The Red Conspiracy

by Joseph J. Mereto

In the latter part of 1918, the Berlin correspondent of the "Kölnische Zeitung" drew a graphic picture of the terrorism exercised in Berlin by the Spartacan gangs:

"Dr. Liebknecht himself, whose imprisonment has obviously clouded his formerly keen intelligence and probably turned his brain, spends his time in visiting barracks in Berlin, Spandau and elsewhere, and inciting the men to refuse to allow any distinctions even of non-commissioned rank or to accept anything resembling orders from officers or to admit them to the local councils. His chief of staff, Dr. Levy, who before the war was his business partner in his law office, is preaching fanaticism in Berlin to all and sundry.

"The word Spartacus goes through the city like a bogy. Civilians, soldiers, employees, capitalists, all feel themselves equally threatened. A sitting of the Prussian Lower House had to be adjourned because it was feared that the Spartacus gang was going to seize the building.

"'The Lokal Anzeiger' has several times failed to appear, as the result of repeated efforts of the Spartacus gang to seize it. Careful burghers chain up the house doors, and it would be well if the steadier elements of our workmen and soldiers would chain up the door of their hearts against the murderous and suicidal ideas of the Spartacus gang."

The Spartacides made a practice of terrorizing German newspapers into supporting them. In the early part of 1919, they tried to prevent the Constituent Assembly from coming together, and later on engineered many a revolt in the various cities of Germany. Since their leaders, the fiery Karl Liebknecht and Rosa Luxemburg, were assassinated, the orderly elements of the German people have succeeded more and more in weakening the power and influence of the Spartacans.

Kurt Eisner, of Bavaria, after the overthrow of the German Imperial Government, sought to establish a federation of German republics under the head of Bavaria. It was not very long before the first step was taken, Bavaria declaring itself a republic independent of the Berlin Government. After the assassination of Eisner, Bavaria, and especially its capital, Munich, came more and more under the control of the extreme radical group of Socialists known as the Communists. About the end of March, 1919, Bela Kun, the Foreign Minister of the newly established Communist Government of Hungary and one of the most active propagandists of Russian Bolshevism, arrived at Munich to confer with the leaders of the Bavarian Government. Shortly afterwards, in the early part of April, a Soviet Republic was proclaimed at Munich.

The socialization of industry began. That part of the press that favored the new regime was upheld by the Government, which suppressed unfriendly organs. Members of the Christian Textile Workers' Association were forced, on pain of being deprived of work, to join the Social-Democratic Union. Various other measures of "freedom, equality, and justice" were also bestowed upon the people, and the hope was expressed by the Red Socialists of Munich that the proclamation of a Bavarian Soviet would have its effect throughout Germany and result in a world revolution.

Towards the middle of April, 1919, press dispatches stated that the Munich Communists had elected a council, consisting of five workmen and five soldiers, with Herr Klatz, a bricklayer, as president; that the police was disarmed; that eleven hostages were taken from the ranks of the trade-union leaders; that revolutionary tribunals were established at Munich, where twenty-eight judges continued, in relays of seven, to pass sentences day and night, and, finally, that a decree was issued by the Communist government confiscating all dwellings.

Shortly after these reports reached America, the peasants of Bavaria rose up against the revolutionary government in Munich and declared an effective ban on the shipment of food to that city. No attacks were made upon Munich by the troops of the moderate Hoffman government of Bavaria which had been ousted by the Communists, for it was feared that the whole country might thus be plunged into civil war. The only strategic movement of these troops was to cut off the supplies of food.

Discord soon sprang up among the Soviet leaders themselves, who engaged in open street fights against each other. Before the end of April, 1919, the Central Council had been dissolved and the Communist mob had turned to plundering. Food ration cards were taken away from the bourgeoisie, and barricades were erected around the city to defend it from Noske's army, sent to attack it by the Ebert-Scheidemann moderate Socialist Government of Berlin. In the early part of May, 1919, the Communist rabble of the Bavarian capital was finally overcome by the artillery fire of Noske's troops, and Hoffman was once more put in control.

The American Socialists look upon the ousted Communists of Bavaria as the upholders of the Marxian doctrine, and consider them, along with the Russian Bolsheviki and the Hungarian Communists, as Socialist brethren worthy of their respect and imitation.

In Hungary the "100 per cent" Socialists, the Communists, under the leadership of Bela Kun, came into power in the early part of the year 1919. Press despatches, at the end of March, stated that all villas, industries and building had been declared the property of the state; that each factory was controlled by a Council of Laborers; that free-love was legalized as in Russia; that all clergymen and nuns were removed from the hospitals, excepting those who acted in the capacity of nurses, and the religious, tuition schools were abolished.