The Birmingham age-herald., 1923-06-24


 was because "the Chief" had in- vestigated and found the story straw dummy.
 Prize Remains Untaken.
 q have offered the staff two hun dred pounds" he said to me, flor proof of genuine case with names, places and photographs" The re- ward was never claimed.
 On the other side of the line, the faTorite German atrocity story was even more horrible and imaginative. It related that the Belgians, when war was declared, cut off the breasts of the German women living among them Brand Whitlock, German charge 'daffaires at Brussels in the interval between declaration of war and the arrival of the German army, stands sponsor for the statement that during this troubled period no German civilian was either killed or seriously hurt. But to the end of the war, the Germans told the breast story as indignantly, believed it as implicitly, as we did the hand story. Later in the. war, we borrowed IL from them. I remember in 1917 an excited civilian retailing at a head quarters mess a story which he had heard" about an outrage of the kind in a Belgian town. And l remember also that the British officers winked solemnly at each other behind his back.
 Having cleared away some of the debris, let me proceed to examine what really did happen.
 Army In Close Control.
 The German general staff sent 1n- to Belgium a magnificently discip- lined army. which would be ruthless or gentle at command. Always the German war lords had believed in "frjghtfulness"-the terrorization of civilian populations-as worthy and useful tactics. They proved that in the Boxer campaign, where experts had 8 chance to observe the methods and ethics of the various armies. War correspondents who followed the advance to Picking told me that the British, French and Americans loeted, while the Cossacks and Ger mans both footed and massacred: the only troops which lived up to Chrls- tian ethics of war were the heather Japanese.
 They proposed, as part of their nlans. to employ a certain amount of fr;ghtfu1ness in Belgium. One factor alone seemed likely to hamper these Understandable opinion both at home ard abroad Frightfulness must De aDnI;ed with discretion, and in such manner as to put the best face on the operations. .,.
 Here was the problem of civilian control" in Belgium, s 1t must nave appealed to the Great general sta1i. They intended to cross Belgium as expeditiously as possible, to strike l the hastily mobilized French an over whelming blow at the border' anu to take Paris before the allies could get their feet. Unless France then sued immediately for terms, the al lied line might be expected to reform across central France, presumably on the River Loire. There, probably would be fought the decisive battle on the western front.
 Examples Demanded By Strategy.
 The plan of campaign involved in the end an extraordinarily long line of unications-across all Bei- gium and half of France. The longer you stretch your communlcatlons, the more troops and material you must drop back from your front line to guard them. By stretching your line too far, you may fritter away the effective strength of your army By the same token, the less aggressive the hostile civilian popu- troops needed as guards. It was necessary at once to put the Be gians in such a frame of mind that they would beard the devil sooner than cut a German telegraph wire, blow m a German bridge. How could this hest be accomplished? Frightfulness. Kill in spectacular fashion hand ful of Beigians here and there. Burn discreet number Of buildlngs anu towns. Show the Belgians and northern French towns that an or fense against the German troops meant vengeance instant and ter rible.
 nostrils Of the world, the Germans | fell back on an amendment to thelr old Jaw of reprisals." Up to the Franco-Prussian war, modern sol diers had considered as an honorable combatant any man who took up arms to defend his native soil.
 Franc rireurs sho3 H 2 by 2 United States.
 In the confusion which followed the fall of Paris and the declaration of the Third Republic, armed but unenlisted and ununiformed citizens used, as individuals or as bands, to take potshots at the invaders. This form of guerilla warfare grew so irritating that the Germans added | new clause to their code of warfare. Any man not in uniform, caught shooting at them, was to be con- sdered a spy, and as such shot or hanged at once. Since 1871. that rule has gradually been adopted by all armies. When we occupied Vera Cruz, we ourselves shot franc-tireurs.
 Now, the great general staff amended and expanded this law of reprisals. If German troops were fired on from a house, every one in that house capable of bearing arms was instantly to be shot. The phrase capable of bearing arms" was de- l fined to mean "any one more than 13 years old" In this, no distinction was drawn between the sexes. Which meant that if a single reckless Bel gian boy shot from his house at the invaders, he involved in his own capital punishment his parents, his grown sisters and his aged grand mother. And the house was to be burned at once. If shots were fired from more than one point along a street, the punishment provided by German military law was to be visited upon the inmates of houses from which firing appeared to pro- ceed, and the street was to be burn ed. Similarly, if anything resem- bling general firing started up in a village, the whole town must be burned.
 Torch Squads Work Calmly.
 These were the orders, as repeated to me without variation by hundreds of Germans from privates in the ranks to Major Boyer, adjutant of the army which occupied Lonvain. UT ihei, Saw tHc fsceHuidTy SQuduS with their apparatus. This consisted of black pastilles made from .some kind of coal-tar derivative which, upon being lighted, burned fiercely and hopped about scattering flame, together with bundles of celluloid l kindling resembling macaroni. On the second night of the historic Lou vain affair, these incendiary squads worked as methodically and stolidly as ditch diggers, reducing building after building to cinders.
 It seems to me that the great general staff worked just as me- | medically to get the troops into the