NEW BOOKS

Evening Star, Issue 21636, 3 February 1934, Page 22

NEW BOOKS

GERMANY TO-DAY ‘ The German Revolution ; Its Meaning and Its Menace,’ is by Joseph King, with a preface by Lord Snowden. Mr King is well known in England as a man deeply informed on Continental affairs. He has written much for leading London journals and has published a number of books dealing with public life in Germany, Russia, and Switzerland. He sat in the House of Commons as a Libera], from 1910 to 1918. Jn ‘ The German Revolution ’ Mr King speaks out fearlessly without bias or prejudice, narrating the events in Germany in sequence from the days of the war up to a few months ago. The book traces from November 1918 the developments, and the various causes which have combined to give Hitler his extraordinary hold on so many millions of young Germans. It shows how mistaken actions of the Allies, the weakness of the Reichstag, the failure of Stresemann’s policy of compliance to restore peace and prosperity, and then the. world collapse all "contributed to Hitler’s rise to power. There is a moving account of the terrorism of the Nazi bandit bands and of the persecution of Jews. The strange developments' of Nazi policy are explained from historical and racial causes. The writer points ou tthat the German revolution of 1933 follows the Russian Communist, and the Italian Fascist revolutions. They are each the dictatorship of a definite political party. In each the dominant party deprives all other parties of any voice dr share in Government, preserves for its members the best paid and most influential offices, uses complete censorship of the Press and publicity, exercises linn grasp on postal telephone, telegraphic, and other services, maintains rigid passport methods, has adopted neculiar methods, and principles of law and law courts, exercises imprisonment without charge, practices “ precautionary ” removal of opponents, and makes acts of terrorism an order of the day. “As in Russia and Italy, so also in Germany, a great leader has emerged. . . To-day Mussolini rules in Rome as much an autocrat as Caesar Augustus, and more beloved. Hitler weilds in Berlin a power greater than any power ever possessed by Bismarck or Kaiser, and is adored and obeyed by bis party as no previous ruler in Germany. ..Is Hitler’s future to follow the lines of the dictatorships in Russia and Italy?” In the author’s view the prospect seems to be that in the struggle between the conflicting aims of the Nationalists, (who desire the restoration of the monarchy) and the Nazis the force and authority of Hitler will prevail over the older reactionary monarchist policy and that Germany’s future will tend’ to be that of a National Socialist Fascist regime. The author discusses all the phases of the new rule in Germany, clearly and fairly, and concludes: “The question still remains and cannot be ignored: Can the democracies of America, France, and the British Empire live in close unity and mutual esteem with a nation basing a grandiose realm on the_ complete suppression of all freedom in Press, speech, or criticism, and on an antiSemitism of cruel fanaticism,_ and on military organisation, education, and objects'? In a word is Hitlerism compatible with the peaceful progress of civilisation? ” The publishers of this hook are Williams and Norgate, London.