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THE CONQUEST OF AMERICA
A Romance of Disaster and Victory: U.S.A., 1921 A. D.
BASED ON EXTRACTS FROM THE DIARY
OF JAMES E. LANGSTON, WAR CORRESPONDENT
OF THE “LONDON TIMES”
BY
CLEVELAND MOFFETT
1916
AUTHOR OF “THROUGH THE WALL,” “THE BATTLE,”
“CAREERS OF DANGER AND DARING,”
ETC., ETC.
[Illustration: ABOUT NOON ON THE DAY OF CAPITULATION, MAY 25, 1921, A
DETACHMENT OF GERMAN SOLDIERS MARCHED QUIETLY UP BROADWAY, TURNED INTO
WALL STREET, AND STOPPED OUTSIDE THE BANKING HOUSE OF J. P. MORGAN &
COMPANY.]
_Thus saith the Lord, Behold, a people cometh from the north country; and
a great nation shall be stirred up from the uttermost parts of the earth.
They lay hold on bow and spear; they are cruel, and have no mercy; their
voice roareth like the sea, and they ride upon horses; every one set in
array, as a man to the battle, against thee, O daughter of Zion_.
Jeremiah 6: 22, 23.
_They seemed as men that lifted up
Axes upon a thicket of trees.
And now all the carved work thereof together
They break down with hatchet and hammers.
They have set thy sanctuary on fire;
They have profaned the dwelling place of thy name even to the ground.
They said in their heart, Let us make havoc of them altogether:
They have burned up all the synagogues of God in the land_.
Psalms 74: 5-8.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER
TO MY FELLOW AMERICANS
I. I WITNESS THE BLOWING UP OF THE PANAMA CANAL
II. AMERICAN AEROPLANES AND SUBMARINES BATTLE DESPERATELY AGAINST THE
GERMAN FLEET
III. GERMAN INVADERS DRIVE THE IRON INTO THE SOUL OF UNPREPARED
AMERICA
IV. INVASION OF LONG ISLAND AND THE BATTLE OF BROOKLYN
V. GENERAL VON HINDENBURG TEACHES NEW YORK CITY A LESSON
VI. VARIOUS UNPLEASANT HAPPENINGS IN MANHATTAN
VII. NEW HAVEN IS PUNISHED FOR RIOTING AND INSUBORDINATION
VIII. I HAVE A FRIENDLY TALK WITH THE GERMAN CROWN PRINCE AND SECURE A
SENSATIONAL INTERVIEW
IX. BOSTON OFFERS DESPERATE AND BLOODY RESISTANCE TO THE INVADERS
X. LORD KITCHENER VISITS AMERICA AND DISCUSSES OUR MILITARY PROBLEMS
XI. HEROIC ACT OF BARBARA WEBB SAVES AMERICAN ARMY AT THE BATTLE OF
TRENTON
XII. REAR ADMIRAL THOMAS Q. ALLYN WEIGHS CHANCES OF THE AMERICAN FLEET
IN IMPENDING NAVAL BATTLE
XIII. THE GREAT NAVAL BATTLE OF THE CARIBBEAN SEA
XIV. PHILADELPHIA’S FIRST CITY TROOPS DIE IN DEFENCE OF THE LIBERTY
BELL
XV. THRILLING INCIDENT AT WANAMAKER’S STORE WHEN GERMANS DISHONOUR
AMERICAN FLAG
XVI. AN AMERICAN GIRL BRINGS NEWS THAT CHANGES THE COURSE OF THE MOUNT
VERNON PEACE CONFERENCE
XVII. THOMAS A. EDISON MAKES A SERIOUS MISTAKE IN ACCEPTING A DINNER
INVITATION
XVIII. I WITNESS THE BATTLE OF THE SUSQUEHANNA FROM VINCENT ASTOR’S
AEROPLANE
XIX. GENERAL WOOD SCORES ANOTHER BRILLIANT SUCCESS AGAINST THE CROWN
PRINCE
XX. THIRD BATTLE OF BULL RUN WITH AEROPLANES CARRYING LIQUID CHLORINE
XXI. THE AWAKENING OF AMERICA
XXII. ON CHRISTMAS EVE BOSTON THRILLS THE NATION WITH AN ACT OF
MAGNIFICENT HEROISM
XXIII. CONFESSIONS OF AN AMERICAN SPY AND BRAVERY OF BUFFALO SCHOOLBOYS
XXIV. NOVEL ATTACK OF AMERICAN AIRSHIP UPON GERMAN SUPER-DREADNOUGHT
XXV. DESPERATE EFFORT TO RESCUE THOMAS A. EDISON FROM THE GERMANS
XXVI. RIOTS IN CHICAGO AND GERMAN PLOT TO RESCUE THE CROWN PRINCE
XXVII. DECISIVE BATTLE BETWEEN GERMAN FLEET AND AMERICAN SEAPLANES
CARRYING TORPEDOES
ILLUSTRATIONS
ABOUT NOON ON THE DAY OF CAPITULATION, MAY 25, 1921, A DETACHMENT OF
GERMAN SOLDIERS MARCHED UNOBSERVED UP BROADWAY, TURNED INTO WALL STREET,
AND STOPPED OUTSIDE THE BANKING HOUSE OP J. P. MORGAN & COMPANY
AS THE GERMAN LANDING OPERATIONS PROCEEDED, THE NEWS OF THE INVASION
SPREAD OVER THE WHOLE REGION WITH THE SPEED OF ELECTRICITY. THE ENEMY WAS
COMING! THE ENEMY WAS HERE! WHAT WAS TO BE DONE?
