The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1917-06-14

whether it is to be brought under its
! mastery or fling itself free.
| THE war was begun by the military
masters of Germany who proved TO De
also the masters of tria-HunSary-
/ These men have never regarded ma
tions as peoples, men, women and chill
dren of like blood and frame as them
Selves for whom governments existed
and in whom governments had their
{ life They have regarded them merely
as servIceable organizations Whlch
they could by force or intrigue Dena
I or corrupt to their own purposes. They
( have regarded the smaller states in
particular and the peoples who could
/ be overwhelmed Ivy force, as their nat
ural tools and instruments or DONNA
ton.
Germany's World Plot.
Their purpose had been long
[ avoWed. The statesmen of other ma
tions, to whom that purpose was in
credible, paid little attention; re-
garded what German professors eX-
/ pounded IL their class rooms and Ger
man writer's set forth to the world
as the goal of German policy as rath-
err the dream of minds detached from
practical affairs, as preposterouS
private conceptions of German des-
tiny, than as the actual plans of re
spCnsible rulers; but the rulers or
Germany themselves knew all the
while what concrete plans, what well
advanced intrigues lay back of what
the professors and the writer's were
saying and were glad to 90 forward
unmolestGd, filling the thrones of
Balkan states with German princes,
putting German officers 1T the ser
vice of Turkey to drill her armies and
make interest with her government.
deV clipping plans of seditinn and re-
beIlion in India and Egypt, setting
n domA
made by austria upon Servia were 4
mere single step in plan which COM
passed Europe and Asia from Berliu
to Bagdug. They hoped these de-
mands might not arouse Europe, but
, they meant to press them whether
they did or not, for they thought
themselves ready for the final issue
of arms.
Other Nations Her Pawn.
Their plan was to throw a broad
belt of German military power and
political control across the very cen
ter of Europe and beyond the Med
iterranean into the heat of Asia; and
Austria Hungary was to be as much
their tool and pawn as Serbia or Bull
garia or Turkey or the ponderouS
states of the East. Austria Hungary,
, indeed, was to become part of the
central German empire, absorbed and
dominated by the same forces and in
fluences that had originally cemented
the German states themselves. The
/ dream had its heart at Berlin. 1t could
have had heart nowhere else. 1t re-
4 jected the idea of solidarity of race
/ entirely. The choice of peoples played
no part in it at all. 1t contemplated
/ binding together racial and political
units which could be kept together
only by force-Czechs, Magyars,
! Croats, Serbs, Rumanians, Turks,
/ Carmenians-the proud states of Bo-
hemia and Hungary, the stout little
commemorative of the Balkans; the
! indomitable Turks, the subtle peo~
pies of the Feast. These peoples did
not wish to be united. They ardently
desired to direct their own affairs,
would be satisfied only by undisputed
independence. They could be kept in
slant threat of armed men. They
would live under a common power
only by sheer compulsion and await
( the day of revolution. But the Ger
man military statesmen had reckOned
with all that and were ready to deal
with it in their own way
Amazing Plot Executed.
And they have actually carried the
greater part of that amazing plan
into execution Look how things
stand. Austria is at their mercy II
has acted, not upon its own initiative
or upon the choice of it's own people
but at Berlin's dictation ever since the
war began. Its peoples now desire
/
is granted from Berlin. The so-caIled
! central powers are in fact but a single
power. Serbia is at its mercy, should
| its hands be but for a moment freed
Bulgaria has consented to its will and
! Rumania is oVerrun. The Turkish
armies which Germans trained, are
serving Germany, certainly not them
selves and the guns of German war
ships lying in the harbor at COnstan-
tinople remind Turkish statesmen ev-
I oh
to take orders from Berlin. From
Hamburg to the Persian gulf, the net
is spread.
rs it not easy to understand the
eagerness for peace that had been
manifested from Berlin ever since the
snare was set and sprung? Peace,
peace peace, has been the talk of the
foreign office for now a year and
more; not peace upon her own initia-
tive, but upon the initiative of the ma
tions over which she deems herself to
hold the advantage. A little of the
talk has been public, but most of il
has been private. Thru all sorts OF
channels it has come to me and in
all sorts of guises, but never with the
terms disclosed which the German
government would be willing to ac-
cept. That government has other val
liable pawns besides those have men
toned. 1t still holds a valuable part
of France, tho with slowly relaxing
grasp, ana practically the whole OF
Belgium. Its armies press close upoI
Russia and overrun Poland at theil
will. 1t cannot go further; it dare
not go back. 1t wishes to close its
bargain before it is too late and it has
little left to offer for the pound OF
flesh it will demand.
THE military masters under whom
: Germany is bleeding see very clearly
to what point fate has brought them
If they fall back or are forced bach
: an inch, their power both abroad anC
at home will fall to pieces like a house
Of cards. It Is their power at home
they are thinking about now more
than their power abroad. 1t is tina
power which is trembling at their very