OCR Text |
Show DANISH WEST INDIES. f the United States takes over the Danish West Indies it will add 13S 1 ;. square miles to its territory and about ; -(.jjiiOd to its population. Three islands, St. Thomas, yt. John and St. Croix, will hoist the Stars and Stripes. That does not seem to be a very in-ring in-ring prospect, but all depends upon the point of view. When Lord Salisbury Salis-bury traded Helgoland for some land on the east African coast he regarded Bismarck as a kind of chump. But England today has little respect for Salisbury's acumen in this particular deal. Helgoland has a strategic value : for Germany in naval warfare which cannot be easily computed in money. The price demanded by Denmark for -," the three little islands of the Lesser ' Antilles is said to be $'23,000,000, and y we paid only $7,200,000 for Russian America, now called Alaska, in 1567. Alaska has returned to us in wealth many times the original cost, but it will be long before the Danish 'West ludies ;. will be worth $25,000,000 to us commercially. com-mercially. It is the strategic value of the islands that counts. Ask a naval expert what ' the islands are worth and he will immediately im-mediately begin to draw dotted lines to . every part of the Atlantic ocean, in- ; eluding the Gulf of Mexico, to show the t importance of the Danish West Indies to a power having a naval base and a coaling station there. For $25,000,000 we can build two dreadnought battleships. battle-ships. The naval expert probably would tell the inquisitive layman yhat in the ,, ... long run the Danish islands would be worth several fleets of battleships. But it is not so much the strategic , value of possessing the islands that . " counts as the strategic value of keeping any other power from possessing them. Great Britain has a strategic position in the West Indies that is sure to cause us a heart-rending amount of trouble in case of a war with her. If Bhe should possess herself of the Danish. West Indies this trouble would not be greatly increased. Our chief concern is to prevent pre-vent a 'new naval power from bein added to the naval powers already anchored off our southeast coast. That new naval power is Germany. Sho has no naval base on this side of the Atlantic At-lantic and needs one sofedv if she ever is to win for her monarch the might ' that goes with the title which German publicists, after the battle of Jutland, conferred upon the kaiser, the title of "Admiral of the Atlantic. " Germany has wanted the islands thee many years and might have obtained them had not the Danish people, cherished hatreds that had come down to them from the time when Trus-ia robbed Denmark of S.-hh'pwig. The German government was willing to risk war wi'h the Tinted Slates to get th islands, for, according to some of our own statesmen, Germany would be violating the Monroe doctrine were she to annex and colonize the Danish West Indies. Perhaps in a few d;;ys we shall hear that Germany lias at t"mpt ed to put a veto on the sale of the island?. If the negotiations had br-ni in progress at the time the l.'tiropcan war bog;m, Germain- i "light have invaded I'nmark as well a1 Belgium. She may dn it yet, for that ma'ter. But now i.; as good a time as any for the I'liitd States to ta!;e over the i-lands perhaps it is tlm best op-ficrtuuity op-ficrtuuity wo shall have, for it must not bo iosf siczr.r of that Germany and pome of the other Kuropenn nations are quite bi:v with other ina 1 1 fin just now. It is said the harbors of St. Thomas nrd St. I'rolx are. of fir sr. importance to the Ani'Ti'-nn navy and that St. Thomas lies in the lane of shipping from T'uropc to the Panama canal. Tf flu- trnatv is ra t i fied at this time D'-nma r'; wi 11 re-cf'iv' re-cf'iv' five times ,v- much as si:n wontd have In-en pnid had the Danish senate consented to the sale a few years auo, when the Danish government, offered the islands for .", 000, oon anil I lie X'nited Stafes jumped at the chance. The Migar output of the iland.s under A me He an ownership will be no longer excluded from tin- PinU'd Stale by t h1 t a riff irn p-! , but wi J I eorne into the eountrv free and Gins compete with Ire"1 product, of one of our grefit aii'l growing indu-triec. Wlflher prices will thoreViv be riffeeted nwnain.s to be seen. Something tells us that before our niilil i-iincu finally reached the .border in those Boston v Maine day coaches I they found some means of prying open the windows. Bo-don Transcript. |