Cabinet of Monocles

Brown-shirted Fascists massed and milled last week outside a squat, soldier-guarded mansion on Berlin's famed Wilhelmstrasse, shouted qualified approval of the occupant. They roared not "Hail Hindenburg!" but "Hail Hindenburg who ousted Bruening!" Plainly the only thing about Germany's Cabinet upset (TIME, June 6) which pleased the Hitlerites was that it meant the end, after 26 months, of what Germans have called the "Bruening System."

Under that system the Republic has been ruled for just over two years not primarily by the Reichstag but by Presidential decrees drafted and administered by Herr von Hindenburg's hand-picked protege, Chancellor Heinrich Bruening. He, a pale, ascetic, tremendously hard-working bachelor soon won greater world esteem than any German diplomat since the late, great Dr. Stresemann. Throughout Germany last week the President's abrupt act in kicking his protege back into obscurity produced an impression never before associated with the name of HINDENBURG--symbol of Loyalty and Duty.

In the recent Presidential election the Socialist Party supported Hindenburg, assured his re-election (TIME, April 18). Last week the famed and moderate Socialist Vorwaerts said: "If the President had really considered a change of Government necessary and had acted accordingly he could not be reproached. But the way in which Dr. Bruening and his Cabinet, personally devoted to the President, were overthrown has profoundly altered in the widest circles the image of the man von Hindenburg. In the eyes of the German people it has clouded that image."

Ex-Spy Into Chancellor. If the 14-year-old Republic has changed profoundly in the past few months, if German public opinion has turned so reactionary as to out-Hitler Hitler, then the 84-year-old President had merely turned with the times, showing his broad back to those parties, classes and principles for which the German Republic has stood since 1918.

Specifically in the new Cabinet constructed last week there is no minister, excepting Dr. Warmbold, who has ever held a Cabinet portfolio before; no representative of German labor or the trade unions; no member of either the Socialist Party or the Fascist Party, respectively largest and next-largest in the Reichstag. To cap the climax President von Hindenburg appointed as Germany's new Chancellor notorious Lieut.-Colonel Franz von Papen. English editors promptly splashed out the screamer EX-SPY BECOMES GERMAN CHANCELLOR!

Intimates of President von Hindenburg advanced a remarkable hypothesis. They suggested that Old Paul had never heard of von Papen's recall from the U. S. on Dec. 10, 1915 by the Imperial German Government at the urgent request of President Wilson. Very likely Der Feldmarschall was too busy in April 1916 trying to win the War to read of the U. S. indictment charging Military Attache von Papen of the Imperial German Embassy in Washington with conspiracy to blow up Canada's Welland Canal.

Fortunately the U. S. State Department was able to deny reports last week that the new German Chancellor would be liable to arrest should he enter the U. S. By mere chance the indictment against him which had stood for 16 years was quashed last March, along with a batch of other German spy indictments.

Why von Papen? In Berlin the intrigue which moved President von Hindenburg to oust Dr. Bruening and appoint Lieut.-Colonel von Papen was universally ascribed to swank Lieut.-General Kurt von Schleicher, a model officer of the Imperial Army type, his bullet head fashionably clipped.

Three years ago General von Schleicher secured the creation for himself of a post called Political and Parliamentary Secretary to the Defense Ministry. There he had a finger in both political and military pies, wangled his way into the President's confidence and first showed his strength earlier this year by maneuvering out of office his immediate superior, Defense Minister General Wilhelm Groener. Last week General von Schleicher was credited with having made the President believe that "the army could not be depended on in a crisis with Dr. Bruening as Chancellor."

In the new Cabinet intriguing General von Schleicher appears as Minister of Defense. He is credited with completely dominating Chancellor von Papen. Germans, noting four barons in the new Government and that all its members are "high born," promptly nicknamed them the "Cabinet of Monocles":

Chancellor--Lieut.-Colonel Franz von Papen.

Foreign Minister--Baron Constantin von Neurath.

Finance--Ludwig Count Schwerin von Krosigk.

Defense -- Lieut.-General Kurt von Schleicher.

Interior--Baron Wilhelm von Gayl. Justice--Franz Guertner.

Food & Agriculture--Baron Friedrich Edler von Braun. Posts & Transport--Baron Paul Eltz von Ruebenach.

Economics--Professor Dr. Hermann Warmbold.

Labor--Hugo Schaeffer.

Cabinet Protested. Though Chancellor von Papen is a Privy Chamberlain to His Holiness Pope Pius XI, though he comes of a family rich for generations, and though he owns Germania, newsorgan of the Catholic Centre Party, he was promptly expelled from the latter's ranks on assuming the Chancellorship. Other Catholic Centrists sympathized with Catholic Centrist Dr. Bruening. When Chancellor von Papen attempted to call on Dr. Bruening he was not admitted, was curtly told that the former Chancellor was "in bed suffering from nervous heart attack."