THEN, FACING INEXORABLE NECESSITY, GENERAL WOOD ORDERED HIS ENGINEERS TO
BLOW UP THE BRIDGES AND FLOOD THE SUBWAYS THAT LED TO MANHATTAN. IT WAS
AS IF THE VAST STEEL STRUCTURE OF BROOKLYN BRIDGE HAD BEEN A THING OF
LACE. IN SHREDS IT FELL, A TORN, TRAGICALLY WRECKED PIECE OF MAGNIFICENCE
THE PEOPLE KNEW THE ANSWER OF VON HINDENBURG. THEY HAD READ IT, AS HAD
ALL THE WORLD FOR MILES AROUND, IN THE CATACLYSM OF THE PLUNGING TOWERS.
NEW YORK MUST SURRENDER OR PERISH!
GERMAN GUNS DESTROY THE HOTEL TAFT
“YOU KNOW, MARK TWAIN WAS A GREAT FRIEND OF MY FATHER’S,” SAID THE CROWN
PRINCE. “I REMEMBER HOW MY FATHER LAUGHED, ONE EVENING AT THE PALACE IN
BERLIN, WHEN MARK TWAIN TOLD US THE STORY OF ‘THE JUMPING FROG.’”
AND ON THE MORNING OF JULY 4, TWO OF VON KLUCK’S STAFF OFFICERS,
ACCOMPANIED BY A MILITARY ESCORT, MARCHED DOWN STATE STREET TO ARRANGE
FOR THE PAYMENT OF AN INDEMNITY PROM THE CITY OF BOSTON OF THREE HUNDRED
MILLION DOLLARS
“MY FRIENDS, THEY SAY PATRIOTISM IS DEAD IN THIS LAND. THEY SAY WE ARE
EATEN UP WITH LOVE OF MONEY, TAINTED WITH A YELLOW STREAK THAT MAKES US
AFRAID TO FIGHT. IT’S A LIE! I AM SIXTY YEARS OLD, BUT I’LL FIGHT IN THE
TRENCHES WITH MY FOUR SONS BESIDE ME, AND YOU MEN WILL DO THE SAME. AM I
RIGHT?”
THE CONQUEST OF AMERICA
TO MY FELLOW AMERICANS
The purpose of this story is to give an idea of what might happen to
America, being defenceless as at present, if she should be attacked, say
at the close of the great European war, by a mighty and victorious power
like Germany. It is a plea for military preparedness in the United
States.
As justifying this plea let us consider briefly and in a fair-minded
spirit the arguments of our pacifist friends who, being sincerely opposed
to military preparedness, would bring us to their way of thinking.
On June 10, 1915, in a statement to the American people, following his
resignation as Secretary of State, William Jennings Bryan said:
Some nation must lead the world out of the black night of war into the
light of that day when “swords shall be beaten into plow-shares.” Why not
make that honour ours? Some day--why not now?--the nations will learn
that enduring peace cannot be built upon fear--that good-will does not
grow upon the stalk of violence. Some day the nations will place their
trust in love, the weapon for which there is no shield; in love, that
suffereth long and is kind; in love, that is not easily provoked, that
beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all
things; in love, which, though despised as weakness by the worshippers of
Mars, abideth when all else fails.
These are noble words. They thrill and inspire us as they have thrilled
and inspired millions before us, yet how little the world has seen of the
actual carrying out of their beautiful message! The average individual in
America still clings to whatever he has of material possessions with all
the strength that law and custom give him. He keeps what he has and takes
what he can honourably get, unconcerned by the fact that millions of his
fellow men are in distress or by the knowledge that many of the rich whom
he envies or honours may have gained their fortunes, privilege or power
by unfair or dishonest means.
In every land there are similar extremes of poverty and riches, but these
could not exist in a world governed by the law of love or ready to be so
governed, since love would destroy the ugly train of hatreds, arrogances,
miseries, injustices and crimes that spread before us everywhere in the
existing social order and that only fail to shock us because we are
accustomed to a regime in which self-interest rather than love or justice
is paramount.
