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CHAPTER 7
sam's only friend is uncle sam
OVER forty years ago Charles Dickens wrote as follows of the United States: "In these times in which I write it is honorably remarkable for protecting its subjects wherever they may travel with a dignity and a determination which is a model for England." Ulysses Grant was then President of the United States. Like Washington and Lincoln and Andrew Jackson, he was an American who was not too proud to fight. Those of my countrymen who are still faithful to the old American tradition cannot but feel with bitter shame the contrast between the conditions Charles Dickens thus described and the conditions at the present moment.

The policy of watchful waiting, a policy popular among governmental chiefs of a certain type ever since the days of Ethelred the Unready and for thousands of years anterior to that not wholly fortunate ruler, has failed, as of course it always does fail in the presence of serious difficulty and of a resolute and ruthless foe. We have tried every possible expedient save only the application of wisdom and resolution. It has been said that we have not tried war; but this statement can be made only by those who are inexact in their terminology. Of course, if any one's feelings are soothed by saying that when we took Vera Cruz, suffered a loss of a hundred and twenty men killed and wounded and in return killed and wounded several hundred Mexicans, we were waging peace and not waging war, why there is no particular objection to this individual gaining whatever comfort is afforded by using words which misdescribe facts. But this is all the comfort he can gain. As a natural result of the impression created on foreigners by our conduct in Mexico, we were forced to hostile action in Haiti and a number of our men and our opponents were killed and wounded. Apparently we "waged peace" in Haiti, much as we "waged peace" in Mexico—and in Mexico the end of the war or peace or whatever it was that we waged was that we withdrew without getting the result which our Government had announced that it would get when it took Vera Cruz.

We of the United States have had a twofold duty imposed on us during the last year. We have owed a duty to ourselves. We have owed a duty to others. We have failed in both.
Primarily both failures are due to the mischievous effects of the professional pacifist agitation which became governmental nearly five years ago when the then Administration at Washington sought to negotiate various all-inclusive arbitration treaties under which we abandoned the right to stand up for our own vital interest and national honor. Very reluctantly we who believe in peace, but in the peace of righteousness, have been forced to the conclusion that the most prominent leaders of the peace agitation of the past ten years in this country, so far as they have accomplished anything that was not purely fatuous, have accomplished nothing but mischief. This result of the activities of these professional pacifist agitators has been due mainly to the fact that they have consistently placed peace ahead of righteousness, and have resolutely refused to look facts in the face if they thought the facts were unpleasant.

It is as foolish to ignore common sense in this matter as in any other matter. It is as wicked to exalt peace at the expense of morality as it is to exalt war at the expense of morality. The greatest service that Lincoln rendered to the cause of permanent peace and to the greater cause of justice and of righteousness was rendered by him when, with unshaken firmness, he accepted four years of grinding warfare rather than yield to the professional pacifists of his day the Copperheads. Washington's greatest service to peace was rendered by similar action on his part. And be it remembered that never in history have two men rendered greater service to the only kind of peace worth having for honorable men and women than was rendered by these two heroes who did not shrink from righteous war.

Failure to perform duty to others is merely aggravated by failure to perform duty to ourselves. To pay twenty-five million dollars blackmail to Colombia does not atone for our timid refusal to do our duty by Belgium.. It merely aggravates it. Moreover, it should always be remembered that in these matters the weak cannot be helped by the weak; that the brutal wrongdoer cannot be checked by the coward or by the fat, boastful, soft creature who does not take the trouble to make himself fit to enforce his words by his deeds. Preparedness means forethought, effort, trouble, labor. Therefore soft men, selfish, indolent men, men absorbed in money-getting, and the great mass of well-meaning men who shrink from performing the new duties created by new needs, eagerly welcome a political leader who will comfort them, and relieve their secret sense of shame, by using high-sounding names to describe their shortcomings.

An adroit politician can unquestionably gain many votes in such fashion, if he exalts unpre-paredness as a duty, if he praises peace and advocates neutrality, as both in themselves moral —even although the "peace" and "neutrality" may be conditioned on the failure to do our duty either to others or to ourselves. Such a politician, if he excels in the use of high-sounding words, may win votes and gain office by thus pandering to men who wish to hear their selfishness, their short-sightedness or their timidity exalted into virtues. But he is sapping the moral vitality of the people whom he misleads.

