The German-Hindu plot to foment revolution in India is an international drama with touches of “Treasure Island” adventure in the South Seas. The characters include Zimmermann, many German agents in the United States (among them Bernstorff), some venal Americans, and a horde of Hindus—some of them ardent fanatics and some plain grafters. The climax produced several executions, one suicide, two cases of insanity, and a murder. The production cost the Germans more than a million dollars, and the net receipts were a deficit. The scenes were laid in Berlin, Constantinople, Switzerland, New York, Washington, Chicago, San Francisco, Socorro Island, Honolulu, Manila, Java, Japan, China, Siam, and India. The last act was laid in a Federal penitentiary.
Writing from San Francisco, on November 4, 1916, Wilhelm von Brincken, the military attaché of the German Consulate, addressed a letter to his father to be “transmitted through the submarine Deutschland on its second voyage from the United States.” The letter was never delivered; its boastful first paragraph and its later candid text were read only by agents of the United States Government. Von Brincken began:
My Dear Father: At last an opportunity presents itself to send an uncensored letter to all of you. May the carrier, Germany’s pride, have a happy voyage and reach the home shore unscathed.
He then launched into bitter criticism of his treatment at the Consulate, complaining especially of its niggardly support of his work. Then he wrote (the italics are mine):
As you know, I am the head and organizer of the Hindu Nationalists on the Pacific. Revolutionary and propaganda work costs money—much money. Berlin knows that and does not economize. The Consul General [Franz Bopp] also is under instructions to support the movement to the best of his ability and to further it financially. However, there is a shortcoming in this respect. Whenever money is urgently needed and I report to that effect, I invariably meet with the same opposition. In ninety-nine cases out of a hundred, the required amount is refused. As a result, the work suffers, is delayed, good opportunities are missed, and my people—the Hindus—are frequently exposed to danger of their lives. Just how many fell into the hands of the English and were hung, owing to unnecessary lack of funds, is, of course, wholly beyond our calculation. The “old man” evidently dislikes this type of work and, therefore, has no understanding for it. The other day a Hindu was here, who came directly from Switzerland, as messenger from Mr. Von Wesendonck, of the Foreign Office (who has charge of Hindu matters there). This Hindu wondered why work in San Francisco dragged in such a manner and I told him quite frankly that if the Hindu work were not reorganized from the ground up, and made independent of the Consulate, the work would not only suffer but half of it would be harmful.
Later in the letter he says:
My Hindu described Wesendonck as a particularly pleasing and fine person.
These extracts were written in November of 1916. They illuminate an earlier cable from Von Wesendonck’s chief, Zimmermann (the German Foreign Minister in Berlin) written in February of 1916 to Bernstorff at Washington, which was “transmitted respectfully for your information” to Von Papen in New York, and which reads as follows:
Berlin, Feb. 4, 1916.
The German Embassy,