The New Germany

by George Young

The importation of flour from America made at first little difference. It cost far too much and came to far too little. Meat was nearly always procurable at a price, and, if one knew where to go, was good enough. And for a hundred marks or so, equivalent to five pounds at the pre-war rate of money, quite a decent dinner could be got in select restaurants.[3]

The organisation of food supply was distinctly good. The conditions in Germany were indeed far more difficult than in England. Instead of having merely to control the importation at the main ports in Germany the supply had to be controlled before it left the hands of the individual farmer. This could, of course, only be done on broad lines. The system followed was to divide the country up into administrative areas corresponding to the local governments and roughly to apportion the supply of food products to the population. This resulted in certain areas becoming surplus and others deficit regions; and the surplus regions were then compelled to supply a certain proportion of their abundance to their less fortunate neighbours. But, of course, no control, however meticulous, could prevent rural districts from feeding full before anything went to the industrial districts, or could stop illicit trading between the well-to-do and the farmers. This "schleich-handel" or sneak trade kept the profiteer well supplied throughout the war with farm produce. After the revolution this profiteers' sneak trade was supplemented by a proletariat sneak trade, in which plundered stores were hawked through the poor quarters by broken soldiers and miscellaneous brigands. In Berlin, round the Alexanderplatz, there was perpetual skirmishing between these "wild traders" and the patrols of the Frei-Corps. The efforts to suppress the sneak trade of the well-to-do classes supporting the Government were not so drastic. Butter could generally be bought through the hotel waiters at forty marks a pound.

There was noticeable in all this a marked deficiency of public spirit in respect to private life. The German has for so long been drilled and dragooned in his public life that his civic conscience is little developed. Whereas in England one had the impression that the government and authorities, and especially the army, were the worst offenders against national economy and the mass of the middle class the most conscientious, in Germany it seemed quite the other way. Undoubtedly one of the irritants that excited the revolution was the failure of the rationing system to secure an equitable distribution—or anything more than a minimum of certain staple foods.

This food shortage is, of course, a cause as well as a consequence of the economic collapse of Germany. German economic life, swept away for years on the tide of war effort, now revolves round and round in a vicious circle like a dead carcase in an eddy after a flood. Famine and fighting have made the people too weak and too weary to work; but until they work they cannot get food from abroad or grow it at home. That is the economic vicious circle. The boycott and blockade have made the people too restless and revolutionary to reconstruct and remodel their constitutional institutions; and until they do so they are to be boycotted and embargoed. That is the political vicious circle in foreign affairs. In all regions of economic life one finds this endless chain of cause and effect revolving round Paris and fettering such energies as are left to Germany.

This is not the place for an estimate of the material sacrifices we have made and are making, so as to coerce Germany into accepting the peace conditions of Paris and into suppressing its own revolutionary movements. I would only point out that a brisk trade between France and Germany was proceeding all through these months of blockade. For example, an acquaintance in Switzerland who wanted in February a certain well-known make of French tyre was told by his garage that they could get them cheaper than in France if he did not mind where they came from. They came via Germany. And no sooner was the Treaty signed than a swarm of American agents descended on Berlin, buying up businesses right and left, as also such stocks as were left. Small wonder, with the mark at one-quarter its pre-war value. As to objets d'art and paintings, the ruin of the plutocracy and the low rate of exchange threaten to strip Germany far more effectively than any German raiders could strip the villas of France and Belgium. But in this legitimate indemnity we English have not benefited. We are too much afraid of "dumping," no doubt.

There are still probably many in England who fear that German competition will begin immediately with the raising of the blockade. Apart from the political and social conditions that make impossible an early convalescence of German industry from its complete collapse, the following official data taken from the preface to new regulations for the textile industry, show the conditions to which this industry was reduced before the revolution. This document it may be noted, is not one prepared for foreign consumption.

At the outbreak of war German industry had a stock of 300,000 bales of cotton on hand, and as much more was held by the Bremen merchants. And as much more again was imported up to the breach with Italy in May, 1915. The stock then was 600,000 bales. During the war 200,000 bales were seized in Belgium and Poland. This supply allowed the German mills an output of 4 per cent. to 5 per cent. of their annual peace output of about a million tons. The annual local wool production during the war was 7,000 tons, flax 20,000 tons, hemp 11,000 tons, artificial wool 25,000 tons, and artificial cotton from rags, etc., 33,000 tons.

Attempts to grow cotton substitutes were a failure. Nettle fibre in 1916 amounted to 200 tons, turf fibre 2,000 tons, reed fibre 1,000 tons. Artificial fabrics (stapel-fasser), on the other hand, rose to an annual amount of 10,000 tons, and seem to have a future. Paper thread rose to 150,000 tons annually, but is only a war expedient. The home production of fibre was about 2 per cent. of the previous importation.

These official figures show that the arrears now required are such that if they could be supplied they could not be paid for. A value of about five milliards is required as compared with a value of 1-½ milliards imported before the war, and 5 milliards is about the total value of all raw material imported annually before the war. The only prospect of supply otherwise is from home-made artificial fibres, and that only if they are protected against foreign cotton, which is absurd.

All the proposals now under discussion for improving methods of production by co-ordinating and controlling the factories even if feasible and effective will not, in the opinion of competent persons here, make up for any material proportion of the loss of productive power due to present conditions both of capital and labour. They wish to get this and other industries restarted, not with any prospect of profit, but to provide clothing and work for the industrial population.