It has been an evil thing that this nation, which for five years has been strutting as the champion of peace and holding conferences to denounce war and praising its wealthy citizens for founding peace leagues, has contented itself with these futile activities and has not dared to strike a blow, has not dared even to say a word for righteousness in the concrete, while wrong has been at least temporarily triumphant during the past eighteen months. It is an even worse thing that during this last eighteen months we have wholly failed to prepare to defend qur own homes from disaster.

Nor can we, the people of the United States, escape blame for ourselves by putting it upon our public servants. Unquestionably the Administration has been guilty of culpable indifference to the honor and the interest of the nation during the last year and a half; but it has been guilty in this fashion precisely because it could count upon popular support; and therefore the ultimate blame rests on the people, that is, on us. It may well be that political gain will come to the politicians who appeal to what is selfish and timid in the hearts of our people, and who comfort soft self-indulgence by praising it as virtuous. A correspondent from Virginia, who has always been opposed to me politically, writes: "The most depressing feature of the present situation is that the great majority of the American people strongly approve of the stand of President Wilson and the other apostles of Buchananism. Every one is so satisfied with his money-making and comforts, the moving-picture shows, and his automobile that there is horror at the thought of death and of need and hunger and fatigue. There is a self-righteous disposition to regard heroism as wickedness, and to consider all soldiers as wicked and immoral. 'Peace with honor' is on the lips of many when the brutal alternatives are war with honor or peace with everlasting shame and dishonor. The Administration is thoroughly terrorized by the Germans. The people of this section are for peace at any price." This may be the general sentiment of the American people, and if so, then those who pander to it will profit politically. But they will win profit for themselves by helping^1 to debase their fellow-countrymen.

When the world war broke out over a year ago, it was simply inexcusable for this people not at once to begin the work of preparation. If we had done so, we would now have been able to make our national voice felt effectively in helping to bring about peace with justice—and no other peace ought to be allowed. But not one thing has been done by those in power to make us ready. On the contrary, in his message to Congress of December, 1914, the President elaborately argued in favor of keeping ourselves unprepared, expressing the hope that, if we thus preserved immunity from hatred by keeping ourselves beneath contempt, we might create a situation where he would be employed as a go-between, as the man to fetch and carry among the warring powers when the time for peace negotiations arrived.

The attitude of the German-American press in this country toward the subsequent notes of the President to Germany throws the true light on this fond anticipation. These hyphenated American newspapers have shown that their entire loyalty is to that portion of the compound term which precedes the hyphen, and that they translate the term German-American as meaning that they are Germans who use their position in America as a means for endeavoring to force America to sacrifice its own honor and the interests of mankind in order to serve the German Government. The professional German-Americans here, acting, as has been shown by President Wilson's ardent supporters in New York, with the connivance of the Administration, and by the direct instigation of the German Government, have deliberately campaigned against the United States, have exulted in the German atrocities, and have openly stated that the support of the German-American vote was conditioned upon the Administration's attitude toward Germany, and that Germany would let President Wilson play a part in the peace negotiations only if he actively or passively helped Germany in the war. He has found them hard taskmasters; and they have so angered his other masters, the American people, that the latter have forced him to belated and half-hearted action. After eighteen months he has begun feebly to advocate an imperfect preparedness. After mere conversation for seven months over the Ltisitania with Germany he finally becomes angry with Austria over the Ancona—for Austria is weaker than Germany and it is safer to be angry with her. But he takes no action about the various other ships which were sunk—there was little popular excitement about these ships.

Men are not to be seriously blamed for failure to see or foresee what is hidden from all but eyes that are almost prophetic. The most far-seeing Americans, since the days of Washington, have always stood in advance of popular feeling in the United States so far as national preparedness against war is concerned. But on the other hand not a few of the leaders have been much less advanced than the people they led. And under right leadership the people have always been willing to grapple with facts that were fairly obvious. They have refused to do this when the official leadership was wrong.

