"
Of course, by "instigators of the war" Helfferich meant the opponents
of Germany, but I think that unconsciously he was a true prophet
and that the "leaden weight of the billions" which this war has
cost Germany will be dragged about after the war by Germany,
the real instigator of this world calamity.
In December, 1915, Helfferich voiced the comfortable plea that,
because the Germans were spending their money raised by the war
loans in Germany, the weight of these loans was not a real weight
upon the German people. He said: "We are paying the money almost
exclusively to ourselves; while the enemy is paying its loans
abroad--a guarantee that in the future we shall maintain the
advantage."
This belief of the Germans and Helfferich is one of the notable
fallacies of the war. The German war loans have been subscribed
mainly by the great companies of Germany; by the Savings Banks,
the Banks, the Life and Fire Insurance and Accident Insurance
Companies, etc.
Furthermore, these loans have been pyramided; that is to say,
a man who subscribed and paid for one hundred thousand marks
of loan number one could, when loan number two was called for,
take the bonds he had bought of loan number one to his bank and
on his agreement to spend the proceeds in subscribing to loan
number two, borrow from the bank eighty thousand marks on the
security of his first loan bonds, and so on.
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