A painful impression has been created by the suicide of
Colonel Redl, chief of the staff of the Eighth or Prague Army Corps. Colonel Redl was one of the most gifted officers of the Austrian army, the confidant of the Austrian generalissimo, and head of the contra-espionage service. It is alleged that to extricate himself from financial difficulties he sold to Russia for £5,000 military secrete of the most vital character, e.g., the whole scheme of Austrian mobilization in the event of war and plans for Austro-German co-operation in case of war with Russia (this, however, is denied by the Germans). It is, however, authoritatively asserted that ho furnished important military information to Russia, that he warned Russia of the names and doings of Austro- Hungarian spies in Russia, and that he also protected Russian spies in Austria-Hungary. Summoned to Vienna to answer these charges, Colonel Redl shot himself in a hoteL An inquiry is being held into what is generally admitted to be the worst military scandal of the Ecuperor'e reign, and the indignation which the Emperor is said to have displayed reflects the feelings of the public. The incident has not merely shaken confidence in the prestige of the general staff; as the Vienna correspondent of the Timis points out, it has led to ugly newspaper polemics against the alleged Jewish extraction of Colonel Redl and encouraged the monstrous contention that the scandal is a natural result of admitting men without family tradition to high military rank.
