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Show CURRENT COMMENT CAKING Flag Day as his text, the president with grim directness has bared the intrigues and chicanery practiced by Germany in her efforts to attain at-tain her "place in the sun." It is, one feels, not a pleasant task that Mr. Wilson set himself, but a most necessary one, in order to reveal to the en-tiro en-tiro country why America was obligated to plant the Stars and Stripes in the forefront of battlo overseas. "We are accountable at the bar of history" for the use of our flag "and must plead in utter frankness what purpose it is we seek to serve." Reviewing the extraordinary insults and aggressions of the imperial government, the president makes clear to anyone left in doubt why there was no self-respecting choice but to take up arms in defense of our rights as a free people and of our honor as a sovereign government. Briefly but succinctly the contemptible acts of the German government are traversed. How the military masters of Germany denied us the right to be neutral, pervading this country with vicious spies and conspirators, tampering with our citizens, seeking by violence to destroy our commerce and halt our industries, trying to incite Mexico to war against us, and to array Japan as our ' enemy. Impudently denying us the use of the high seas, threatening death to our people If they dared to venture within the interdicted territory. It is a ruthless indictment, not of the German people but of the imperious rulers of Germany. Their Machiavellian plans to control the Balkan states, to dictate to Turkey and Persia as they already dictate to and control Austria-Hungary, Austria-Hungary, are recited and their objects set forth. Why Germany wants peace is obvious. It wishes to close its bargain before it is too late and it has little left to offer for the pound of flesh it will demand. The imperial government has reached an impasse; it cannot go further; it dare not go back. If it is forced back, its power at home is threatened. It has but one chance to perpetuate its military power. Peace with its immense advantages ad-vantages gained on its own terms will be justification for its conduct before the German people; with it the prestige of its rulers will be secure, hence their political power and Germany's commercial opportunities will be assured and the world undone. If they fail, the German people are saved and the world will be at peace, concludes the president. On the contrary, if they succeed, America will fall within the menace, which means that we and all other nations must remain re-main armed, waiting for Germany's next step in aggression. This, then, explains the imperial government's increasing desire for peace and its new Intrigues to gain its ends. It is using as dupes political groups it has hitherto despised and oppressed, and which, once it attains its objects, will again be the buffet of the military masters of the nation. Agents In various guises are at work in the United States spreading the propaganda of "peace," which, as shown, is but another form of German impudence. But, as the president presi-dent observes, they make no headway; behind their masks are discernible their disloyalties. Their sophistries deceive only the feeble-minded. We are at war to insure freedom and justice and self-government among all the nations of the world, including the German people. We have made our choice, and, to quote the president, "woe be to the man or group of men that seeks to stand in our way in that day of high resolution, when every principle we hold dearest is to be vindicated and made secure for the salvation of the nations." What better Flag Day, straight-from-the-heart talk than this? L. A. Graphic. |
