[Illustration:
1890–98: 51 Millions
Annual Cost of
the Army and
Navy of the
United States
1902–10: 185 Millions
COMPARISON OF THE ANNUAL COST OF THE ARMY AND NAVY OF THE
UNITED STATES--1890–98, 1902–10]
Overproduction of offspring--“race-suicide” by suffocation instead
of by starvation--is responsible, we are now told, for the impulse
that is driving the great nations toward war. Germany has outgrown
her territory and must seize on some of Great Britain’s colonial
overflow territory; Japan is similarly plethoric with population and
must disgorge into our Philippines. This is the simple explanation of
modern militarism offered by Henry M. Hyde, writing under the title
that heads this article, in _The Technical World Magazine_. His
theory has the advantage that most of the great world-movements in
recorded history may be traced to this cause, from the Aryan migration
to the daily influx of Poles and Hungarians on our own shores. After
dwelling on the recent huge increase of armaments, the hasty building
of dreadnoughts, the war-scares in England, the eager toasts on German
battleships “to the Day”--meaning the day when the Kaiser shall turn
loose his dogs of war on Britain--the writer goes on:
What is the matter with the world? What is the disease from
which civilization suffers? And where are the physicians who
shall prescribe the necessary remedies?
Pending an answer to these ancient and disputed questions, it is
desired to point out certain facts which may help to explain the
present situation and to ask whether, because of these facts,
the nations may not, almost in spite of themselves, be driven
into war?
In 1800 France had 4,000,000 more population than Germany. At
that time both nations occupied approximately the same amount
of territory, about 200,000 square miles each. The density of
population in France was 134 to the square mile; in Germany it
was 113.
[Illustration: COMPARATIVE DENSITY OF POPULATION
United States 30 per sq. mile Germany 303 per sq. mile
Canada 2 per sq. mile Japan 315 per sq. mile Philippines
69 per sq. mile South America 7 per sq. mile]
In the last hundred years the fertility of the German nation has
been so great that, in spite of the fact that it has sent more
than 6,000,000 emigrants to the United States and millions more
to other foreign countries, it has increased its home population
to 64,000,000, nearly treble the number in 1800. During the same
period the population of France, which has sent practically
no immigrants abroad, has increased by less than 50 per cent.
And, it should be remembered, in spite of Alsace and Lorraine,
the territory of the two nations has remained practically the
same--approximately 200,000 square miles each.
[Illustration: COMPARATIVE NAVAL STRENGTH OF ENGLAND AND
GERMANY IN TERMS OF DREADNOUGHTS
1907 - Germany None England (four) 1910 - Germany (seven)
England (seven)]
[Illustration: AT THE END OF THREE YEARS Comparative
naval strength of the nations, in dreadnoughts, in 1913;
the United States has six dreadnoughts, built and building.
Germany England Austria Russia Japan France Italy]
At present the density of population in the German Empire is
303 to the square mile. What that means may be grasped by
considering that if the United States was as thickly populated
as Germany is at the present time we should have 900,000,000
people--ten times our present population. In other words the
present density of population in the United States is only 30 to
the square mile.
If there were ten men to the present one on every acre in the
United States some of us would certainly think of moving.
Indeed, there is already complaint that the country is getting
overcrowded. This year alone nearly 100,000 farmers from the
Western States moved across the line into Canada, where land is
still plenty and unsettled. If every man, woman and child in the
United States was shut up within the limits of Texas, the Lone
Star State would be little more crowded than is Germany at the
present time. Put the strongest navy in the world across the
Gulf from Texas and line the boundaries of the State with camps
of armed men and one may get a fairly good idea of the German
situation.
But--granted that Germany now holds all the people it can
support--where may the loyal German go and remain under the
German flag? The German colonies are small, scattering and not
well fitted for the homes of white men. There are hundreds of
thousands of Germans in various parts of South America, where
the country is still undeveloped. But the United States holds
all this continent under the protection of the Monroe Doctrine
and forbids the hoisting of a foreign flag. Almost all the rest
of the undeveloped world which is counted a white man’s country
is part of the Empire of Great Britain.
Where and how shall the immensely virile and fertile Germanic
race find a new home and a new empire over seas? Or will it,
with the greatest army in the world at its command and a
tremendous war fleet in the making, sit tight within its narrow
boundaries at home until famine and pestilence sap its vitality
and reduce its numbers? It may do that, it may allow millions of
its sons to renounce their allegiance to the fatherland, or it
may--the last terrible alternative is the one of which the world
stands in dread.
(3426)
See ARMIES OF THE WORLD; MILITARISM; NAVIES OF THE WORLD.