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Show I fee liiaiser as m knew sim tot k ourteen ears ! By ARTHUR N. DAVIS, D. D. S.-American Dentist to the Kaiser from 1904 to 1918 (Copyright, litis, by the McClure Newspaper Syndicate.) CHAPTER VII. The Japanese. According to the tulk of the German diplomats before the war the expectation expecta-tion was that Japan's power would be used against America at the first opportunity. op-portunity. Whether the object of this campaign wus to stir up trouble between be-tween Japan and America or only to awaken this country to a sense of the danger which the Gorman: professed to believe threatened her I don't know. I do know, however, that prospect of a Japanese-American war seemed to worry the Germans considerably more than It worries us. The day England declared war against Germany, August 5, 1914, the Prince von Pless called to see me professionally. pro-fessionally. "There will be two wars fought," he said, oracularly. "The present one, by which we shall gain control of the continent con-tinent of Europe forever, and then a war with the yellow races, in which we shall probably have your country to assist 11a I" That this opinion was more or less general in Germany may account for tile fact that from the time war was declared until August 23, 1014, when Japan declared war against Germany, the Japanese residents In Berlin were made the subject of the most sickening sicken-ing attentions. It was reported that Japan was going to attack Russia, anS the Germans could not do enough to show their newly born admiration for the yellow race which they had hitherto hither-to so deeply despised. The Japs were carried through the streets on the shoulders of the populace and kissed and cheered wherever they appeared In public. And then Japan declared war against Germany! Instantly there was a wild demonstration in the streets of Berlin, which would have resulted most disastrously disas-trously for the Japs who had so recently recent-ly been hailed as friends but for the astonishing fact that every single Jap had succeeded in getting away from Berlin before the news of Japan's entry en-try Into the war became generally known. 1 In the absence of Japanese upon which to vent their spleen, the Germans Ger-mans did everything they could to make life miserable for those who resembled re-sembled Japs. The few Chinese who were there were terribly treated either because they were taken for Japs or because they were of the same race. The Siamese minister, Prince Traldos, who was one of my patients, told me that when his wife and children went out on the streets the crowds followed them and Jeered, referring to the Japanese Jap-anese as monkeys and using other opprobrious op-probrious epithets. They even went so far as to spit in Princess Traidos' face, and the minister finally decided to send her and the children to Switzerland, Switzer-land, although he himself remained at his post. 1 I saw the kaiser shortly after the Japanese declaration of war, and he was very bitter against the United States because of that development. "What Is yonr, president thinking of to allow a yellow race to attack a white race ! Now the Japanese are attacking at-tacking Klau-Chau, and America could have prevented it. All that America had to do was to raise a finger and Japan would have known enough to keep her place I" He spoke in this strain on several subsequent occasions. When Klau-Chau fell he again criticize! crit-icize! the United States for not having stopped Japan. "liow can your president allow Jap:ai to Increase In power at the expense ex-pense of a white race?" he asked, indignantly. in-dignantly. "Now China is lost to the world forever. America is the one power that could have prevented it, but now Japan has got her fingers on China and she is lost to us forever 1" After we were in the war, the kaiser expressed to me his opinion that our object in taking this step was fourfold: four-fold: "First," he said, "Wilson wants to save the money you have loaned to the allies. Second, he wants to have a seat at the peace table. Third, he wants to give your army and navy a little practical experience unfortunately, unfortu-nately, at our expense. And fourth, and principally, he wants to prepare for the war with Japan which he knows is inevitable. The Japanese are the ones which your country must look upon as its real enemies." A German officer of high standing told me Just before I left Berlin that America had made the great mistake of sending ammunition, guns and supplies sup-plies to Russia, via Japau, because Japan had Just retained the finely made American articles and had dumped on Kussia a lot of good-for-nothing material of her own in their place. "My advice to America," he declared, de-clared, "is to cut the throat of every Japanese in America and get rid of the internal danger." He did not sug-tjt sug-tjt cutting the throats of all the undesirable un-desirable Germans who were in America Amer-ica and who had already demonstrated that they were far more dangerous Jbjin the Jar-sues hud ever been. CHAPTER VIII. The Kaiser's Confidence of Victory. 