In vain the new Chancellor addressed an open letter to a high German Catholic prelate, attempted to explain that he had "accepted the President's call not as a party man but as a German." Sternly an official Catholic Centrist manifesto denounced "the frivolous intrigues of constitutionally irresponsible individuals." At Cologne the Party's newsorgan called the new Cabinet "a bad joke," added: "Of all the surprises which domestic politics have recently produced this is the greatest and most painful."

Meanwhile officials of the Socialist Party had informed President von Hindenburg that they could see no valid reason for his having dropped Dr. Bruening. Rumors that the Cabinet of Monocles favored "deliberate inflation" sent stocks & bonds zooming on the Berlin Exchange.

No Inflation, No Joke. First act of Chancellor von Papen was to confer with Dr. Hans Luther, President of the Reichsbank, and issue a communique that there would be no inflation, whereupon German securities slumped.

Parliamentary experts told the Chancellor that if he dared to face the Reichstag his Cabinet would be overwhelmingly defeated. Therefore Protege von Papen asked Patron von Hindenburg to dissolve the Reichstag, which he obligingly did. Within 60 days a new Reichstag must be elected--but in less than ten days Germany must send a delegation to the Lausanne Conference, which all the world hopes will untangle Reparations, War Debts and German private debts (see p. 15).

Thus for better or for worse Chancellor von Papen will hold supreme directive power during one of the most trying crises faced by the Reich. To dismiss his Cabinet of Monocles as a bad joke became impossible.

Cabinet Analyzed. If Foreign Minister Baron Constantin von Neurath leads the German Delegation to Lausanne, the Fatherland will be represented by its leading Francophobe and anti-Republican.

Only the wealth and family prestige of Baron von Neurath have enabled him as Ambassador at Rome and lately at London to hold his diplomatic post while snubbing or cutting direct visiting German Republicans. Dr. Stresemann, who placed Franco-German relations on friendly terms for the first time since the War, may well have turned in his grave at the appointment of Baron von Neurath as his successor. On the other hand Chancellor von Papen may decide to head the German delegation himself. Paradoxically, the Chancellor is rumored, as a man of business and trade, to have notably friendly relations with Frenchmen whose moneyed interests parallel his own.

Next to General von Schleicher, the most prominent new Cabinet figure is Baron Wilhelm von Gayl, Minister of Interior. Charged with the federal policing of all Germany, this typical Prussian junker (landed aristocrat) can wield much power in the coming Reichstag election. During the War as Chief Political Officer of the Eastern Army Command and afterward as Governor of Northern Lithuania in 1918 he showed both velvet tact and an iron hand.

On the face of things the Hitlerites should win the coming Reichstag election as they won the election for the Prussian Diet (TIME, May 2), but last week an astonishing prediction was made from a source close to General von Schleicher and Baron von Gayl. Prediction: "The von Papen Cabinet will last from three to four years."

Short of a military coup d'etat or acquiescence of Adolf Hitler in a coalition this prediction seemed flatly unfulfillable. Observers inclined, however, to see in General von Schleicher and Baron von Gayl precisely the pair who may be able to draw Adolf Hitler into a Junkers-Army-Fascist coalition, thus giving the Fatherland a fresh and iron front, potent in dealing with other nations.

Wilhelm III? Newsorgans controlled by Dr. Alfred Hugenberg, "Hearst of Germany" rumored that on President von Hindenburg's 85th birthday next October he will resign and place Germany in the hands of former Crown Prince Friedrich Wilhelm as Regent. At once Munich papers began to clamor for restoration of the Kingdom of Bavaria with former Crown Prince Rupprecht on the Throne. In Berlin last week was Viscount Rothermere, "Hearst of England." Flatly he asserted, "Germans have learned from their economic distress that monarchy is good for business." He prophesied the "rescue of the Reich" with a Hohenzollern on the Throne. Promptly at the von Hindenburg mansion a spokesman scouted these rumors, declared: "You cannot put it too strongly that the President will not resign."

"Battlecry of Reaction." The new Cabinet's declaration of policy was called throughout Germany a battle cry of reaction. Declaring that "postWar German Governments have weakened the morale of the people by a system of State Socialism" including the dole, Chancellor von Papen declared that "this moral degeneration was enhanced by the class struggle with Bolshevism which, like a corroding poison, threatens to destroy our moral code."

"There must be a showdown!" cried Chancellor von Papen, then proposed somewhat vaguely to "force the building of a new Germany on the basis of the unchanging principles of Christianity."

Significantly the New Chancellor sought fiscal advice from former President of the Reichsbank, Dr. Hjalmar Schacht, who nearly wrecked the Young Plan Conference at The Hague by his truculent demands (TIME, Jan. 27, 1930). "It would be no calamity," snorted Dr. Schacht, "if the forthcoming Lausanne Conference should be indefinitely postponed."

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