Armament Scandal May Be Hushed Up.

New York Times 100 years ago today, April 27, 1913:
Germans Disgusted Over "Milk and Water" Functions of the Reichstag Inquiry Board.
THE KAISER IS MORTIFIED
Krupps Likely to Lose His Friendship — War Minister von Heeringen Believed to be Doomed.
Special Cable to The New York Times.
    BERLIN, April 26.— Will the armament scandal end in a miserable and ineffective fizzle? That is the question of the hour in Germany. The affair of the Krupps' alleged bribery of the War Office and the Deutsche Waffen und Munitionsfabrik's attempt to manufacture a war-scare in the French press, which staggered the empire a week ago, already shows signs of fading into a police court episode.
    To a large extent the scandal has already disappeared from the columns of the newspapers. The Reichstag is about to adjourn for the Whitsuntide recess, and when it reassembles on May 26, predictions are already freely made, the armament revelations will be more or less forgotten.
    The country's hope of probing them to the bottom was dashed by the refusal of the Reichstag to clothe its own Commission of Inquiry with judicial powers of the far-reaching extent of those enjoyed by the Pujo Money Trust Commission in Washington. The Government's spokesmen assured the house that such powers could not legally be conferred on a parliamentary commission.
    The spokesmen of the Conservative and Catholic Parties, who had earlier in the week shouted themselves rod in the face with indignation over the alleged corruption of the Krupps and their confrères, meekly supported the Government's view. Only the Social Democrats insisted that the commission should be armed with authority to summon witnesses, compel testimony, and drag the truth from the most reluctant quarters.
    The Frankforter Zeitung, the great organ of the commercial and financial classes, summarizes the popular disgust over the milk and water functions with which the Reichstag's Commission of Inquiry is now compelled to content itself.
    "The armament scandals are so gross a case of corruption," says the Zeitung, "that the hour is ripe to break the precedent of ordinary commission practices. In more progressive countries parliamentary commissions of inquiry have long been clothed with judicial prerogatives, because they are perfectly natural and obvious. Unless we invoke them the investigation of the armament scandals will inevitably be nebulous. The interests will divulge a lot of glittering generalities and meaningless information, and conceal the essentials."
    However the scandals eventually end, they have undoubtedly shaken German political life to its foundations. The Kaiser is known to be angered and mortified beyond expression. Unless the Krupps can clear their name, a breach in the longstanding and intimate friendship between them and the Emperor is almost inevitable.
    The position of Gen. von Heeringen, the Minister of War, is believed to be shattered. It is not German tradition to retire a Cabinet Minister under fire. Von Heeringen, therefore, will probably remain in office until the Army bill is enacted into law, but the general impression is that he must go. The Lokal-Anzeiger, obviously acting on behalf of the influential military clique, is waging war against von Heeringen's connection with the Krupp scandals.
    The prominence and fame of the Krupps have resulted in concentrating public attention at home and abroad on their alleged misdeeds in attempting to corrupt officials of the War Office, but German commentators agree that the offense of the Deutsche Waffen und Munitionsfabrik in inspiring fake French military news is really far more reprehensible.
    An incriminating letter which has been revealed bears the name of Dr. von Gontard, one of the managing directors of the Fabrik and son-in-law of Adolphus Busch, the St. Louis brewer. Dr. von Gontard was elevated to the Prussian peerage by the Kaiser in 1911. He and his American wife have, in recent years, been prominent in the aristocratic social set in which the Crown Prince and Princess are leaders.
    The Berliner Tageblatt, in reviewing the career of von Gontard's company, points out that the very year it attempted to manipulate French public opinion the company increased its annual dividend from 20 to 32 per cent., while the price of its shares rose from 290 to 575.
    One of the Directors of the company. Prince Guido Henckel von Donnersmarck, sometimes called the German Carnegie, the multi-millionaire Silesian coal and iron magnate, is a warm personal friend of the Kaiser, who often visits the Prince's country home.