THE REVELATION OF GERMANY TO THE UNITED STATES. A LL through
the war the official plan at Washington has been to act, and in most instances to speak, as though Germany and the Allies were fighting for causes which to outsiders were scarcely distinguishable. Of course, President Wilson has taken a verbally emphatic line against German crime at sea, but such conduct on the part of Germany has been regarded dialectically as an unfortunate excrescence on a general purpose admissible or even good in itself. In his famous offer of his services to reconstruct the basis of the civilized world after the war, Mr. Wilson spoke of Germany and the Allies as having, according to their own statements, much the same objects in view. We know that the words may not have represented Mr. Wilson's own judgment. When a man comes forward as adjudicator he must be careful to produce in the minds of the parties an impression that he is really judicial. Every allowance must be made for that, however little the Allies may be flattered by Mr. Wilson's verbal artifices. But the fact remains that a large number of Mr. Wilson's countrymen, and a large number of neutrals in other countries, have long been fortified in what necessarily seemed to us a slack and indifferent attitude towards Germany. They were encouraged to believe that Germany was accident- ally, not radically, in the wrong. Over all German crimes was spread the condoning and consoling thought that Germany might be " convicted of sin " in respect of special excesses, and that., having repented and made reparation for her more glaring acts, she would then be at heart and in substance on a moral level with the Allies. Both sides in the war, according to the opinion nominally, if not intentionally, promulgated by Mr. Wilson, might still be regarded as brothers. They were Abels, or might of course be Cains ; but in either case there was not any essential difference. By far the most interesting and important fact which emerges from the disclosure of the Zimmermann scheme is that that conception of Germany is no longer possible for Americans. The evidence no longer permits them to attribute to Germany a Sunday- school view of life. They know now that to her war is an instrument of policy. There is for her no question of a war being right or wrong. If a war serves her purpose, she wi I make war—and call it right to satisfy fools. In the Eastern States of America illusions about Germany have not been common for a long time •, but through geographical remote- ness, and a consequent dimness of vision in regard to the affairs of our " obsolete Old World," the Middle West and the West have entertained illusions very widely. Now these illusions are ended. They cannot any longer persist. Ger- many is revealed as what she is at heart and in essence—a tiger that would devour all that comes in its way, and is not deterred by printed rules posted in front of human encamp- ments. • The scheme which the German Minister of Foreign Affairs formulated to pull Germany through her troubles is fantastic, and does not contain the barest elements of success, but it is quite in keeping with German obtuseness about the working of the human mind in other countries. What Herr Zimmermann proposed in the letter intercepted by the United States when it was on its way to the German Diplomatic Agent at Mexico City, was that President Carranza of Mexico should enter into an affiance with Germany directly it became clear that there must be war between the United States and Germany. Germany would give general financial support to Mexico, and the Mexicans would set out to reconquer from the United States their lost territories of New Mexico, Texas, and Arizona. General Carranza was also to approach Japan, seduce her from her present alliance, and persuade her to fall upon the Western coasts of the United States. It need not be empha- sized that here is a scheme which comes home to the Far West and the States on the Mexican border, however little they may have troubled their heads hitherto about the " European War." Of course, the Far West and the frontier States are terribly shocked. We hope we may not add inconsiderately to the shock if we say that we cannot feel greatly shocked by the scheme in itself. Germany is at war, and, moreover, in a desperate hole, and it is natural for her to look for help wherever she can find it. If she can make a new Ally and seduce one of our Allies, she would naturally hold that she has a right to do so. What is inexpressibly shocking to us, as we suppose to all men with a remnant of decency, is that this proposal was on its way to Mexico when the German Chancellor was speaking of the long-established friendship between Germany and the United States, of his desire to maintain that friendship, and of the high value which he set upon it. While he was describing his concern for the good opinion of the United States, and pointing out how she and Germany could nobly serve the world together, the letter was in full flight on its disastrous mission of turning loose the bandits and cut-throats of Mexico on peaceful settled towns of the United States, and of making real the dread of the Pacific States that some day the martial and well-armed Japanese would descend upon their shores. Americans in districts remotest from the war now appreciate the exact value of the language when Germans protest against the enor- mity of their Kultur being assailed by Indian savages and Arab desperadoes under. the patronage of Britain and France. They may even be tempted to compare the ancient and venerable cults of India with the unfettered savagery of the Mexican freebooters, with whose attentions they have been threatened.
