Glacier County chief. [volume] (Browning, Mont.) 1931-1940, 1940-08-16
GEN z RAJ
HUGH S.
jon N SON
..1dHc:'
As TO PERSHING's SUGGESTION


NEW YORK.-General Pershing
says that we ought to sell so "obso-
Iete" destroyers to England to save
our own country from Germany. On
the same subject George Fielding
Eliot says:
1.-The question which we have to
ask ourselves is a plain one. It
ought not to be befuddled by such
non-essentials as whether the trans
fer of destroyers to Great Britain
would or would not be an act Of
war II would be of course, but
that is only an academic question
-. The legal definitions of interna-
tonal conduct {. . are now obsolete"
It seems that everything is now
obsolete as far as it suits the pur-
pose Of those who are hell-bent on
getting this country into a war for
which it is completely unprepared.
The destroyers are "obsolete. Our
own engagements in treaties and
conventions and the things we have
always stood and sometimes fought
for are, in international law, "ob-
solete."
As to the destroyers being "obso-
lete": II they are, how does it hap
pen, as men Of this opinion intimate
or argue, that the battle of Britain,
the fate Of the worlds freedom and
the safety Of our own country de-
pend upon sending them to Britain?
As an American officer said when
it was being argued that we ought
also to send over a million "obso-
lete" Springfield rifles, mo rifle is
obsolete that will kill a man with
an aimed shot at 500 yards-espe-
cially when you have nothing with
which to replace it."
A ship doesn't necessarily become
obsolete" or surplus" simply be-
cause it is l6 years old.
Nobody has shown this more
clearly and honestly than Major
Eliot. ] don't know his qualifica-
tons as naval expert, but apply
ing well known published naval
standards and opinions as to the
proper ratio of destroyers to battle
ships, Major Eliot showed that prac-
tically none of these destroyers is
surplus or can be taken without
stripping our own navy. They are
no more Surplus" than "obsolete.
Just as sidelight, most of them
are armed with four-inch and three
inch guns, as well as with anti
aircraft guns. Except for World
war rs nm. artillery (about three
inch), cannon of higher caliber and
anti-aircraft guns are what we do
not have, what we most need and
what we have the least prospect Of
getting quickly.
In Mr.. Knudsen's last progress
report as published, "bottle-neck'
items of procurement were dis
cussed as well as those in which
there were no bottle-necks But he
didn't mention cannon. He proba-
bly, didn't mention them because the
trouble there isn't just bottle-neck.
It's a needles eye and flock of
camels.
Major Eliot is very frank and very
accurate in calling the shipment of
destroyers an "act of war" 1t is
war itself. But it is vicarious war
undercover war. The kind of war
we have always condemned and
pledged ourselves not to wage. The
weakness ofthis position seems to me
to be this: Our policy always has
been not to be aggressors in any
war. We fight only when we are
attacked or threatened.
These war minded men are put
In the position of having to say, and
they do say, that we are so threat
ened now-to the death. If that is
not true, then we ought not to go to
war-even to this blind-pig, bootleg
war. If it is true, then we ought to
go to war tomorrow-with every
thing we have. In a fight to a
knockout you can't ''hit soft"
LINDBERGH AND PERSHING
You can get a sample taste of
what "can happen here" from the
debate in the senate blasting Charles
Lindbergh's speech.
Three New Deal senators, than
whom there are none whicher,
danced around the torture stake:
Minton, Pepper and-with deep
bushes for my own home state of
Oklahoma-that ineffable ex-teacher
Of elocution and Desarte, Josh Lee.
These gentlemen offered to dis
embowel Lindbergh for saying that
If we are going to do business at
all after this war is over, we will
have to do it with both victor and
vanquished, even if the victor is Ger
many, that we shall have to recon-