WHAT WE OWE TO THE HUN SPIES.

Taranaki Herald, Volume LXVII, Issue 16379, 4 March 1919, Page 7

WHAT WE OWE TO THE HUN SPIES.

(By Frederic Martyn.) Be kind to German spies—we owe them a lot. If you happened to meet a man who told you tnat there have not been enough German spies about you would probably say some thing rude to him; but you would be wrong if you did so, for he -would not. bo making such an unpatriotic statement as you might imagine. tweaking with a much greater knowledge of tiie facts and results of German espionage than is possessed by the man in the street, 1 say that German spies have done so much damage to Germany that it is fairly safe to say that tho majority of them.have worked foi the success of the Entente. Let me try to convince you of the truth of that statement.^ According to an officer on von Kluck’s staff, who is amply corroborated by circumstances, it was the reports of his spies that hired that general to his defeat on the Marne, under the date September 4, 1914, this officer wrote in his diary, captured at the same time as himself by tuc Frcncn ; “The reports of the spies who have witnessed tho retreat of tho French and British armies are very reassuring. They depict the enemy troops as depressed, discontented, and altogether without energy. The general is convinced that there is nothing between ns and Paris. Tho 4th. Reserve Corps has been detailed to make the triumphal entry into the grand capital.” THE MARCH ON PARIS.

Well, those spies of his sold ColonelGeneral von Kluck very badly. He found out shortly afterwards, when it was altogether too late, that there was a something between him and Paris. If lie had only known or suspected that tilings wore not quite as his spies represented them to be ho would certainly not have put himself into such a position as to compel him to tight the Battle of the Marne, for his own troops were in a pretty parlous state. “Our soldiers are at the end of their strength. For the last four days they have advanced at the rate of about 25 miles a day. The ground is difficult, the roads broken up and obstructed by fallen trees, and the fields are as full of holes as a. colander. The soldiers stagger at every step, their faces are covered thick in dust, and their clothes are so tattered that they can truthfully be called mere living bundles of rags. They march with their eyes closed and have to sing in chorus to keep themselves awake.” And he goes on to say that the men oro allowed to get as drunk as they like whenever the opportunity offers so that they may forgot their miseries and keep going. Von Ivluek must have been certain sure that there was nothing in front of him when ho marched on Paris with such troops I THE OSTEND FAILURE. Now I will call another German witness. In January, 1916, there appeared in Germany a book entitled “Dio Schlachtcn an der Marne,” written by an officer of the General Staff. ' In this book I find it stated that according to tho plan of campaign the main German armies were to drive the French and British beyond tho Meuso, tho Aisne, tho Marne, and perhaps the Seine. While this was going on “other parts of the army, particularly the reserve corps and the Landwohr, wore to advance bctwoe.i Dunkirk and Calais to the coast in order to prevent the landing of British reinforcements.” There was a time in the early part of tho war when tho part of the programme which I have taken verbatim from the book could have been carried out with ridiculous case, lor there were no troops to prevent a German march to the const As it was the obvious thing to do from a strategical point of view it wafs a mystery why tho Germans did not do it. It was also inexplicable why tho German troops did not occupy Ostend before the fall of Antwerp and thereby mako the capture or destruction of tho Belgian Army arid the British troops assisting it a practical certainty. Those mysteries were solved for me in the summer of 1917 when I met in Holland an ex-member of tho German Secret Service of superior rank who told me that ho had been informed by Lieut.-Colonel Ostertag—formerly military attache to the German Embassy in London—who was then employed in the German Intelligence Department, that the Gorman troops did not advance to Ostend, or Calais when they ought to have done so because the Staff had received information from spies that there wore at least two Allied Army corps in their path. THOSE RUSSIAN SOLDIERS! This information was credited, because it came from half a dozen spies working independently, four in Great Britain and two in France, and was circumstantial and dogmatic. These spies have a lot to answer for and wo ought to bo grateful to them, for they reported that they had actually seen at least two army corps of Russians passing through great Britain and landing in Franco. My informant added that Colonel Ostertag credited the British Intelligence Department with the deliberate organisation of the “Russian spoof,” for the express purpose of deceiving German spies, and through them, the German High Command. Ho described it as a most brilliant piece of work and said that he would never have believed the English to ho capable of such a ruse. The colonel-spy, for a time he was chief of the German spies in Great Britain—has probably been often astonished since then. The same ex-spy told me that the German Admiralty blamed German spies in Groat Britain for tho Battle of the Falkland®, inasmuch they hot only failed to report the departure of Admiral Sturdee’s squadron, but sent other information to the effect that so many British warships wore in dock under exonsive repair that it was judged to bo impossible that any fast heavilyarmed' ships could be spared for tho chase of von Spee. WHAT HAPPENED IN AMERICA. It was almost certainly this blind reliance on its spies that lost_ Germany von Spec's squadron at the time. The German ships would have been sunk sooner or later, without doubt, but if von Spee had been warned by wireless that battle-cruisers were in search of him ho could probably have dodged them for months, and have done enormous damage to British slapping in the meantime. I have no doubt whatever that we owe tho intervention of the United States to the bungling of German spies. I was on tho American continent when war broke out, and during tho first two .months of its course I travelled over the. United States from East to West, and from North to South. Moreover,, I have been there*

at intervals of five or six months, several times since.

When I returned to England in the winter of 1914, I was asked my opinion as to the probability of the United States coming into the war on our side. In reply I said, and I honestly believed, that the word probability did not fit as it could not be used in connection with a contingency that was so remote as to be practically impossible. If I had been told that the United States would, as a matter of fact, intervene in the war, and had been invited to guess on which side she would throw her weight, I would have unhesitatingly plumped for Germany. In the early days of the war I found, except in tho South and East, very little sympathy for us and a great deal for Germany. Everywhere 1 found a deep feeling of irritation and sense of grievance against us lor interfering with American “rights.” It was, 1 imagine, exactly the same sort of feeling that brought about the war of 1812. If Germany had not irritated American susceptibilities moi'e than we did there would not have been the slightest chance of tho United States coming to our assistance. And Germany irritated American susceptibilities to breaking-point because, depending on the reports of her spies, she was sure she sould do so with impunity. 1 myself heard Captain von Papcn say in the German Club at New York, that the general feeling of th? country was so anti-British and, moreover, so pacificist, that thee was nothing that’Germany need be afraid of behind the President’s protests. Ho also said that America could not exercise any influence on the result of the war even if she did fight. HUN SPIES ARE NOT SUPERSMART. I must say that I went a- good part of the way with von Papen, but I balked at the idea of America not being able to influence the course of the war, although I was very far indeed from imagining that she either would or could do what she has done. Ido not think that anyone, even in America, realised that. If it were not that in these times one has to sacrifice much interesting copy to the exigencies of tho public policy, I could give many more instances of German spies having helped us to win the war; but as things are tho reader must take my word for it that wo owe a great deal more to German spies than i have indicated. Believe me the German spy does not by any means deserve the halo of su-per-smartness that fiction-writers have invested him with.