A DANGER SPOT.

Taranaki Daily News, 14 July 1922, Page 5

A DANGER SPOT.

PLOTS IN GERMANY. MONARCHISTS ACTIVE. LATENT CIVIL WAR. By Telegraph.—Press Assn.—Copyright. London, July 12. The Berlin correspondent of the Manchester Guardian states that at least 300 men and women, including Liebknecht, Erzberger and Rathenau, have been murdered for political reasons in Germany during the past three years. They were all either Liberals or Socialists and all the murderers were re--1 actionaries and Monarchists. The few | acts of violence committed against Monj archists have been punished with excessive severity. it is not possible to make an estimate of the forces engaged in the latent civil war between the Republicans and Monarchists. The movement for a counter-revolution, the militarist reaction and the Monarchists movement are practically identical, as the overthrow of the Republic and the restoration of the monarchy will be the first step towards a Germany sufficiently militarised to wage a war of revenge against the Entente or France. The whole of German organised Labor is Republican and the general strike is its only weapon. This is probably sufficient to destroy any attempt to overthrow the Government, but it is a defensive weapon, and practically helpless against the preparations for the overthrow of the Republic and against the Monarchist agitation. All the landed gentry and bigger farmers are Monarchists. Probably the majority of the middle class are Monarchist. The officers in the Reichswehr are nearly all Monarchist and the rank and file of 100.000 would probably follow their officers in a civil war. The security police, of 150,000. are a semi-military force with Monarchist officers.

The strongholds of the Monarchist movement are Pomerania, East Prussia and Bavaria. The secret military organisations all over the country are the backbone of the active. Monarchist movement. The most powerful is the Organisation Consul, of which 100 members have been arrested. It is a secret society with hidden depots of arms and ammunition, spies and agents. Gunther. who organised Dr. Rathenau’s murder, is a member. It was mainly his indiscretions in boasting that revealed the conspiracy. Sections of the reactionaries are fighting to restore the partially lost privileges of their class and to re-establish Germany’s military predominance in Europe. They are largely actuated bv racial hatred of all foreigners, particularly the’ French and Poles and most of all o-f the Jews. There are educated Germans who seriously maintain that Christ was a German. The universities are notoriously retrograde politically. The vast majority of the professors are extreme reactionaries, and the students have played a sinister part in every putsch and been guilty of most of the political murders committed in Germany. ESCAPE OF KERN AND FISCHER. POLICE TRICKED. Received July 13, 8.4 p.m. Berlin, July 13. The police were deliberately misled by local recipients of bribes, who enabled Kern and Fischer to escape to Bavaria. — Aus.-N.Z. Cable Assn.