1 About twelve years ago I attended the German military maneuvers at , Liegnltz, in Silesia, having been invited in-vited by some Journalistic friends of mine to accompany them in the motor 1 allowed the press. The military representatives repre-sentatives -of England, -France, America Amer-ica and other countries were there with the kuiser's staff to witness the display of Germuny's military power. Apparently they were very much impressed, im-pressed, for I heard afterwards that one of the French officers who had been present had written a book in which he said: "With such an army, Germany could annex France in six months !" I happened to mention this fact to the kaiser shortly afterwards and his significant comment was: "Six months 1 I should hope so. It wouldn't take that long!" The confident belief that when "Der Tag" "the day" finally arrived, Germany Ger-many would crush her enemies and accomplish ac-complish her object within a few months at the outside was held not only by the kaiser but by the people generally and their conduct when the war broke out clearly disclosed it. Whea Germany's man power was mobilized, no one in Germany believed it would be very long before they would all be back and every effort was made to make their few weeks of active ac-tive service as little irksome as possible. pos-sible. "Liehesgaben," gifts of love, consisting of clothing and food of every description, were forwarded to them by their relatives and friends in the most lavish manner, although, of course, at that time the German commissary com-missary was able to satisfy all the soldiers' sol-diers' requirements. One of my patients told me that she had sent seventeen hundred pounds of sausages to one regiment within a week, and when I asked her why she had been so generous she replied that her chauffeur was a member of the regiment ! The extent to which the country's resources, were squandered in those early months Is evidenced by the fact that the soldiers had such an excess of ill-fitting woolen wearing apparel that they used many of the knitted articles ar-ticles as earpieces and covers for their horses. No one had the slightest idea that the time might come when the whole nation would be clothed in paper! pa-per! At this late day it can hardly be necessary to establish how thoroughly prepared the Germans were for the war, but an incident which occurred in the early days of the conflict may not be out of place to show the self-satisfied and confident attitude which all the Germans assumed. Two officers sitting at a table in an out-of-door cafe shortly after the war began overheard one of several ladies who were passing remark : "Look at those officers sitting there drinking. Why are they not at the front fighting?" fight-ing?" Cae of the officers got up and, approaching the ladies, eaid: "Our work was completed months ago. We worked from early morning till late at night on plans which our armies are now carrying out. It is our time to rest" The resistance that France would be able to put up was always very lightly estimated, and if the intervention of England was at all taken into consideration, consid-eration, the comparatively small army she could place In the field was regarded re-garded as but a drop In the bucket compared com-pared with the well-trained German horde that was ready to sweep across the border. How could England's 80,000 men cope with Von Kluck's 500,000 or the hastily mobilized French armies resist re-sist the thoroughly prepared, equipped and well-disciplined German warriors? It is really not to be wondered at that the Germans firmly believed that they would bring the allies to their knees within a comparatively few weeks and that the conquering German Ger-man armies would celebrate Sedan day, September 2, In Paris. What actually ac-tually happened Is, of course, too well known here to require recital, but I know that the Germans were kept in absolute ignorance of the marvelous resistance the allies were able to put up in those critlcul days of August and September, 1914, and to this day the majority of Germans have not heard of the battle of the llarne ! Just after the English passed their conscription law I was called to see the kaiser at the great army headquarters, headquar-ters, which at that time were at Pless. Although the war had then lasted two or three times as long as the Germans had expected, the kaiser masked the depression he must have felt by putting put-ting on a bold front "How foolish for England to start conscription now," he declared. "She thinks she can accomplish in a few mouths what it has taken Germany a hundred years to attain. Armies and officers cannot be developed over night. We have never stopped preparing since the days of Frederick the Great!" "Yes, your majesty, but the Northern North-ern states in our Civil war put In conscription con-scription two years after the begln-- begln-- ning of the war," I suggested. "But Just look how locuj tout war lasted," the kaiser replied quickly. "This war won't last that long. The allies will feel what the power of Germany Ger-many is long before English conscription conscrip-tion can avail them anything!" "And .while England is slowly building build-ing up her insignificant army," the kaiser went on, "she will see America's navy and merchant marine constantly growing and the dollar replacing the pound as the unit of the world's finance. No, Davis, England will 60on be sick of the war and will look with fear upon America's growing power 1" The French army, too, was generally belittled, and the Russians were believed be-lieved to be absolutely negligible. The French army was so poorly equipped, It was pointed out, that the officers had to go to the field in patent-leather boots, and on the Russian front, only the first-line men had guns, the others being armed with clubs ! Eventually, officers and soldiers returning re-turning from the western front on furlough- or passing through the countrj en route from one front to the other brought the report of the defeat before Paris. Soldiers who participated in that disastrous retreat wrote from the new trenches to their friends and relatives rel-atives telling of the terrible experiences experi-ences they had undergone, when they went for days with nothing to eat but raw potatoes and turnips which they picked from the fields. When these reports finally spread through Germany the