The Dominion. FRIDAY, MARCH 12, 1920. AMERICAN SABRERATTLING?

Dominion, Volume 13, Issue 143, 12 March 1920, Page 6

The Dominion. FRIDAY, MARCH 12, 1920. AMERICAN SABRERATTLING?

It has been said that the deplorable failure of tho United States to assist in enforcing the Peace Treaty comes under the rule of "least said, soonest mended." This attitude, no doubt, is recomniended by go'od sense, and amounts to making the best of a bad job, but some leaders of American public opinion arc determined apparently to go to an extreme of folly which it is difficult to regard from a standpoint of polite detachment. The latest example in point is.afforhd in some observations by Mil. Josephus Daniels (United States Secretary for tho Navy) on the subject of naval expansion. When Mn. Daniels stated a few days ago that if the Senate rejected the Peace Treaty, the United States must have "incomparably the greatest navy in the world," it was possible to assume that he was rather urging the ratification of the Treaty than advocating naval expansion on the grand scale. But what is to be thought of his later observations on the same subject, to the Congressional Committee on Naval Affairs, in which he indicated making the island of Guam an "American Heligoland," and the construction of a great submarine, aviation and destroyer base at Hawaii? If these recommendations, and the accompanying observation of tho Secretary for the Navy that "our friends of to-day may be our enemies to-morrow" aro all to be counted as advocacy of Treaty ratification, they are carried to a strange extreme. It is at best a dangerous line, of argument that if the United States finds itself incapable of playing a really worthy part in the international arena, the next oest thing she can do is to pile up armaments at an unprecedented. rate and conduct herself in a fashion reminiscent of tho posturing of Prussian militarism before the war. The mere mention of such plans of naval expansion as are uadcr consideration in the United States is calculated to make mischief in the world, and a glance at the map of the Pacific will demonstrate that the development of naval bases suggested by Mn. Daniels is hardly calculated to promote international amity. Tho Hawaiian Islands, no doubt, are fairly regarded as nn advanced defence of the American coast, but the conversion of the island of Guam into' an "American, Heligoland" would be interpreted with some, justice as a move in aggressive militarism. Guam lies about twelve hundred miles east of the Philippines a-nd at a somewhat similar distance north of New Guinea. Islands held by Japan as a mandatory Power are located both west and east of Guam. It would be far-fetched to say that the establishment of a formidable naval I axe at Guam is necessary to safeguard tho Philippines or any other American territory. On the other hand the existence of such a base would do much to awaken the uneasy suspicions _ that in past history have given rise to competition in armaments and have tended to foment wars!

It would perhaps be wrong to take speeches like that of Mr. Secretary Daniels too seriously. Yet the fact stands that there is at present in, America a dangerous, if partly-de-veloped, tendency to swing back from the international ideals awakened in the late war to an extreme of militarism. Congress is at present considering a programme of naval expansion which seems to utterly lack any'reasonable justification. British sea-power is assuredly no menace to the United States, and the British Empire is dependent as the United States never will be on the maintenance of open sea-routes. If distrust of Japan' inspires the American proposals they must still be set down as extravagant. Japan at present possesses nine Dread l noughts and the United States more than twice as many. Yet while Japan is proposing to build four battleships and as many battlccruisers during tho next seven years, the United States is considering the construction in three years of ten battleships and six battle-cruisers. It is_ fairly obvious that such a policy is unworthy of a_ nation which wishes to see international peacc securely established.. The anomalous state of affairs that has arisen in America was well summed up recently by the. New York Evcninn Post:

. ~. With criminal lightheadedness we speak of crossing bridges when we tench tlieni. After crying out- during the agony of the war that the thing must not happen again, v/g contemplate another war with apparent equanimity. Wo discuss compulsory military service. Wo. discuss a billion-dollar nayv. Wo, insist on not learning from the past.. Such is tlie present mood of America if Lodge and Borah represent America.

With other representatives of moderate opinion in the United States, the New York JUveniw/ Post holds that those who are obstructing the ratification of the Pcnce Treaty and talking of building up armaments in fact misrepresent the American people. It is not becoming easier as.time goes on to accept this view. What needs to be recognised in America, and apparently is little recognised, is that a nation which finds itself unable promptly and spontaneously to do the right thing is not of necessity bound to do the obviously wrong thins:. It is only too plain that the United States for the time being will do little actively to assist in establishing and consolidating world pe'ace. Even so. howevor, its own interests as well as those of other nations demand that evei-ything possible should be done to rcduee and' lim.it armaments.