Evening Republican, Volume 21, Number 304, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 30 December 1918 — The Future of the Hun [ARTICLE]

The Future of the Hun

By B. B. HARRIMAN

There must be a future for the German. tie cannot stop and resolve into a mere memory. It is out of the question for the civilized nations to annihilate him. For their own sakes they cannot be as savage as he planned to •be. However many were killed in this war, there will still be many millions left to propagate. What manner of future awaits those million*? What will they do? Whet will be their status in the world? How will they prosper? Already many thinking people are considering the matter of German trade, German industry, German debt paying. The nation Itself is making active preparations for the after-the-war campaign. With this war ended Germany will find herself handicapped with a double load: the debts she has Incurred through the financing of the war, and

the rehabilitation of deyastated countries. In order to pay either bill she must be able to manufacture and sell. She must have markets and supply them. In order to secure markets she must first establish confidence in her wares and in her business methods. She .must gain a certain, and very decided, amount of friendly regard or the rival salesmen, the rival manufacturer, will hold too great an advantage. She can only hope to be a scavenger otherwise, for the other nations will leave her only that which they do not wish to Imndle. All Nations on Guard. How is she going to acquire the necessary standing, the confidence, of buying nations, to give her these markets? Once she would have sent her thousands of emigrants to colonize, with • rigid instructions to demand German goods and thereby create a condition -that would force importations. That iday is past, for in all such cases Germany’s colonial idea carried with it the control of politics through colony ballots. It is inconceivable that any na•tion should ever again cater to the German vote or allow it to be in control of even a fraction of national activities. With all nations on guard against Germanizing influences, that plan must 'be abandoned. If Germany, in her .stupid disregard of all rights and prejudices, should attempt to again get control of any part of the'national Wffalrs of America or Canada or Bra-

——— ■ -- til, fbr instance, it will probably lead to the barring Cf intercourse with her d fidt ! ■ t It is difficult to ascertain where 'she can first gain a fuothold. With her reputation blackened by her own acts, her 'gotten methods tiidroughly exposed, It will be a hazardous thing for any , nation to attempt to deal with her. . It is a- matter that, calls for the sober, calm study of master minds, the consideration of all nations opposed to Germanic ideas. IJt must be made a'matter of the most careful consideration, for upon the policy adopted by the notions wiH depend much of their own welfare. There must be a limit set for Teutonic aetivtty, a bound beyond which they dare not go or It will be dnly-a question -of time until the world will again have to take up the task of bdffiSiS? Hun deviiishness. It is time for the nations and their deepest thinkers to begin to plan and consider, for it will not be long now until the Hun will be wanting to emigrate from. Hunland to escape the burdens he has helped-to create. He must not be allowed to shirk his task. He must be the one to pick up the burden nnd stagger along under it He must not be allowed to shift it to other shoulders, in part or in entirety. Must Be Kept Under Surveillance. Ti* forces of many nations have been harnessed in the effort to hammer some reasonable degree of sense into the Hunnlsh head. Next will come the prodigious effort to hold him to his work and force him to walk the straight and narrow path. It is to be almost as hard a task as fighting him into submission, if the way he is preparing for a commercial campaign is any criterion. Unless he is so hedged about by rigid, Inflexible guards that he can do only the right thing, he will soon be doing the wrong one. It is folly to think that getting a whipping wiH change the Hun nature. A cracked crown will not ensure a rejuvenation or any degree of reformation. He will be no more spiritually redeemed than he will be physically restored by the war. The living Hun will, need a process of refining that will Require more than one generation. The dead Hun, thank God, will help to hold him where' he belongs by the thinning out of evil blood when he died. So let us plan now for what comes, later, that we may enjoy life with no fear of despotic oppression in the future years. We must weld a steel ring, such as Kaiser Wilhelm loved to have about, that will keep the Prussian on his good behavior for the nexf two thousand years.' In that lengtl of time, the world of decency may make some progress toward the. elimination of the savage part in his nature, and so bring him to where he la neighbor for decent people.