My point is that if individuals are thus universally, or almost
universally, selfish, nations must also be selfish, since nations are
only aggregations of individuals. If individuals all over the world
to-day place the laws of possession and privilege and power above the law
of love, then nations will inevitably do the same. If there is constant
jealousy and rivalry and disagreement among individuals there will surely
be the same among nations, and it is idle for Mr. Bryan to talk about
putting our trust in love collectively when we do nothing of the sort
individually. Would Mr. Bryan put his trust in love if he felt himself
the victim of injustice or dishonesty?
Once in a century some Tolstoy tries to practise literally the law of
love and non-resistance with results that are distressing to his family
and friends, and that are of doubtful value to the community. We may be
sure the nations of the world will never practise this beautiful law of
love until average citizens of the world practise it, and that time has
not come.
Of course, Mr. Bryan’s peace plan recognises the inevitability of
quarrels or disagreements among nations, but proposes to have these
settled by arbitration or by the decisions of an international tribunal,
which tribunal may be given adequate police power in the form of an
international army and navy.
It goes without saying that such a plan of world federation and world
arbitration involves universal disarmament, all armies and all navies
must be reduced to a merely nominal strength, to a force sufficient for
police protection, but does any one believe that this plan can really be
carried out? Is there the slightest chance that Russia or Germany will
disarm? Is there the slightest chance that England will send her fleet to
the scrap heap and leave her empire defenceless in order to join this
world federation? Is there the slightest chance that Japan, with her
dreams of Asiatic sovereignty, will disarm?
And if the thing were conceivable, what a grim federation this would be
of jealousies, grievances, treacheries, hatreds, conflicting patriotisms
and ambitions--Russia wanting Constantinople, France Alsace-Lorraine,
Germany Calais, Spain Gibraltar, Denmark her ravished provinces, Poland
her national integrity and so on. Who would keep order among the
international delegates? Who would decide when the international judges
disagreed? Who would force the international policemen to act against
their convictions? Could any world tribunal induce the United States to
limit her forces for the prevention of a yellow immigration from Asia?
General Homer Lea in “The Valour of Ignorance” says:
Only when arbitration is able to unravel the tangled skein of crime and
hypocrisy among individuals can it be extended to communities and
nations, as nations are only man in the aggregate, they are the aggregate
of his crimes and deception and depravity, and so long as these
constitute the basis of individual impulse, so long will they control the
acts of nations.
Dr. Charles W. Eliot, president emeritus of Harvard University and
trustee of the Carnegie Peace Foundation, makes this admission in _The
Army and Navy Journal:_
I regret to say that international or national disarmament is not taken
seriously by the leaders and thinking men of the more important peoples,
and I fear that for one reason or another neither the classes nor the
masses have much admiration for the idea or would be willing to do their
share to bring it about.
Here is the crux of the question, the earth has so much surface and
to-day this is divided up in a certain way by international frontiers.
Yesterday it was divided up in a different way. To-morrow it will again
be divided up in a new way, unless some world federation steps in and
says: “Stop! There are to be no more wars. The present frontiers of the
existing fifty-three nations are to be considered as righteously and
permanently established. After this no act of violence shall change
them.”
Think what that would mean! It would mean that nations like Russia, Great
Britain and the United States, which happened to possess vast dominions
when this world federation peace plan was adopted would continue to
possess vast dominions, while other nations like Italy, Greece, Turkey,
Holland, Sweden, France, Spain (all great empires once), Germany and
Japan, whose present share of the earth’s surface might be only one-tenth
or one-fiftieth or one-five-hundredth as great as Russia’s share or Great
Britain’s share, would be expected to remain content with that small
portion.
Impossible! These less fortunate, but not less aspiring nations would
never agree to such a policy of national stagnation, to such a stifling
of their legitimate longings for a “greater place in the sun.” They would
point to the pages of history and show how small nations have become
great and how empires have fallen. What was the mighty United States of
America but yesterday? A handful of feeble colonies far weaker than the
Balkan States to-day.
“Why should this particular moment be chosen,” they would protest, “to
render immovable international frontiers that have always been shifting?
Why should the maps of the world be now finally crystallised so as to
give England millions of square miles in every quarter of the globe,
Canada, Australia, India, Egypt, while we possess so little? Did God make
England so much better than he made us? Why should the Russian Empire
sweep across two continents while our territory is crowded into a corner
of one? Is Russia so supremely deserving? And why should the United
States possess as much of the earth’s surface as Germany, France, Italy,
Belgium, Holland, Austria-Hungary, Denmark, Greece, Serbia, Bulgaria,
Roumania, Spain, Norway, Sweden and Japan all together and, besides that,
claim authority to say, through the Monroe Doctrine, what shall happen or
shall not happen in South America, Mexico, the West Indies and the
Pacific? How did the United States get this authority and this vast
territory? How did Russia get her vast territory? How did England get her
vast territory?”
