Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1916-02-03
President in Kansas City Speech
Cites War With Spain as Example
Of U1prepQred1esS of C0urtru

for a little navy. as well as party
in Congress that was for a big navy.
No nation ought to wish either an
army or navy to be proud of. to make
a display with. to make a toy Of
1T is the arm of force which must lie
and the navy of the United States must
now be as rapidly as possible brought
to a state of efficiency and of numeri-
cal strength which will make it practi-
the world. The fighting force Of
the navy now is splendid. and
should expect very great achievements
from the fine officers and trained men
that constitute that great navy. But
it is not big enough; it is not numer-
Gus enough: it is incomplete, and it
must be completed. And what the pres
ent administration is proposing is that
we limit the number of years to five
within which we shall complete a
definite program which will make that
navy adequate for the defense of both
coasts.
But on land what stands behind the
President if he should have to set out
in your behalf 10 enforce the demands
of the United States for respect and
not had men enough to patrol the
Mexican border.
The Mexican border is a very long
border. I admit. 1t runs the whole
whole southern length of New Mexico
and Arizona besides. and that is great
strip of noble territory, but what is
that single border to the whole extent
and coast of the United States? And
have not had men enough to prevent
of Mexico into the United States. 1t
has been a very notifying circum-
stance, indeed. have been tempted
to advise Congress to help Texas build
IT.
and now, if you please, because / am
asking the Congress to give the gov
eminent an army adequate to the uses
of peace, to the uses of the moment,
some gentlemen go about and pirate OF
military establishments. They see phan-
toms, they dream dreams. Militarism
in the United States. springing out of
any of the proposals of the administra :
tion-which man must have very
strong imagination indeed to conceive
asking, the administration is not ask
ing, to be backed by any bigger stand
ing army than is necessary for the
uses of the moment, but it is asking
this.
do you remember the experiences of
the Spanish American war? That was
not much of war. was it? Did not
last long. You remember the satirical
verses tina: some newspaper man wrote
about it:
War is rude and impolite:
1t quite upsets a nation.
It's made of several weeks of fight
And years of conversation
"A war which was parodied in verse,
and yet what happened? You sent thou
sands of men to their death because
they were ignorant. They did not get
any farther than the camps in Florida.
They did not get on the water even.
much less get to Cuba, and they died
in the camps like flies, of all sorts Of
camp diseases leases Of all sorts i.no Of
ance of medical science and camp
sanitation. Splendid boys. boys fit with
a little training to make an invincible
army, but sent to their death by mis-
cradle diseases. the coil of which was
Observation-Disclosures ignorance. Why,
the percentage of our loss in that war
by disease in the camp was greater
than the percentage of the loss of the
Japanese by disease and battle in their
war with Russia.
Asking for So Little.
1T is a very notifying thing. There
is not any place in the world where
medical science is more nobly studied,
or more adequately applies than in the
United States, but we poured crude,
ignorant. unframed boys into the ranks
of those armies and they died before
they got sight of an enemy. Do you
want to repeat that? And while that
is going on what might happen? What
sort of disaster may come to you while
you are trying to make an army out
of absolutely raw material: why, II
seems almost ridiculous to state how
little the present administration is
asking for. 1t is asking that you give
1t something that is not sheer raw ma
terial out of which to begin to make
an army when 1t is absolutely neces-
sary to make an army. 1t is asking
that 500, 900 men may be asked to vol
unteer to take a little training every
year for three years: not more than
two or three months out OF the year. in
order that when volunteers are called
men, at least 100000 of them. who know
about the use of arms.
about the sanitation OF
camps, something about the organiza-
ton and discipline OF war in the held
and in the trenches.
That is all that we are asking for at
the present time, and If there is any
criticism to be made upon it. it is that
1t is too little. not too much.
And there are men in Congress ask.
ing Can you get the 100000 men? VIII
they volunteer" Why, | believe you
could get them out of any one state in
the Union. You could almost get 5000
of them out of this audience. But.
ladies ana SentleiHeHt, 90 Hol ioi So
that that is not all there is to this
problem. suppose that l know that
back of the insistence of the United
States, upon it's rights was a great
navy that ranked first in the world.
and a body of men trained to arms
adequate at any rate to fend off any
initial disaster to the United States
while we were making an army ready
That would be only the beginning
There are other things that we have
been very much concerned about in
Washington, and We are taking steps
to "ttend to.
The railroads of this country have
never been drawn into the counsels OF
the government, never until recently IN
such fashion as to make plans for CO.
troops and transport provisions and
transport munition in such way as
to be the effective arteries Of the red
blood and energy of the nation; never
until recently. though we are begin
ming to do 1t, for we called the BUSH
ness men and the engineers of the
country into counsel to say What are
the resources of manufacture in this
country and how can we coordinate
them and put them into cooperation
so that there will be no waste of time,
no duplication of effort and no failure
to get every part of the machinery into
operation should we need to use them
in case of war We are taking counsel
with regard to that now; but, mark
YOU, the munitions of war are made in
this country almost exclusively near
the borders of the country and for the
most part upon the Atlantic aboard
and any initial disaster to the force OF
the United States might put the great