The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1907-05-05

along neutral coast, without coalins
j liers, since they had not been con
sidered necessary.
THE HAWAIIAN ISLANDS AT.
Tackled.
Before this news had penetrated al
parts of the country a second blow
was struck, this time at the Hawaiian
| Islands, which have aptly been called
| the key to the Pacific" Two days
| after the disaster at the Panama Canal
a japanese fleet appeared in Oahu
| Channel. 1t consisted of the giant
battleships Asaka, Jingoro and Kiusiu,
| two battleships of $1,000 tons, six
armored cruisers, one first class, two
second class and seven third class pro-
tected cruisers. Opposed to them we
could place but two battleships, one
coast-defense monitor of the old type
two armored cruisers, three second
class and four third class protected
cruisers.
Supporting these were the land bat
teries at Pearl Harbor Lochs, our coal
supply and naval repair station, and
at MoAnalua. For half a century our
naval strategists had pointed out to
the country the Importance of Pearl
Harbor Lochs and the Hawaiian ISL
ands as a strategic vantage ground
from which the entire Pacific Ocean
could be swept by the fleet holding
them. In 1898 the group was annexed
and made a territory. In 1900 a bill
passed Congress providing for the pur-
chase of land for a coaling and naval
station. The channel was dredged out,
but here the matter rested for ten
years, when in 1910 the appropriation
of five million dollars was made as the
first step toward making Pearl Har-
Dor as impregnable as Gibraltar. To
the Panama Canal it occupied the same
relation as the island of Malta to the
Suez Canal, and from it, with a radius
of twenty-five hundred miles, our fleet
could sweep our own entire Pacific
coast. the Aleutian Islands as well as
the southern islands of Fiji and Sa-
moa. 1t was our first stepping stone
to the Far East, of which the second
was Wake Island, the third Guam and
the Philippines the fourth.
WHO HOLDS HAWAII HOLDS THE
PACIFIC.
The holder of this strategic point
must of necessity be master of the
Pacific, since no fleet save that of
Great Britain could successfully OPP
crate against our Pacific Coast so long
as it was in our possession: but once
gained as a foothold by foreign pow
er it became a menace. 1t is the apex
of triangle of which the base is our
coast line. 1t is like the one pass in
vast mountain range, the one point
that must be held by US for defense.
or by our opponents for successful Of
tense. Not a merchant ship could
cross the Pacific from the United Stat
es to the Orient, from the Panama
Canal to Asia, from Canada to Aus
tralia or New Zealand, without pass
ing through the zone commanded by
the ships of the nation having their
base of supplies here. Hence, tardily,
we had begun the work of fortification
which work was perhaps 80 per cent.
completed when the japanese fleet APP
peared in Oahu Channel.
In our blindness and -sufficiency,
another point had been overlooked. In
1854 there were 116 Japanese residents
in the Hawaiian Islands, and in the
following sixteen years they had in
creased to twelve thousand and more
IN the next six years the Japanese pop
ulation of Honolulu had doubled, hav-
ing reached over twenty-four thousand.
The admission Of Hawaii as a territory
brought it within the restrictions of
the Chinese exclusion law. The sugar
planters of Hawaii, needing labor, were
driven, perforce, to the announcement
OF japanese immigration to till the
helds, and in four years more this
class Of population had again more
than doubled, having reached sixty
one thousand. Up to 1910 this increase
mad continued until there were, at a
falr estimate, one hundred and forty
thousand of them dorniciled here, and
since 1906 the newcomers were large
ly discharged veterans of the Japanese
army seeking occupation The Amer
lean population of the Hawaiian ISL
ands was about eight thousand. not |