The Washburn times. [volume] (Washburn, Wis.) 1896-1976, 1917-12-20


fish claims to advantage even on the
part of victors.
To Give All To Win War.
Let there be no misunderstanding
Our present and immediate task is 10
win the war and nothing shall turn US
aside from it until it is accomplished
Every power and resource we possess
whether of men, of money or of mate.
rails, is being devoted and will con-
tinue to be devoted to that purpose
until it is achieved Those who desire
to bring peace about before that pur-
pose is achieved l counsel to carry
their advice elsewhere. We will not
entertain it. We shall regard the war
as won only when the German people
say to us, through properly accredited
representatives that they are ready to
agree to settlement based upon JUS
tice and the reparation of the wrongs
their rulers have done. They have
done wrong to Belgium which must
be repaired. They have established a
power over other lands and peoples
than their own-over the great en-
pire of Austria Hungary, over hitherto
free Balkan states, over Turkey and
within Asia-which must be relin-
pushed.
German Industry Admired.
| "Germany's success by skill, by in
dustry, by knowledge, by enterprise
we did not grudge or oppose, but adj
mired rather. She had built up for
herself a real empire of trade and in
| fluence, assured by the peace of the
world. We were content to abide the
rivalries of manufacture, science and
commerce that were involved for US
in her success and stand or fall IS we
had or did not have the brazil and
the initiative to surpass her. sat at
| the moment when she had conspicu-
ously won her triumphs of peace she
| threw them away to establish in their
stead what the world will no longer
political domination by arms, by
which to GUST where she could not
excel the rivals she most feared and
hated The peace we make must rem
| edy that wrong. 1t must deliver the
once fair lands and happy peoples of
Belgium and Northern France from
the Prussian conquest and the Prus-
sian menace, but it must also deliver
| the peoples of Austria-Hungary, the
peoples of the Balkans and the peo-
pies of Turkey, alike in Europe and in
Asia, from the impudent and alien
domination of Prussian military and
commercial autocracy.
Not To NEEDLE In Austria.
"We owe it, however, to ourselves
to say that we do not wish in any
way to impair or to rearrange the
Austro-Hungarian empire. 1t is no af-
fair of ours what they do with their
own life either industrially or polite
ally. We do not purpose or desire to
dictate to them in any way. We only
desire to see that their affairs are left
| in their own hands, in all matters,
great or small. We shall hope to Sc
cure for the peoples of the Balkan
peninsula and for the people of the
Turkish empire the right and oppor-
| tunity to make their own lives safe,
| their own fortunes secure against op
preston or injustice and from the die
| tation of foreign courts or parties.
And our attitude and purpose with re-
gard to Germany herself are of like
kind. We intend no wrong against
| the German empire, no interference
with her internal affairs. We should
| deem either the one or the other alb
solutely unjustifiable, absolutely con-
trary to the principles we have pro.
| fessed to live by and to hold most
sacred throughout our life as ma
ton.
Autocrats MisIead Germans.
| The people of Germany are being
| told by their men whom they now per.
nit to deceive them and to act as
their masters that they are fighting
| for the life and existence of their en-
pire, a war of desperate self-defense
against deliberate aggression. Nothing
could be more grossly or wantonly
false and we must seek by the utmost
| openness and candor as to our real
| aims to convince them of its falseness
We are in fact fighting for their eman.
cipation from fear, along with our own
! from the fear as well as from the fact
of unjust attack by neighbors or rivals
or schemers after world empire. No
/ one is threatening the existence or
| the independence or the peaceful en-
terprise of the German empire.
World Partnership After War.
The worst that can happen to the
detriment of the German people is this
| that if they should still, after the war,
is over, continue to be obliged to live
under ambitious and intriguing mas
tiers interested to disturb the peace
of the world, men or classes of men
whom the other peoples of the world
could not trust, it might be impossible
to admit them to the partnership of
nations which might henceforth guar
antee the worlds peace. That part
nership must be 2 partnership of peo-
pies, not mere partnership of gov
ernments. 1t might be impossible, al
so, in such untoward circumstances,
to admit Germany to the free econom-
| ic intercourse which must inevitably
spring out of the other partnerships
of a real peace. But there would be
no aggression in that, and such a sit
uation, inevitable because of distrust,
would in the very nature of things
sooner or later cure itself by process
es which would assuredly set in.