The Pulaskian., 1915-11-05
NE MUST PREPARE
 SAYS PRESIDENT
Larger Army and Rapidly Built
 Up Navy Called For.
PLAN OF NATIONAL DEFENSE
Mir. Wilson, Addressing Manhattan Club at Fiftieth Anniversary Din ner, Asks Support for Admin
 istration Program.

New York. Nov. 5.-President Will son was the guest of honor and the principal speaker at the fiftieth ami versary dinner of the Manhattan club last night at the Biltmore hotel. There was great gathering of distin. guished men. and the chief executive took the occasion to tell them and the country what his administration is planning in the way of national de fense.
 Our ambition, said MT. Wilson. is not only to be free and prosperous ourselves. but also to be the friend and thoughtful partisan of those who are free or who desire freedom the world over We shall, he declared he believed, never again take another foot Of territory by conquest, or seek to make an independent people sub ject to our dominion. Because of the great European conflict, said the pres ident. from one end of our own dear country to the other men are asking one another what our own force is, how far we are prepared to maintain ourselves against any interference with our action or development"
 Though the mission of America in the world is essentially a mission of peace and good will among men. de- clared Mr Wilson, we feel justified in preparing ourselves to vindicate our right to independent and unmolested action by making the force that is in us ready for assertion
 Plans for the Army.
 And we know" continued the pres fdent, that we can do this in way that will be itself an illustration of the American spirit. In accordance with our American traditions we want and shall work for only an army adequate to the constant and legitimate uses of times of international peace. But we do want to feel that there is a great body of citizens who have received at least the most rudimentary and neces- sary forms of military training: that they will be ready to form themselves into fighting force at the call of the nation; and that the nation has the munitions and supplies with which to equip them without delay should it he necessary to call them into action We wish to supply them with the training they need. and we think we can do so without calling them at any time too long away from their civilian pursuits.
 It is with this idea with this con ception in mind that the plans have been made which it will be my privi lege to lay before the congress at it's next session. That plan calls for only such an increase in the regular army Of the United States as experience has proved to be required for the perform. ance of the necessary duties of the army in the Philippines. in Hawaii in Porto Rico. upon the borders of the United States. at the coast fortifica tions, and at the military posts of the interior. For the rest, it calls for the training within the next three years of force of 100000 citizen soldiers to be raised in annual contingents of 133.- GOO, who would be asked to enlist for three years with the colors and three years on furlough. but who during their three years of enlistment with the colors would not be organized as a standing force but would be expect ed merely to undergo intensive train ing for very brief period of each year. Their training would take place in immediate association with the or ganized units of the regular army It would have no touch of the amateur about it. neither would it exact of the volunteers more than they could give in any one year from their civilian pursuits
 And none of this would be done in such way as in the slightest degree to supersede or subordinate our pres ent serviceable and efficient National Guard. On the contrary the National Guard itself would be used as a mart of the instrumentality by which train ing would be given the citizens who enlisted under the new conditions. and should hope and expect that the leg. islation by which all this would be ac compished would put the National Guard Itself upon better and more permanent footing than it has @, CT been before, giving it not only the rec ognition which it deserves but more definite connection with the military organization of the nation
 For Development of the Navy.
 It has been American policy time out of mind to look to the navy as the first and chief line of defense. The navy of the United States is al- ready very great and efficient force. Not rapidly. but slowly. with careful attention. our naval force has been devel0Ded until the navy of the United States stands recognized as one of the most efficient and notable of the mod. ern time. All that is needed in order to bring lt to point of extraordinary force and efficiency as compared with the other navies of the world Is that we should hasten our pace in the policy we have iong been pursuing