The Coconino sun., 1917-04-13
LETTERING OUT OUR
 FIGHTING FORCES

war. That is a platitude, a solemn
 way of saying an undisputed thing.
 But nevertheless it is well enough to restate it when so many political and
 journalistic forces are trying to per
 suade the president to limit our pre- parations to half way war, a war of
 pin bricks, a slap you on the wrist sort of combat.
 AS matter of fact Germany will largely attend to the character of the war if we should be foolish and fatu- ous enough to fail of putting forth our fiercest efforts. Halfway meas ures do not harmonize with frightful- ness. She will probably strike first and will certainly strike hard. An army of her citizens reside within our borders upon whose loyalty we have no right to count since they have not been naturalized. Oaths of loyalty now rendered to them are rejected as insults" Under German discipline, trained to explicit obedience to their official superiors, even at the price of death, these resident Germans offer the first menace to our institutions when war shall come. Arms are plenty. From all parts of the country come reports of surreptitions drilling of secretly hostile bodies of men. High explosives are readily obtain able, and the art of making bombs has long seemed a congenial one to men of Teutonic race. Germany's first strike will probably be delivered within our borders, and will be none the less effective because delivered secretly by the hand of professed friends. It is wholly probable that German officers are and long have been organizing the forces of alien Germans in this country for active hostilities. r
 On the Mexican border we face the danger of attack from Mexican mer- cenaries organized and led by German officers, with a plenty of Germans, lately from the United States, to give stability, order and some degree of discipline to the ranks.
 On the sea the British navy has the German fleets bottled up in their har- bors. But the submarines roam far abroad. U-53 honored us by visiting New London and straightaway there after sinking five merchantmen off our coast, leaving to our destroyers the humane task of succoring the sur vivors. The Deutschland has made two visits to our shores. How many other submarines are now lurking within. striking distance no one can guess. They mount 4-inch guns now, these wasps of the sea, and a sudden visit to this harbor would leave sav- age scars on the skyline of lower Manhattan. The effect on the German spirit of a reported bombardment of New York would be worth subma- rine and the score of lives lost with her.
 In the face of the known vigor, amounting at times to savagery, of the German war policy, advice is coming to the president from many quarters to limit the scope of our ac- tivities in the conflict We must do nothing to help the allies, say some We must confine ourselves to safe guarding our own ships on the ocean. We might lend the allies $10O,0OO,OOO at 6 per cent, as our contribution to the war, but we must not think of sending an army corps or two to France to hearten the soldiers who there are fighting for democracy by giving visible proof of the sympathy and cooperation of the greatest of democracies.
 These counsels of half way meas ures must be repudiated. For our national safety during the war and after it is essential that we enter this struggle with the determination to do the utmost possible injury, to force her down in complete defeat. Our energies exerted toward this end necessarily align us with the allies. Systematic cooperation with them is the most efficient method of attaining our purpose. If our flag must wave in the trenches of Flanders or even of the Balkans, if our naval guns must boom in the North sea to ad- vance that end, let it be so.
 The president will have to encoun- ter this sinister effort to hamstring our armed forces by limiting the field of their activities. We hope he will fight it and down it. In nearly every case it's proponents are pro-Germans masquerading as pacifists or as foes to England. Their success would | mean our downfall. Let us not Ere