French Strother

“ From this angle alone the original idea was pretty close to an inspiration, since it improvised in the hour of need such an organization as not even a generation of effort and many million dollars could have built up.
Just because it was improvised and its personnel kept secret, the League could meet the most dangerous German agents on their own ground and paralyze their efforts by keeping them guessing. Propaganda dies on the lips of the man who can’t be certain that his listener is not making mental notes for an official report of the conversation. ”

“ Ram Chandra, at the instigation of Von Brincken, sent Hindu emissaries from San Francisco to organize revolutionary movements among the Indians in Manila, Tokyo, Shanghai—even in Seoul and Peking. Other emissaries, gathering men and money or transmitting messages, worked in Panama, in Switzerland, in the Sinai Peninsula, in Sweden—scarcely a country in the world but was touched by a filament of this spider’s web of German intrigue. ”

“ The American Protective League On going to war with the great masters of spy craft last year, the United States had only a handful of secret service men to guard its internal frontier. Within our borders were a million and a half men and youths who were enemy aliens. Not all of them hostile, it is true; but all potentially dangerous because great national organizations existed—even shooting societies—through which German influences might reach in a few hours or days. ”

“ Even while they went through the long, legal processes in which German intrigue tried in vain to save Werner Horn from delivery to Canadian justice (and Horn was supplied with good counsel and every facility for making his defence) , among the Yankee traders there was alert activity as well as dormant patriotism. The way in which the Department of Justice, through these merchants, lawyers, doctors, men of the “main chance,” soon had a network of special agents in every city, town, and hamlet in the country, is one of the cleverest pieces of American Government detective work born of the war. ”

“ It is my impression that we can disorganize and hold up for months, if not entirely prevent, the manufacture of munitions in Bethlehem and the Middle West, which, in the opinion of the German military attaché, is of great importance and amply outweighs the expenditure of money involved.
But even if strikes do not come off, it is probable that we should extort, under the pressure of the crisis, more [100] favourable conditions of labour for our poor, down-trodden fellow countrymen. In Bethlehem these white slaves are now working for twelve hours a day and seven days a week. ”

“ As the cargo weighed the ship down, the box would disappear beneath the water. At length the ship starts on its voyage, and, as the rudder swings her into the stream, the first beat in the slow, sure knell of death for ship and crew is clicked out by its very turning. Out upon the sea the shift of wind and blow of wave require a constant correction with the rudder to hold the true course forward. At every swing the helmsman unconsciously taps out another of the lurking beats of death. ”

“ Outside the larger cities territorial organization is the rule. When the district is identified with some industry of special value in war, like mining, lumbering, or cattle raising, protection of that industry may be the chief function of the League.
Not only does the classified method of organization help each trade and profession to police itself; it greatly facilitates important inquiries. For example, suppose that the Government wants to find and learn the local errand of a visiting electrical engineer with a German name and considerable cash whom it has had under surveillance elsewhere. ”

“ Quite as important in discouraging disloyalty or pro-German activities is the service of League members as eyes and ears for the Government in detecting and making first reports on offenses or intended offenses against the war code of the United States.
This means that every League member is always on the lookout for any word or act that smacks of sedition or espionage. It is here that the classified organization by industries, [204] trades, professions, and individual business establishments develops its full value. ”

“ With his most convincing eloquence, Lamar assured him that he could. Never had Rintelen been better advised, so Lamar declared to him, than when his friend in Berlin had given him his name. [165] For he had friends in Washington, he whispered, men powerful in the Government. And friends among the labouring people, the men whose hands made those munitions Rintelen had come to stop, and whose hands might be paralyzed by the clever use of brains and money. Lamar would supply the brains: Rintelen would supply the money. The Wolf saw good hunting ahead. ”

“ In the application of the Selective Service Act the League has taken off the shoulders of the Government one of its heaviest and most important tasks. The draft was and is a favoured field of German agents, who have played upon ignorance and prejudice, religious and union labour fears, racial antipathies, and the baser emotions of cupidity and cowardice. They have utilized every device to persuade men to avoid their military obligations to the country. To the League is assigned the task of checking up all claims for exemptions and all failures to appear before exemption boards. ”

“ He swore he would bring the men to a military prison for years to come, simply because they refused to be treated like dogs after being informed by the U. S. Officers that they don’t have to stand for anything like that. If it was not for the iron discipline maintained by the Germans, there would have been a mutiny on board the ship. Even a common man hates to see good supplies going to waste just because the captain could not get quick enough to his wine, and the men feed on hardtack that was full of worms. ”

