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Show What Associated Press staff writer wri-ter Richard L. Turner called "a j new and to some, a startling phase in the argument for helping help-ing Great Britain. "' recently appeared ap-peared while the Senate was de-baling de-baling the lease-lend bill. This new phase was the admission that the proposed policy involves the risk of war. The opponents of the lease-lend lease-lend measure have long used that as their prime weapon. They have declared that once the bill becomes law it will be only a matter of months before we are active participants par-ticipants in the war against the Axis. At the beginning, however, the bill's supporters general!,;' pooh-poohed that supposition. They sad that the measure could not carry us any closer to war. Now their tone has undergone significant change. For example, Senator Barkley, the majority leader, recently said that "the course we chart is not without risk." Going a long step farther, Senator Pepper, one of the most aggressive backers of all-out aid to Britain, said, "If the action we propose will not save England, we will save it anyway.'' Frankest of all was Senator Bailey, another leader of Democratic forces, who said: "I am hoping that intervention may not mean war, but I am ready if intervention does mean war.'' The President himself said that there were hazards in any course that this country might pursue in its foreign policy. It was ob-. ob-. vious that the possibility of war was in his mind when, in answer ans-wer to a question at a press conference, con-ference, he said that even if we were to engage in naval hostili-,ties hostili-,ties with Japan, there would be ho let-up in our sending supplies to England. The Administration stand is that, risky as the lease-lend lease-lend bill policy may be, it contains con-tains the greatest assurance for I American security with the least risk of war. If we went to war, it is apparent ap-parent that, at the beginning, our participation would involve the navy and perhaps the air force, not the army. Britain could certainly cer-tainly use our fighting fleet the great British navy, which has sustained sus-tained heavy losses, is spread out dangerously thin. She must command com-mand the North Sea, the Mediterranean, Medi-terranean, and a considerable part of the Far and Near East. She must convoy the merchant ships J that bring her supplies from the New World and Oceania. Herj fighting force in the Orient is inferior to Japan's. Britain has plenty of men in Khaki today she' hasn't enough floating gun plat-' forms. In theory, if we should go to war with Germany, Japan would at once attack us. She might at-' tempt to seize the Phillipines and the lesser Pacific islands wheih fly the American flag. And then what might prove one of the greatest naval wars of all time1 would begin. I |