GERMAN AFFAIRS.

Grey River Argus, 14 July 1922, Page 5

GERMAN AFFAIRS.

THE JUNKER CONSPIRATORS. AND TIIEIR MURDER SOCIETIES. [A. and N.Z. Cable Association.] LONDON, July .12. The “Manchester Guardian’s’' Berlin correspondent stales: At least three hundred men and women ineluuing Liebknecht, Erzberger and llathenau, have been murdered for political reasons in Germany during the past three years. They were all either Liberals or Socialists, and all the murderers were Reactionaries -and Monarchists. A few acts of violence committed against the Monarchists have been punished with excessive severity. It is not. possible to make an estimate of the forces engaged in the latest civil war between the Republics i and Monarchist movement. The counter revolution of Militarist reaction and the Monarchist movement are practically identical, as the overthrow of the Republic and the restoration of the Monarchy will be the first step towards a Germany sufficiently militarised to wage a war of revenge against the Entente, or France. Th-e whole of German organised Labour is Republican, and a general strike is its only weapon, which is probably sufficient to destroy any attempt to overthrow the Government, but it is a defensive weapon and pratieally helpless against the preparations for an overthrow and against the Monarchist agitation. All the landed gentry and the bigger fanners are Monarchist, and probably tire majority of the middleclasses are Monarchist. The officers in the Reichswehr are nearly all Monarchist and the rank and file of a hnndred thousand would probably follow the officers in a civil war. The Security Police of 100.000 are a seminiilitary force with Monarchist officers. 3ho strongholds of the Monarchist movement are Pomerania. East Prussia. ami Bavaria. Secret military organisations all over the country are the backbone ot the active Monarchist movement. The most powerful is the Organisation “Consul.” of which a hundred members have been arrested. It is a secret society with hidden depots of arms and ammunition, and spies and agents, Gunther, who organised Raihanau’s murder, is a member. It was mainly his indiscretions in boasting that revealed the conspiracy. Sections of the Reactionaries uro fighting to restore the partially lost privileges of their class and to re-es-tablish Germany’s military predomination in Europe. They are largely actuated by racial hatred of all foreigners, particularly the French and Poles, and most of all, the Jews. There are educated Germans who seriously maintain that Christ was German. The universities are notoriously retrograde politically. The vast majority of the professors arc Extreme Reactionaries. The students played a sinister part in every “Putsch” and have been guilty of most of the political murders committed in Germany.