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Chapter
Four
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| WELL,
it's a racket, all right. A
few profit – and the many pay. But there is a way to stop it. You
can't end it by disarmament conferences. You can't eliminate it by peace
parleys at Geneva. Well-meaning but impractical groups can't wipe it out
by resolutions. It can be smashed effectively only by taking the profit
out of war. The
only way to smash this racket is to conscript capital and industry and
labor before the nations manhood can be conscripted. One month before
the Government can conscript the young men of the nation – it must
conscript capital and industry and labor. Let the officers and the directors
and the high-powered executives of our armament factories and our munitions
makers and our shipbuilders and our airplane builders and the manufacturers
of all the other things that provide profit in war time as well as the
bankers and the speculators, be conscripted – to get $30 a month,
the same wage as the lads in the trenches get. Let
the workers in these plants get the same wages – all the workers,
all presidents, all executives, all directors, all managers, all bankers
– yes,
and all generals and all admirals and all officers and all politicians
and all government office holders – everyone in the nation be restricted
to a total monthly income not to exceed that paid to the soldier in the
trenches! Why
shouldn't they? They
aren't running any risk of being killed or of having their bodies mangled
or their minds shattered. They aren't sleeping in muddy trenches. They
aren't hungry. The soldiers are! Give
capital and industry and labor thirty days to think it over and you will
find, by that time, there will be no war. That will smash the war racket
– that and nothing else. Maybe
I am a little too optimistic. Capital still has some say. So capital won't
permit the taking of the profit out of war until the people – those
who do the suffering and still pay the price – make up their minds
that those they elect to office shall do their bidding, and not that of
the profiteers. Another
step necessary in this fight to smash the war racket is the limited plebiscite
to determine whether a war should be declared. A plebiscite not of all
the voters but merely of those who would be called upon to do the fighting
and dying. There wouldn't be very much sense in having a 76-year-old president
of a munitions factory or the flat-footed head of an international banking
firm or the cross-eyed manager of a uniform manufacturing plant –
all of whom see visions of tremendous profits in the event of war –
voting on whether the nation should go to war or not. They never would
be called upon to shoulder arms – to sleep in a trench and to be
shot. Only those who would be called upon to risk their lives for their
country should have the privilege of voting to determine whether the nation
should go to war. There
is ample precedent for restricting the voting to those affected. Many
of our states have restrictions on those permitted to vote. In most, it
is necessary to be able to read and write before you may vote. In some,
you must own property. It would be a simple matter each year for the men
coming of military age to register in their communities as they did in
the draft during the World War and be examined physically. Those who could
pass and who would therefore be called upon to bear arms in the event
of war would be eligible to vote in a limited plebiscite. They should
be the ones to have the power to decide – and not a Congress few
of whose members are within the age limit and fewer still of whom are
in physical condition to bear arms. Only those who must suffer should
have the right to vote. A
third step in this business of smashing the war racket is to make certain
that our military forces are truly forces for defense only. At
each session of Congress the question of further naval appropriations
comes up. The swivel-chair admirals of Washington (and there are always
a lot of them) are very adroit lobbyists. And they are smart. They don't
shout that "We need a lot of battleships to war on this nation or
that nation." Oh no. First of all, they let it be known that America
is menaced by a great naval power. Almost any day, these admirals will
tell you, the great fleet of this supposed enemy will strike suddenly
and annihilate 125,000,000 people. Just like that. Then they begin to
cry for a larger navy. For what? To fight the enemy? Oh my, no. Oh, no.
For defense purposes only. Then,
incidentally, they announce maneuvers in the Pacific. For defense. Uh,
huh. The
Pacific is a great big ocean. We have a tremendous coastline on the Pacific.
Will the maneuvers be off the coast, two or three hundred miles? Oh, no.
The maneuvers will be two thousand, yes, perhaps even thirty-five hundred
miles, off the coast. The
Japanese, a proud people, of course will be pleased beyond expression
to see the united States fleet so close to Nippon's shores. Even as pleased
as would be the residents of California were they to dimly discern through
the morning mist, the Japanese fleet playing at war games off Los Angeles. The
ships of our navy, it can be seen, should be specifically limited, by
law, to within 200 miles of our coastline. Had that been the law in 1898
the Maine would never have gone to Havana Harbor. She never would have
been blown up. There would have been no war with Spain with its attendant
loss of life. Two hundred miles is ample, in the opinion of experts, for
defense purposes. Our nation cannot start an offensive war if its ships
can't go further than 200 miles from the coastline. Planes might be permitted
to go as far as 500 miles from the coast for purposes of reconnaissance.
And the army should never leave the territorial limits of our nation. To
summarize: Three steps must be taken to smash the war racket. We
must take the profit out of war. We
must permit the youth of the land who would bear arms to decide whether
or not there should be war. We
must limit our military forces to home defense purposes. |