The late Professor J. A. Cramb, an Englishman himself, gives us one
answer in his powerful and illuminating book, “Germany and England,” and
shows us how England, in the view of many, got _her_ possessions:
England! The successful burglar, who, an immense fortune amassed, has
retired from business, and having broken every law, human and divine,
violated every instinct of honour and fidelity on every sea and on every
continent, desires now the protection of the police!... So long as
England, the great robber-state, retains her booty, the spoils of a
world, what right has she to expect peace from the nations?
In reply to Mr. Bryan’s peace exhortations, some of the smaller but more
efficient world powers, certainly Germany and Japan, would recall similar
cynical teachings of history and would smilingly answer: “We approve of
your beautiful international peace plan, of your admirable world police
plan, but before putting it into execution, we prefer to wait a few
hundred years and see if we also, in the ups and downs of nations, cannot
win for ourselves, by conquest or cunning or other means not provided for
in the law of love, a great empire covering a vast portion of the earth’s
surface.”
The force and justice of this argument will be appreciated, to use a
homely comparison, by those who have studied the psychology of poker
games and observed the unvarying willingness of heavy winners to end the
struggle after a certain time, while the losers insist upon playing
longer.
It will be the same in this international struggle for world supremacy,
the only nations willing to stop fighting will be the ones that are far
ahead of the game, like Great Britain, Russia and the United States.
We may be sure that wars will continue on the earth. War may be a
biological necessity in the development of the human race--God’s
housecleaning, as Ella Wheeler Wilcox calls it. War may be a great soul
stimulant meant to purge mankind of evils greater than itself, evils of
baseness and world degeneration. We know there are blighted forests that
must be swept clean by fire. Let us not scoff at such a theory until we
understand the immeasurable mysteries of life and death. We know that,
through the ages, two terrific and devastating racial impulses have made
themselves felt among men and have never been restrained, sex attraction
and war. Perhaps they were not meant to be restrained.
Listen to John Ruskin, apostle of art and spirituality:
All the pure and noble arts of peace are founded on war. No great art
ever rose on earth but among a nation of soldiers. There is no great art
possible to a nation but that which is based on battle. When I tell you
that war is the foundation of all the arts, I mean also that it is the
foundation of all the high virtues and faculties of men. It was very
strange for me to discover this, and very dreadful, but I saw it to be
quite an undeniable fact. The common notion that peace and the virtues of
civil life flourished together I found to be utterly untenable. We talk
of peace and learning, of peace and plenty, of peace and civilisation;
but I found that these are not the words that the Muse of History coupled
together; that on her lips the words were peace and sensuality, peace and
selfishness, peace and death. I found in brief that all great nations
learned their truth of word and strength of thought in war; that they
were nourished in war and wasted in peace; taught by war and deceived by
peace; trained by war and betrayed by peace; in a word, that they were
born in war and expired in peace.
We know Bernhardi’s remorseless views taken from Treitschke and adopted
by the whole German nation:
“War is a fiery crucible, a terrible training school through which the
world has grown better.”
In his impressive work, “The Game of Empires,” Edward S. Van Zile quotes
Major General von Disfurth, a distinguished retired officer of the German
army, who chants so fierce a glorification of war for the German idea,
war for German Kultur, war at all costs and with any consequences that
one reads with a shudder of amazement:
Germany stands as the supreme arbiter of her own methods. It is of no
consequence whatever if all the monuments ever created, all the pictures
ever painted, and all the buildings ever erected by the great architects
of the world be destroyed, if by their destruction we promote Germany’s
victory over her enemies. The commonest, ugliest stone that marks the
burial place of a German grenadier is a more glorious and venerable
monument than all the cathedrals of Europe put together. They call us
barbarians. What of it? We scorn them and their abuse. For my part, I
hope that in this war we have merited the title of barbarians. Let
neutral peoples and our enemies cease their empty chatter, which may well
be compared to the twitter of birds. Let them cease to talk of the
cathedral of Rheims and of all the churches and all the castles in France
which have shared its fate. These things do not interest us. Our troops
must achieve victory. What else matters?
Obviously there are cases where every noble sentiment would impel a
nation to go to war. A solemn promise broken, a deliberate insult
to the flag, an act of intolerable bullying, some wicked purpose of
self-aggrandisement at the expense of weaker nations, anything, in short,
that flaunted the national honour or imperilled the national integrity
would be a call to war that must be heeded by valiant and high-souled
citizens, in all lands. Nor can we have any surety against such wanton
international acts, so long as the fate of nations is left in the hands
of small autocracies or military and diplomatic cliques empowered to act
without either the knowledge or approval of the people. Wars will never
be abolished until the war-making power is taken from the few and
jealously guarded by the whole people, and only exercised after public
discussion of the matters at issue and a public understanding of
inevitable consequences. At present it is evident that the pride, greed,
madness of one irresponsible King, Emperor, Czar, Mikado or President may
plunge the whole world into war-misery that will last for generations.
