For Us, the Living Read online

  “I suggest that you note it down and wait until you study the current economic system. You were probably educated in the conventional economic theories of your period which were magnificent and most ingenious, but—if you will pardon me saying so—all wrong. But to return to our muttons; the improved economic condition produced the usual political reaction and a conservative administration was elected after LaGuardia. There still remained however considerable spread between production and consumption. It had always been the conventional point of view, especially in the economic beliefs of the Conservative Party, that a prosperous nation required a favorable trade balance or gold balance as it was formerly called. In simple language that means that a country is best off when it exports more than it imports. Phrased in that way it sounds silly, for it is surely evident that a country that ships out more than it takes in gets poorer every year in terms of real wealth. Nevertheless there was an element of truth in it, a very practical truth at that time. The economic life was organized in such a comical fashion that each year the country produced goods of greater value than the people of the country were able to buy back and use up. This was known as over-production and many were the esoteric nonsensical things said about it. But the situation was that simple. The system of necessity produced more than it consumed. Of necessity. You can go into the mathematics of it later. Being an engineer you are bound to see the truth of it, and will probably be vastly amused by it.”

  “Do you mean to say that that was all there was wrong with business in the United States in my day?”

  “That was all. And all of your labor troubles, and poverty, and physical suffering were as unnecessary as they were tragic.”

  “That seems preposterous. If it was as simple as that it could have been fixed. I could work out some scheme to fix it myself, half a dozen schemes. Why in the navy we wouldn’t have put up with any such damn nonsense. Why didn’t somebody see it?”

  “Some people did, C.H. Douglas, Goulds Gainesborough, Bronson Cutting and a few others, but it was almost as difficult to convince people of the fact as it had been to convince an earlier generation that the world was round. In each case the fact was true and the fact was simple but the sturdy common sense of the man who had been brought up to believe in a flat earth or a ‘favorable trade balance’, rejected the truth. The socialists understood this truth of course, but they insisted that there was only one solution. There were many good solutions for so simple a problem. We believe nowadays that we have a solution more suited to the United States than socialism. But come, we are getting a long way off from South America.

  “From 1970 to the turn of the century a partial solution was found. Our excess wealth was poured into our sister continent and it was developed as a new frontier. Gold mined from the Chilean Andes helped for a while to preserve the fiction of a favorable trade balance. After that and in addition to it, almost any sort of wildcat financing was acceptable that would keep up the flow of goods to the south. The private bankers turned to this rich field of exploitation and convinced the public that the new El Dorado lay under the Southern Cross. The whole shaky business piled up until practically the entire continent was mortgaged to the skies in return for goods that we couldn’t use ourselves and would have poisoned us if we had kept them. But the Latin temperament had a simple solution. I sometimes wonder whether it was planned or was the inevitable result of the circumstances. But when the due day came each government folded up and a new government calmly repudiated the commitments of its predecessor.

  “The first incident of the A.-B.-C. War occurred in 2002 April. The Argentine government had refused to recognize its debts to us both public and private, and several stiff notes had been exchanged. Our South American squadron was ordered to Buenos Aires. Chile and Brazil each informed the United States that any display of force in Argentina would be regarded as an unfriendly act.

  “Nevertheless the squadron was not recalled. It steamed into the harbor and had no more than anchored, two old aircraft carriers and an odd dozen of minor craft, when it was attacked from the air and sunk to the last man, before a plane could rise. We don’t know yet who did it, but we do know that both the Chilean and Brazilian navies and air fleets had made a rendezvous some two hundred kilometers off Buenos Aires.”

  “How did the war work out? I found the record account a bit sketchy for my professional taste.”

  “Why, Perry, you aren’t really interested in killing, are you?” Diana was perturbed and incredulous.

  He patted her hand. “No Dian’, not at all. But the matters of the strategy and the tactics involved and the weapons used are of intellectual interest to me, just as you might be interested in the ceremonial dances that accompanied the Aztecs’ Blood sacrifices.

  The wrinkles smoothed out from her brow. “Yes, I suppose so. But it does seem barbaric.”

  “I imagine the weapons would have been largely familiar to you, Perry. The United States had not been at war for many years and it is a matter of history that few weapons are developed in peacetime. The military mind clings tenaciously to its accustomed ways—if you will pardon me. The strategic principle of exterior lines determined the war. Neither side was equipped to deal any telling blow on the other. They were too far apart and there was too much terrain involved. There was no commerce to raid as practically all the shipping had been between the United States and South America. Each side was able to raid the cities of the other, but armies of occupation would have necessitated extended lines of communication to protect at a serious strategic disadvantage. The most startling single incident in the war was the raid on Manhattan.”

  “Tell me about that.”

