Eagle River review. [volume] (Eagle River, Wis.) 1890-1927, 1923-12-20
WEEKS ASKS FOR
HELP FOR ARMY
he MAY INDUCE. CONGRESS TO
STRENGTHEN SOME BRANCHES
OF OUR POOR DEFENsEs.
FALSE STATEMENTS BY REDS
ey EpwARp B. CLARK

Secretary Weeks already has made the
request that something be done, but
the something which he has asked
hardly can be looked upon as having
in 1t the germ of militaristic desire.
The army and the navy today are
shot to pieces. This apparently Is as
good many people would have 1t,
but if Secretary Weeks has sensed
the situation right it is not as the
majority of the American people would
have it.
So far as the army is concerned,
there are not enough men in 1t today
to do police duty, let alone to act as
In case Of an offensive warfare against
its wellbeing. The secretary has
asked that the present limit of 125,0OO
men shall be raised to 10000 men
at the earliest possible date"
Congress will not sanction the re-
quest for an additional $4,000 men.
This much can be taken for granted.
All, apparently. that the War depart
ment can hope for is that few
branches Of the army, which today are
pitiably weak, shall be SO strengthened
that they may approach If they do not
reach the point of the demands OF
proper defense for the country.
Some time ago an organization which
is in sympathy with Communism and
which has been doing its best and is
still doing its best totally to disarm
the United States, printed and sent
broadcast statement to the effect
that the machinery Of war was costing
the United States more money than
all the machinery intended to run the
works of peace. OF course the state
ment was not true, but good many
people believed it as some people seem
to believe anything that they read.
Weeks Tells Of Military Costs.
Secretary Weeks has felt it neces-
sary to issue what he calls brief
economical analysis of our national
defense. He says among other things
that military preparations cost us only
one-eighteenth of what we spend for
luxuries, amusements and mild vices.
L
measures have not kept pace with our
increased prosperity and responsibility
as nation.
Army officers and enlisted men feel
today that they have been placed on
defensive basis, not on basis of
proper defense against an alien enemy,
but on a basis of the necessity of de-
Tending themselves against charges of
being engaged in an ignoble profess
sion Men willing to fight in defense
Of American institutions for those who
do not want to fight are today in a
sense going about with their heads
down.
Another. who has been writing from
Washington has had the courage to
tell a few things about the attempts
which today are being made to render
the United States entirely defenseless.
The present writer has written some
thing on this subject himself, thereby
reaping a harvest of abuse as mill
tarist. The total disarmament folk
have a big vocabulary of abuse. There
is no good outside of their own head
quarters.
One organization recently has en-
Iarged its field Of activities. It now
is not content with efforts to prevent
war in the future, but apparently is
determined that if war shall come the
United States shall not have rifle
or a doughboy to meet it.
"SIacker's Vote" Is Being Signed.
Women of the country are being
asked to sign what decent folk call
"slacker's vote" Women who sign it
pledge themselves to abstain from acts
of mercy to the wounded in case their
country shall become involved in war.
One trouble is that nobody can
arouse any sentiment against this sort
of yellowism. The aspiration for it,
and one hates to use Inc word inspira-
tion in this connection, is the heart
desire to Communize the United States.
Communism recently has given an e&-
hibition or two of what 1t can do in
the way of. pressing its campaign.
There have been some bomb throw
fngs in the United States lately.
Congress is just getting into SEES
sion. There are in the two houses Of
congress a good many men who will
ingly would vote for the complete de-
struction of the American army and
navy. Nine-tenths of them were pro
German during the war and nine
tenths Of them are pro-Russian to-
day.
Not long ago it was believed that
congress would sanction loan of $685.
100000 to feed the starving in Ger
many. Naturally enough all Ameri-
cans want to feed the starving any
where. but it now is said that the at
tempt to secure from the American
congress an appropriation for food for
the German foodless did not originate
in any group of real Germans who
knew the situation. It's origin was in
a Communist camp.
To Protect Immigrants.
A good many immigrants come to
America to exploit this country, but
1t is also certain that some Americans
succeed in exploiting some immigrants
before they have been long on these
shores.
The governments attention has