Evening Post. TUESDAY, APRIL 25, 1916. DYNAMITE CAMPAIGN

Evening Post, Volume XCI, Issue 97, 25 April 1916, Page 6

Evening Post. TUESDAY, APRIL 25, 1916. DYNAMITE CAMPAIGN

The German diplomats (?) in tho United States have been living well up | to moving-picture standards, and the recent raid of the detectives on Yon Papen's office, the breaking of the doors, and the seizure of the resisting Yon Igel, were stirring enough for any film, provided some super had been present to burn a little gunpowder. Yon Papen was German military attache at Wash-ington,-and Yon Igel was liis secretary and henchman. Shortly after the war Yon Papen became deeply involved in a series of dynamite plots, for which he supplied the money, if not the* brains. His tools were Germans—with whom America swarms — and probably any other adventurer who could be persuaded to undertake a dangerous job; for instance, the " German "'who sfho other day "held up " a ship off the American coast proved on analysis to be a renegade Englishman. Yon Papen, as the paymaster of thi6 criminal gang, in time became known to the American Government, as did the Austrian diplomat Dr. Dumba, and both received their passports. But the general knowledge of Yon- Pa-pen's exploits in America was considerably added to when the British authorities, en route, seized his papers, which -were not included in his personal "safe conduct." A number of interestI ing documents were brought to light, I and perhaps the most interesting of all was his cheque book, which showed a j remarkable record of secret' service. I There was a cheque " for dumdum in- ! vestigation"; 700 dollars for Horn a | fortnight before his attempt to blow up a bridge; 500 dollars for the German I Consulate at Seattle less than three | weeks before an explosion in Seattle j harbour; two cheques for a man now interned who constantly attempted to enter the British service; and 100 dollars for Kuepferle some months before his suicide in an English cell. In the words of one j of the German letters in the seized correspondence, "tho struggle on the American front is sometimes very hard." This carrying of. tho war into the United States was bad enough. Ib meant that American lives and property were destroyed by criminals paid by the official representatives of Germany and Austria, with the official money of those countries. In a sense, however, Yon Papon was an underling. ■■■But the arrest of Yon Igel ajjd the seizure of the papers in his office establishes the fact (according to to-day's cablegrams) that "Count Bernstorg is in the same category as Yon Papen and Dr. Dumba." If this is so, it is easy, to believe that, whether the submarine crisis is settled or not, Count Bernstorff will have to go. Whether his dismissal would be a sufficient measure to meet the case is a question for Americans. If Germany, in July, 1914, had received , from any oE her neighbours one fraction lof the provocation which Bernstorff and his satellites have given to America, there is no doubt that Germany would ! have replied with a declaration of war. | The German dynamite campaign in America is not only ground for war; it !is war. Anyone who compares the j Austro-Servian quarrel in 1914 with the record of German diplomacy in America cannot fail to be struck with the fact rthat, whereas an assassination by private persons (for which Servia offered all reasonable reparation) was sufficient to send the Austrian army, to the Danube, a murder campaign in America by tho highest official representatives of the Central Powers leaves the'great Republic still proudly pursuing its struggle foT peace. Meanwhile, with characteristic German bluff, Bernstorff demands | the return of the documents taken from i Yon Igel, on the ground that they are Embassy papers. Here, however, he is i placed in a dilemma, for the American Department of State asks him to indicate which of the- papers are official, and he cannot officially father the incriminating ones without strengthening the case against himself. So the way of j conspirators, like other transgressors, is ] liable to be hard. But perhaps the real tragedy is that New .York takes all these thing 3 with a light heart; and, as Mr. j Sydney Brooks showed in his thoughtful av'Uclo in y'satirday's iaue, drowns ! its conscience six a dehigs.Pl dollaj's. ;