Evening star., 1940-05-19

will take refuge on this side of the
Atlantic or, at the worst, will be de-
stroyed to prevent their seizure by
Germany. But we would be foolish
and reckless in the extreme to rely
on that sort of wishful thinking.
In the calamitous event that Ger
many should get possession of the
allied fleet what could we do with
our present forces to defend the
Western Hemisphere or even the
United States?
We have a good Navy. But until
1t can be expanded it is a one-ocean
Navy. And let us not make the
blunder Of believing that it could
hold of a combined attack of the
totalitarian forces in both oceans,
or even that it surely could defend
this hemisphere in the Atlantic from
an attack by the German and pos
sibly another totalitarian navy,
strengthened by the warships that
may be taken from France and
Britain. At best the scales would be
heavily weighted against us. Our
Army is undermined and under
equipped. We could not place more
than $4,000 thoroughly trained and
adequately equipped troops in the
field If called upon to fight in the
near future. And what Of our air
force? 1t totals about 5,100 planes
in both Army and Navy branches.
But many Of these are out of date
and unsuitable for modern combat.
The number in this category, of
course, is a matter Of opinion, but
Major General Arnold, chief of the
Air Corps, is authority for the state
ment that we have only fifty-two
planes capable of meeting the best
fighting ships of the European
powers. And all of our planes are OBJ
solete insofar as self-sealing tanks
and armor are concerned. Germany
alone, according to conservative es-
Inmates of well-informed American
officials, has 1000 bombers capable
Of flying from Africa to South
America or from Northern Europe
to Greenland and Canada.
Another contingency that we must
consider is the possibility of "ffth
column" activity, if not in this
country in some of those nations
to the south where totalitarian in
fluence has been most strong. It
is quite conceivable that through
the now familiar Trojan horse" tao
tics Germany, for example, might
establish base somewhere in South
or Central America and unless we
were in position, without depending
on help from any outside source,
to destroy it Immediately such base
could quickly be made permanent.
This leads to consideration of our
prepared plans for hemisphere de-
tense. These plans have been form
ulated in the belief that Britain and
France would be our allies in any
war in defense of the Western Hem
isphere, or at the worst that they
would be sympathetic neutrals. But
If the British and the French are
to be destroyed as military factors
these plans become of little use and
must be wholly revised.
For America, all of this is a truly
dolorous outlook. Strong and ruth
less forces hostile to us by every
rule of reason are smashing their
way to power throughout the world.
We are not prepared to resist them
and we will not be permitted to pre-
pare ourselves If they can prevent it.
We must act with all our energy
and act now to get ready for the
appalling possibilities that the world
of tomorrow holds. The first move
is to open our eyes and our minds
to what is portending and to do
everything that is humanity possible
to assure an allied victory in Europe.
The Importance to us of bringing
about that result cannot be over
estimated. No effort must be spared
to achieve it. There remains, how
ever, the possibility that our best
efforts in that direction will come too
late and will fail. Should that tragic
result come to pass our work will not
have been wasted for the means of
producing the defensive equipment
we will have to possess here will
have been vastly expanded.
America is truly menaced We
have no choice but to make the su-
preme effort to guard those things
which we hold most dear from the
threat of alien attack. To that ef-
fort we must give our all and any
attempt to divert us, from whatever
source it may come, must be recog-
nized for what it is and rejected as
an undermining of the Nations
security.
industrial Espionage
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