GERMANY TO-DAY.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XLII, Issue 2098, 4 March 1920, Page 4

GERMANY TO-DAY.

TRAVELLERS’ VIEWS. - TRANSITORY'REGIME. Two foreign experts on German conditions, one on Englishman, the other an American, both of whom' knew. Germany thoroughly before the war, have just returned to London from visits of investigation to Berlin. They have, supplied men with what they term “an unvarnished tale” of what they saw*, and heard, writes Frederick William Wile in the Daily Mail. Fresh and sweeping upheavals, they say, are inevitable. A counterrevolution in the militarists’ interest is not regarded as a probability, but my informants are agreed —and aver that'most Germans are —that the present regime in Berlin is transitory.. No one knows what sort of a Governmental system will, succeed it. The only certain thing is that it cannot last. Many important Germans look Cor salvation in a Constitutional Monarchy on British lines. NO “STARVATION.” Foreigners newly arrived in Berlin,” said the Englishman, “if they knew pre-war Berlin, are immediately struck by the haggard appearance of the people. One's fat friends of 1914 are lean now. But it is beyond the mark to speak of ‘starvation’ conditions, or of ‘streets filled with living skeletons.’ Infants are suitering from an under-supply of milk, and many older children who ought to be getting milk are without it. But, speaking generally, there is food, and plenty of it, Cor people who can pay for it. These fortunate persons have never gone short at all since 191-1. if the roiling stock situation on the railways were less desperate food conditions would bo, while not normal, quite tolerable. Lack of goods waggons and locomotives is mainly responsible for both the fuel and the food shortage in- Berlin, and the (dher big towns.

HERO WORSHIP. “There has always been and always will be a militarist and dupker cii<jne in Germany. It is dying hard, and eagerly seizing on such events as the recent presence of Ifiridenburg and LiulendorJf in Berlin for demonstration purposes. But, barring a miracle, the militarists and jankers will hardly ever succeed in putting any more real tight into (he German people. Except for tho lens of thousands still alive who were officers or .non-commissioned ollicers in the, late war, the Germans are chastened and depressed by their debacle. When they think of the uverweeningly prosperous Ger-. many of 1914 and contemplate the wreck of. to-day, they are in. no mood to exalt the men who brought them to their present position. NonniiJilarist Germans say, ‘We are finished. You Allied peoples have us at your mercy!' “The truth is undoubtedly da wining in Germany. The bubble about our ‘holy war of defence’ lias burst. Nobody any longer believes in that twaddle. The country realises that it was led to the slaughter in a reckless mllitarLl gamble for world power. The Germans, as many ol them said to me. know now bow long the militarist gang fooled them when it insisted .that men must be soldiers nil their lives to be good ‘Fatherland defenders.’ The nnmililary British and American nations, the .Gormans say, turned out on short mil ice soldiers who wore the toughest antagonists.

“In all essential respects, I think, the scales have fallen from German eyes so tar as the military myth is concerned. It had its chance, and it failed. The Germans claim that they are done with it. They may he bluffing, but their chastened and depressed demeanour certainly doesn't hear out such a, theory. There are arrogant Germans still at large, hut they are a minority of Last-Ditchers. EAGER FOR BUSINESS. “What the German eapitailislid and labour world wants is to get. hack to business as rapidly as possible. All classes know that they have a lung and thorny path to travel. A great captain of industry, well known in England, told me that never in my lifetime —and I expect to live 25 or 30 years —will German commerce and trade approximate its old-time importance. But the world may rest assured (hat Germany is determined to retrievejier lost fortunes as soon as she can. The great industrialists look forward to the future with calmness, coolness, and courage, even with confidence, hut always with a full realisation of the grim struggle that awaits them all along the line. They derive encouragement —a fad that British and American Labour will do well to note —from the readiness of (he German - working citruses to huekle down to the realities of the .situation. “With the breaking of the metal workers’ strike a few weeks ago, German business men think the crisis was reached and passed. German Labour is now prepared to remain at work, and even to tolerate 10 or 12 hours a day, in order that the process of rehabilitation may he hastened. Germany’s Labour troubles are hardly at an end. But her workpeople seem to be under no illusions as to what is required of them if the country is to make a serious start on the road to recovery.” WHO RULES GERMANY 1 I asked the Englishman who 7 advanced these views who seems to be the real ruler of Germany, the power behind the Socialist thx ; one. He replied: , “One hears Noske's name mo ( st

frequently .mentioned as the strong man, but tliere does not appear to be any really outstanding personality. That fact strengthens the general conviction that the present Socialist Government can be nothing but a makeshift. It has not developed anybody big enough to be looked upon as a .real national leader.”