Prager Tagblatt
- Trials of Strength for the Republic
- Hindenburg to Seeckt
- Conservative Radicalism
The Prager Tagblatt of 9 October 1926 followed political tremors in Berlin and London. An editorial headed "Trials of Strength for the Republic" opened with the departure from Berlin of Lord d'Abernon, the British ambassador. A Berlin report printed the closing lines of President Hindenburg's courteous letter to the outgoing army chief Hans von Seeckt, said no successor had yet been chosen, said that the senior general Reinhardt had reportedly asked not to be appointed, and named Lieutenant Generals Hasse and Heye as the names under discussion. From London the paper reported, with open irony, that the Conservative conference at Scarborough had demanded the expulsion of the Russian trade delegation, the end of the 1921 Anglo-Russian trade agreement, tougher laws against sedition, harsh penalties for harassing strike-breakers and treatment of a general strike as treason. This reading covers three fragments, and the editorial survives here only in its first sentence.
Translation
Trials of Strength for the Republic
Lord d'Abernon, the British ambassador, yesterday left the Berlin post he had held until now
Hindenburg to Seeckt
knowledge and ability, your energy and your experience will continue to be of service to our Fatherland in the future, and in this expectation I remain, with comradely [?] greetings, your devoted (signed) von Hindenburg."
No decision has yet been made on Seeckt's successor. Reinhardt, the most senior general of the Reichswehr after Seeckt, who is commander of the Reichswehr command in Kassel, is said to have asked not to be considered for the appointment. At present two names, Lieutenant General Hasse, commander of the Third Infantry Division, which comprises the Brandenburg and Silesian units, and Lieutenant General Heye, commander of the Königsberg infantry division
Conservative Radicalism
and trained, and just as great are the services that you, in the years of grave upheaval of the Reich now behind us, for the maintenance of order active and during the Kapp Putsch headed the Reichswehr Ministry in Berlin. He is also said to have been the one who induced General von Lüttwitz to step down.
Conservative Radicalism.
Resolutions of the Scarborough party conference.
London, 8 October. The Conservative party conference in Scarborough today treated itself to a few revolutionary showpiece resolutions. One demands the expulsion of the Russian trade delegation and the termination of the Anglo-Russian trade agreement of 1921; another resolution calls for tougher legislation against sedition and anti-state propaganda; the third resolution demands the severest punishment for any harassment [?] of a worker willing to work during a strike. The fourth motion proclaimed a general strike to be treason and calls for criminal proceedings against all [?]
Context
Why Seeckt had to leave the army command in October 1926
Hindenburg's letter, whose closing lines the paper printed, was the farewell attached to a forced departure. According to the Weimar Republic chronicle, Seeckt was made to step down as head of the Heeresleitung on 6 October 1926 at the insistence of Defence Minister Geßler and President Hindenburg. The chronicle names the immediate cause as Prince Wilhelm of Hohenzollern's participation in a Reichswehr manoeuvre that neither the minister nor the president had approved beforehand. It adds that relations had already deteriorated because of Seeckt's open opposition to the government's Locarno policy and his disputes with Hindenburg over their respective areas of authority. Read against that background, Hindenburg's polite hope that Seeckt's knowledge and experience would remain useful to the Fatherland softened what was in practice a dismissal. The Prager Tagblatt report did not discuss the cause; it concentrated on the open succession, and its statements that Reinhardt had declined and that Hasse and Heye were under discussion are the paper's account of the state of play on 9 October, not a record of the eventual appointment.
Why a Hohenzollern prince at a Reichswehr manoeuvre was so sensitive in 1926
The manoeuvre affair touched a bitterly contested domestic question of 1926, the property of the former ruling houses. According to the German Historical Museum, the KPD and SPD moved in the Reichstag in January 1926 for the expropriation of the princely houses without compensation by referendum, while the monarchist DNVP, the DVP, national associations, the churches and President Hindenburg himself opposed it. After the referendum failed on 20 June 1926, most state governments reached financial compromises with their former dynasties fairly quickly, and Prussia concluded its settlement with the House of Hohenzollern on 15 October 1926, six days after this issue appeared. A Hohenzollern prince therefore appeared at a Reichswehr exercise just as the family's claims against Prussia were in their final stage. That coincidence of dates helps explain why an unapproved participation could end the career of the army chief, although this link is an inference from the chronology; neither source states it as a cause.
What became of Scarborough's demand to expel the Soviet trade delegation
The first Scarborough resolution targeted the Anglo-Soviet trade agreement of 16 March 1921, which, as the Modern Records Centre at Warwick notes, had given diplomatic immunity to official Soviet trade agents. The same collection records that relations between the two governments had grown increasingly fraught since Stanley Baldwin's Conservative government was elected in 1924. The Prager Tagblatt treated the conference motions as "revolutionary showpiece resolutions", that is, as party demonstrations rather than government policy. Seven months later, on 12 May 1927, British police raided the London headquarters of the Soviet trade delegation and ARCOS; Warwick describes the raid as a breach of the 1921 agreement and its fall-out as the final straw that led to the breaking off of diplomatic relations. Britain severed diplomatic and economic ties in late May 1927, ending the trade agreement. These sources do not show that the Scarborough resolutions caused the break; they show that the end of the trade agreement, which the party conference had demanded in October 1926, came after the raid, when the government broke off relations.
Original
Kraftproben der Republik.
Lord d'Abernon, der englische Botschafter, hat gestern seinen bisherigen Berliner Posten verlassen
Hindenburg an Seekt.
Wissen und Können, Ihre Tatkraft und Ihre Erfahrungen auch künftig unserem Vaterlande nutzbar sein werden und bin in dieser Erwartung mit kamera [?] aftlichem Gruße Ihr ergebener (Gez.) von Hindenburg. " Eine Entscheidung über den Nachfolger Seeckts ist noch nicht gefallen. Der nach Seeckt dienstälteste General der Reichswehr Reinhardt, der Kommandant des Reichswehrkommandos in Kassel ist, soll gebeten haben von seiner Ernennung abzusehen. Augenblicklich werden zwei Namen, Generalleutnant Hasse, Kommandeur der dritten Infanteriedivision, die die Brandenburger und schlesischen Truppenteile umfaßt, und Generalleutnant Heye, Kommandeur der Königsberger Infanteriedivision
Konservativer Radilalismus.
und ausgebildet haben und ebenso groß sind die Verdienste, die Sie sich in den hinter uns liegenden Jahren schwerer Erschütterung des Reiches um die Erhaltung der Ordnung tätig und hat während des Kapp-Putsches das Reichswehrministerium in Berlin geleitet. Er soll es auch gewesen sein, der General von Lüttwitz zur Abdankung veranlaßte. Konservativer Radikalismus. Beschlüsse des Parteitages von Scarborough. London, 8. Oktober. Der konservative Parteitag in Scarborough hat sich heute einige revolutionäre Paraderesolutionen geleistet. Die eine fordert die Ausweisung der russischen Handelsvertretung sowie die Kündigung des englisch-russischen Handelsabkommens von 1921, eine weitere Resolution verlangt die Verschärfung der Gesetzgebung gegen Aufruhr und staatsfeindliche Propaganda, die dritte Resolution verlangt die schärfste Bestrafung jeder Belästigung [?] eines Arbeitswilligen während eines Streikes. Der vierte Antrag proklamierte einen Generalstreik als Landesverrat und verlangt strafrechtliches Einschreiten gegen alle [?]