Twenty years after the Civil War we had let our Army and Navy sink to a point below that of any third-class power in Europe. Then we began to build up the Navy. The Navy is more important to us than any other branch of the service; and gradually our people grew to appreciate this. In 1898 came the Spanish War. We did badly; but the Spaniards did worse. As that profound philosopher who writes under the name of "Mr. Dooley" put it: "We were in a dream; but the Spaniards were in a trance." However, as a result we did bring our Navy up to the fourth or fifth position among the navies of the big powers, and we did raise our Army until it was capable of being expanded to a hundred thousand. But immediately that the war was over Congress, probably, I regret to say, reflecting popular indifference, sagged back.* In 1901, under the malign leadership of certain men on the Senate Naval Committee, Congress actually stopped making any appropriation whatever for fighting ships. During the succeeding eight years, however, the interrupted work was resumed. The Navy was steadily built up in numbers and still more in efficiency; shooting and fleet maneuvering on a large scale were for the first time treated as they should have been treated; and the result was that in 1909 our fleet stood second among the fleets of the world and was in shape to guarantee us against the aggression of any foreign power. This was then our first duty; and it had been accomplished. Meanwhile the efficiency of the Army had likewise been greatly increased, as was shown by the contrast between the handling of the expeditionary force to Cuba under General Barry and the handling of the army corps under General Shaf-ter six or eight years previously. But very properly the men who were alive to the need of national defence had to devote their chief attention to the Navy; and it was impossible to get the public to consider both our real military and our real naval needs.
(footnote) Certain adherents of the Administration, in endeavoring untruthfully to defend it, have actually asserted that while I was President I did not myself do enough to upbuild the Army and Navy! Of course these individuals know perfectly well that the criticism aimed at me while I was President was invariably because I was supposed to be too militaristic, and my critics always condemned me for endeavoring to force Congress to go farther than it was willing to go in building up the Army and Navy. During my term in the Presidency the Navy was increased threefold in strength and at least sixfold in efficiency; the Army was certainly doubled in efficiency. I did my best to get Congress to do much more than it would do. I accomplished the very utmost that by appeal and argument I could get the people to support. Beginning with my first message to Congress, on December 3d, 1901, and in every year in my subsequent messages, I at length and in detail argued for "preparedness in advance," for "forethought and preparation," in building up our naval and military forces, in favor of training "for years" in advance our crews, for "no cessation in adding to the effective units of the fighting fleet," for a general staff, for keeping only the military posts and navy yards demanded by military needs, etc., etc. I repeated these arguments in dozens of speeches in every quarter of the Union. My messages to Congress and these speeches, in which I so often and at such length argued for full preparedness in advance, are open to any one who has access to a public library. ( end footnote)

Then came the awful cataclysm of the present world war. During the years 1913 and 1914 our Navy deteriorated with frightful rapidity. This was partly due to the way it was handled in connection with our absurd and humiliating little make-believe war with Mexico. Our ships were not maneuvered and were never trained in fleet or squadron gunnery during these two years; and in consequence of this, among other causes, our fleet now stands certainly not higher than fifth among the nations in point of efficiency and is not fit at this moment to defend us from serious attack.

The events of the last year have shown that all who believed that the most frightful wrongdoing by warlike nations could be averted by the opinion of civilized mankind as a whole have been utterly in error. What is happening in this year 1916 shows that not the slightest particle of advance in international morality has been made during the century that has elapsed since the close of the Napoleonic wars. This failure is quite as much due to the misconduct of the pacifists as to the misconduct of the militarists. The milk-and-water statesmanship of the American Government during the past year has been a direct aid to the statesmanship of blood-and-iron across the water; it may not be as wicked, but it is far more contemptible. The United States has signally and culpably failed to keep its promises made in the Hague Conventions, and to stand for the right. Instead, it has taken refuge in the world-old neutrality between right and wrong .which is always so debasing for the man practising it. As has been well said, such a neutral is the ignoblest work of God.

There was much excuse for a general failure of Americans to understand the danger to America prior to what happened in this world war. But now there is no excuse whatever. Now, thanks to our own feeble shirking of duty, we know that if any great nation menaces us, no matter how innocent of offence we may be, we have absolutely nothing to expect from other nations. Most assuredly the neutrality we have kept between right and wrong when Belgium was trodden under foot will be repaid.us if our turn comes. Small blame will attach to the nations which grinningly quote our own neutral proclamations and say that they themselves intend in their turn to be neutral not only in deed but even in thought, if any European or Asiatic military power concludes to take from us the Panama Canal or Hawaii or Porto Rico or to seize and hold for ransom New York or San Francisco. Moreover, this war has made it evident that armies of hundreds of thousands of men can be transported not only across the narrow but across the broad seas. England's great navy has made the ocean a barrier to her foes, and a highway for herself, and it is only Britain's navy which has saved her from utter disgrace.

