Reading Eagle (November 1, 1944)
ON THE RECORD —
The birth of a new nation
By Dorothy Thompson
If I come back again today to the naval battle in the Philippine waters, it is because the perspectives on it would furnish material, not for a series of columns, but for volumes – as, in the future, it will. I do not believe the American people have realized what it means, not only for the war, but for our position in the world.
As a battle between our fleet and the greatest Asiatic fleet, it is comparable to the Spanish Armada. The defeat of that Armada, in the days of Queen Elizabeth, destroyed Spain as a world power, and made England its successor, and the undisputed master of the seas – the only worldwide element of those days – from then until our own times. In that succeeding epoch of the “Pax Britannica” was demonstrated the relationship between naval power and power itself. And in this battle of the Philippines, the United States has reinstated the leadership of Western civilization for at least a hundred years to come.
But more than that has happened. In one of his last speeches, the President made the statement that our Navy alone is now greater than all the navies of the world combined. That is significant in itself, but it is only a statistical statement. We knew before this Second World War, that Russia had the largest land army on earth. But that alone did not give the Soviet Union an adequate place among the great powers. Only when this land army met its supreme test and proved its superiority over the technically and traditionally best competitor – the Wehrmacht – did the statistical argument become a political fact of vast importance.
In the same way, the battle in the Philippine waters has transformed a statistical fact into a political reality.
The Japanese have proven in their short naval history that they are capable of challenging great Western powers. When they destroyed the Russian Navy, in 1904, there was already the premonition of a coming challenge to America. In reality, that was the birth of Japan as a great naval power.
But it could be argued that the Russian fleet was not comparable to that of a true naval power. But when, in the early days of this Second World War, the Japanese sank the two British battleships, the Prince of Wales, and the Repulse, the whole British nation was rocked. A sea-minded people realized what it meant.
That blow to British naval prestige followed closely our disaster at Pearl Harbor. At one blow, we were thrown out of the eastern Pacific, and its rich booty – the East Indies, Malaya, the Philippines – fell into Japanese hands.
But the inevitable course of history cannot be changed by a single treacherous trick or mighty blow.
The Japanese could only have succeeded if we had succumbed, through decadence, or internal division. Actually, that blow set America on her feet. And once she rose to her feet, that thing happened which was preordained should happen. The battle of the Philippines is only a demonstration of something that has been slowly developing during the past generation. Almost against the will of the American people, by sheer weight of its vitality, its geography, and its engineering skills, this country has been pushed into the leading place among world powers.
At no time has there been a competitive race with the British master of the seas. But when the world struggle forced the mobilization of all forces, the inherent truth about America came out: She is without question the supreme naval power of the earth.
Today, this means airpower as well as ships. And again, the factors that created our naval supremacy created our air supremacy, and for world power, the two are one.
The deeper significance of this will be felt only by farsighted Americans, today and tomorrow. It will be realized by all Americans in the coming decades. In the waters of the Philippines, not only was the Japanese fleet destroyed, but a traditional America was destroyed. There may be those who will deplore this, and look back to the days of “Little America,” remembering with nostalgia her ancient independent detachment from the earth. But they will waste their tears, because history does not stop because of nostalgias.
In history, through all the centuries, the grasp of naval power has invariably been the forerunner of a new epoch for the country that obtained it. Previous to the destruction of the Spanish Armada, England was Shakespeare’s little island, and the great explorers and openers of the globe were Spanish and Portuguese. It was not British world travelers who created British world influence, but British naval power which created the travelers who carried the influence.
And so, these last few days will affect the minds, habits, visions, and responsibilities of Americans yet unborn. They will not be like us, who see these great events, almost with bewilderment, hardly with realization, against the background of a provincial America. At one single leap, we have outrun the runners – and we cannot plod back to the starting line.
It must have been with this in mind, that the President – throughout his life a Navy man – spoke, in his foreign policy speech about the necessity of our becoming a mature nation.