Evening Republican, Volume 21, Number 44, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 1 March 1918 — TIME TO END THE PEACE TALK [ARTICLE]

TIME TO END THE PEACE TALK

Let us have an end to this prattle of peace, peace, when there is no peace that free men can accept. We can have the peace of submission— for a time—by “acknowledging Germany’s victory,” by leaving the kaiser supreme on the continent of Europe and granting his “right”,to commit unlimited murder on the sea, by bowing down to his own audacious claim that “nothing must happen anywhere on earth without the consent of the German emperor.” We can have the peace of dishonor—for a time—by deserting Belgium, deserting France, deserting our own dead, by confessing that treaties are scrape of paper, that frightfulness, when practiced by Germany, is a beautiful thing, that the kaiser has a perfect right to invade, trample, butcher and enslave any country, which displeases him. We can have the peace of terror — for a time—waiting eagerly on the kaiser’s smile or frown, watching his slimy spies poison our morale and ruin our preparations without daring to thwart them, piling up taxes and armaments against the new Armageddon, giving up our domestic liberties, one after the other, to the iron needs of defense, and knowing all the while that that defense may prove in vain. &

But we can not have a lasting peace, or one that would leave us free, unafraid and willing to live with ourselves, until we make it on the ruins of kaiserism. The task is not too great for our strength. It will not require from us the exertions which Britian and France have made already, it will not demand as great a proportionate sacrifice or effort as the country made for union from. 1861 to 1865. Germany’s industrial districts, alone among those of the continent, are untouched, and her population has not been decimated by such slavery as she has visited on Poland, Belgium and northern France. But her fighting line has suffered more than that of any other power, save her ally, Austria-Hungary, and her collapsing enemy, Russia. Two million Germans, by the best estimates available, have been killed. Two million more are disabled or prisoners. Her foreign commerce has ceased to exist. Her people have been on rations for nearly three years. In Berlin, each person gets a weekly allowance of not quite 4 pounds of war bread, 13 ounces of fresh meat, 1.8 ounces of butter—or oleo, 5.5 pounds of potatoes, a little flour, and an agg every four weeks. Rich Berliners, if they want luxuries, can have them by paying 95 cents per pound for the neck of a goose ,$1.95 per pound for its liver, or $2.81 per pound for its smoked fat.

Germany survives because within her borders there is no business but war and no will but that of the general staff. With all the good fortune that her spies have brought her in the east, our allies in the west have fought her to a standstill, and brought her where we can deliver the coup de grace. An effort by all America as great in proportion as that which the north made to crush Lee will grind Hinderburg to powder. But the job can not be put through with words, and peace talk slackens the muscles which should be braced for conflict. Have done with it.—Chicago Journal.