Prof. Hollmann attempted to prove that Bédier had made mistakes in translating and interpreting, but he did not deny the genuineness of the diaries. "These notebooks," he says, "may well be authentic and I accept this without further comment for all those which are provided with the name of their authors and whose authenticity can in any case be established after the war."
American sources.
The American evidence is drawn mainly from material in the archives of the State Department. In addition, statements from our ambassadors and ministers and other well-known officials and authors are given. Messrs. Hoover, Kellogg, and Walcott have written statements especially for this pamphlet. All of this material is essentially the testimony of neutrals, for it is based wholly on observations made before the United States entered the war. Occasionally official documents and well authenticated facts from foreign sources are used.
Frightfulness as a system.
The purpose of this pamphlet is to show that the system of frightfulness, which is itself the greatest atrocity, is the definite policy of the German Government, against which more humane German soldiers themselves revolted at times. For this reason it has not seemed necessary to set forth the individual acts of cruelty; such acts are cited only when necessary to illustrate the system. Anyone who wishes to read chapters of horrors can find them in the Report of the Committee on Alleged German Outrages, presided over by the former British Ambassador to this country and therefore generally known as "the Bryce report;" in the official reports by the Belgian Commission d'Enquête; in the official French reports compiled under the auspices of the French minister for foreign affairs; in many other publications, and especially in the conclusive admissions of the official German White Book cited above. The last, published by the German Government, is the most damning testimony concerning the system of frightfulness.
TREATMENT OF CIVILIANS
I. MASSACRES.
Protection of noncombatants agreed to by Germany.
In the wars waged in ancient times it was taken for granted that conquered peoples might be either killed, tortured, or held as slaves; that their property would be taken and that their lands would be devastated. "Vae victis!—woe to the conquered!" For two centuries or more there has been a steady advance in introducing ideas of humanity and especially in confining the evils of warfare to the combatants. The ideal seemed to have become so thoroughly established as a part of international law that the powers at The Hague thought it sufficient merely to state the general principles in Article XLVI of the regulations: "Family honors and rights, the lives of persons and private property, as well as religious convictions and practice, must be respected. Private property can not be confiscated." Germany, in But her military leaders did not acquiesce. common with the other powers, solemnly pledged her faith to keep this article, but her military leaders had no intention of doing so. They had been trained in the ideas voiced by Gen. von Hartmann 40 years ago: "Terrorism is seen to be a relatively gentle procedure, useful to keep the masses of the people in a state of obedience." This had been Bismarck's policy, too. According to Moritz Busch, Bismarck's biographer, Bismarck, exasperated by the French resistance, which was still continuing in January, 1871, said: