IRON RING OF SEA POWER

Dominion, Volume 35, Issue 7, 3 October 1941, Page 7

IRON RING OF SEA POWER

U.S. Aid In Defeating Germany STATEMENT BY NAVY SECRETARY :(By Telegraph.—Press Assn. —Copyright.) (Received October 2, 7.5 p.m.) NEW YORK, October 1. “Eventually we shall lock up Nazi Germany in an iron ring 6f sea power and within that she will perish,” said the Secretary of the Navy, Colonel Knox, in an address to the American Bar Association. “We shall keep the sea lanes open wherever they may lead,” he added. “We shall do this so that totalitarianism can be defeated and the principle of free Governments and free peoples preserved. “The United States and Britain should join forces for at least 100 years to produce, by force if need be, an effective system of international law. It is the hope of the world that sea power, on, under and above the seas, will reside for the next hundred years in the hands of the United States an-1 Britain. “Should war come, it is far better to have a distant war than one at home. If we must fight, let us determine that we shall fight elsewhere than on our own soil. That we will proceed from one measure to another till we have taken adequate steps to defeat the legions of Hitler and his satellites, Italy and Japan, I have no doubt. “We will not arouse our people to the full urgency of the situation and bring them to make the necessary sacrifices unless we seize .and understand the grander and nobler concept which lies beyond a military victory.” Colonel Knox at a Press conference said there were no reports of any new incidents involving the Atlantic fleet. The Battle of the Atlantic was now very quiescent. . The word convoy was now obsolete in describing the task of the United States fleet, he said. He preferred the word protection. The navy was providing whatever protection was needed anywhere.