NOT INVULNERABLE

Evening Post, Volume CXXV, Issue 69, 23 March 1938, Page 10

NOT INVULNERABLE

DOMINION OF CANADA

SHELTER OF AMERICA

THE MARCH OF EVENTS

(From "Tho Post's" Representative.) VANCOUVER, March 2.

Canada, in common with the rest of the Empire, was stirred by the events associated with the crisis in the British Cabinet, but not to the same extent, except on the Pacific and Atlantic littoral, where the people are more'conscious of the needs of Empire defence than in the interior. Generally speaking, Quebec, Ontario, and the Prairie Provinces have not been seriously concerned with defence. Until last year, when the Dominion Government decided to increase the vote, there had grown up, since the war, a feeling that Canada was immune from attack, and could entertain a sense of security, in the light of the knowledge that the United States would not permit a foreign Power to get a foothold in North America,

Recent events have modified that [ false sense of security. Mussolini's i exploits in Ethiopia and the Mediter- f ranean, the civil war in Spain, Japan's- i invasion of China, and Hitler's repeated j demand for return of colonies lost in j the Great War have made Canadians [ conscious that their country, lacking [ effective defence, is likely to be in the vortex of a new war theatre, especially as the United States ha 3 concentrated ; all its preparations in the Pacific. The ! knowledge that Italy and Germany | support Japan's campaign in China t adds to the conviction that the Pacific littoral, extending for a thousand miles, is very vulnerable. Last year the Dominion voted 36,000,000 dollars for defence; this year, 34,000,000. ROOSEVELT'S PLANS. President Roosevelt, in two recent messages to Congress, stated frankly that his plans for defence comprehended the defence of the "neighbourhood" of the United States, which the General Staff, by their naval and air dispositions, have interpreted as defending the coasts of British Columbia, as well as Central America, extending to the Panama Canal. Tactical maps, for war manoeuvres, embrace an area in the Pacific, extending from Panama to Hawaii and American Samoa, northward to the extreme westward tip.of the Aleutian Islands, thence along the coast of Alaska, British Columbia, the Pacific States, and that part of Latin America lying north of Panama. As Alaska has no communication by land with continental United States, President Roosevelt has advised the Canadian Government that he is prepared to finance the building of a strategic highway, through British Columbia and the Yukon to Alaska, at a cost of 50,000,000 dollars, or more, in order to get communications established at an early date. It is expected that Canada will co-operate in the scheme, as 400 miles of its northern terrain have yet no road link with the remainder of the Dominion. Alaska has,already been linked by air with New York and Chicago by services crossing the Prairie, British Columbia, and the Yukon. The construction Of a United States Army base in Alaska will be hastened by these projects.

The most elaborate war manoeuvres jn American history will be held in the North Pacific next month. They will extend over 12 million square miles of ocean—three times the extent of last year's manoeuvres, which demonstrated that Honolulu could be destroyed by an enemy fleet, carrying a sufficient number of aeroplanes. Taking part in the manoeuvres will be 150 warships, 500 aeroplanes, and 60,000 officers ancl men, more than half the navy's personnel. At periods, extending over six weeks, residents of the coastal areas of British-Columbia will hear America's; warships and planes shelling and bombing an imaginary enemy off Canada's undefended Pacific littoral. They may or may not be consoled by the fact that the cost of United States naval defence this 'year is twenty times that of Canada, per head of population.