Page 207 - The interest of America in sea power, present and future

1 88 Preparedness for Naval War. ;

ginning or continuance of a state of things,
the tendency of which is to induce future em-
barrassments, — to complicate or to endanger
essential welfare. A nation situated as Great
Britain is in India and Egypt scarcely can fail
to appreciate our own sensitiveness regarding
the Central American isthmus, and the Pacific,
on which we have such extensive territory
nor is it a long step from concern about the
Mediterranean, and anxious watchfulness over
the progressive occupation of its southern
shores, to an understanding of our reluctance
to see the ambitions and conflicts of another
hemisphere approach, even remotely and indi-
rectly, the comparatively peaceful neighbor-
hoods surrounding the Caribbean Sea, bearing
a threat of disturbance to the political distribu-
tion of power or of territorial occupation now
existing. Whatever our interests may demand
in the future may be a matter of doubt, but it
is hard to see how there can be any doubt in
the mind of a British statesman that it is our
clear interest now, when all is quiet, to see
removed possibilities of trouble which might
break out at a less propitious season.
Such facility for reaching an understanding,