CONDITIONS OF PEACE WITH GERMANY.

I. LIST OF GERMAN PEACE DELEGATION.

I. DELEGATES.

Imperial Minister of Foreign Affairs Count Brockdorff-Rantzau.
Imperial Minister of Justice Dr. Landsberg.
Imperial Minister of the Postal Service Giesberts.
Oberburgmeister Leinert.

Prof. Dr. Schücking.

Dr. Carl Melchior.

II. COMMISSIONERS.

A. Imperial ministry of foreign affairs: General Commissioner Director von Stockhammern, General Commissioner Director Simone, Envoy von Haniel, Privy Legation Counsellor von Keller, Working Legation Counsellor Schmidt, Working Legation Counsellor Gaus, Legation Counsellor Freiherr von Lersner, Legation Counsellor Breitling, Legation Secretary von Bülow, Legation Secretary Rödiger, Dr. Fritz Mac Cahen.

B. Imperial ministry of finance: Under State Secretary Dr. Schröder, Director Bergmann.

C. Imperial ministry of the interior: Privy Counsellor Beer, Assessor von Friedberg.

D. Imperial ministry of justice: Privy Counsellor Dr. Richter.
E. Imperial colonial ministry: Privy Counsellor Ruppel.

F. Imperial economic ministry: State Counsellor von Meinel, Richard Merton.

G. Imperial food ministry: Under State Secretary von Braun. H. Imperial ministry of labor: Imperial Minister Schwarz, Privy Counsellor Fritz, Carl Legion.

I. Imperial office of imperial railway administration: Privy Counsellor Eberbach.

K. War minister and great general staff: Gen. von Seect, Maj. Draudt, Capt. Fisher.

L. Imperial naval office: Commodore Heinrich, Lieut. Klep.

M. Armistice commission: Dr. von Becker, Ministerial Counsellor Dr. Schall, Maj. von Botticher.

III. SECRETARIES OF THE DELEGATION.

Privy Counsellor Lohre, Privy Counsellor Flemming, Prof. Jackl, Prof. Wolsendorff, Government Counsellor Fuchs, Privy Counsellor Trautman, Victor Schiff, Attaché Riesser, Attaché Dr. Hans Meyer, Baumeister, Fritz Thissen, Mrs. Dornbluth, Secretary Tisher, Secretary Rose, Registrar Grunewals, Secretary Stein.

IV. EXPERTS.

Bank Director Franz Urbig, Banker Max Warburg, Bank Director George von Strauss, General Director Heineken, Privy Counsellors Cuno, F. H. Witthoefft, Hilger, Prof. Dr. Bosch; Director Schmitz, Councillor of Commerce Hardt, Imperiol Councillor von Miller, Councillor of Commerce Röchling, Director Lübson.

V. INTERPRETERS.

Michaelis, Schauer, Kisp, and Miss Selma Fliess.

VI. PRESS.

Paul Block, Dr. Redlich, Dr. Mühling, Dr. Kaufmann, Friedrich Stampfer, August Abel, Baumann, Wertheimer, Rolf Brandt, Floch, Dr. Guttman, Prosper-Mollendorf, Dr. Goldmann, Dr. Hirth, Dr. Lothringer, Dr. Nanteler, Juillerat, Consul General Dr. Hirsch, Dr. Haas.

Press secretaries: Dr. Faff, Dorn, Dr. Bohminger, Kauder, Jolles, Hammer, Blohm, Wettler.

VII. BUREAU.

A. Imperial foreign office: Privy Court Counsellor Bohnstedt: Court Counsellors Weber, Schultz, Soika, Findekleo; Secretaries Rodiger, Autzen, Baumbach; Chancery officials Borrowicz, Niedeck, Lange; Consulate Secretary Walther, Dr. Feldmann; Court Counselor Reimeke; Private Secretary Klaus; Private Forwarding Secretary Propp; members of the Diet, Jahn Luders, Mme. Cahen, Miss Rossi, Miss Rocholl, Miss Kirchner.

