Britain's Feverish War Preparations
Britain's Feverish War Preparations.—In the debates in the House of Commons on England's naval budget the first lord of the admiralty was criticized for having made inadequate preparations. His reply was in part as follows: "We are spending $225,000,000 this year, and we are going to spend more next year. We are raising the personnel of the navy to 141,150 by 1913 and to 146,000 in 1914. "As regards construction, Germany this year is laying down two new battle-ships and we four. Next year Germany is laying down one extra and we two. This year Germany is laying down two small cruisers; we are laying down eight. Germany in the course of the next eighteen months is laying down twenty-one destroyers, we forty-three. There is no cause for panic or alarm." It is an unheard-of thing for one nation to go right on year after year increasing its war facilities so as to be able to meet another nation, and then for both these nations to continue to discuss the matter openly and compare the progress that each is making. These powers of war are held now by divine decree. When they break loose in all their fury, it will be Armageddon.