There are other cases where war is not only inevitable, but actually
desirable from a standpoint of world advantage. Imagine a highly
civilised and progressive nation, a strong prosperous nation, wisely and
efficiently governed, as may be true, some day, of the United States of
America. Let us suppose this nation to be surrounded by a number of weak
and unenlightened states, always quarrelling, badly and corruptly
managed, like Mexico and some of the Central American republics. Would it
not be better for the world if this strong, enlightened nation took
possession of its backward neighbours, even by force of arms, and taught
them how to live and how to make the best of their neglected resources
and possibilities? Would not these weak nations be more prosperous and
happier after incorporation with the strong nation? Is not Egypt better
off and happier since the British occupation? Were not the wars that
created united Italy and united Germany justified? Does any one regret
our civil war? It was necessary, was it not?
Similarly it is better for the world that we fought and conquered the
American Indians and took their land to use it, in accordance with our
higher destiny, for greater and nobler purposes than they could either
conceive of or execute. It is better for the world that by a revolution
(even a disingenuous one) we took Panama from incompetent Colombians
and, by our intelligence, our courage and our vast resources, changed a
fever-ridden strip of jungle into a waterway that now joins two oceans
and will save untold billions for the commerce of the earth.
Carrying a step farther this idea of world efficiency through war, it is
probable that future generations will be grateful to some South American
nation, perhaps Brazil, or Chile or the Argentine Republic, that shall
one day be wise and strong enough to lay the foundations on the field of
battle (Mr. Bryan may think this could be accomplished by peaceful
negotiations, but he is mistaken) for the United States of South America.
And why not ultimately the United States of Europe, the United States of
Asia, the United States of Africa, all created by useful and progressive
wars? Consider the increased efficiency, prosperity and happiness that
must come through such unions of small nations now trying separately and
ineffectively to carry on multiple activities that could be far better
carried on collectively. Our American Union, born of war, proves this,
does it not?
“United we stand, divided we fall,” applies not merely to states,
counties and townships, but to nations, to empires, to continents.
Continents will be the last to join hands across the seas (having first
waged vast inter-continental wars) and then, after the rise and fall of
many sovereignties, there will be established on the earth the last great
government, the United States of the World!
That is the logical limit of human activities. Are we not all citizens of
the earth, descended from the same parents, born with the same needs and
capacities? Why should there be fifty-three barriers dividing men into
fifty-three nations? Why should there be any other patriotism than world
patriotism? Or any other government than one world government?
When this splendid ultimate consummation has been achieved, after ages of
painful evolution (we must remember that the human race is still in its
infancy) our remote descendants, united in language, religion and
customs, with a great world representative government finally established
and the law of love prevailing, may begin preparations for a grand world
celebration of the last war. Say, in the year A.D. 2921!
But not until then!
If this reasoning is sound, if war must be regarded, for centuries to
come, as an inevitable part of human existence, then let us, as loyal
Americans, realise that, hate war as we may, there is only way in which
the United States can be insured against the horrors of armed invasion,
with the shame of disastrous defeat and possible dismemberment, and that
is by developing the strength and valiance to meet all probable
assailants on land or sea.
Whether we like it or not we are a great world power, fated to become far
greater, unless we throw away our advantages; we must either accept the
average world standards, which call for military preparedness, or impose
new standards upon a world which concedes no rights to nations that have
not the might to guard and enforce those rights.
Why should we Americans hesitate to pay the trifling cost of insurance
against war? Trifling? Yes. The annual cost of providing and maintaining
an adequate army and navy would be far less than we spend every year on
tobacco and alcohol. Less than fifty cents a month from every citizen
would be sufficient. That amount, wisely expended, would enormously
lessen the probability of war and would allow the United States, if war
came, to face its enemies with absolute serenity. The Germans are willing
to pay the cost of preparedness. So are the French, the Italians, the
Japanese, the Swiss, the Balkan peoples, the Turks. Do we love our
country less than they do? Do we think our institutions, our freedom less
worthy than theirs of being guarded for posterity?
Why should we not adopt a system of military training something like the
one that has given such excellent results in Switzerland? Why not cease
to depend upon our absurd little standing army which, for its strength
and organisation, is frightfully expensive and absolutely inadequate, and
depend instead upon a citizenry trained and accustomed to arms, with a
permanent body of competent officers, at least 50,000, whose lives would
be spent in giving one year military training to the young men of this
nation, all of them, say between the ages of eighteen and twenty-three,
so that these young men could serve their country efficiently, if the
need arose? Why not accept the fact that it is neither courageous nor
democratic for us to depend upon hired soldiers to defend our country?
