The Durant news. (Durant, Miss.) 1882-1985, 1940-09-12

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enemy and ours. Let Britain go un-
der now and we face alone the bonn
bers and the gray-green hordes and
the U-boats and the fifth columns
and all the brutal, sordid strategems
Of Germany. Let Britain die, and we
let die the last stronghold of hum
aneness, of liberty, and of reason
left in Europe. Let Britain die and
we face the loss of import of vitality
needed raw materials, of our over
seas trade and investments, the ruin
of our prosperity the end of the kind
Of living and thinking that this coun-
try has enjoyed since the founding
of the Republic; We face the cen
t~ralization of government until 1t
achieves or approaches totalitar-
ianism, the prospect Of violent inter-
nal revolution, and, in my opinion,
eventual run. If we save wounded
Britain, we may save ourselves; If
we abandon her to death today, the
chances are that we shall face death
in a not too remote tomorrow.
If Britain goes, we shall have to
fight a defensive war against the
mightiest calition of powers the world
has ever know. (The time and the
place will be of Hitler's choosing.)
He will have available to him the
shipyards of Britain, France, Bel
GUM, the Netherlands, Italy, Spain,
and Germany. Within the continent
of Europe the Nazis will find nearly
everything they need for shipbuild-
ing; what they do not find they can
obtain with goods; and their ships
will be built by a vast mass of skilled
workers employed for a pittance. I'm
der these circumstances Germany can
build two or three ships to our one.
We shall have to defend the Atlantic
and Pacific Coasts Of the United
States, Canada and Mexico; Alaska,
the Gulf, the Caribbean, and Pan
anna; Hawaii, the Philippines, Guam,
Samoa, the Virgin Islands and much
of South America. And if we assume
we are capable militarily, economical
ly and spiritually Of accomplishing
a task of almost cosmc proportions,
we shall nonetheless be eternally on
the defensive. Our eyes will forever
be turned seward and skyward; u
economy will be a military instead of
a peace economy Jour souls will have
to be trained to an inexhaustible pa
tience and a quality of steel resis-
tauce they have never known.
We know now that Britain and
France, amid a host Of other errors,
made the fatal error of committing
themselves to a war of defense. Why
should we know with our eyes open
consign ourselves to the same error?
The primary object, Therefore, of join
ing England, is to fight Extensively
to carry on the war to the enemy on
his own terms on his own soil. We
shall be fighting to preserve the Bri-
fish Isles as naval and air bases from
which at some time in the future we
might be able to launch unceasing
and irresistible air attacks on Ger
many. Once the United States is or
ganized for production, we can build
planes faster than Germany. Ger
tainly we can build them faster than
a still fighting war-weakened Ger
many. We can train pilots. We can
find mechanics. The future Of the
world might turn upon our present
resolution to strike now before the
last hope of striking shall be gone.
1t is not necessary, for the pur-
poses in view, to send millions of men
to Europe. The question is one Of
airplane production and pilot train
ing at home; of the transport of
men, materials, and food; of the use
of these men and materials against
Germany in precisely the way she
used her air force against Poland and
the Netherlands. The NaZis are nei-
Their superhuman nor invunerable.
Their bodies are MANNED by bombs
just as easily as French bodies; their
factories collapse under explosion
just as readily as English factories.
By the continuous, u~nceasing en-
ployment of superior air power the
Nazis will to war can be broken as
the Polish or Dutch will to resist was
broken. Given time, we are capable
of producing and applying that force.
But we shall be able to do it even
tually only if we act now while Bri-
tain still has her strength and the
will to resist, while her mighty fleet
is still intact. If anyone believes that
we shall be spared by Hitler because
we do not make war against him,
let him go to b~ombblasted Rotter-
dam. If anyone believes in the sup
.eriority of the war of defense, let
him visit France.
There are other possibilities. With
the United States ranged alongside
Britain, Turkey may enter the war.
Russia, knowing that her day will
come when Hitler has crushed Eng
land, may also enter the conflict. A
war-weakened Germany would then
have to dissipate her strength on
other fronts, while Italy becomes a
burden to her; and the remaining
free countries of Europe, all of which
drood on n1tip,ota f,i,,panb Mo-, o1;1.