12 OCTOBER 1918, Page 12

GERMANY'S INDUSTRIAL PENETRATION.

(To THE EDITOR Or THE "SPECTATOR.")

Si&,—In your issue of July 27th, on p. 86, I note your remark : " One is tempted to think that the success of our arms has had a Lad effect on some classes of labour." After the demonstration Cermany has given to the Allies of her methods, more especially after her success in enlisting to her aid the Bolshevism in Russia, this remark almost convinces me that there must be some basis for the world-wide belief, or pretended belief, that my countrymen are the most thick-headed and slow-witted of all races. For twenty years the principal intention behind the German propaganda against Great Britain has been to convince the world that England had lost all military power, that she would be useless to any eountry as an ally in the event of war, that in the event of a world- war her Empire would fall to pieces, that she would be unable to protect it because Ale British working people were a lot of alcoholic degenerates, thoroughly corrupt, filled with a vicious class hatred, and on the verge of anarchy. in fact the German propaganda predicted for England exactly what the German agents, Lenin and Trotsky, have brought about in Russia. It is safe to say that for every dollar Germany spent in this world-wide Press propa- ganda she spent another thousand to make the prediction come true. To think otherwise is to confess oneself an unobservant idiot. My home-staying countrymen can rest assured that long before der Tag Germany planted her agents by the hundreds within tile ranks of British Labour Unions, to capitalize for Germany's benefit all those within the ranks of the Unions who had through greed, class hatred, alcoholism, or any other vice lost all patriotism. I have been out of England for twenty years, but during those twenty years I have, year by year, seen reflected in the British Press the success of the German manipulation within British Labour Unions and its perfect co-ordination with German world-wide propaganda against England. During that time thousands of aspirants in England have reached national, local, sr Labour Union office or preferment solely through their utility in helping Germany's plans for disruption, engendering of class hatred and anarchy in England. Most of them did not know it, but they reached office solely through the assistance of the German- created and German-directed machine within Labour. Union politics. It is apparent to every intelligent observer of German methods that this German machine within Labour Union and Socialistic circles will not drop out of the game with the cessation of war. A supreme effort will be made during the five years follow- ing the war to cripple England in her industrial life. The five years following the declaration of peace will be the most dangerous to England as a nation. Every dull-witted editor of an English news- paper who seeks to cajole the pennies out of the pockets of the working man by echoing the German-made Bolshevistic slogans is striking directly at his country. Five years of anarchy in England is Germany's hope and aim after peace is declared. I do not think she will succeed in this aim. However, let no true Englishman