Does any one doubt that a year of such military training would be of
lasting benefit to the men of America? Would it not school them in
much-needed habits of discipline and self-control, habits which must be
learned sooner or later if a man is to succeed? Would not the open air
life, the physical exercise, the regularity of hours tend to improve
their health and make them better citizens?
Suppose that once every five years all American men up to fifty were
required to go into military camp and freshen up on their defence duties
for twenty or thirty days. Would that do them any harm? On the contrary,
it would do them immense good.
And even if war never came, is it not evident that America would benefit
in numberless ways by such a development of the general manhood spirit?
Who can say how much of Germany’s greatness in business and commerce, in
the arts and sciences, is due to the fact that _all_ her men, through
military schooling, have learned precious lessons in self-control and
obedience?
The pacifists tell us that after the present European war, we shall have
nothing to fear for many years from exhausted Europe, but let us not be
too sure of that. History teaches that long and costly wars do not
necessarily exhaust a nation or lessen its readiness to undertake new
wars. On the contrary, the habit of fighting leads easily to more
fighting. The Napoleonic wars lasted over twenty years. At the close of
our civil war we had great generals and a formidable army of veteran
soldiers and would have been willing and able immediately to engage in a
fresh war against France had she not yielded to our demand and withdrawn
Maximilian from Mexico. Bulgaria recently fought two wars within a year,
the second leaving her exhausted and prostrate; yet within two years she
was able to enter upon a third war stronger than ever.
If Germany wins in the present great conflict she may quite conceivably
turn to America for the vast money indemnity that she will be unable to
exact from her depleted enemies in Europe; and if Germany loses or half
loses she may decide to retrieve her desperate fortunes in this tempting
and undefended field. With her African empire hopelessly lost to her,
where more naturally than to facile America will she turn for her coveted
place in the sun?
And if not Germany, it may well be some other great nation that will
attack us. Perhaps Great Britain! Especially if our growing merchant
marine threatens her commercial supremacy of the sea, which is her life.
Perhaps Japan! whose attack on Germany in 1914 shows plainly that she
merely awaits favourable opportunity to dispose of any of her rivals in
the Orient. Let us bear in mind that, in the opinion of the world’s
greatest authorities, we Americans are to-day totally unprepared to
defend ourselves against a first-class foreign power. My story aims to
show this, and high officers in our army and navy, who have assisted me
in the preparation of this book and to whom I am grateful, assure me that
I have set forth the main facts touching our military defencelessness
without exaggeration. C. M.
WASHINGTON’S BIRTHDAY, 1916.
CHAPTER I
I WITNESS THE BLOWING UP OF THE PANAMA CANAL
In my thirty years’ service as war correspondent of the London _Times_ I
have looked behind the scenes of various world happenings, and have known
the thrill of personally facing some great historic crises; but there is
nothing in my experience so dramatic, so pregnant with human
consequences, as the catastrophe of April 27, 1921, when the Gatun Locks
of the Panama Canal were destroyed by dynamite.
At that moment I was seated on the shaded, palm-bordered piazza of the
Grand Hotel at Colon, discussing with Rear-Admiral Thomas Q. Allyn of the
United States Navy the increasing chances that America might find herself
plunged into war with Japan. For weeks the clouds had been darkening, and
it was now evident that the time had come when the United States must
either abandon the Monroe Doctrine and the open door in China, or fight
to maintain these doctrines.
“Mr. Langston,” the Admiral was saying, “the situation is extremely
grave. Japan intends to carry out her plans of expansion in Mexico and
China, and possibly in the Philippines; there is not a doubt of it. Her
fleet is cruising somewhere in the Pacific,--we don’t know where,--and
our Atlantic fleet passed through the Canal yesterday, as you know, to
make a demonstration of force in the Pacific and to be ready for--for
whatever may come.”
His hands closed nervously, and he studied the horizon with half-shut
eyes.
In the course of our talk Admiral Allyn had admitted that the United
States was woefully unprepared for conflict with a great power, either on
sea or land.
“The blow will be struck suddenly,” he went on, “you may be sure of that.
Our military preparations are so utterly inadequate that we may suffer
irreparable harm before we can begin to use our vast resources. You know
when Prussia struck Austria in 1866 the war was over in three months.
When Germany struck France in 1870 the decisive battle, Sedan, was fought
forty-seven days later. When Japan struck Russia, the end was foreseen
within four or five months.”
“It wasn’t so in the great European war,” I remarked.
“Why not? Because England held the mastery of the sea. But we hold the
mastery of nothing. Our fleet is barely third among the nations and we
are frightfully handicapped by our enormous length of coast line and by
this canal.”