B. Secretariat for the Peace Negotiations: Secretary Kloe, Secretary Assayer, Duncker, Miss Imbach, Miss Loos, Miss Lantos, Miss Gunther, Miss Sachse, Miss Moene, Miss Kohn, Miss Scheibel, Miss Bechert, Miss du Boys-Reymont, Miss Steeger, Miss Beletz, Miss von Dorpowski, Miss Bach, Miss Buchenholz, Miss Fiedler, Miss Stegemann, Miss Wertheimer, Miss Gartner, Mme. Kirchhoff, Miss Haas, Miss Frankel, Secretary Behrend; Secretaries Friedrich Stauch, Wilhelm Beinke; Chancery officials, Fast, Schruut, SchulzTelkum; Government messengers, Repp, Schmidt, Jeckle, Thiele: Orderlies, Wilhelm Ferrahl, Lehmann, Kopp, Papproth, Hardt. Scholz, Perlbach, Heicht, Schuelke, Gunther.

VIII. STENOGRAPHERS.

Head officials Ahnert, Ewald Heuer, Albert Backhaus.

IX. COURIER OFFICER.

Von Bismarck.

X. PHYSICIAN.

Prof. Bier, Dr. Herschmann.

XI. TELEPHONE AND TELEGRAPH OFFICIALS.

Postal inspector Waltker; Chief Telegraph Secretaries Griebler, Neugebauer; Telegraph assistants Sack, Marzhn, Korla, Bietz, Homuth, Wende; Telegraph chemists Kirsch, Seebrandt; 'Chief linemen Kuhne, Blankenburg; Linemen Franke, Stressenreuter, Rodel: Car inspector Degen; Barber Tizepanski.

II. PLENARY SESSION HELD AT THE TRIANON PALACE HOTEL, VERSAILLES, ON MAY 7, 1919, 3 P. M.

Communication of the preliminaries of peace to the German delegates.

M. Clemenceau said: The session is open.

(The German plenipotentiaries were announced and entered the room.)

M. Clemenceau speaks in French.

(M. Mantoux interprets the foregoing:)

Gentlemen, plenipotentiaries of the German Empire, it is neither the time nor the place for superfluous words. You have before you the accredited plenipotentiaries of all the small and great powers united to fight together in the war that has been so cruelly imposed upon them. The time has come when we must settle our accounts. You have asked for peace. We are ready to give you peace.

We shall present to you now a book which contains our conditions. You will be given every facility to examine those conditions, and the time necessary for it. Everything will be done with the courtesy that is the privilege of civilized nations.

To give you my thought completely, you will find us ready to give you any explanation you want, but we must say at the same time that this second treaty of Versailles has cost us too much not to take on our side all the necessary precautions and guaranties that that peace shall be a lasting one.

The above was thereupon translated into German.

M. Clemenceau speaks in French.

(M. Mantoux interprets the foregoing:)

I will give you notice of the procedure that has been adopted by the conference for discussion, and if anyone has any observation to offer they will have the right to do so. No oral discussion is to take place, and the observations of the German delegation will have to be submitted in writing. The German plenipotentiaries will know that they have the maximum period of 15 days within which to present in English and French their written observations on the whole of the treaty, the headings of which are as follows:

League of nations.

Geographical frontiers of Germany.

Political clauses for Europe: Belgium, Luxemburg, Saar, Alsace-Lorraine, Austria, Czechoslovakia, Poland and Eastern Prussia, Denmark, Heligoland, clauses concerning Russia and the Russian States, recognition of new European States.

Political clauses for countries outside Europe: General clause of renunciation of colonies, Siam, Liberia, Morocco, Egypt, Turkey, Bulgaria, and Shantung. Military, naval and aerial clauses.

Execution of the armistice, end of the war, state of peace.

Before the expiration of the aforesaid period of 15 days the German delegates will be entitled to send their reply on particular headings of the treaty or to ask questions in regard to them.

After having examined the observations presented within the aforementioned periods, the supreme council will send their answer in writing to the German delegation, and determine the period within which the final global answer must be given by this delegation.

