Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1908-04-15
President Urges Need
OF More Battleships.

standpoint of national interest and
honor it is mischievous folly for any
statesman to assume that this world
has yet reached the stage OF has come
within measurable distance of the
stage when a proud nation. jealous of
it's honor, and conscious of its great
mission in the world, can be content to
rely for peace upon the forbearance of
other powers 1t would be equally fool
ish to rely upon each of them posses
sing at all times and under all circum-
stances and provocations an altruistic
regard for the rights of others. Those
who hold this view are blind indeed
to all that has gone on before their
eyes in the world at large. They are
blind to what has happened in China,
in Turkey, in the Spanish possessions.
in Central and South Africa, during
the last dozen years. For centuries.
China has cultivated the very spirit
which our own peace-at-any-price men
wish this country to adopt. For CEN
turtles China refused to provide mill
tary forces and has treated the career
of the soldier as inferior in honor and
regard to the career of the merchant
or the man of letters. There never has
been so large an empire which for so
long time has so resolutely proceed
ed on the theory of doing away with
what is called "militariSm."
Whether the result has been happy
in internal affairs need not discuss;
all the advanced reformers and far
sighted patriots in the Chinese empire
are at present seeking q may add. with
our hearty good wilD for a radical and
far-reaching reform in internal affairs.
external affairs the policy has re-
suited in various other nations now
holding large portions of Chinese terri
tory while there is a very acute fear in
China lest the empire, because Of its
defenselessness, be exposed to absolute
dismemberment and it's we'll wishers
are able to help it only in small
measure, because no nation can help
any other unless that other can help
itself.
The state department is continually
appealed to to interfere on behalf OF
peoples and nationalties that insist
that they are suffering from oppres-
sion: now Jews in one country, now
Christians in another now black men
said to be oppressed by white men in
Africa. Armenians COreans, Firms,
Poles, representatives of all appeal at
times to this government All of this
oppression is alleged to exist in time
of profound peace and frequently, al
though by no means always, it is al
legged to occur at the hands of people
who are not very formidable in q mil
itary sense. In some cases the accuse
lions of oppression and wrong-doins
are doubtless well founded. In Others
they are well founded and in certain
cases the most appalling loss of life is
shown to have occurred, accompanied
with frightful cruelty. 1t is not our
province TO decide which side has been
right and which has been wrong
in all or any of these con-
trOversieS. / am merely refer
ring to the loss of life. 1t is probable
a conservative statement to say thai
within the last IL years, at periods oil
profound peace and not as the result
of war, massacres and butcheres have
occurred in which more lives or men
women ana children have been los