Omaha daily bee. (Omaha [Neb.]) 187?-1922, 1918-11-04
The End of a Dream
New York Evening Post.

New 7 ofk Evening Fost.
Deutschland, Deutschland, uber allies, uoer allies
In der Welt
Won der Mas bis an Gle Memel. Won der Etsch
bis an den Belt
When Hoffman, Won Fallerseben wrote his
Lied der Deutsehen," in l841, he did not en-
body in it anything like aspirations of full
blown Junkerism which in our own days
seized upon his Deutschland. Deutschland uber
allies" and made it the slogan of world DONNA
ton. Only in one direction-and that excusably
does the poet lay himself open to the charge
of imperialism when he claimed for the German
people space between the Meuse and the Memel
(the Niemen), between the Adige and the Belt.
The Germany OF l84l did virtually touch the
Meuse, north Of x-la-Chapelle, the Belt, and
the Niemen at Konigsberg, and the Austrian
Germans were ruling in Italy to the Adige. The
Junkers chanted Fallersleben's geography but
in a symbolic sense only. For the Meuse they
substituted the mouths of the Mouse with Hol-
land and Belgium; for the Memel they substi-
tuted the Gulf of Finland and the Dnieper; be-
yond the Belt the ultimate plan ran to the
Arctic. Instead Of the Adige the German fur
thest south was carried to Bagdad and the Per-
sian gulf.
Today the mad program Of domination
lies ptiful wreck. 1t is no longer a question
of German Mittel-Eurasia from the North Sea
to the Persian gulf At either end of the huge
Junker map the allied shears have been at work.
Mesopotamia went first After long pause
came Palestine and Bulgaria, and the southern
terminus of Bremen-B agdad was pushed back to
the Danube Without loss Of time, the allied
shears cleaved through at the other end of the
map, and the Flanders coast is now a German
memory. With England as the arch foe of am
bilious Prussiansn, two pistols were to be d.
rected against British power, one from Flanders
at the heart OF England, the other from the
Persian gulf at India. Both these weapons are
now in the scrap heap. But the reduction pro-
cess has not stopped there. Only month ago,
Immediately after the Bulgarian collapse, the
junkers would have been happy to keep
limits of the Mouse and the Danube. Today
the Mouse is in danger, and the French in Ser
bia have reached the Danube.
The Rhine and the Danube have been the
two great Germanic rivers Along their cur
rents Teuton destiny was to flow, in one drec-
ton towards the North Sea and domination Of
the Atlantic, along the other towards the near
and middle east. First these mighty streams
were to be conquered to their mouths, and then
Teuton Weltmacht was to debouch on the
oceans. That is thing of the past. But the
debacle of junkerism does not stop there. Its
tide is receding The cutting of navigation on
the Danube is only dramatic reminder of a
closed chapter. Further up stream the great
river Is strewn with the wreck Of Teuton am
billions. The Danube has been virtually blocked
to the kaiser at Budapest. 1t is menaced further
north around Pressburg by the newborn
Czecho- Slovak nation. And on the Rhine it is
now foregone conclusion that the French will
establish their own watch. Junkerism set out
to navigate the great German streams towards
the ocean. Junkerism will end by losing the
middle courses of the Danube and the Rhine.
What is not generally known is that the poet
Of Deutschland uber Allies" the year after he
had written his hymn, was expelled from his
professorship at Bresau, and subsequently from
other German states, for his political tenden-
cies." 1t is one of the ironies of history that
German reaction under the guidance Of Meter
mich should have sent into exile a poet whose
words were to be distorted half century later
into the hymn of Prussian world domination.
But history may yet vindicate the poet against
the junkers The brutishly militaristic
Deutschland ubber Allies" is vanishing When
the process has been completed beyond doubt
the world will welcome the Deutschland of Fal-
1ersleben's third stanza: F
Eingkeit und Recht und Freiheit fur das
deutsche Vaterland