Let us profit alike by Belgium's heroic example in the present, and by the terrible fate brought on her by her lack of forethought, and preparedness in the past. At present, in spite of the shattering disasters of the last year and a quarter, and although only a tiny fraction of her territory is left unconquered, Belgium's army is stronger and more efficient than ever before. It numbers about 120,000 fighting men, with over 400 guns and thousands of machine guns and in addition first-class services of aviation, food supply, sanitation, manufacture of ammunition and the like. There are fourteen centers for the drilling of recruits, and excellent schools for the officers. The morale of the army is extraordinary. I know of nothing finer in history than the way in which this army has been raised and maintained by the Belgian nation in the midst of a cataclysm well-nigh unparalleled in the history of nations. But this cataclysm, this frightful and crushing disaster to Belgium, occurred precisely because no such effort was put forth before the event. The splendid heroism of the present can only repair a small part of the horrible damage due to the unpreparedness of the past. Belgium has suffered the last extremities of woe; and she would have gone almost unscathed if before the war carne she had prepared an army as strong relatively to her then strength as the present army is strong relative to her present weakness.

England, during the first year of the war, afforded a lamentable example of the punishment that will surely in the end befall any nation which fails to take its duties seriously and to prepare herself thoroughly in advance by universal military training of her citizens, and by a high standard of loyal social efficiency, for the evil day when war may come on the land. Her navy did admirably from the beginning—thanks to men like Lord Fisher, who built it up, and to Prince Louis of Battenberg, who mobilized it in the nick of time, with an efficiency comparable to that which marked the mobilization of the German army. Her soldiers at the front behaved splendidly. But the English people as a whole did not appear to advantage when compared, for instance, with the French, until more than a year had gone by. This was true of their capitalists. It was still more true of their workingmen—compare their striking workmen with the French workingmen, who toiled night and day, and exchanged brotherly greetings with the generals at the front. It was true of their men in Parliament and the press who opposed universal military service. Over a year passed before they began to produce the instruments and munitions of war in a way at all comparable with what was being done in France and Germany. Her people have as a whole volunteered in magnificent manner; but those who wished to shirk their duty were permitted to shirk their duty, and this was a thoroughly evil thing. Now, eighteen months after the outbreak of the war, her people are working with extraordinary resolution and patriotism, but it is not possible wholly to undo the evil done by the lack of preparedness in advance.

If there were no lesson in this for us, I certainly should not dwell on the fact. The important point for us to remember is that if England did not do as well as she ought to have done, she did infinitely better than we would have done; and moreover she has learned her lesson and is doing well, whereas we have not learned our lesson, and our national leaders, executive, legislative, and non-official, from Mr. Wilson and Mr. Bryan to such Congressmen as Messrs. Kitchin and Hay, are still acting in a way that brings dishonor to the American name and that is fraught with the gravest peril to the future of the nation. Capital books have been inspired by this war; Owen Wister's "Pentecost of Calamity," for instance; but in its practical teachings the best book that this war has produced is Oliver's "Ordeal by Battle." I wish that every American would read Mr. Oliver's book and would realize that everything there said as to both the shortcomings and the needs of the English people applies with far greater force to the American people at the present time. Col. Arthur Lee, M.P., in an address to his constituents which all Americans should read, has clearly placed before the British people the vital needs and duties of the hour. Our politicians and our self-styled humanitarians and peace lovers, if they would read this address with open minds, would profit much.

Most certainly we should avoid with horror the ruthlessness and brutality and the cynical indifference to international right which the Government of Germany has shown during the past year, and we should shun, as we would shun the plague, the production in this country of a popular psychology like that which in Germany has produced a public opinion that backs the Government in its actions in Belgium, and cheers popular songs which exult in the slaughter of women and children on the high seas. But if we value the heritage bequeathed to us by Washington and saved for us by Lincoln, we will at once begin the effort to emulate the German efficiency, efficiency which is not only military but also social and industrial.

