Atlanta semi-weekly journal. (Atlanta, Ga.) 1898-1920, 1918-06-07
:: The Truth About Belgium
BY BRAND WHTTLOCK
=

all power, all authority, all privilege
is vested finally in the generals, the
field marshals and the general staff.
Pastors exist only to assure them of
the approval of the Teutonic God;
professors TO write learned justifica-
tions of their crimes, and scientists to
invent new and more terrible meth
DDS of destruction. For forty-fOur
years the writer's and thinkers of Ger
many had been at work upon this
theory-fOrty- four years of what
laborious study, Of what prodigious
toll! There is something almost
pathetic in the spectacle. One ray of
humor visiting those patient, docile,
heavy minds would have spared
them all their trouble-and made the
empire impossible. Forty-four years,
and whole libraries of ponderous
tones to define a theory that Louis
XIV, without hypocrisy and with no
illusions, with French clearness,
French logic, French cynicism and
French wit, but into a word
81 'Etat, c'est mol"
But the trouble with theories is
that when they undertake to realize
themselves, to body themselves forth
they have nothing to do il ",
cept men. | am sure that those old
men of the landstrum-in the little
round caps and the boots, and the
rifles with the long shining bayonets,
and with buckles with Colt nit
Uns'' on their bellies, whom we used
to see standing in ecstacies before
the windows of the delicatessen
shops in Brussels, where the red
sausages glistened and the golden
Dutch cheeses gleamed-had never
heard of Nietzsche, or of Barnhardi,
or IF Treitschke. They were neither
philosophers nor mystics, and were
all unaware that they were super
men. All they had heard of was the
burgundy of Belgium, the cham
payne of France-and franc-tireurs.
In their pockets they carried infiam-
mable pastels, and the like, phrase
books giving alternate translations
in German and French of such SEN
fences as:
Hands up"
Garry out all the furniture"
81 am thirsty; bring me some
beer, gin, rum.
You have to supply a barrel OF
wine and a keg of beer!"
'If you lie to me l will have you
shot immediately"
Lead me to the wealthiest 1nhab-
itants of this village"
81 have orders to requisition sew
eral barrels of wine"
SHOW us the way to -. II
you lead us astray you will be shot.
For forty years German writ
ers had been preaching duty OF
waging war not only on armies, but
on civil populations as well, and the
German mind was saturated with
the notion that in France the civil
population was composed OF franc
tireurs Not only the military writ
ers, but the German romantlclsts
had filled their books with the ldea.
Their popular romances. abound IN
tales of terrible French franc-tlr-
eurs. with their ferocious names, the
eidolons of those Tartorins the Ger
mans had heard of in France IN
1870. Those tales were told every
where in the Prussian Germany that
grew up after the war 1870.
In the first days of the war, ar
irving in a village that was on the
frontier, near Malmedy, partly in
Belgium and partly in Germany, 1t
is said Ct cannot vouch for TINS
storv) that the German soldiers at
once began burning houses. and
that there were cries of "Ne1n.
Nein! Dis list noch Deutsche! Al
any rate, along the Route de la Irols
Chiminees the peasants we're assem-
bled under guard by the soldiers ana
pointed out to the oncom1ng col
umns as specimens of the Belgian
franc-tireurs that had fired on their
comrades!
German Fear of Franc Ilreurs
The result was that when the Ger
man soldiers entered Belgium they
we're in such highly excited state
in a condition of such fear, that they
saw a franc-tireur in every peasant
in every peaceful civilian. The light
est sound, the cracking OF US
the slamming of a door, brought the
crv MAN hat geschossen! ana the
stampede and carnage began. Even
officers we're not free from the Cd
session. A general quartered IN
nalace in Brussels in the autumn OF
1914 was awakened by an unusual
sound-a steady, persistent t1ck-tlck-
tick. there in the silent watches OF
the night. He arose, sumomned the
guard. told them that there was an
internal machine at work, ordered
them to ransack the house from attic
to cellar, where at last they found
a defective water-meter.
To the general, of course-and no
doubt to all those with loftier seats
in the hierarchy-the doctrines
meant something. War had become
a sacred thing, and a Germans -hrst
duty of all was to the state. An oth-
cial at Brussels one day, while ne
was smoking a cigar with a relish
that seemed entirely human, SAID
with an air of great merit and, no
doubt. with entire sincerity:
eff that sentinel out there should
tell me to throw away this cigar l
should do so, unhesitatingly and in
stantly."
Thus the peculiar conception of
duty" came before conscience, before
honor, before every moral cOnsidera-
ton. Distinctions become blurred and
fade from the mind. Men
who in their private or personal
capacity would not think of counte-
nancing such deeds would permit,
even command, any brutality, any
any atrocity, the moment
they could say to themselves that it /,