GERMAN WAR PLANS

Hokitika Guardian, 5 January 1933, Page 8

GERMAN WAR PLANS

THE INVASION OF BELGIUM. BETRAYAL TO FRENCH. SECRET OF “UNKNOWN SPY.” The suggestion .that. the late King Leopold of Belgium, taking advantage | 0l an indiscretion of Kaiser .Wilhelm, , was the “unknown spy” who betrayed German plans for the invasion of Belgium and France, is made by Herr Rudolf Martin, a well-known historian and former high Government official, says a Berlin dispatch. The existence'of the “unknown spy” was revealed recently by M. Maurice | Paleologue, the former French Ambas- J sadi.r in St. Petersburg (Leningrad). I He alleged that it was a memuer ol ; the German general staff who betrayed the plans. j An investigation has been ordered by the German authorities, who hope I to prove that M. Paleologue’s assertions are false. It would be a great blow to German patriotism if the German army’s record, were blotted with |an incident like that of the Austrian Colonel Redl, who sold his country’s secrets to Russia. Herr Martin, in a recent holds that the alleged treason was a myth. First, he takes the assertion that the French generals did not know the identity of the German who told ’*h e m of tiie secret plans. How could the French rely on information from an unknown person, he asks, contending that no general staff in the world would nay for information from an unidentified person. M. Paleologue must have been duped by General Pendezee, who fold him about the “unknown spy’s” revelation in 1904, asserts Herr Martin. Further, the informant could- not have been a member of the German general staff, because, although he was right in saying that the Germans intended to march through Belgium in the case of war with Frnnce, he was wrong in regard to the details. The original plan was to avoid Namur, Liege, and Maubeuge, and proceed through the Grand Duchy of Luxemburg. This plan still held at the date of the alleged revelation.

Astonishing Hypothesis. Therefore, argues Herr Martin, the’ alleged German spy did not liavfe full knowledge. It was later that the new plan of General Schlieffen was elaborated. This plan anticipated the British landing at Antwerp, and called for the occupation of Namur and. the other fortified paces. The “unknown spy” was an unconscious prophet, but liis statements were wrong when he was alleged to have made them. Then comes an astonishing hypothesis, Herr Martin conjectures that the j French .had. a very strong reason for ( withholding the name of their inform-, ant from M. Paleologue. The “romantic fable” of the mysterious German general, who betrayed his country’s plans was invented, asserts Herr Martin, because the informant was the late King Leopold, of Belgium, who had the story from Kaiser Wilhlem, of Germany himself. This Herr Martin deduces from a study of the memoirs of Baron von Bulow, the former German | Chancellor. I Bulow relates that in January, 1904 I —four months before M. Paleologue j got the story from General Pendezec— , I Kaiser Wilhelm disclosed the plans to King Leopold in a moment of indiscretion. Intimidating a Guest. King Leopold was not much loved, and according to von Bulow the Kaiser simply wanted to intimidate lii s guest. He did not realise that by betraying the German general staff’s jealouslyguarded secret he was doing untold • harm to liis country. Herr Martin’s assumption is that King Leopold communicated this firsthand, but incomplete, information to i France on condition that he was not ' to be brought into it. This secrecy led to thP invention of the story of the unknown German spy. The details of the German strategic plan, unknown to King Leopold, were probably added to his basic story by a scries of shrewd guesses, concludes Herr Martin.