Jasper County Democrat, Volume 20, Number 7, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 21 April 1917 — PLANNED TO INVADE AMERICA [ARTICLE]

PLANNED TO INVADE AMERICA

Had Germany Subdued England the United States Was Next. Boston, April 18.—To show the deep hatred “which he asserted Germany has held against the United States,” former Ambassador James W. Gerard last night disclosed facts which he said had been kept from the, 9 American people during the past two and a half years. He was the principal speaker at a national defense dinner given by the Pilgrim Publicity association.

Air. Gerard said that Admiral von Tirpitz in thinly veiled statements and the German reichstag and Prussian parliament in open discussions, proposed the institution of unrestricted submarine warfare against England with the intention “when England should have been subdued by hunger, to come over to the United States and collect the price of the war from As.” “I want to tell you,” Mr. Gerard added, “that if we had not gone into this war Germany would have fulfilled its intention to come over here afterwards and attack us, and would have done so almost the applause of the rest of the world. I can tell you also that everything consistent with honor was done to keep us out of the war. Beyond that, I am sure, none would have us go.” The former ambassador expressed his belief that citizens of German descent would prove loyal, but, he added, “If they do not stand With us, I think we know where tp festoon them.”