Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1927-01-23
ANTICIPATES MORE
WARS FOR THIS CENTURY

Continued from First Page.l
ranks does not seem to me to have
characteristics of finality about It's
settlement that suggest it will be the
last.
"At any rate" he added. with a
sarcastic drawl. after the big World
Wa rive had a little war between Rus
STA and Poland, and then another be.
tween Greece and Turkey.
War Like Hurricane.
War" the~Duce continued, lis like
a hurricane-it may burst upon us
suddenly The statement may lack
novelty, but it does not lack time
liness''
''It is sometimes claimed" ] inter
jected. that excessive armt tent is
in itself a cause of war. Germany's
highly organized military machine has
been accused of being responsible for
the holocaust of 1914. Powder maya
zines are apt to lead to explosions.
Your excellency, too, is sometimes
blamed for increasing the war power
of Italy on land and on sea, as ell as
in the sky"
Mussolini smiled somewhat con-
temptuouSly.
There is nothing sinister about
preparation for war, he said; there
is something very sinister about GER
tain phases of pacifism. In a sense.
every assertion of the will to live in
a nation or in an individual is a prepa-
ration for war.
THE identification of railway is
a preparation for war. An increase
in the means of communication of a
ic rat A
ship that takes the sea for the first
time adds to the resources of a nation
for war. The teaching of a nation S
history is a preparation for war. The
glory associated with the name OF
NaDoIeon's tomb is a preparation for
war by the French.
But all these preparations for war
are insufficient if people plunge into
the sensualism of a peace that is
hedonistic and selfish and sef-satis-
fed, leaving them soft in body, weak
in mind, shrinking from physical eX-
ertion, no less than from mental effort
Preparation for war involves too many
ideas that are economic, social. cui-
tural to be denounced wholesale by
pacifists who talk about war as If
they knew what it was and knew how
to avoid it. 1t is a duty to avoid war
whenever possible. but it takes the
highest genius as well as the highest
character to do that.
Men Essential Factor.
Every people that lis fit to live
must prepare itself to defend its exist
ence," the Duce continued. THE spirit
is more important in that respect than
the mechanical means.
you do not think that it is posi-
BILE in the twentieth century to disarm
a people by restricting the tools or
WARP" / interjected. If so, the max
ers of the peace treaty of Versailles
were sadly mistaken when they at
tempted to disarm Germany.
MussoIini smiled. You cannot" he
replied. "disarm a people unless you
destroy its manhood. The war m1sled
some into the belief that machines are
more important than men.
Society. government, social systems
exist not for the production of mate
rial things as an end. The end is the
production of men and women in the
highest state of efficiency and well
being.
"All governments. all rulers come
to this conclusion in the end. | thought
OF this when, not long ago, read the
intensely interesting memoirs OF Gal
lieni. He was, you know. military gov
ernor of Paris in the early days of the
World War.
Nothing can be conceived more
stirring than the pages Gallieni de-
votes to an account of the crisis in
Paris. The city was an intrenched
camp. The territorial militia. the only
force available with all the others on
he firing line, was absolutely unarmed
in the face of the approaching Uhlans.
Machines Secondary.
Although Paris had become an in
trenched camp, there were no weap-
ons to hand out. There were no shells,
there were no bayonets. there were no
guns of any caiiber There was moth
ing to signal with. The mobilization
had stripped the arsenals and the
magazines.
They Were terrible days for France,
those in which, from the 26th of Au-
gust until the 9Th of September, the
plans of the German general staff
were in full development. The Ger
mans had crossed Belgium and were
turning upon Paris. The Germans
had reached the edge of the forest of
Compiegne.
''One might infer from the record
of those days that there could be no
such thing as enough weapons and
enough ammunition. The same idea
was at one time in the mind of the
German general Ludendorff. He de-
SPARED of victory until, at the second
battle Of the Somme, he happened to
look toward the hills and he saw the
prospect made pleasing by quantities
of tanks"
Mussolini's words rang out reso-
nantly. He evidently envisaged the
scene he described.
$50 far" he continued, 1.-The facts
seem to suggest that machines and
weapons are more important than
men. In due time, the discovery is
made that men are more important