New Britain herald., 1916-06-03

defenders so strong that no power on earth would dare challenge their position That is the fundamental idea of the preparedness campaign now sweeping the country. It is pre- paredness for an honorable peace, not preparedness for war, but against war.
 The national Congress has been nightly touched by the numerous great demonstrations throughout the nation in the past thirty days. The original preparedness parade in New York was the awakener of the pulse in Boston was an endorsement, and the three great parades today, the one in Hartford, the one in Chicago, and the other in Providence, R. l., the men whose sworn duty it is to listen to the wants and yield tc the demands of the people. After a period of some half century of peace, with a faint intermittent spasrn of war after the sinking of the battleship Maine, the nation has suddenly realized the total lack of nreparedness that exists today. Dur
 ing the rush for gold and fortune
 men have entirely forgotten the needs
 Of society. While the business in"
 o+TN absorbed attention, while men have bent over
 1he ticker and rolled in ease and
 1Ixurv. the sterner demands of life
 have been let sink into oblivion.
 Were it not for the terrible violations
 of the rights of neutral nations com
 nlitted by the belligerents of Europe
 it is possible that the United States might have gone along for another half century, or, until suddenly at
 lacked by a foreign foe, without realizing it's state of utter helpless ness. a state that grows all the more alarming when the martial strength of any European nation is summoned to mind.
 Nor is there the same self com p1acency in evidence in this country today that has been prevalent for the past fifty years. Men are beginning to realize that various interests of foreign powers might make it ad- sable for them to sWOOp down upon us at any time. The Atlantic Ocean, once viewed as the great wall of de- fense for this nation, is no longer considered as safe as when sailing vessels were the only available trans ports and steamships were unknown. Theodore Roosevelt touching on this speech before the veterans of the Civil War in Kansas City on Mem crial Day, pointed out that the ocean is now highway for any power whose ships control it. In support of his contention he pointed to the by sea Of a Russian Army rom Eastern Siberia to France. This necessitated a sea voyage three 1 ines as great as that across the At &ntic. Next, he pointed to the huge 1 army gathered at the Dardanelles. i m army made up of troops from ! England, France and Australia The i distance from Australia to the Dar- 1 1anelles is even greater than the dis 1 ance from Bombay to New York. ! 1t is easily seen here that the men i lighting in the trenches of Europe 1 nave been drawn from the far corners of the globe. The men of Australia have been sent to reenforce he men from the British Isles, two far removed continents, and the transfers were all made during the ten times as many as the men in the ranks of the United States army have been carried from the northern and the southern hemispheres in speedy, reliable transport steamers This is enc of the best arguments yet ad Vanced for preparedness. If the day should ever come when, for one req son or another, the United States would be chosen as target for at tack by any foreign nation, there would be no trouble in transpOrting troops from any portion of the world for attack on this country. These are the emergencies for which the nation wants to prepare, for which such raradcs as the one in Hartford sounds the warning.