GERMAN DEPRESSION

Dominion, Volume 9, Issue 2831, 24 July 1916, Page 6

GERMAN DEPRESSION

"PEMO.fr OF MILITARY SUCCESSES NOW OVER." "I have liatl «. very interesting conversation with an impartially-minded Swiss traveller (said t;bo Rome correspondent. of the Central News recently), who has just arrived hero from Berlin. He assured ine that the failure of the German offensive against Vordim, and tm> enormous losses entailed there, h.ivo produced a disastrous impression throughout the Empire. At last the German people aro awakening to n true realisation of the situation, and discouragement is general. 'J'hey understand* that never again can Germany make such efforts as she has madq;in the past, and that all hope of a decisivo victory lias thtl-efore vanished. The traveller believed that the German failure at Verdun was largely responsible for the recent outbreaks in Berlin, Leipzig, and elsewhere.

"Hitherto, he said, public spirit in Germany has been sustained entirely by military victories, 'but now these aro lacking, and, on the oilier hand, failures and disappointments aro multiplying. Verdun is not the only failure, there is also tlio failure of llw submarine and Zeppelin campaigns, tht failure of the Irish revolt, the defeats of the Turks in Armenia, Die Russian advance, the Italian advance, the immobility, of the ians, the instability of Greece and Ru- ? mania, and lastly, the imposibilily of breaking tlio British bloekadc.

"The Germans are not 'ignorant, and they aro quite ea,pablo of judging the significance of events. 11 is difficult noiv to find a German who does not recognise that the period of military succcsses and territorial conquests is over. They also recognise the gravity of the economic and financial crisis, and aro further depressed by the spectacle of many thousands of half-starved families, the prospects of another bad harvest, and the improbability of an early peace. Tn brief, said the Swiss traveller, the German people are steadily giving way to despair."