solution that implacable politicians had left open for the Irish question, he surprised them at about twenty-four hours' notice into a unity which all tho political genius of tho nation could never have accomplished unaided. Though nobody outside of Potsdam and Bedlam supposed that the oversea Dominions would seize Britain's peril as a suitable opportunity for revolt, he surprised both the Dominions and the Mother Country with the discovery of an essential oneness which went much deeper than they knew. Tho thrilling loyalty of India — India from which the outside world had hoard little in recent years but the mutterings of discontent and thinly-veiled rebellion — was another of these glorious surprises. And even from South Africa, where a race with which the Empire was recently at war has now a pieponderanco of political powor under Ireo institutions,- there c»iuo a pleas<

ant surprise in the undertaking of the Government to see to the defence of tlie country and relieve the Imperial authorities of the necessity of keeping any troops there. But Africa, which from the days when the ancient Romans j held the northern fringe of tho Continent has been proverbial as a land of surprises, has unfortunately sprung a surprise of another kind upon us now. Tho flame of a real rebellion has broken out in South Africa to gladden the heart of the Kaiser and to put the mettle of tho Empire still further to the proof. The act of disloyalty is of the most flagrant, treacherous, and dangerous description. An officer holding the King's commission has turned traitor, practically on the field of battle, has taken, apparently, the bulk of his men with him, and has handed over those who refused to participate in his treachery to the enemy as prisoners of war. So dramatic an act of treachery as this is well calculated to attract the attention of the Empire and the world. It recalls the good old days when soldiers of fortune travelled over Europe and enlisted without shame or disguise in the service of the highest bidder. As they fought for the love of fighting as well as for the wages, they often gave good value for the money, but the trouble for their employer was that the very field of battle might serve the purpose of an auction room and transfer his mercenaries to an enemy who could tempt them with a higher bid. Colonel IMaritz stands on at least as low a level as these mercenaries. He was under no obligation to serve against the Germans; he was under no obligation to serve at all; but that he should elect to serve in a high command for the purpose of betraying plans and men and munitions to the enemy brands him as one of the blackest of traitors. Nobody will grudge to the Germans the acquisition of such a recruit, but the serious question is to what extent he represents the general feeling of his compatriots. He has mentioned the names of Generals Hertzog, Beyers, De Wet, Kemp, and Muller in a way that suggests their complicity ; and the first two of these names, at any rate, will not come as a surprise to an observer from a distance. Racial hatred has been the inspiration of General Hertzog's politics throughout. Has it driven him to the same pitch of folly as the traitor who has put him at the head of his list of confidants? and are we to suppose that the same sentiments' are shared by De Wet and the rest? If so, the position is a serious one, but even co there are at least two grounds for profound thankfulness. One is that the plot has been revealed before it has produced any graver military consequences than the loss of Mantz's force and possibly the Namaqualand surrender. The other is that the crisis finds' the loyal Dutch in power and the government in the hands of men of such courage • and resource. a a |l ,B,t>tha i( and (> Pjj\utSj liti jri}t«jr i saved the Union from a rebellion threatened from another quarter at the beginning of the present year, and their prompt proclamation of martial law shows that they are prepared to act with equal decision now. It is well that South Africa should face the inevitable under such auspices and have a general "washing-up" at once. Stern and summary justice for the active traitors, the removal from office of the less malignantly disaffected, and a general trek of the irreconcilables who aspire to realise their ideals of freedom under the German flag — this is the purge that will bring lasting peace to South Atfrica and put it as much in the Kaiser s debt, as the rest of the Empire.