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Show PREPAREDNESS. It is perhaps too early to say -what will be the results of the investigation into our naval and military preparedness. prepared-ness. Certain ideas, however, seem, to loo talcing more or le6s definito form. Senator Weeks is of the opinion that no appropriation by the present con gress should be for a specitie numDer of dreadnoughts or other ships, but should be turned over as a lump sum , to be expended as the president and the general board of the navy might decide. The argument in favor of such action is that the European war is a supreme test of the various I types of warships, and that until tho naval operations have been carried' to a more decisive stage evon tho experts ex-perts will be nnable to determine which types of ships should be retained and which abandoned. Before the appropriation ap-propriation of the present congress can be used the war probably will have furnished fur-nished a. complete demonstration for the benefit of tho naval board, which then can make every dollar of tho omnibus om-nibus appropriation tell by , wise expenditure. ex-penditure. It should be added that the war as far as it has gone seems to have proved the superior efficiency of two lands of ships the submarines and tho dreadnoughts. Torpedo boats, destroyers destroy-ers and light cruisers, except the fast i scout and raiding cruisers, have not accomplished much. With reference to the army, two conflicting con-flicting ideas are conspicuous. On the one hand, we have the president and the peace partisans deprecating any thing that tends towara militarism, to is pointed out in support of this position posi-tion that when the war ends the nations na-tions no longer will be able to finance vast armies and will be compelled com-pelled to agree upon disarmament. If meantime the United States shall have committed itself to a larger military establishment the cause of disarmament, j it is argued, will be weakened fatally and the whole world will be driven to resume a rivalry which brought on the greatest war iu human history. The advocates of an enlarged army point out that the United States is not prepared to defend itself in case of attack by any first-class power. They declare that we should have an army of at least 500,000 men with provisions for several hundred thousand reserves. The president's plan is not to enlarge the army, but to provide means by which any citizen desiring to acquire knowledge of the military art shall be permitted to volunteer for training. Both plans have the same end in view an adequate number of well-trained men for immediate service in case of war. ' |