people began to realize that their generals in the west were not meeting with the same success that Von Hindenburg had had in the east and Von Hindenburg became the idol of the people immediately, a fact that was very distasteful to the high command. The kaiser's dislike of Von Hindenburg Hinden-burg was of long standing. He had never forgiven that general for the mistake mis-take he made during military maneuvers maneuv-ers in peace time when by a brilliant stroke of strategy he had succeeded in capturing the kaiser's forces, including the kaiser and his whole staff! I have referred In a previous chapter to the kaiser's unbounded confidence after the Italian collapse in 1917. "Now, we've got the allies!" he exclaimed, ex-claimed, with an air of conclusiveness which emphasized the optimism he displayed. After the capture of Roumanla, he exhibited a similar degree of exultation.- He believed that in that achievement achieve-ment he had successfully solved the food problem the one cloud which constantly darkened the kaiser's horizon. hori-zon. "Now the allies will never succeed in starving us," he said to me in my office of-fice shortly after the Roumanian drive. "With Roumania in our pockets and Servia already ours, their wonderful agricultural possibilities will supply our food needs and foil our enemies' efforts to starve us. Indeed, they had better look out for themselves. Don't forget we have a monopoly on the potash mines of the world. Without proper fertilization, American crops will go on decreasing and decreasing and they won't get any potash until we get ready to let them have it !" The failure of the Zeppelins from a military standpoint was undoubtedly a great disappointment to the German people at large, who had counted so much upon them to bring disaster to England, but it cannot be said that the kaiser shared their chagrin. On the contrary, I have reason to believe that he never expected very much from that arm of his military force except as it might be useful to terrorize the civil population. A day or two after Zeppelin's death, in 1917, a patient of mine, a lady, happened hap-pened to remark that it was too bad that the count had not lived to see the triumph of his invention, and when I saw the kaiser shortly afterwards I repeated her remark to see what he would say. "I am convinced that the count lived long enough to see all that the Zeppelins Zep-pelins were capable of accomplishing," wits his only comment. It recalled the answer he had given me some years before when both Zeppelins and airplanes air-planes were In their Infancy and I had asked him which held the greater promise. "We do not know. Time alone will tell," was his reply. The last time I conversed with the kaiser was on November 26, 1917. Up to that time we had sent over 109,000 troops, according to the figure which have since been revealed by Secretary Baker. According to the kaiser's information, in-formation, however, we had onl 80,-000 80,-000 men in France at that time and he was of the opinion that we would never have many more. "America is having a fine time trying try-ing to raise an army," he declared satirically. "I hear that 1,600 mutinied the other day in Nev York and refused re-fused to get on a transport, and a town in the Northwest composed principally prin-cipally o citizens of Swedish blood refused to register at all ! We are getting get-ting excellent information about all conditions in America." Shortly before this had come the revelations rev-elations from Washington of the Intrigue In-trigue of Count von Lnxburg, the Ger- Iman minister to Argentina, and I knew where the kaiser waa getting the in formation he referred to. In nearly every case, it appeared, the kaiser's informants in-formants were misleading him. Both before and after we entered the war the kaiser was thoroughly convinced con-vinced that we could play only a nominal nom-inal part in it so far as man power was concerned and his assurance on that point undoubtedly accounted for his decision to carry through his submarine sub-marine program even though It resulted re-sulted in bringing us into the war. "Do you realize how many tons of shipping it takes to ship a single soldier?" sol-dier?" he asked me on one occasion. I confessed my ignorance on that point "Well, it takes six tons to the man ! To send over an army of 500,000 men, therefore, your country would require 6,000,000 tons of shipping in addition to the tonnage required for regular traffic. Where is it coming from, with my submarines sinking the allied vessels ves-sels faster than they can ever be replaced? re-placed? My U-boats are doing wonderful won-derful work and we are prepared to take care of all the troops America may try to land in France." "How foolish for America to have come Into the war," he went on. "If she could succeed in landing a real army In France, what good would it do? America can see how easy it was for me to break through and to capture cap-ture 300,000 of the Italians, and they must realize that I can break through on the western front and do the same thing there. If America had kept out of the war she would have gone on making untold profits and when peace was finally declared 6he would have been in a most enviable position among the nations of the world. As it is, Wilson will never have a seat at the peace table if I can help it, and now America shall have to pay all the costs of the war I" Evidently he imagined imag-ined that his triumph would be so complete that there would be -no peace table, but that the warring nations would be compelled to accept the terms he offered them, in which event, knowing the magnanimity of the German Ger-man make-np, I should say the world at large would have to be content with very little. How the kaiser