The President wishes to add that when we receive, after two or three or four or five days, any observation from the German delegation on any point of the treaty we shall not wait until the end of the 15 days to give our answer. We shall at once proceed in the way indicated by this document.

The foregoing was translated into German.

M. Brockdorff-Rantzau speaks in German. (Translation of the foregoing:)

Gentlemen, we are deeply impressed with the sublime task which has brought us hither to give a durable peace to the world. We are under no illusion as to the extent of our defeat and the degree of our want of power. We know that the power of the German arms is broken. We know the power of the hatred which we encounter here, and we have heard the passionate demand that the vanquishers may make us pay as the vanquished, and shall punish those who are worthy of being punished.

It is demanded from us that we shall confess ourselves to be the only ones guilty of the war. Such a confession in my mouth will be a lie. We are far from declining any responsibility that this Great War of the World has come to pass, and that it was made in the way in which it was made. The attitude of the former German Government at The Hague peace conference, its actions and omissions in the tragic 12 days of July, have certainly contributed to the disaster. But we energetically deny that Germany and its people, who were convinced that they were making a war of defense, were alone guilty.

Nobody will want to contend that the disaster took its course only in the disastrous moment when the successor of AustriaHungary fell the victim of murderous hands. In the last 50 years imperialism of all European States has chronically poisoned the international situation. The policy of retaliation and the policy of expansion and the disregard of the rights of peoples to determine their own destiny, has contributed to the illness of Europe which saw its crisis in the World War.

Russian mobilization took from the statesmen the possibility of healing and gave the decision into the hands of the military powers. Public opinion in all the countries of our adversaries is resounding with the crimes which Germany is said to have committed in war. Here also we are ready to confess wrong that may have been done.

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We have not come here to belittle the responsibility of the men who have waged the war politically and economically, and to deny any crimes which may have been committed against the rights of peoples. We repeat the declaration which has been made in the German Reichstag, at the beginning of the war, that is to say, Wrong has been done to Belgium," and we are willing to repair it. But in the manner of making war, also, Germany is not the only guilty one. Every nation knows of deeds and of people which the best nationals only remember with regret. I do not want to answer by reproaches to reproaches, but I ask them to remember, when reparation is demanded, not to forget the armistice. It took you six weeks till we got it at last, and six months till we came to know your conditions of peace. Crimes in war may not be excusable, but they are committed in the struggle for victory, and in the defense of national existence, and passions are aroused which make the conscience of peoples blunt.

The hundreds of thousands of noncombatants who have perished since the 11th of November by reason of the blockade were killed with cold deliberation, after our adversaries had conquered and victory had been assured to them. Think of that when you speak of guilt and of punishment.

The measure of guilt of all those who have taken part can only be stated by impartial inquest before a neutral commission before which all the principal persons of the tragedy are allowed to speak, and to which all the archives are open. We have demanded such an inquest, and we repeat this demand. In this conference, also, where we stand toward our adversaries alone and without any allies, we are not quite without protection. You yourselves have brought us an ally, namely, the right which is guaranteed by the treaty, by the principles of peace.

The allied and associated Governments have foresworn in the time between the 5th of October and the 5th of November, 1918, a peace of violence, and have written a peace of justice on their banner. On the 5th of October, 1918, the German Government proposed the principles of the President of the United States of North America as the basis of peace, and on the 5th of November their Secretary of State, Lansing, declared that the allied and associated powers agreed to this basis, with two definite deviations. The principles of President Wilson have thus become binding for both parties to the war, for you as well as for us, and also for our former allies. The various principles demand from us heavy national and economic sacrifices, but the holy fundamental rights of all peoples are protected by this treaty. The conscience of the world is behind it. There is no nation which might violate it without punishment. You will find us ready to examine, upon this basis, the preliminary peace which you have proposed to us, with a firm intention of rebuilding, in common work with you, that which has been destroyed, and repairing any wrong that may have been committed, principally the wrong to Belgium, and to show to mankind new aims of political and social progress. Considering the tremendous quantity of problems which arise, we ought, as soon as possible, to make an examination of the principal tasks by special commissions of experts on the basis of the treaty which you have proposed to us.