We in America claim that a democracy can be as efficient for defence as an autocracy, as a despotism. It is idle to make this claim, it is idle to utter windy eloquence in Fourth of July speeches, and to prate in public documents about our greatness and our adherence to democratic principles and the mission we have to do good on the earth by spineless peacefulness, if we are not able, if we are not willing, to make our words count by means of our deeds. Germany stands as the antithesis of democracy. She exults in her belief that in England democracy has broken down. She exults in the fact that in America democracy has shown itself so utterly futile that it has not even dared to speak about wrongdoing committed against others, and has not dared to do more than speak, without acting, when the wrong was done against itself. She openly exults in and counts upon the fact that the professional German-Americans are disloyal to the United States. She uses the politicians who are afraid of the German-American vote.

Every professional pacifist in America, every representative of commercialized greed, every apostle of timidity, every sinister creature who betrays his country by pandering to the anti-American feeling which masquerades under some species of hyphenated Americanism—all these men and women and their representatives in public life are at this moment working against democracy. If the democratic ideal fails, if democracy goes down, they will be primarily to blame. For democracy will assuredly go down if it once be shown that it is incompatible with national security. The law of self-preservation is the primary law for nations as for individuals. If a nation cannot protect itself under a democratic form of government, then it will either die or evolve a new form of government.

I believe that our people will realize these facts. I believe that our people will make democracy successful. They can only do so if they show by their actions that they understand the responsibilities that go with democracy. The first and the greatest of these responsibilities is the responsibility of national self-defence. We must be prepared to defend a country governed in accordance with the democratic ideal or else we are guilty of treason to that ideal. To defend the country it is necessary to organize the country in peace, or it cannot be organized in war. A riot of unrestricted individualism in time of peace means impotence for sustained and universal national effort toward a common end in war time. Neither businessman nor wage-worker should be permitted to do anything detrimental to the people as a whole; and if they act honestly and efficiently they should in all ways be encouraged. There should be social cohesion. We must devise methods by which under our democratic government we shall secure the socialization of industry which autocratic Germany has secured, so that business may be encouraged and yet controlled in the general interest, and the wage-workers guaranteed full justice and their full share of the reward of industry, and yet required to show the corresponding efficiency and public spirit that justify their right to an increased reward. But the vital fact to remember is that ultimately it will prove worse than useless to have our people prosper unless they are able to defend this prosperity; to fight for it.

Let us, then, make up our minds to prepare; and make up our minds just what we want to prepare to do. We have the Panama Canal. Many of our Congressmen have in the past consistently opposed the upbuilding of the navy and the fortification of the Panama Canal. These men may mean well, but their action has represented an unworthy abandonment of national duty; and they have shown themselves to be the most dangerous enemies of this republic, men unfit to be trusted in public life in any position whatsoever. If the American people wish to support such public servants, then let them instantly abandon the Canal, giving it back to Panama or turning it over to Japan or Germany or England or any other people whose ruling class is composed of men and not of eunuchs. Let them also abandon the Monroe Doctrine; let them abandon all pretense of protecting life and property in Mexico. In short, let us take the position of the China of the Occident and await with helpless weakness the day when our territory will be divided among more competent peoples.

But if we intend to play our part as a great nation and to be prepared to defend our own interests and to do good to others, let us decide what we want to do and then make ready to do it. South of the Equator, that is, south of the line of approaches on each side to the Panama Canal, we need no longer bother about the Monroe Doctrine. Brazil, Chile, the Argentine, are capable themselves of handling the Monroe Doctrine for all South America, excepting the extreme northern part. Consider the case of Argentina, for instance. In Argentina, as in Switzerland, they have universal military service. This has been of enormous use to them industrially and socially. It has also given them at present an army of close to half a million men, although they have not one-tenth the population of the United States. Argentina is far more fitted to defend its own territory from a sudden attack by a powerful enemy than is the United States. We would do well to sit at her feet and learn the lesson she can thus teach us.

Therefore we need bother with the Monroe Doctrine only so far as the approaches to the Panama Canal are concerned, that is, so far as concerns the territories between our southern border and, roughly speaking, the Equator. We do not have to bother about the Monroe Doctrine and Canada, for during the past year Canada has shown herself infinitely more efficient than we are.

