STOCKHOLM.

Hokitika Guardian, 15 September 1917, Page 4

STOCKHOLM.

FULL OF GERMAN SPIES BERNSTORFF AGAIN. (From A. M. Thompson). Stockholm, June 16 The Daily Mail did a bold and sportsmanlike thing in asking,the acting editor of the leading British Socialist paper to proceed to Stockholm and' report his own free and unfettered views on the Labour and International Conferences convened bv the Dutch-Scaiulinavian Socialist Committee. The opportunity of such wide publicity was obviously not to lie refused, and I jumped at it.

Thence arises this curious situation, Ilia '.while British Socialists may not attend the conference as delegates I am privileged to lie a witness of the proceedings as a journalist. This distinction, of course, makes all the difference. I claim no right to stand outside the nation as the representative of a part}- to discuss “ terms ot peace” with members of a corresponding parly from the enemy, a nation with whom the British nation at present declines to negotiate. . Indeed, I had determined before starting to hold no personal communication with any representative of enemy nationalitv, but already one of the accidental contacts of travel has defeated that resolve. Last night, on the Swedish frontier at Charlottenburg, in the twenty minutes’ halt for /dinner, I exchanged table courtesies with a prodigally affable neighbour, and incidentally inquired his nationality. When he replied that he was a German delegate to the Peace Conference the answer struck like a blow. I suddenly realised the impossibility of my resolution ; I had practically entered the enemy’s country.

It was the most dramatic sensation experienced since we sailed from England in the darkness, rejoicing in the discomfiture of certain pacifist delegates. SWARMING WITH HUNS.

The change has been confirmed everywhere in Stockholm. This beautiful capital swarms with Germans. There is a difference even in the tone of the inhabitants from the cordial sympathy expressed by fellow travellers in Norway. The ,; e latter were mostly seafaring men with bitter experience of submarine outrage. One of them, recently torpedoed, told how the German commander had taken h s watch and his purse after sinking his ship. All were angry about the treachery of some Norwegian seamen, including the captain and mate of a mail boat running between Bergen and Newcastle, who were convicted last weekoi betraying information to the Germans as to sailings from Norway, thus delivering their own compatriots to submarine devilry. All resented the merciful sentence imposed on those Iscariots; all expressed fervent hopes of Germany’s defeat. Here the people are friendly, but there is a difference. The German propaganda has been marvellously astute and various. The hotel table is littered with German

newspapers, literature, and statistics, but there is not one Allied newspaper nor one scrap of Allied propaganda. Among the papers we found one, the Russian Hessen - ger (Russky Vyestnik), printed in Russian, with specially cheap rates for distribution in Russian prisoner camps and occupied Russian territories. It contains lists of prisoners (unobtainable elsewhere), cunningly doctored - news, and tearful pathos about “ the cruel fate of tlie simple moujik (peasant), butchered for the sake of British and Japanese expansion.”

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Stockholm itself . swarms with spies and agents. German methods do not change as easily as Hindeuburg’s brilliant plans ; neither is any German change of heart indicated by the methods of German delegates at the conference. At all the previous International Congresses the Germans have hectored, jockeyed, and “ruled the roost,” and it looks as if this established usage is likely to persist.

bernstorffs dodge. When the Dutch-Scandinavian Committee decided to convene the conference, Branting and the Swedish Socialist leaders asked that Germany should send representa-

tivcs of the minority as well as of the majority Socialists. • The German Government refused sion to the former, lmt cheerfully erranted permission to the faithful Scheidemann and his disciplined followers. Brantiug bluntly declined to deal with one section alone, and the German Government discretely gave way. The orthodox faction had already stahed on its journey, but on the Government promise that the minority should start immediately the committee allowed business to begin. The minority were to have arrived last week. Now Count Bernstorff, that diplomatic genius whose pleasing idiosyncrasies have been transferred from Washington to Stockholm, is “ desolated” to have to announce that the minority delegates cannot be brought here before the end of June. With a month’s start for Scheidemann, Count Bernstorff probably concludes that there will not be much left for the others. But “ the best-laid schemes of mice ail’ men gang ait agiev.’V A curious rift is said to bedeveioping between Scheidemann and David, who distinguished himself in 1915 by declaring that if oar enemies are not disposed to make peace we shall compel them.” Now David disavows the policy of annexations and advocates the restitution of Belgium. Even the well-drilled German Socialists begin to think it inadvisable to demand the unobtainable. But the n\pst significant of happenings at Steckho'm relates to the publication of reports. The Germans - insisted at the outset that 110 reports should appear in Branting’s paper, the “Social Demokrat,” til l thev have appeared in the Berlin “Forward” fVorwarts). The reason of this condition appears to be that, as the reports ior ‘ forward” must pass the German cen sor before publication, reprints in Branting’s paper must necessarily orove quite nice and gooa for Swedish and .neutral consumption. Marvellous to relate, this condition was accepted by tne Dutcn-Scandi-navian Committee, who docilely reprint the reports from “Forward” with a, bare footnote to the effect that they “have no comments to make on their version." The genius of Jauresin past congresses failed before the fixed and unalterable laws ol “ Sozialdemokfatie.” Is ’History to repeat itself at Stockholm? .