“ Lamar laid before Rintelen a scheme. They would capitalize the American passion for peace: they would capitalize in particular the labouring man’s aversion to war. A section of opinion among labouring men held that wars were instigated by capitalists for gain, and were fought by labouring men who gave their lives to make good the selfish ambitions of the rich. And one of the American people’s deepest convictions was that war was an odious moral crime ”

“ Before taking up some of the German code and cipher messages that have been translated, with dramatic results, it will be well to discuss codes and ciphers in general.
A code is an arrangement by which two people agree, when exchanging messages, always to substitute certain words or symbols for the real words of the message. Thus, they might agree on these substitutions:
With such a code, a German spy in New York could cable a seemingly harmless message to a friend in Holland, such as:
“The market price is 110.” ”

“ How urgent it was for me to go away is shown by the fact that, two days after my departure, detectives, who had followed up my telephone calls, hunted up my wife’s harmless and unsuspecting cousin in Brooklyn, and subjected her to an interrogatory.
Mr. Von Papen and Mr. Albert have told my wife that I forced myself forward to do this work. That is not true. When I, in Berlin, for the first time heard of this commission, I objected to going and represented to the gentleman that my entire livelihood which I had created for myself in America by six years of labor was at stake therein. ”

“ Meloy saw in Rintelen exactly what Lamar had seen—a lot of real money and an eagerness too great for caution. He began to belittle Lamar’s scheme. Labour’s National Peace Council would never do. It looked good on paper, but it would never stop the shipment of munitions. He even hinted that Lamar had been “playing” Rintelen. Now, if Rintelen wanted a real scheme, certain to succeed, he knew the very thing. Direct action—stop the bluffing and the dangerous intrigues. Buy the whole munitions output of the country. Bid high enough to get it, pay for it outright, and store it. ”

“ Nevertheless, everything German here is slandered and run down with emphasis and consistency. An impartial individual can hardly escape the feeling of appreciation with which the far-reaching activity of Geheimrat Albert [105] must inspire him. But there are very few impartial persons in New York.
The torpedoing of the Arabic, in the event of its having been done without warning, or its having caused American passengers to lose their lives, will do more than any newspaper accusations to prejudice Germany in the public opinion of the United States. ”

“ Now code should not be confused with cipher. When some Hindus in New York, subsidized by Berlin, wished to write their plans to some other Hindus in San Francisco, concerning their [135] common purpose of fomenting revolution against British rule in India, they wrote out messages that consisted entirely of groups of Arabic numerals.
Those messages were in cipher.
To any one but an expert, many code messages look simple and harmless, and cipher messages usually look unintelligible and suspicious. Yet, oddly enough, the cipher messages are by far the easier to make out. ”

“ The Eitel Friedrich was soon interned for the period of the war and her officers and crew put under formal arrest. Even the British, whose fleet had been outwitted, gave their tribute of praise to the men who had taken their fair chance and had got away. Captain Max Thierichens and his crew became objects of admiration to the world. They were showered with felicitations, most of all, as was natural enough, from Germans and German-Americans. ”

“ When a factory making munitions, clothing, motor trucks, or any other war necessity has been organized as a League unit, the members are on the alert for signs of disturbance. They can quickly report to their supervisor what they have seen or heard, and, after comparing notes, can take precautions against the threatened trouble. If they need outside help in checking up a suspect after working hours, the territorial organization is ready to coöperate. The suspect need never know that he is under suspicion until his guilt or innocence is pretty well established. ”

“ That scheme was to build up a great political organization of labouring men and farmers. This organization would oppose the making and shipment of munitions; it would exert pressure to compel workers to abandon the factories, and it would exert pressure to compel Congress to declare an embargo on the shipment of arms. This organization was labelled “Labour’s National Peace Council.”
Lamar, fortified with Rintelen’s money, launched his scheme in Washington. This scheme was an inspiration of genius. Able lawyers have declared that no cleverer conspiracy has ever come to their attention. ”

“ He, as the head of the Bayer Chemical Company—a German concern that practically monopolized the trade in synthetic drugs in the United States—was to report on, to model, or undermine our development of industrial chemistry. Dr. Scheele was to report on and develop the plan and chemistry of warfare, explosives, incendiaries, poison gas, and the products Germany should import and accumulate to make her sure and independent on the day she should strike the world. Did these young men faithfully accomplish their tasks?
Dye making was almost an unknown art in America when the war broke out ”