Hitherto, when the Allies have pointed to the vile bad faith of Germany, and urged the world to awake to the fact that Germany was really a tiger, their communications have been somewhat suspect in America. Of course (thought unconcerned Americans) the Allies have to talk in that strain. They are prejudiced and angry, but we should be very foolish to take such language literally. And so those unconcerned Ameiican.s continued to live in the theory that the tiger was a poor pussy, really anxious to live at peace, though sometimes using her claws in a rather unfortunate and unaccountable manner. The revelation of the tiger-nature of Germany must throw much light on many other events in the past ; the " freedom of the seas," for instance. Of all meaningless phrases invented during the war, this is probably the most ridiculous. It is justifiable to hope now that all Americans may see at last that the phrase which Germany has used so often is only a roar of the tiger. The facts are that in peace the British Navy has suppressed piracy and left the seas free for peaceful traders of all nations to move about as they pleased without let or hindrance. What Germany wants is ' freedom of the seas " in war and for the purposes of war. She 'wants the naval power of Britain to be so stifled by agreement that German and neutral merchant vessels shall be free to feed the all-conquering armies of the Kaiser. The preposterous.phrase has no other sense, and can have no other sense. But in spite of the flood of light on such matters as these that has spread over the United States, it would be rash to expect that Mr. Wilson intends to do more than circumstances absolutely compel him to do. We feel certain that though events may force him far, he will always tend to drag a little behind the action which most rulers would think imperatively demanded by the provocation. He is the creator of an idea that you may be at war and yet not at war. He attacked Mexico, but the word " war " was banned in the polite society of the Washington Government offices. So in regard to Germany he seems to be arranging a hostile relation which is not war. If American armed merchantmen are sunk by German submarines, it may, for all we know, be contended that as they were armed they were sunk in a military encounter, and no " overt act " was therefore, after all, committed by Germany. We are only guessing, but such solutions of difficulties might seem perfectly right to any one who started every argument on the assumption that war is the greatest of evils.
For our part, we are well satisfied to have at last the moral support of the most powerful of neutrals—for this is now beyond dispute—and the exact degree of hostility between the United States and Germany may be left to look after itself for all it concerns us. But we must say that if we were Americans we should be profoundly alarmed at the prospect. Even if Mr. Wilson stops short at his present stage, he has undeniably pulled the tiger's tail. It cannot be expected that the tiger will forget this. Mr. Wilson has ceased trying to stroke it into a good temper. He has given the tail a hard tug and a wrench. But what if the tiger, having disposed of the tired skik.ai-is of Europe, returns to the United States ? We repeat that if we were Americans we should be very much alarmed. We think we should want to make sure of killing the man-eater _while the chances arc good. If the Allies should lose the war, the tiger may be expected in the Western Hemisphere very soon. But take another supposition. Suppose that there should be an inconclusive peace, and that Germany, having failed to take money out of the pockets of the Allies, were on the look-out for a source of reimbursement. The tigerish eye would fall on the fat and almost unprotected piece of meats in the United States. The tiger would not even be guilty of the immorality of theft. Oh, dear no ! Germany would be inflicting a just punishment on the nation who tried to prevent her from making secure the freedom of the seas in the interests of civilization. It may be said that Britain and France, if not Russia, would at mite rush to the rescue. They would naturally want to save any one from a tiger. But they may be too tired. Of course we know that such an event can never happen, because we know that as long as there is a drop of British blood to shed we shall fighOon, and so shall win. But America cannot know that as we know it. She is therefore, as far as she can tell, running a risk of a tiger being let loose on the New World without taking any effective precautions. That seems to us a strange policy.
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