Daily Kennebec journal., 1913-10-28
SEC. DANIELS.
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Continued from Page One.)
tor of the Western Hemisphere and
the mistress of the seas.
Now that the Canal is nearing
completion and the day is near at
hand when ships will sail from San
Francisco to the Caribbean in about
240 hours, as against 1924 hours it took
the Oregon to sail around Cape Horn,
we are told that the building of the
Canal demands twice as large a navy
as formerly and that control Of the
Canal demands large standing army
OH the Isthmus.
Secretary Daniels referred to the
declaration of Count Maurice de Per-
igny, a celebrated French explorer,
that this gigantic and remarkable
work of the United States is INSULT
GENTLY protected in a military sense"
The Frenchman calculated that 5000
men would be barely sufficient to
guard the waterway.
But in these statements" Secreta-
ry Daniels continued "as in almost all
other things, the truth lies between
two extravagant assertions. The
ness of our navy, but it will greatly
increase its ability to defend every
part of the coast on the Pacific as we'll
as on the Atlantic. 1t will not virtu-
ally multiply the numbers of the
army. 1t will make necessary forti-
fications and troops. but it need not
be nearly SO expansive or require one
half so many troops as our distin-
guished Frenehman predicts.
mo great achievement comes with
out sacrifice and cost, but the benefits
to be derived will be worth the moder-
ate cost its protection and operation
will require in all the years to come,
and with the expansion of trade the
benefits will increase an hundred fold
whereas the expense will remain
practically stationary.
"The Panama Canal is a mammoth
carving knife that cuts and slashes
distances in record breaking way.
And cutting and slashing the dis
tances between New York and San
Francisco means to revolutionize nav
al, as we'll as commercial, conditions.
The military significance of the Canal
of course is that it enables the quick
to the other in time of war.
1T will be the most vital chord in
that system of transference by which
the navy of he United States can
come promptly to the support on eth
er coast of the local defenses. With
competent navy, and with the canal
secured not merely as to tenure, but
with guns of such range as to insure
deployment in the open sea at either
end-a necessary condition of all sea-
coast rtifieations-invasion Will not
be attempted, for it can lead to no
adequate results. Without the Canal
it would require four months for an
Atlantic fleet to go round Cape Horn
into the upper Pacific; with the canal
it will require less than four weeks.
! Secretary Daniels, referring to
Spanish American War days, lauded
the battleship Oregon's hazardous trip
of 13, 400 miles in record breaking time,
declaring the cruise helped powerfully
to build the Canal
"A few months hence" he added,
.'the navy, the chief cause which led
to the construction of the Canal, will
proudly sail through the majectic wa
terway from the Atlantic to the Pa
cific. Headed by the Oregon, the inn
posing fleet will teach to all the world
the fact that the Navy of the Repub-
lie. long anchored in one ocean, has
hoisted anchor and is equally at home
on the Atlantic and the Pacific, the
protector and defender of American
honor and American interests.
IF it be given to those who have
gone before to look out of the Win
dows of the skies and find happiness
in the doings of this world, the heart
of John 4. Morgan will thrill as he
sees the realization of a dream that
took him out of the lowlands OF
thought and gave him the vision that
comes only TO those who live upon
the mountain tops of public duty and
of private thinking. where they are
given the power TO prophesy ana
dream dreams"