Germany from Within

Progress, Volume X, Issue 6, 1 February 1915, Page 205

Germany from Within

Views of Distinguished Neutral " A Pathetic Adventure " We recognise that the economic pressure put upon Germany and Austria through the throttling of their commerce is a big factor making for the Allies success, and it is quite evident, from what the London "Times" correspondent in Copenhagen has gleaned in an interview with a high authority, that the Germans are already awakening to the hopelessness of their position. "From a distinguished citizen of a neutral country, whose name I am sending you privately, a banker by profession, whose longstanding business relations with the country required him to spend the past seven weeks in Germany. I have received a graphic account of the aspect which events present to a keen observer'' writes the "Times" correspondent. "His views are not only those of a man of affairs, but of one who, through his professional connections with Germans of eminence in politics and commerce, enjoyed unusual opportunities for gauging the actual attitude of

mind with which this class views the war. It is, of course, at complete variance with the rosy tint in which the "inspired" German Press depicts the situation for the deception of the public both at home and abroad." It would be a grave fallacy (said my informant) to judge German affairs by the German newspapers of to-day. They must not only suppress what the Government does not want printed, but are required to publish practically that, and that only, which the Government lays before them. I refer, of course, to news and views of all sorts bearing on the war. Everything, for instance, tending to suggest that the rigours of war are slowly but surely undermining the national economic fabric is strictly contraband. It is that feature of the situation, naturally, which makes the liveliest appeal to the imagination of a

business man. My every-day contact with Germans of my class, extending over a period of many weeks, leaves me firmly convinced that those of them who must know now realise that Germany has been plunged into a tragic and pathetic adventure. Even the great industrialists of Rhineland-Westphalia, though many of their works are occupied in the production of war materials to a wholly unprecedented extent, are depressed and melancholy over the awful struggle into which Germany has been precipitated. These are men who cannot be deluded by official optimism and bluster. They are men accustomed to deal with facts. Nothing else impresses them. What are the facts? The General Staff told the

great captains of industry, who in Germany are hardly a less important factor in the conduct of a war than the Staff itself, that the plan of campaign —reduced to essentialswas this:—We shall smash France within three weeks, then wheel about and deliver Russia a knock-out blow before she has had time to complete her mobilization. Belgium will offer only the resistance of sullcnness. England will not “come in” at all. The German Government had the positive assurance of leading Englishmen to that effect. Well, this hammer-and- programme has not come off. Cogs have slipped at numerous vital points. Belgium’s resistance, to begin with, was more than sullen. England did “come in.”

Paris A\ r as not occupied by August 25th, and Russia, far from being “knocked out,” has not ever reeled. Not a single one of the General Staff’s objectives has been attained. Checkmated in all directions, Germany has little but an enormous death-roll to counterbalance the terrific effort the first 100 days of war have cost her.

These are the immutable things which thinking business Germans see and knoAv. They know more than that. They realize that, thanks to a very farseeing economic and financial organization, their trade and commerce have thus far-—barring the annihilation of the German Merchant Marinebeen dislocated perhaps to no greater extent than the trade and commerce of their enemies.