Evening public ledger. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1914-1942, 1916-06-02

/ centrate on the ATLANTIC eeenOhFu MI
the factories for the manufacture OF
war material. For political ss wen rs
strategic reasons, some Of them should
be in the west and the South.
TIME Illinois Congressman who are de
i manding as unit that the proposed
srmor-plate factory be built at the Rocl
Island Arsenal are not less patriotic thar
the Alabama Congressman who insist
that It should be built at Birmingham
Their interest in national defense is as
great as that of the Pennsylvania Con-
gressn1en who insist that the League
island Navy Yard on the Delaware is the
best site for 1t.
Strong arguments, both political and
strategic. can be marshaled in support of
either the Birmingham or the Rock
Island site. Each is inland and far
enough from the sea to be safe from at.
tack. Rock Island is in the Middle West,
where the interest in the defense Of the
| seaboard is not so acute as 1t IS in the
coast States. And Birmingham is in the
South, which needs to be stirred to EN-.
thusiastic support of a greater navy
program.
or course It Is denied that the stra-
tegic value Of either Birmingham or Rock
Island is greater than that of Philadel-
phia. And no one win argue that armor-
plate can be delivered from the interior
to battleships that are to be built on the
Atlantic coast so cheaply as 1t can be de-
livered from this city.
The armor plant ought to be built here,
If it is to be built at all. But IL we are to
have the nation prepared for any emer-
gencies of the future v is of the first i'm
portance that the whole nation be inter-
ested in the subject. The sea is long
way from the northern Mississippi Valley.
The average citizen of a Western State
reads that the sea is salt, but he doubts
1t. When he comes East he carries back
with him a bottle of sea water to con-
vince his family and friends that what
the books say is true. The imagination
which cannot make the physical facts of
nature with which he is unfamiliar seem
real to him fails also to convince him that
he can suffer from any attack by for
eign foe on the Atlantic coast.
If there should be great gun foundry
within the confines Of his State, and if
powder mills should be located where he
could hear the detonations from the ex-
plosions that happen wherever powder is
manufactured in large quantities, and if
a rifle factory were employing his sons
in the manufacture of guns to be used in
the defense OF his country, the whole
question of national defense would take
on different aspect.
There is political wisdom in distribut-
ing as widely as possible the plants where
war material is produced. When Illinois
asks for an armor.plate factory we
should not denounce her Congressman, but
should tell them that the justice of their
demand is admitted and that when
the Government arranges to manufac-
ture other war materials the advantages
of that great State will be considered and
the employment of her sons provided for
in a plant of another kind. The claims
of Alabama can be confessed in the same
broad-minded way. Then we shall con-
vert lukewarm friends of preparedness
into enthusiasts because we shall admit
their right to participate in the actual
work of preparation.
"nen we tel IHeIn JldL HllllIdTy ana
naval authorities are agreed that there
can be no adequate preparation until the
country ceases to be dependent for it's
war materials upon the factories within
hundred miles of the Atlantic coast we
have added the motive of patriotism to
that of self-interest.
The German drive through Belgium
iofn int he ~
Kaiser's forces the Belgian and French
iron and coal region and deprived the
French of the great furnaces where their
guns had been made A foreign foe which
should get possession OF our Atlantic
coast would find it easy to seize the steel
mills and munition plants from Maine to
Virginia, and could use them for turning
out weapons with which to fight us on
our own soil. The probability of such a
disaster is remote. but the unexpected
happens in war as well as in every other
human occupation. 4
General Wood has been going about the
country for the last few months setting
forth the Importance of preparing for the
unexpected. II is the policy which every
military man of any standi7- f~-'o"s for
1t will provide a second and a third line
OF factories for that sort of material
equipment without which no war can be
successfully fought. 1t lis the policy
which every statesman ought to favor,
for it enlists the traits of fallible and
selfish humanity in the work of defend
ing the institutions under which we live.
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WAGES Ann IAZTNFSs