On June 28, 1919, the day this was printed, the Treaty of Versailles was signed in France ending the state of war between Germany and the Allied Powers of World War I. That’s the context for the “hun mine-layer” comment.
Other way round. The nickname/insult was saying Germans are warlike barbarians like Atila the Hun and the rest of the the Huns.
Kaiser Wilhelm gave a speech encouraging his soldiers to “be huns” on campaign, which led to it being an insult applied to Germans.
Ehhh yes, but the stereotype already existed before that speech: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hun_speech
‘atilla’ meant something like ‘little Daddy’ in visigothic.
Do with that what you will