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Show HUNS OVERPLAY ! Spartacan Stories Exaggerated Exagger-ated by Germans for Outside Out-side Consumption. Old Gang in Control, but "Bust-up" Is Predicted After Peace Comes. By EDWIN L. JAMES. (New York Times Cable, Copyright.) COBLENZ. March 2;!. Coming from Paris, where I stood for a few days at the edge of the maelstrom of arguments attending the toilsome making of peace, I have had a long talk with members of the commission and high American army 1 officers just returned from"' Berlin, where they went to get for the American authorities au-thorities some idea as to the chances of the present German government remaining remain-ing in the saddle until the submission of neace terms. The most striking feature of the opinion opin-ion formulated by these officers is that the Spartacist business " has been overplayed. over-played. They believe that the reports sent out for foreign consumption, have been exaggerated by the Germans and for a purpose. They say that when Ihe folks in Berlin read in the French 'and English newspapers accounts of the : seriousness of the Spartacits uprising in Germany they sit back and laugh. Say Matter Was Overplayed. , I ; They state frankly that if the author!- j i ties sitting :n Paris are hurrying through I for fear of Bolshevism spreading from j there it means the Germans have played j ; a good game. Not that they say Ger- ; i many should not be fed. They say the : i Germans should be fed because of-the ! serious lack of food, which prevents Germany Ger-many getting back into a settled stride. ! Bub there was a well-informed opin-; opin-; ion among them that the Germans , had used the Spartacist bugaboo to the limit. In ennection with supplying food as an laid to restoring good conditions, it is also recommended that the1 Gorman government govern-ment stop paying idlers ten marks a day, i which causes thousands of men to stay' ! away from work on farms where they j would probably receive half what the ! gvernment pays them for doing nothing. Protest, Then Accept. One member of the commission, an expert ex-pert on German affairs, had an interesting interest-ing prediction as to the effect of the announcement an-nouncement of the peace terms 'on Germany Ger-many politically. Pie predicted that the present government would last until the peace terms were announced and would, j after protest, accept them. Then there would come a storm of protest which ! would lead to the resignation of ousting j of the Ebert-Scheldemann government i and the formation of a new govern- ment. which might be one of two kinds either one more strongly autocratic than j the present government, or a really dem- j j ocratic one. This government would ; I say that it would have to carry out the j I peace terms already accepted, but would pose as occupying the position that it was not responsible for their harshness. j Real One Yet to Come. ! "The rea revolution has not yet come in Germany. ' said this officer. "By revolution I mean revolution in the sense of the Ethiopian changing his skin or the leoDard his spots. The kaiser has gone to Holland, it is true, but outside of that the same old gang is running things. Ebert, Scheidemann and Noske are but puppets, managed and controlled by men who held offices under the Hohenzollern regime. The present government gov-ernment is not responsible, and if things run along in the present direction the old crowd will get back its control in name as well as in reality. Peace is going to bring a change I don't believe anyone any-one knows in which direction. Bernstorff and Ratzau and company will get full control or a truly democratic government govern-ment will come. Which will come anybody's any-body's guess is as good as mine." |