feels now that the failure of the U-boats to intercept American troop ships must be painfully pain-fully apparent to him, and America has so overwhelmingly overcome the shortage of shipping, I don't know, but it is more than probable that for some time to come the real situation will, at any rate, be successfully concealed from the German people. I know that the failure of the U-boat campaign was unknown to the Germans up to the time I left Berlin in January, 1918. While the kaiser and the Germans generally felt confident that we would never be able, to send many men across, they professed to feel little concern even if we did. According to some of the German officers of-ficers with whom I spoke, even if we landed 2,000,000 men in France it would not be enough to break the deadlock, as the Germans were taking a similar number of trained troops from the Russian front. The only menace of American participation in the war lay in the possibility that we might add considerably to the allied air strength. Man power alone, they contended, would never be sufficient to help the allies much, but overwhelming superiority in the air might occasion the Germans some annoyance. The kaiser himself had but a poor opinion of the fighting qualities of the American soldier so far as modern war requirements are concerned. "The American soldier would possibly pos-sibly give a good account of himself in open fighting," he declared, "but he is not built for the kind of warfare he will encounter in France. He lacks the stolidity to endure, life in the trenches. He is too high-strung and couldn't stand the inactive life which is such an Important part of modern warfare. Besides, he lacks discipline and trained officers." CHAPTER IX. The Kaiser's Plan for World Dominion. The history of modern Germany is, perhaps, in itself sufficient indication of the underlying plan of the Teuton war barons to control the whole of Europe and, eventually, the world. The program has been slowly unfolding itself it-self since the time of Frederick the Great and the present generation is now witnessing what was Intended to ba the climax. There can be no doubt that if Germany Ger-many had succeeded in her' efforts to gain control of the major part of Europe Eu-rope she would have soon looked toward the western hemisphere and the east. This program is fairly Indicated by the course of events as history lays them bare, but I have the actual word of the kaiser to substantiate it. At one of his visits to me 6hortly after the beginning of the war we were discussing England's participation in it. "What hypocrites the English are!" tie knlser exclaimed. They had -aj8 treated ma co well when I visited them I never be lleved they would have come Into this war. They always acted as if they liked me. My mother was English, you know. I always thought the world was big enough for three of us and we could keep it for ourselves that Germany could control the continent conti-nent of Europe, Englnnd, through her vast possessions and fleet, could control con-trol the Mediterranean and the far east, and America could dominate the western hemisphere!" How long it would have been before Germany would have tried to wrest dominion from England can readily be imagined, and with the whole of Europe Eu-rope and the far east under her thumb America would undoubtedly have proved too tempting a morael for the kaiser's or his descendants' rapacious maw to have resisted. He said that he believed that the world was "big enough for three;" he didn't 6ay it was too big for one. What was really in his mind, however, how-ever, is Indicated by a passage in an address he made some twenty-five years ago, in which, as Rev. Dr. Newell New-ell Dwight Hillis has pointed out, he used these words : "From my childhood I have been under un-der the influence of five men Alexander, Alexan-der, Julius Caesar, Theodoric II, Napoleon Na-poleon and Frederick the Great. These five men dreamed their dream of a world empire : they failed. I am dreaming my'dream of a world empire but I shall succeed !" The kaiser's plan to dominate Eu rope included the control of Turkey and he made every effort to strengthen that country so that she might be a valuable ally in the war to come. When Italy took Tripoli from Turkey Tur-key before the Balkan war I mentioned men-tioned to the kaiser how opportunely Italy had acted, but the kaiser dismissed dis-missed my remark with an exclamation exclama-tion of displeasure, realizing, of course, that Turkey's loss was in a sense his own eince he had planned to make Turkey his vassal. To that end he had sent German officers of-ficers to train the Turkish army and had supplied them with guns and munitions. mu-nitions. With an eye to the future, too, he had constructed the great Bagdad Bag-dad railway. When the Balkan war broke out in 1912 the kaiser had great confidence that the Germanrained Turkish army would acquit itself creditably and that in the outcome of that conflict his European program would make considerable consid-erable progress. He told me that he had a map of the war area placed in his motor and that with pegs he followed fol-lowed the fortunes of the fighting armies while he was traveling. The kaiser had little regard for President Wilson from the time the latter was elected for the first time. "A real scoundrel" scoun-drel" was the way he characterized character-ized he president on one occasion. occa-sion. The kaiser admired Roosevelt Roose-velt very much, but was greatly disappointed at the stand taken by the former president after the war started What the kaiser kais-er thought of Wilson, Roosevelt, Henry Ford, and other Americans Ameri-cans Is disclosed in the next installment in-stallment of Doctor Davis' story. (TO BE CONTINUED.) |