OCR Text |
Show REVIEW GERMAN WARPRACTICES Some of the blackest pages in all history, comprising a documentary record of "deeds that make one despair de-spair of the future of the human race," are found in a book named "Geramn War Practices," which has just been issued at the Government Printing Office by the Committee on Public Information for free distribution. distribu-tion. It is edited by Prof. D. C. Mun-ro, Mun-ro, of Princeton, and other scholars. The dumfounding evidence :vhich this book presents to the jury of mankind is drawn mainly from German Ger-man and American sources, an"d includes in-cludes official proclamations and utterances ut-terances of the responsible h.-ads of the Imperial German Government, letters and diaries of German soldiers, sol-diers, quotations from German newspapers, news-papers, and material drawn from the archives of the State "Department which lay bare the story of inconceivable incon-ceivable German atrocities. The purpose of the book is to j show that the system of frightful-j frightful-j ness, itself the greatest atrocity, is : the definite policy of the German Government, so sinister that German soldiers have themselves at times revolted. re-volted. Individual acts of wanton ! cruelty and barbaric destruction are cited only to illustrate the operation of the remorseless system. The book supplements the Bryce report which was the first official survey of the path of horror, ruin and death left by the German army on the lands of innocent and defenseless defense-less people. The book is supplemental supplemen-tal also to the official reports by the Belgian Commission and the French Minister of Foreign Affairs, and it reveals more of the damning German Ger-man war philosophy as expressed in the German White hook and various official utterances, extenuating revolting re-volting crimes on the grounds of expediency ex-pediency and the advancement of that "Kultur" which now mocks its, own name throughout the civilized world. The humanity of German soldiers was so torn by fhe system of brutality that they cried out in letters let-ters to Ambassador Gerard, one expressing ex-pressing his protest against the slaughter of the Russians in the Ma-, surian lakes and swamps by saying. "There is no God, there is no moral-I ity, and no ethics any more; there are no human beings any more, but only beasts." The illuminating reports of Brand Whitlock, Minister to Belgium, tell of miseries inflicted upon the Belgian Bel-gian people, Mr. Whitlock saying: "One is so overwhelmed with the horror of the thing itself, that it has been, and even now is, difficult to write calmly and justly about it. Herbert Hoover, writing for this book of his experiences in Belgium, says: "The sight of the destroyed homes and cities, the widowed and fatherless, the destitute the physical misery of the people but partially nourished at best, the deportation of men by tens of thousands to slavery in Geramn mines and factories, the execution of men and women for paltry pal-try effusions of their loyalty to their country, the sacking of every resource re-source through financial robbery, the fattening of armies on the slender produce of the country, the denudation denuda-tion of the country of cattle, horses and textiles; all these things we had to witness, dumb to help other than by protest and sympathy, during this long and terrible time, and still these are not the events of battle heat, but the effects of a grinding heel of a race demanding the mastership of the world. All these things are known to the world but what can never be known is the dumb agony of the. people, the expressionless faces of millions whose souls have passed the whole gamut of emotions. ,And why? Because these, a free and democratic people, dared plunge their bodies before the march of autocracy." au-tocracy." The book gives excerpts from the diaries of German soldiers of which these are specimens: "In the night of August 18-19 the village of Saint-Maurice Saint-Maurice -was punished for . having fired on German soldiers by being burnt to the ground by the German troops. . . . The village was surrounded,' men posted about a yard from one another, so that no one could get out. Then the Uhlans set fire to it house by house; neither man, woman nor child could escape; only the greater part of the live stock we carried off, as that could be used. Any one who ventured to come out was shot down. All the inhabitants left in the village were burnt with the houses." "A horrible bath of blood. The , whole village burnt, the French , thrown into the blazing houses, civil-, civil-, ians with the rest." That the reign of frightfulness was the definite policy of the German Government is testified to by an amazing collection of documents and utterances of German officialdom. Herewith are excerpts from documentary docu-mentary proof furnished by German records establishing the truth beyond be-yond question: "As soon as you come to blows with the enemy he will be beaten. No mercy will be shown! No prisoners will "be taken! As the Huns, under King Attila, made a name for themselves, them-selves, which is still mighty in traditions tra-ditions and legends today, may the name of German be so fixed in China by your deeds, that no Chinese shall ever again dare to look at a German askance. . . . Open the way for Kultur once for all." From the kaiser's speech to the soldiers on the eve of their departure for China in 1900. "Whenever a national war breaks out, terrorism becomes a necessary military principle." General Von Hartmann. "The city of Brussels, exclusive of its suburbs, has been punished by an additional fine of 5,000,000 francs on account of the attack made upon a German soldier by Ryckere, one of its police officials." Baron Vor Luettwitz, Governor of Brussels. ' "One cannot make war in a sentimental senti-mental fashion. The. more pitiless the conduct of the war, the more humane hu-mane it is in reality, for it will run its course all the sooner." General Von Bernhardi. "The innocent must suffer wit'' the guilty . . . All this must not in our eyes weigh as much as the life of a single one of our brave soldiers the righteous accomplishment of duty is the emanation of a high Kultur, Kul-tur, and in that the population or the enemy countries can learn a lesson les-son from our armies." General Vo" Bissing. |