“The Canal gives us a great advantage, doesn’t it? I thought it doubled
the efficiency of our fleet?”
“It does nothing of the sort. The Canal may be seized. It may be put out
of commission for weeks or months by landslides or earthquakes. A few
hostile ships of the _Queen Elizabeth_ class lying ten miles off shore at
either end, with ranges exactly fixed, or a good shot from an aeroplane,
could not only destroy the Canal’s insufficient defences, but could
prevent our fleet from coming through, could hold it, useless, in the
Atlantic when it might be needed to save California or useless in the
Pacific when it might be needed to save New York. If it happened when war
began that one half of our fleet was in the Atlantic and the other half
in the Pacific, then the enemy could keep these two halves separated and
destroy them one by one.”
“I suppose you mean that we need two fleets?”
“Of course we do--a child can see it--if we are to guard our two
seaboards. We must have a fleet in the Atlantic strong enough to resist
any probable attack from the East, and another fleet in the Pacific
strong enough to resist any probable attack from the West.
“But listen to this, think of this,” the veteran warrior leaned towards
me, shaking an eager fore-finger. “At the present moment our entire
fleet, if massed off Long Island, would be inferior to a fleet that
Germany could send across the Atlantic against us by many ships, many
submarines and many aeroplanes. And hopelessly inferior in men and
ammunition, including torpedoes.”
As I listened I felt myself falling under the spell of the Admiral’s
eloquence. He was so sure of what he said. These dangers unquestionably
existed, but--were they about to descend upon America? Must we really
face the horrors of a war of invasion?
“Your arguments are very convincing, sir, and yet--” I hesitated.
“Well?”
“You speak as if these things were going to happen _right now,_ but there
are no signs of war, no clouds on the horizon.”
The Admiral waved this aside with an impatient gesture.
“I tell you the blow will come suddenly. Were there any clouds on the
European horizon in July, 1914? Yet a few persons knew, just as I have
known for months, that war was inevitable.”
“Known?” I repeated.
Very deliberately the grizzled sea fighter lighted a fresh cigar before
replying.
“Mr. Langston, I’ll tell you a little story that explains why I am posing
as a prophet. You can put it in your memoirs some day--if my prophecy
comes true. It’s the story of an American naval officer, a young
lieutenant, who--well, he went wrong about a year ago. He got into the
clutches of a woman spy in the employ of a foreign government. He met
this woman in Marseilles on our last Mediterranean cruise and fell in
love with her--hopelessly. She’s one of those devilish sirens that no
full-blooded man can resist and, the extraordinary part of it is, she
fell in love with him--genuinely in love.
“Well--it was a bad business. This officer gave the woman all he had,
told her all he knew, and finally he asked her to marry him. Yes. He
didn’t care what she was. He just wanted her. And she was so happy, so
crazy about him, that she almost yielded; she was ready to turn over a
new leaf, to settle down as his wife, but--”
“But she didn’t do it?” I smiled.
The Admiral shook his head.
“He was a poor man--just a lieutenant’s pay and she couldn’t give up her
grand life. But she loved him enough to try to save him, enough to leave
him. She wrote him a wonderful letter, poured her soul out to him, gave
him certain military secrets of the government she was working for--they
would have shot her in a minute, you understand, if they had known
it--and she told him to take this information as a proof of her love and
use it to save the United States.”
I was listening now with absorbed interest.
“What government was she working for?”
The Admiral paused to relight his cigar.
“Wait! The next thing was that this lieutenant came to me, as a friend of
his father and an admiral of the American fleet, and made a clean breast
of everything. He made his confession in confidence, but asked me to use
the knowledge as I saw fit without mentioning his name. I did use it
and”--the Admiral’s frown deepened--“the consequence was no one believed
me. They said the warning was too vague. You know the attitude of recent
administrations towards all questions of national defence. It’s always
politics before patriotism, always the fear of losing middle west
pacifist votes. It’s disgusting--horrible!”
“Was the warning really vague?”
“Vague. My God!” The old sea dog bounded from his chair. “I’ll tell you
how vague it was. A statement was definitely made that before May 1,
1921, a great foreign power would make war upon the United States and
would begin by destroying the Panama Canal. To-day is April 27, 1921. I
don’t say these things are going to happen within three days but, Mr.
Langston, as purely as the sun shines on that ocean, we Americans are
living in a fool’s paradise. We are drunk with prosperity. We are deaf
and blind to the truth which is known to other nations, known to our
enemies, known to the ablest officers in our army and navy.
“The truth is that, as a nation, we have learned nothing from our past
wars because we have never had to fight a first-class power that was
prepared. But the next war, and it is surely coming, will find us held in
the grip of an inexorable law which provides that nations imitating the
military policy of China must suffer the fate of China.”
