GERMANY AND RUSSIA

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LXI, 9 October 1928, Page 7

GERMANY AND RUSSIA

SECRET MILITARY ARRANGE ME NTS

SOCIALIST A LLEGATIONS

United Press Association —By Electric Telegraph—Copyright ‘Times’’ Cables. LONDON, Bth October. “The Times” Berlin correspondent reports that Herr Kunstaler, a Socialist member of the Reichstag, has given “Vorwaerts” details of alleged secret Gorman-Soviet military arrangements negotiated in 1922-23, including the establishment of a- Junkers aircraft aeroengine works in Soviet Russia. Kunstaler says that everything and everybody was given a- code designation; thus Junkers’ works were “The firm NN,” the German Ministry of Defence “the special group”; and aeroplanes, “cases”. “Vorwaerts” publishes the key and also quotations from letters written to Professor Junkers and others hv “mixed commission” sent from Aloscow in December 1921.

If Kunstaler’s disclosures are genuine, they confirm the version hitherto current, but never clearly established, says a Berlin correspondent, who points out that when the question of relations between the Reichswehr and the Red army came up in the Reichstag two years ago, it was admitted that Junkers’ activities in Soviet Russia had the German Government’s official hacking, but the Government then gave assurances that relations with Junkers had long since been dissolved. Nationalist newspapers are declaring that the whole djselosures are ancient history and accuse Kunstaler ot treason in publishing them, and regret that Parliamentary immunity protects him front prosecution.