This Administration was elected on the specific promise to give freedom to the Philippines. The United States must keep its promises. No greater service has been rendered by any people to another during the past hundred years than we have rendered to the Philippines—and than we have rendered to Cuba also. In February, 1909, when the battle-fleet returned from its voyage around the world, the United States was in point of military, that is, primarily naval, efficiency in such shape that there was no people that would have ventured to attempt to wrong us; and under such circumstances we could afford to keep the Philippines and to continue the work that we were doing. But since then we have relatively to other powers sunk incalculably from a military standpoint; we are infinitely less fitted than we were to defend ourselves. Above all, we have promised the Filipinos independence in terms which were inevitably understood to be independence in the immediate future; and we have begun to govern them weakly.

Such indecision in international conduct shows that this people ought not to undertake the government of a distant dependency, and this both from military reasons and because of the need of keeping promises that have been made. Let us, then, as speedily as possible, leave the Philippines; and as the Philippines desire us to leave we would be quit of all moral obligations for them, and would under no circumstances be obliged to defend them from other nations.

There remain Alaska, Hawaii, our own coasts, and the Panama Canal and its approaches, as the military problem with which we should grapple; and with this problem we should grapple in the manner already set forth in this book.

A democracy should not be willing to hire somebody else to do its fighting. The man who claims the right to vote should be a man able and willing to fight at need for the country which gives him the vote. I believe in democracy in time of peace; and I believe in it in time of war. I believe in universal service. Universal service represents the true democratic ideal. No man, rich or poor, should be allowed to shirk it. In time of war every citizen of the Republic should be held absolutely to serve the Republic whenever the Republic needs him or her. The pacifist and the hyphenated American should be sternly required to fight and made to serve in the army and to share the work and danger of their braver and more patriotic countrymen; and any dereliction of duty on their part should be punished with the sharpest rigor. The man who will not fit himself to fight for his country has no right to a vote in shaping that country's policy. As for the woman who approves the song, "I Did Not Raise My Boy To Be a Soldier," her place is in China —or by preference in a harem—and not in the United States. But she is all right if she will change the song into "I Did Not Raise My Boy To Be the Only Soldier." Every woman who has not raised her boy to be a soldier at need has in unwomanly fashion striven to put a double burden on some other boy whose mother had a patriotic soul. The much-praised "volunteer" system means nothing but encouraging brave men to do double duty and incur double risk in order that cowards and shirks and mere money-getters may sit at home in a safety bought by the lives of better men.

The United States has—and deserves to have —only one friend in the world. This is the United States. We have ourselves treated the Hague Conventions as scraps of paper; and we cannot expect any one else to show the respect for such treaties which we have lacked. Our safety and therefore the safety of democratic institutions rests on our own strength and only on our own strength. If we are a true democracy, if we really believe in government of the people by the people and for the people, if we believe in social and industrial justice to be achieved through the people, and therefore in the right of the people to demand the service of all the people, let us make the Army fundamentally an army of the whole people.

This will be carrying out the democratic ideal. The policy advocated for Britain by Lord Roberts was really the necessary complement to the policy advocated for Britain by Lloyd-George. In a democracy service should be required of every man, in peace and in war; we should guarantee to every man his rights, and require from each man the full performance of his duties. It may well be that in the end we shall find it worth while to insist that all our young men, at their entrance to manhood, perform a year's industrial service—in the harvest fields, in city sanitation, on the roads, anywhere. Such service would be equally beneficial to the son of the millionaire and to the boy who grows up in the crowded quarters of our great cities or out on lonely fartns in the back country.

This is for the future. As for the present, it is certain that a half year's military service would be a priceless boon to these young men themselves, as well as to the nation. It would tend to social cohesion. We would gain a genuine citizens' army, and we would gain a far higher type of citizenship. Our young men, at the outset of their lives, would be trained—not merely to shoot and to drill, which are only small parts of military training—but to habits of bodily endurance and moral self-mastery, to command and to obey, to act on their own initiative and to understand and promptly execute orders, to respect themselves and to respect others, and to understand that they are to serve their country with deeds and not words only. Under such conditions the young American would enter manhood accustomed to take pride in that disciplined spirit of orderly self-reliance combined with ability to work with others, which is the most essential element in the success of a great, free, modern democracy.