Vilas County news. [volume] (Eagle River, Vilas County, Wis.) 1896-1927, 1919-06-25
ALLIES GIVE OUT
TEXT OF GERMAN
REPLY TO TREATY
Injustice of Pact in Its Present
Form Is Cited in Docu-
ment.
DECLARES ARMISTlCE
AGREEMENT VIOLATED
Foe Uses 10000 Words to Reply to
Demands of the Victors-Says Ger
many's Importance Is Independent.
of Military Position.


of Military Position.
Paris, June 16.-"Germany's impor-
lance is Independent of her temporary
military and political position. If she
is not admitted Ito the League of Ma
tions) Immediately ON the signing of
peace it is impossible to speak OF
League of Nations"
This is one of the points raised by
Germany in her 10000 word reply to
the peace treaty, in which she makes
long series of contemporaries. A
summary of that reply was issued by
the committee on public information
on the eve of the delivery TO Count
Won Brockdorff- Rantzau by the allies
of the amended pact.
On the whole the summary covers
little new ground, the main points of
the German arguments having been
covered in press dispatches during the
last few weeks. Beyond putting Off
cial stamp on those dispatches the
summary reveals, however, some inter
esting Details 1t shows, also, that the
German reply was much stronger,
both in text and tenor of protests and
counter demands, than hitherto indi-
Gated.
Main Thread of Reply.
The main thread of the German an
swer is the charge that the original
peace treaty constitutes a breach Of
the solemn armistice agreement, based
on the Wilsonian IA points. 1t says
the treaty would mean "the complete
enslayement of the German people and
the betrayal of all the worlds cher
ished hopes of peace" The right of
self-determination, the Germans assert,
has been "wilfulIy violated through
out"
1t is difficult to see, Germany AYERS,
how and harsher terms could have
been diStated to the former imperial
istic and irresponsible government
Many speeches of allied statesmen and
| of President Wilson are then quoted
as saying the war was against that
government, not against the German
people, In the words of the summary:
"
are racing not irresponsible Ger
| man government but the German peo-
pie ruling its own future for itself.
This has been utterly disregarded in
the draft treaty"
The treaty is described as merely
a celebration of the last triumph of i'm
perialist and capitalist tendencies"
Won't Barter Human Beings.
In another passage the reply says
Germany cannot consent to the bar
tering of human beings and later:
1.-The German government declines
to make any reparation in the form of
punishment, and still more emphatical-
~ declines to pass on to individual
parts of the population the punishment
intended for the whole of the COM
munity."
Annexation of the Saar district is
called the creation of another Alsace-
Lorraine. AS for those provinces. Ger
many claims their cession without
consulting the population would be a
new wrong. She admits that, accord
ing to present conceptions of right, an
injustice was committed in 1871, when
the people were not consulted"
Acceptance of the trial of the ex-
kaiser an dsanction of his extradition
from Holland are fatty refused on the
ground that mo German subject can
be brought fore foreign court with
out established law or legal basis"
Nor will she consent to the extradition
of other subjects accused of war
crimes but instead proposes an inter
national court of neutrals ito judge
the fact of crime" The punishment,
however, she claims. must remain with
the national courts.
The document bitterly assails the
abolition of all German rights outside
Europe as "irreconcilable with the pre-
liminary negotiations and as wholly
impossible to a great people who not
only have supreme needs for markets
and supplies but who have shown
themselves capable of sharing the
worlds task of colonization"
A summary of the German protests
and contemporaries as computed
from today's official resume follows:
Reparaton.
Germany accepts responsibility only
| for civilian losses in the Belgian and
French areas occupied by her in the
war. She agrees to pay not more than
| S25. 600 100000, provided her other
| contemporaries are accepted. Char
acterizing the allied plan for repara-