The Admiral now explained why he had sent for me. It was to suggest that
I cable the London _Times_, urging my paper to use its influence, through
British diplomatic channels, to avert another great war. I pointed out
that the chances of such intervention were slight. Great Britain was
still smarting under the memory of Americans’ alleged indifference to
everything but money in 1918 when the United States stood by,
unprotesting, and saw England stripped of her mastery of the sea after
the loss of Gibraltar and the Suez Canal.
“There are two sides to that,” frowned the Admiral, “but one thing is
certain--it’s England or no one. We have nothing to hope for from Russia;
she has what she wants--Constantinople. Nothing to hope for from France;
she has her lost provinces back. And as for Germany--Germany is waiting,
recuperating, watching her chance for a place in the South American sun.”
“Germany managed well in the Geneva Peace Congress of 1919,” I said.
The veteran of Manila threw down his cigarette impatiently.
“Bismarck could have done no better. They bought off Europe, they
crippled England and--they isolated America.”
“By the way,” continued the Admiral, “I must show you some things in my
scrap book. You will be astonished. Wait a minute. I’ll get it.”
The old fellow hurried off and presently returned with a heavy volume
bound in red leather.
“Take it up to your room to-night and look it over. You will find the
most overwhelming mass of testimony to the effect that to-day, in spite
of all that has been said and written and all the money spent, the United
States is totally unprepared to defend its coasts or uphold its national
honour. Just open the book anywhere--you’ll see.”
I obeyed and came upon this statement by Theodore Roosevelt:
What befell Antwerp and Brussels will surely some day befall New York or
San Francisco, and may happen to many an inland city also, if we do not
shake off our supine folly, if we trust for safety to peace treaties
unbacked by force.
“Pretty strong words for an ex-President of the United States to be
using,” nodded the Admiral. “And true! Try another place.”
I did so and came upon this from the pen of Gerhard von
Schulze-Gaevernitz, professor of political economy at the University of
Freiburg and a member of the Reichstag:
Flattered and deftly lulled to sleep by British influence, public
opinion in the United States will not wake up until the ‘yellow New
England’ of the Orient, nurtured and deflected from Australia by England
herself, knocks at the gates of the new world. Not a patient and meek
China, but a warlike and conquest-bound Japan will be the aggressor when
that day comes. Then America will be forced to fight under unfavourable
conditions.
The famous campaigner’s eyes flashed towards the Pacific.
“When that day comes! Ah! Speaking of Japan,” he turned over the pages in
nervous haste. “Here we are! You can see how much the Japanese love us!
Listen! This is an extract from the most popular book in Japan to-day. It
is issued by Japan’s powerful and official National Defence Association
with a view to inflaming the Japanese people against the United States
and preparing them for a war of invasion against this country. Listen to
this:
“Let America beware! For our cry, ‘On to California! On to Hawaii!
On to the Philippines!’ is becoming only secondary to our imperial
anthem!... To arms! We must seize our standards, unfurl them to the winds
and advance without the least fear, as America has no army worthy the
name, and with the Panama Canal destroyed, its few battleships will be of
no use until too late.
“I tell you, Mr. Langston,” pursued the Admiral, “we Americans are to-day
the most hated nation on earth. The richest, the most arrogant, the most
hated nation on earth! And helpless! Defenceless! Believe me, that’s a
bad combination. Look at this! Read this! It’s a cablegram to the New
York _Tribune_, published on May 21, 1915, from Miss Constance Drexel, an
American delegate to the Woman’s Peace Conference at The Hague:
“I have just come out of Germany and perhaps the predominating impression
I bring with me is Germany’s hatred of America. Germany feels that war
with America is only a matter of time. Everywhere I went I found the same
sentiment, and the furthest distance away I found the war put was ten
years. It was said to me: ‘We must settle with England first, but then
will come America’s turn. If we don’t make war on you ourselves we will
get Japan into a war with you, and then we will supply arms and munitions
to Japan.’”
At this point, I remember, I had turned to order an orange liqueur, when
the crash came.
It was terrific. Every window in the hotel was shattered, and some scores
of labourers working near the Gatun Locks were killed instantly. Six
hundred tons of dynamite, secreted in the hold of a German merchantman,
had been exploded as the vessel passed through the locks, and ten
thousand tons of Portland cement had sunk in the tangled iron wreck, to
form a huge blockading mass of solid rock on the floor of the narrow
passage.
Needless to say, every man on the German ship thus sacrificed died at his
post.
The Admiral stared in dismay when the news was brought to him.
“Germany!” he muttered. “And our fleet is in the Pacific!”
“Does it mean war?” I asked.
“Yes, of course. Unquestionably it means war. We have been misled. We
were thinking of one enemy, and we have been struck by another. We
thought we could send our fleet through the Canal and get it back easily;
but--now we cannot get it back for at least two months!”