The Daily News. TUESDAY, JANUARY 15, 1918. GERMANY'S REAL AIMS.

Taranaki Daily News, 15 January 1918, Page 4

The Daily News. TUESDAY, JANUARY 15, 1918. GERMANY'S REAL AIMS.

: The tone of the enemy press is decidedly against the peace formula so clearly enunciated by Mr. Lloyd George, and supported by (President Wilson. The press plaintively exclaim that the peace offered is one that could only be imposed on a defeated enemy by a victor, suggesting that as things stand the Aus-tro-Gcrmans are on the box seat and able to dictate their own terms. Of course, everyone knows that. The Allies' terms do not suit the freebooting Powers that plunged the world into war and have caused such untold suffering, simply because the terms provide that the plunder they Bet out to obtain should be returned to their rightful owners, with com■pensatibn for the wrong so grievously and systematically done them. The Amsterdam Telegraaf epitomised the Allies' terms when it observed that "the peace the Entente wants is a peace satisfying everybody except those wishing to enrich themselves at the expense of other nationalities." Such a peace is furthest from the thoughts of the arch criminals directing the affairs of the bloodguilty Powers, who, though wanting peace badly because of the darkening military outlook and the economic rocks ahead, are anxious to retain what is now in their possession, including great slices of Russia, besides the return of their colonies, Mesopotamia and Palestine. The Allies, according to their inverted logic, must not only return all the territory taken from Germany and Turkey but agree to Austro-Germany retaining those portions of Europe they have seized. The history of the past hundred years shows that what Germany conquers she holds—if she can. She has not the slightest idea of giving up any of the spoils, if she can help it. That is why a peace at the present time is ton much to hope for. Germany has to be defeated on the battlefield before the Allied peace formula can be given effect to. Germany, however, can surrender Belgium, and all northern France, and all of Russia that she now occupies, and all of Italy that is held by her armies and the Austrian armies, and still achieve the greatest victory since Rome conquered the world That she has rifled the treasures of Belgium and France; that she lias seized coal and iron mines in France and Belbium and Poland that she has

stolen horses and cattle- and grain and food products of all kinds; that she lias laid hold on machinery of all sorts, taken it to pieces, and transported it into Geimanv; that she has robbed private owners in enemy countries of securities and jewels and silver plate and works of art; that she has forcibly enlisted the labor of the civilian population of occupied territory so that to-day Germany owns forty-two million slaves—all this wo may for the present purpose pass by, keeping it in mind only as an indication of what Germany would ibe willing to do with her might if she could win world dominion. It is world dominion by Germany, not merely what she does in trying to secure it, which the free peoples of the earth must give their utmost to prevent,. To that world dominion she is already well on her way Let us state ! some of the facts that Andre Cheradame,. a French writer, gives in a recent num- [ ber of the Atlantic Monthly. We shall state them very largely in his own words. "In 1914 Prussian miliarism held away over only the 88,000,000 inhabitants of the German Empire. At the beginning of 1917 it had been extended by consent or by force to the 176,000,000 people of PanGermany." Ab Friedrich Naumann has said: "Mitteleuropa is in existence today. Nothing is lacking save its organs of movement and action. These organs ean he provided by its two Emperors (the German Kaiser and the Emperor of Austria-Hungary), since they have at their disposal the necessary elements for the creation of a common army.*' Even if the Kaiser's armies were to withdraw from Russia, Poland, Belgium, and Prance, "Pan-Germany would still include 150,000,000 people." In the Allied nation's "people continue to speak of Germany, Austria-Hungary, Bulgaria, and Turkey as though these states remained just as they were before the war." As a matter of fact, they do not exist any longer as separate state in a quadruple alliance. Turkey, Bulgaria, and AustriaHungary are not the allies of Germany; they are Berlin's vassals. The influence of these countries with Berlin is "less than that of Saxony or Bavaria"; and "t>e rulers at Constantinople, Sofia, Vienna, and Budapest are simply marion•t.tes movedT'by fnreaTls which are pulled by Berlin." . Indeed, what now exists is more than Central Europe; it is PanGermany extending into Asia. There is no longer even a Germany; "instead there is Pan-Germany." What is necessary to the preservation of this PanGermany, the extinguisher of freedom, the great anarch among world empires? Look at the map. Belgium can he sacrificed, northern France can be and even Alsace-Lorraine might be given up; all of Poland could be turned back. But Austria-Hungary is essential, and so is enough of the Balkans, including Serbia, Bulgaria, and the occupied province of Roumania, to establish a line of domination through Constantinople to the point where British troops in Mesopotamia have drawn its limits. What will break up this new and menacing empire of PanGermany? Will the cry of "no annexations, no indemnities"? Those who remain credulous in spite of German lies and German treachery say that it would. They point to the map and say that if Serbia was not annexed or any of Boumania ' thi3 Pan-Germany would fall apart. Of course no one in his senses could believe that the Hermans would give up Serbia unless forced to do so by the most ruthless methods. "Of course it is easy to imagine that Germany would give her signature to treaties of settlement even involving Serbia. But treaties signed by Germany Tave no value whatever." Even supposing that Berlin were party to a treaty concerning Seroia, "this treaty might allow Serbia to exist in theory, but not in fact." "Serbia is one great graveyard. Her population has been systematically butchered by the Bulgarians, *ith German approval." The principle of "no indemnities" would keep Serbia in this state of misery; and the principle of "no annexation" would not prevent Serbia trom remaining a subject nation, a link 5n the Pan-German chain!. As Lloyd George said, the first condition of peace must be the complete and unrestricted restoration of Serbia. But Serbia's independence can never be assured so long as Germany remains practical master of the fifty million people of Austria-Hun-gary. "The pledge of Serbia's independence, therefore, does not lie in Serbia, but north of the Danube. This pledge involves the liberation of the peoples under Hapsburg domination." AustriaHungary is the key to this war—the only key that will unlock the door that will lead to liberty for the world.