Evening star., 1940-06-11
1ydings Makes Plea
For Defense Able
To Repe| Any Foe
Backs Gen. MurshuII's
Plan for Regular Army
Of 375,0O0 Men

Senator Tydings. Democrat, Of
Maryland spoke on Military Pre-
paredness for the Present and for
the Future in the National Radio
Forum over Nation wide network
of the National Broadcasting Co
last night. The forum, arranged
bv The Star, was heard locally over
Station WMAL.
The text of Senator Tydings' ad-
dress follows:
The devastating war now being
waged in Europe, with its new weap-
ons and methods, has finally brought
the people of the United States to
a full realization of the pitiful state
of our own national defense, particu-
larlv on land.
Heretofore, it has always been as
sumed that with good Navy the
Atlantic and Pacific Oceans were
ample barriers against attack. Few
realized that oceans can be high
ways to invasion as well as barriers
against attack; that rapid trans
portation and communication and
modern ways and means of war have
largely destroyed the former secur-
ity we enjoyed, and that our nat
ural ramparts of defense are no
longer as efficacious as we had sup
posed.
Fortunately, some of us in Con-
gress have not been blind to these
changed and changing conditions
Considering that it takes four years
to build battleship and many
years to train and equip men for
efficient service in the air, Navy and
land forces, we have for some years
been calling attention to the tragic
state of our national defense.
More Efficient Defense.
The time to create national
defense is not when you need it,
for usually then you cannot get it.
The time to provide for it is when
you do not need it, for then it can
not only be more efficiently con-
structed, but more cheany obtained
as we'll
Millions OF our people in the past
five years have opposed the enlarge
ment of our Navy and the modern
ization of our Army. They opposed
nearly every measure calculated to
increase the defensive preparedness
of the United States. They sup
ported bills in Congress to do away
with military training in the land
grant colleges. they favored reduced
appropriations and further reduc-
ton of the numerical strength of
our Army and Navy.
Against such well-intentioned op-
position during the last five years it
has been difficult to make progress
in keeping our Army and Navy and
air force at proper strength and
trained and equipped to high de-
gree of efficiency
Those who have consistently
fought preparedness on land, sea
and in the air during the past five
years must now realize what a tre-
mendous disservice they have done
to this country and to its people.
In the light of the happenings
abroad, they must know that wish
ing for peace does not secure it, that
to be unprepared is to invite attack,
as witness the conflicts in China,
Ethiopia, Austria, CzechoS Slovakia,
Finland, Albania, Poland, Denmark,
Norway Holland and Belgium, and
France and England AS well.
1t is generally accepted now that
the surest guarantee of peace is to
be so we'll prepared that no nation
will feel it desirable to attack us
or engage us in war-that the surest
way for a rich nation to invite at
tack is to be unprepared to resist
such attack.
Lesson Learned Temporarily.
We have learned that lesson now
temporarily. Have we learned it
sufficiently we'll to make adequate
preparedness part of our future
democratic governmental program
as the years continue to unfold?
If the nations are narrower today
than they were, they will contin-
uallv grow more and more narrow
in the face of new invention, of
speed and equipment. 1t is my
fervent wish that the present
emergency, together with the re-
lentless march of intervention, will
cause all to make a firm resolve
that never, never, never again shall
this rich, great and powerful
United States of America be caught
so pitfully unprepared to defend
itself as we all know it today.
If We can only learn this lesson