The accusations, especially those which have been made against the General Staff to the effect that it worked for war, are pretty untenable. The Prussian General Staff served its King and fatherland by hard, faithful work, and maintained Germany's ability to defend herself by labors extending over many years of peace, as was its duty, but it exerted absolutely no political influence whatsoever. Interest in politics, as is well known, was never particularly strong in the Prussian-German army. Looking backward, one might almost say, in fact, that it would have been better for us if those in leading military circles had concerned themselves a bit more with foreign policy. Therefore, how the Peace of Versailles, in view of this perfectly clear state of affairs, could have been founded upon Germany's guilt in having caused the World War, would seem an insoluble riddle if it were not possible to trace the tremendous effect of a new war weapon--_viz._, the political propaganda of England against Germany--planned on a large scale and applied with audacity and unscrupulousness. I cannot bring myself to dismiss this propaganda by branding it with catchwords such as "a piece of rascality," etc., since it constitutes an achievement which, in spite of its repugnant nature, cannot be ignored; it did us more harm than the arms in the hands of our opponents. To us Germans, such an instrument of insincerity, distortion, and hypocrisy is not pleasing; it is something that is incompatible with the German character; we try to convince our opponents with the weapon of truth as well as with other weapons. But war is a cruel thing and what matters in it is to win; after all, to fire heavy guns at civilized beings is not a pleasant matter, nor to bombard beautiful old towns, yet this had to be done by both sides in the war. Moreover, we could not have developed a propaganda on a large scale like that of our enemies during the war for the very reason that they had no foes in their rear, whereas we were surrounded. In addition, most Germans have not the gift to fit a scheme of propaganda to the different nationalities of the nations upon which it is supposed to work. But, just as the English were more than our match with that terrible weapon of theirs, the tank, against which we could bring nothing of equal efficiency, so also were they superior to us with their very effective weapon of propaganda. And this weapon still continues its work and we are compelled still to defend ourselves against it over and over again. For there can be no doubt that the unjust Peace of Versailles could not have been founded upon Germany's war guilt unless propaganda had previously accomplished its task and, partly with the support of German pacifists, instilled into the brains of 100,000,000 human beings the belief in Germany's guilt, so that the unjust Peace of Versailles seemed to many justified. HOPES FOR VERSAILLES REACTION