Show dispelling THE FOG by charles michelson it would be interesting to learn just what act of hitler would in the estimation of the opponents of americas defense policy justify counter measures on our part senator wheeler and others of the isolation group characterized our venture in iceland as an aggressive gres sive war var measure and prophesied t that hat it would be followed b by Y our occupation of the gals A ares 7 ires and me verde islands in portugal Poi Poll ugal has icen assured that we were perfectly satisfied to have those islands remain in neutral hands bands a and nd could have hav no designs on them as long iona as that condition prevailed suppose we had not occupied iceland with the 14 consent and inai tation of the Ic elanders and that get belmany many successfully attacked the british force there and took over the country would the anti admin adain senators in such a case insist that it was none of our bus iness aness it is only a hop from lealand to greenland and thence to canada it requires no military strategists to figure out the implied I 1 menace to this country we are engaged in a huge effort to protect this country against possible extension of the nazi con 1 quests our occupation or 0 this base before germany could seize it I 1 is just as plainly an element of national defense as our doubling our navy and building a modern army we are pledged to withdraw our forces at the termination of the emergency that brought brou glit our marines or whatever troops are arc required there to iceland we dont want the azores or 1 cape verdes or dakar but we might want them if it appeared that hitler meant to occupy them for then they would be a threat w wa could not ignore it is not a question of hemispherical ica 1 1 limitations imi t a ti 0 ns holland and france both conquered by hitler have possessions on this side of the atlantic I 1 the axis forces are using french and dutch ports as their chief bases in their assault on england doubtless they would use martinique of french guiana in a similar way ostensibly as attacking points on the adjoining british possessions if they thought they could get away with it the eastern end of russ russia la projects far into the western hemisphere does a anybody suppose that if germany succeeds in total conquest of russia she will be stopped by a parallel of latitude in the north pacific that soviet thumb bulging out 1 in n bering sea would be most convenient in a baxi attack on vancouver and other canadian centers on the pacific so that hitler could still if he gained siberia insist that his campaign was against the belligerent british empire and was not a against the united states who even among the isolationists would really believe him the icelandic enterprise is part of the general theory of american bases extending from newfoundland to british guiana when we made the trade of overage over age destroy ers in exchange for bases basei on tish lands there was of course some mumbling and grumbling but the value of the new posts was so clearly obvious that soon subsided |