The Taihape Daily Times. AND WAIMARINO ADVOCATE THURSDAY, JANUARY 17, 1918. IS IT PEACE OR WAR?

Taihape Daily Times, 17 January 1918, Page 4

The Taihape Daily Times. AND WAIMARINO ADVOCATE

THURSDAY, JANUARY 17, 1918. IS IT PEACE OR WAR?

(With which is incorporated The Tajhapo Post and Waimarino News).

Cables received yesterday indicate that nothing is more sure than that Germany’s political troubles are even greater than her military troubles, very little really authentic gets through the censorship that the Military party have instituted, but from what has come it is certain that the German people may be regarded as on the verge of revolution. Only recently the Ludendorff-Hindenburg leaders of the war party were jubilating in connection with a victory over the stop-war party, and all we have to form an idea of what magnitude and importance the difference or defection was is that Ludendorff and Hindenburg threatened to resTgli if they did not get their way; There are now indications that their victory is to be hut a short-lived one; there is also some evidence as to the nature of what was creating such a momentous impasse. Out of the farrago of military-political muddle a clearer view of dividing lines is arising. While Ludendorff is boasting about his three chances to one of decisively defeating the Britisn in the great offensive blow he will strike when weather permits, his All-Highest Master, the Kaiser, is calling together the political princes of Germany and German diplomatists from neutral countries to discuss impending ministerial changes. It is stated that great political changes are on the tapis and that reshufflings in the upper personnel of the Government are foreshadowed, even the resignation of the Kaiser’s chief civilian secretary is probable. What has transpired to warrant an entirely new ministerial crew that Kuhlmann, Bulow, Bcrnstorff, and all diplomats in neutral countries are needed to discuss with the Kaiser? Perhaps a point of cleavage Has been reached between Hindenburg and those who refuse to believe that the sacrifice of hundreds of thousands more of Germany’s depleted manhood in a final effort can secure advantages superior to conditions offered in the Wilson-Lloyd George war aims. This is probably what has happened, but there is nothing to Indicate definitely which party is the more powerfully hacked by the soldiers cTT?S civilian population. The only real evidence that the military caste is in the minority—and it is evidence of rather a consequential and significant character —is that the present war administration is obviously being replaced by a political administration. The Chancellor, Hertling, is retiring, finding the position too irksome for him; and sweeping changes are being made in the upper personel of the Ministry The question naturally arises, why oust Ministerial representatives of the war-continuation party if the Ludendorff —Hindenburg offensive is to be persisted in? It is a Ministry of Militarism’s own fashioning and there was a threat to resign If it wag interfered with in ils conduct. There was jubilation over the defeat of their opponents, but that is little indicative of the German mind, for it is charae teristic of the Hun to boast of advantages gained, even in his worst and most depressing defeats. it would be little short of madness to assume that the present German Ministry are being replaced with Ministers having more bitterly extreme war leaning while the nation is starving, soldiers and sailors mutinying, and the whole population is clamouring for peace. Mr Philip Gibbs, one of the best-informed, far-seeing, and'reliable

of Britain’s war journalists expressed strong doubts about the probability of Germany launching a final offensive on the West front, He knows what he is not allowed to tell the world, and he is of opinion that Germany has had enough, and that no further wasteful sacrifice of German manhood will be persisted in. He thinks that the German people will rather accept what the Allies demand in their stated war aims than lead thousands more to the slaughter and then have to accept worse terms. That man of few words, disciple of Kitchener, Sir Douglas Haig, has frankly told us to discount the boast about the huge number of German troops coming from the Hast front; he says the majority of them have already come and have been disposed of by our BVitish soldiers. Then, the Kaiser is not calling together a council of his war lords, it is Germany’s very cleverest, most gifted- diplomatists —Kuhlmann, Bulow, Bernstorff—that he is hurriedly consulting. It is the highest in German politics not y-ar, the Kaiser has summoned, and there is foreshadowed a new Ministry and a new Chancellor who is the Kaiser’s representative in the Ministry. To hope for an immediate peace is to tax one’s credibility to an extreme, but it is most extraordinarily significant that a political and not a war council should be called on flip eve of an effort to secure military victory. It is certain that some momentous changes are contemplated ,and we naturally search for the motives that are behind them. The people want peace to save them from further slaughter, and to save them from starvation; trading and manufacturing interests realise that much more is to be gamed by shaking hands now than by waiting for complete military defeat; military leaders may prefer to mow to poltical paramountcy rather than risk degrading military defeat, •and the Kaiser himself may see some chance of saving his neck, of securing some safety for his throne in accepting a political rather than a mili tary defeat. He now has visions of a revoluton in which German and Russian I.W.W. hordes are devastating his country as Russia is now beingTevastatcd; of military naval and political princes being massacred as highborn Russians are being massacred; of the German blood that remains over from the war being, made to flow by internecine war as Russian blood is flowing In short, so much hinges upon the projected offensive on the West front, matters of, such far-reach-ing and momentous portent to the German Empire are so closely and dangerously involved that Germany may decide to accept peace on Allied terms rather than risk the alternative. In oUr opinion Germany and the world is threatened with trouble before whi'&i* the present war becomes insignificant. We mean that a wave of anarchy has commenced to roll; it is small, but it is there. Will the leading countries of the world save civilisation from a German hegemony and thereby sacrifice it to world-wide anarchical murder, assasination, plunder and confiscation? Bolshevikism has control of Russia; it is causing extensive mutiny in the armies of Germany; it has got a footing in Britain; it is spreading in other belligerent countries, and it is making headway amongst neutrals. The world is in a state of 'extreme unlest and danger, and all because of the sufferings, deprivations, starvings, resulting from continuation of the war. Has the Kaiser and his war lords grasped the full consequences of persisting in war, or will humane (?) considerations for his suffering people overcome'.-his desire for humbling his enemies? The Kaiser can save himself now by sacrificing all i other considerations to secure com- I fort for his people, and he may enlist the help 0 f all the world in stemming the wave of destructive anarchy that has commenced to significantly roll. On the other hand does this calling together of Germany’s leading politicals and diplomats, and the substitution of a political Ministry for a war Ministry only mean that the Kaiser is so sure of final victory on the West front that he deems it time to commence political and industrial reorganisation of the world ?