"A week before the Germans first used this method they announced in their official _communiqué_ that we were making use of asphyxiating gases. At the time there appeared to be no reason for this astounding falsehood, but now, of course, it is obvious that it was part of the scheme. It is a further proof of the deliberate nature of the introduction by the Germans of a new and illegal weapon, and shows that they recognised its illegality and were anxious to forestall neutral, and possibly domestic, criticism. "Since the enemy first made use of this method of covering his advance with a cloud of poisoned air he has repeated it both in offence and defence whenever the wind has been favourable. "The effect of this poison is not merely disabling, or even painlessly fatal, as suggested in the German Press. Those of its victims who do not succumb on the field, and who can be brought into hospital, suffer acutely, and in a large proportion of cases die a painful and lingering death. Those who survive are in little better case, as the injury to their lungs appears to be of a permanent character and reduces them to a condition which points to their being invalids for life. These effects must be well known to the German scientists who devised this new weapon and to the military authorities who have sanctioned its use. "I am of opinion that the enemy has definitely decided to use these gases as a normal procedure, and that protests will be useless." APPENDIX E. EFFORTS OF GERMAN MINISTERS OF STATE TO LAY BLAME ON BRITAIN. Since the war, both the German Imperial Chancellor, Herr von Bethmann-Hollweg, and the German Foreign Secretary, Herr von Jagow, have endeavoured to explain away the former's phrase: "a scrap of paper," which shocked the diplomatic conscience of the world. Both have endeavoured to lay the blame for the conflict at Great Britain's door.[114] The German Imperial Chancellor now declares that:-- "Documents on the Anglo-Belgian Military Agreement which ... we have found in the archives of the Belgian Foreign Office ... showed that England in 1911 was determined to throw troops into Belgium without the consent of the Belgian Government."[115] The true facts of the case are to be seen in the following extract from the statement issued by the Belgian Minister in London, on March 17, 1915:--