The Brecon County Times Neath Gazette and General Advertiser for the Counties of Brecon Carmarthen Radnor Monmouth Glamorgan Cardigan Montgomery Hereford

A LOOK ROUND. The Voice of the Charmer. [BY SENTINEL. "] WHAT is mount by a Peace Offensive'"? The words are appearing in all the news- papers. We are told that. as soon as the German attacks have failed, there will be a German Peace Offensive." Nay, it was said a week ag'o that the Peace Offensive had already began. But how can an attempt to make peace be an "offensive." when all offensive means that sort of attack which is of the essence of war? The two words seem to contradict each other. It is important to understand this point. What we mean by a German Peace Oil elusive is an attempt to weaken our will, and to separate us from our Allies, words and by a cunning offer of terms which will appeal to our selfish- ness or our Weariness, but which will leave the Huns in possession of all that they want, but have been unable to obtain by lighting. That is to say, an attempt to win by fraud what they could not win by force. Let, us take an example. AIJUut;1 fortnight ago a rumour got about, and appeared in the papers, that the Ger- mans were ready to make peace with Great Britain, France, and Italy, on certain terms. The independence of Belgium was to be restored Alsace and Lorraine were to have com- plete self-government within the Ger- man Empire. These terms sound all right for ns, or almost all right, for they do not meet the desire of FnHllT to recover Alsace and Lorraine. There- in lies the artful attempt to divide us from our French brothers-in-arnis. But there is another point which we have not mentioned yet. All these things were to come to us in the West, on condition that things in the East are left as they are. That isto say that Germany is left in possession of the parts of Russia that she has seized, with German or Austrian princes on the thrones of Poland, Fin- land, and the Baltic Provinces of Russia, that one-fifth of Roumania is taken away and given to Austria and Bulgaria, and that all the Balkan | States and Turkey are left under the thumb of Germany, who would thus have her desired road down to the borders of Egypt and India, and have the whole of middle Europe and middle Asia in her power. Both Europe and Asia would be cut clean into two by the Germans and those under their control Austrians, Bulgarians, and Turks. Instead of being weaker and less able to attack their neighbours than before. the Kaiser and his Generals would be about twice as strong, for they would ,(] I of 1)('01)1(' have another hundred millions of people draw upon for food for powder." That is not the kind of peace wc have been fighting to obtain. Our brave men have not, shed their blood by sea and land in order that the War Lords of Germany may have bigger armies than ever before to let loose upon us. We know how the Germans have treated the Russians, who trusted to their promises and laid down their arms before peace was made. Last week the news came that the German soldiers were in Sebastopol--thc place the Trench and British fought to try to take seventy years ago in the Crimean War. rIle valley where our dead soldiers lie is now in the hands of a worse enemy to Britain tliiii ever the Russians were. So this is what a "German Peace means. W e must close our minds to it absolutely. We dare not ask the questioll," What does the East matter to us?" If docs matter! It matters so much that, if we make peace belore Germany is beaten, and a How *er keep what she has won from jmssia and Roumania, we shall alwavs to stand 011 guard against another whatever terms wo get j 11 the The War Lords of Germany Jum> taught the (ionnan people t ia war pays now as well as it paid in 1870. ,1Ter,naps will have won the war. a|H they will be able to got ready for ;||1° .,ei which it will bo much easier to \\îl, because they will have all sorts iings food, oil. copper, cotton. and so on which thev have been short of now as well as manv millions more nic". we make peace now with an unbeaten (lermanv, in ten vears time (jernidiiv will make an end of us.

A "GERMAN PEACE" MAP. [This Map indicates the territory over which Germany hopes to establish control by the arrangement of a "German Peace." Germany would gladly agree to evacuate some of the territory she has over-run in the West if she were allowed a free hand to develop unchecked her "influence" on the Russian border and in the Baltic provinces. Read what "SENTINEL" says about this design in Column 1.]

OUR WAY WITH ENEMY WOUNDED. Bringing in a Wounded German lad aged only 16. d_ "J 'J 'J'f '-( ( ( ( ( (

STRAIGHT TALK. I ( i ( < ( ( Never will American ( < ( ( workers meet the Germans ( < until the latter abandon the ( ( v cause of Imperialism and < < ( < Militarism. Till then the [ Americans will fight to the < ( last dollar and the last drop of blood." < ( J. U.S.A. Labour Delegate. ) ) ) J' Helping Wounded Germans out of an Ambulance. I- -.1.

A GLIMPSE OF THE CAMP PIGGERY. ,'IfI-r- -lit Every camp in France has its piggery, and Jacky is fed almost entirely on broken food collected by the Camp Waste Salvage Corps.

I REMEMBER ROUMANIATI What a "German Peace Means. I Roumania has signed peace with Ger- 1:7, 1 11 many—and it is a German peace. The Germans prepared the way for it with soft words. Roumania had only to listen to terms, and she would be free to develop her own national life peacefully as a sovereign State." But no sooner had the fly walked into the parlour than the spider began to suck greedily. This is how the Germans translate into practice thcirflneprofcssionsabout" peace without annexation" and peace with friendship." Roumania is to forfeit a fifth of her territory, an area equal to that; of Wales. The Germans do not call this annexa- tion "—it is a slight rectification of frontiers." Roumania loses the great province of Dobrudja, and the fine port of Constanza. and all direct touch with the Black Sea. Germany and Austria do not ask for all indemnity in cash, but they have arranged to take it in kind, and the indemnity they appropriate is estimated at. £ 50,000,000. Roumania is to support an Army of occupation provided by the "friendly" oppressors, a.nd that Army will have powers to bleed Roumania white of corn, peas. beans, fodder, wool, cattle, she must go to Germany for it. There is nothing left to her which she may do of her own free will. Public opinion is to be repressed newspapers gagged personal liberty in this sovereign State will be only a, drea m. The Germans have dictated terms which place Roumania and Roumania us and all that their country contains at the absolute mercy of Germany and her confederates. In short, they have concluded a very characteristic example of a peace by agree- ment, i.e., a German peace. We shall do well to remember these things when the next Peace Offensive is launched from Berlin.

A SEED BED OF WAR. Why the French Provinces Must Be Restored. [BY OBSERVER."] THE unofficial statement of German peace terms—the kite scut up to test the way of the wind for the German peace offensive—reveals that Ger- many is Etill unready to right the great wrong committed in 1871. She still wants to keep a tight hold on the provinces of Alsace and Lorraine, and if you remember that it was from the iron mines in these two provinces that she has got 80 per cent. of the raw material for building up her war stores for the present conflict, you will know the reason why. We shall hear much of Alsace-Lorraine "hen a real discussion of peace terms comes along, because to restore the two provinces to France is one of our declared war aims. It appeals to us as an act of justice to our Ally, and of mercy to her citizens kept for nearly fifty years in German thraldom. But to France herself it is as the healing of a wound in her own body, and there is 110 object she is more resolute OIl securing before she lavlS down her arms. Since Germany seized the provinces, after her victory of 1870, there have been many attempts to jnt ify the annexation, It has been pointed out that the majority of the people of Alsace speak German which is quite true. It has been argued that the provinces are old possessions of Germany, which she merely recovered. But it has never been pretended that the inhabitants agreed to the change of nationality or that they have been recon- ciled to it by half a century of Prussian government. The territories have a long and intricate history, but. not a foot of them was ever ruled by a Hohenzollern till they were made part of the booty gained at Sedan. In the Middle Ages they belonged to the loose jurisdiction known as the Holy Roman Empire (whose sovereigns were Austrians and not Prussians), but since the seventeenth cent ury there had been 110 dispute as to their French allegiance. The people of Alsace were enthusiastic sup- porters of the French Revolution, and insisted on being included in the Republic which succeeded to the Bourbon kings. It was in the city of Strasburg that the Marseillaise was first composed and sung, and Marshal Ney, and several other of Napoleon's brilliant Generals, were Alsatians by birth and upbringing. When Germany announced her intention oi annexing the two provinces, their inhabitants made every protest open to a defenceless people, and it was repeated by the first representatives who filled the seats allotted to them in the German Reichstag. Almost two generations have passed since then, but Alsace and Lorraine have never ceased to be French at heart or to detest the brutal rule which has sought to mould them into German subjects. It was only just before the war that the world had a dramatic illustration of the character of that government and the feelings of the people towards it. This was the famous affair of Zabern, when a German officer, merely because lie conceived that civilians were not treating his uniform with due humility, ran amok with his sword among inoffensive citizens, cutting down a cripple boy amongst other victims. The scandal was so great that a violent debate took place in the Reichstag, but the officer, because lie was an officer and the other people were "only civilians," was acquitted, and the supremacy of the mili- tary jackboot was triumphantly demon- strated. To escape these insufferable con- ditions, more than half-a-million Alsatians have become exiles from their homes, and thousands of them have taken service every year in the French Army. The conquerors have made untiring efforts to Germanise their annexations. 'They have suppressed the French language, established education upon German lines, and introduced all the apparatus of Kultur." They have even imported into the country some hundreds of thou- sands of real German settlers with the view of changing the political and social atmosphere and weakening the popular ties of memory and affection. But all this "spade work "has been in vain. Alsace remains impregnably faithful to her French loyalty, and believes, through all the twilight of suspense and suffering, that the hour of reunion with the Mother- land is not far distant. Our interest in the restoration o| the two provinces to France is based on a desire to ensure perfect foundations for a lasting peace, when peace—not a "German peace is restored. One of our greatest statesman has rightly traced 1 wo genera- tions of unrest in Europe, and the fierce competition of armaments, and all the developments of military power that have culmi nated in this most terrible war, to tfia crude and shortsighted act of spoliation nearly forty vears ago. Bismarck tuny foresaw that his countrymen were sowmto trouble for the future and told [ so- Unless we now cut out every roo o trouble, it will continue to spiou an growth that will be always a ma » j influence in European and ^e,,iL:ous 0f polili. s, and will make the louudatioua oi peace periously unstable.