Montgomery County sentinel. [volume] (Rockville, Md.) 1855-1974, 1945-09-06


= can take stock of the wars
cost-at least the cost during
the war. Just how much will be
added can't be foretold but we
are certain that the end is in
sight and that no more great
budgets of scores of Bill
LIONS will be voted by Con-
gress.
The greatest, Unreasonable,
cost, to begin with, is represent
ed in the loss
Taking Stock of lives and in
OF men who will
Wars Cost be back amongst
us minus legs,
or arms or eyes, or perhaps with
nerves shattered to the point
where they will be unable to
take part again in normal pur-
suits of life.
The dead number 252,S85; the
wounded 651 y218; the missing
43,969; listed as prisoners,
122,747.
Total casualties, including
dead, wounded and missing
amount to nearly a million. That
means that we had one casualty
for every 100 men in service
and one killed for every 800 in
service. In the total armed
forces we have one-tenth of our
population.
From this cost we come to
the money cost and the waste of
the worlds natural resources by
DESTRUCTION. According to
figures released by official Wash
ington the United States spent
the staggering total of 287 bill
lion dollars STATED a little more
UNDERSTANDABLE this figure is
2S7 THOUSAND MILLIONS).
We come to the wars end with a
national debt of 208 billion dol-
. lars and we spent 119 billion
dollars of money collected d.
rectly from taxes. The pending
Victory Loan will add probably
another Is billion to the debt.
From the standpoint of waste
of natural resources the total is
undetermined and inconceivable.
That it will prove a curse to
mankind at some
Casualties future date can
Nearly not be success
One Million fully denied.
That such waste
of God-giyen resources will show
as a blot on the historical page
of this and the pest generation
is a certainty. 1t takes but a
little Imagination to lead one to
the conclusion that had even a
small part of this money value
been used to convert only a small
part of our natural resources to
the benefit of mankind through
CONSTRUCTION, world civiliza-
would have been moved forward
by generations. 1t takes but
mighty little sober and thought
full reflection to draw the con-
clusion that war, even when sue
cessful as we have been against
the Japs and Nazis, is man.
kinds greatest curse.
Wars make heroes. But the
heroes who receive the plaudits
of their countrymen would
themselves prefer to have lived
normal lives. In number, the
real heroes are small fraction
of those whose lives. are sacri-
feed or whose bodies are so
mangIed that they are denied any
further normal life activities.
Heroes?. Who'll ever know them
all? And yet the number is
smaller than many would believe.
All of which brings me to the
point where / am afraid our
American attitude of tolerance
and forgiveness will prove again
to be our un-
Total Cost doing. The laps
In Dollars are smooth.
287 Billion They accept de-
feat in war as
though they had Most at a game
of baseball. "We have better
luck, next time. So solly." They
I have been beaten at their own
game. They were forced to sur
render but they have not been
conquered in spirit. That re-
mains to be done and it cannot
be done by occupation of few
years. Even if we must occupy
Japan for generation we