  “One would think that Manhattan would have been evacuated early in the war, but it was extremely inconvenient to do so and the public had been assured that no enemy force could possibly get that far north. As a matter of fact, practically all the fighting had been below the equator. Except for two raids in the Gulf and one on Palm Beach, none of which did much damage, the United States was untouched. But in 2003 December two aircraft carriers, the Santa Maria and the Reina Borealis raided Manhattan. They had proceeded to New York by a route that took them far east in the Atlantic and by luck and partly by foresight they reached the North Atlantic without discovery. They were aided by the weather for the last thousand kilometers had to be made in a thick fog. They attacked at noon, dropping out of a cloudy sky with a ceiling of less than two hundred meters and in some places lower. The attack must have been worked out with great precision, for each ship seemed to know exactly where to go. The bridges were destroyed first, and the landing platforms. It must have been a terrifying sight to see those great helicopters settling out of the clouds and proceeding leisurely to destroy their objectives while the more agile fighting planes that escorted them buzzed around like hornets. The tubes under the rivers were bombed also. A helicopter would settle at the last station, its crew would gas the bystanders while a working party commandeered a train and loaded aboard the explosives. Then with controls and time bomb on board the train would make its last run.”

  “How much damage was done?”

  “The damage was practically complete. The water works were destroyed along with the power stations. The skyscrapers were almost completely wrecked. Incendiary fires were started throughout the city. It was remarkably efficient, for warfare, as explosives were not thrown around at random but carefully placed to do maximum damage. It is believed that the helicopters made two or three trips. The weather made the whole thing possible, of course, particularly the gas attack that completed the job.”

  “How was that?”

  “After the attackers had apparently exhausted their supplies of high explosives, they systematically patrolled the island, remaining always in the clouds and dropped gas containers. They must have returned to their floating bases time and again for they kept this up for thirty-six hours.”

  “You speak as if they had no opposition.”

  “There was opposition
, surely, but consider—You are a pilot. How would you attack an enemy ship in a cloud bank.”

  “I couldn’t.”

  “That’s the answer. They destroyed Manhattan and nearly eighty per cent of its population. Although it wasn’t conclusive, hardly more than an exhibition of frightfulness, it lead indirectly to the end of the war.”

  “Why was that?”

  “Five out of six of the heads of the leading international banks were killed in the raid on Manhattan, not to mention the destruction of a large part of the records of the financial dealings that had started the trouble. And of course hundreds of the small fry in the banking racket. With the ring leaders gone Congress listened to the people of the country who had never wanted a war in the first place. An armistice was declared in 2004 February. The terms of the peace included moratoria on international obligations which was a polite word for cancellation, and established a Pan-American export-import bank to provide for resumption of trade on what amounted to a cash and carry basis.”

  “Anything else?”

  “That was about all. The destruction of Manhattan was checked off against the raids on Rio and Buenos Aires. But the most important result was the twenty-seventh amendment.”

  “That’s the war referendum amendment, isn’t it?”

  “Yes. Did the records tell you how it works?”

  “Well, I gathered that it was an arrangement whereby the people had to vote on it before war could be declared.”

  “That is true as far it goes. In effect the amendment states that, except in case of invasion of the United States, Congress shall not have the power to declare war without submitting the matter to a referendum. The article sketches out briefly the machinery for holding the referendum and sets a time limit in which to accomplish it. But the most amusing feature is the provision saying who shall vote in the matter.”

  “Doesn’t everybody?”

  “No, only those persons vote who are eligible for military duty.”

  “Aren’t women permitted to vote?”

  “Yes and no. If the current laws make women eligible for combat duty, they vote. If not, they don’t vote.”

  Perry whistled. “I’ll bet that caused an uproar.”

  Cathcart grinned as if savoring the joke. “It certainly did. Militant feminists screamed and frothed at the mouth. Then it was pointed out to them that the proposed amendment made no mention of sex and that they could, if they chose, make women eligible by including them for military service in the implementing bill.”

  “But that isn’t practical.”

  “On the contrary. As a matter of fact the law did include women for a number of years. Women can be used in the place of men in practically all military positions. Not as effectively in many of them, but they have been used many times. Your military history should have told you that.”

  “I guess you’re right. Yes, I’d forgotten the Battalion of Death. And they make very good pilots of course.”

  “At the present time a limited class of women are eligible for service and would consequently vote on a war question.”

  “But see here. It seems to me that it is unfair to leave it in the hands of those who are eligible to go into the service. If there is any one thing I’ve learned from history I’ve studied today it is that war affects everybody in the country, that it can kill off an entire population. Why we knew that even in my day.”

  “What you say is true. But the non-combatants don’t expect to be killed—not seriously. In the A.-B.-C. war if those bankers who were killed in the raid on Manhattan had expected to be bombed and gassed, there wouldn’t have been any war. But they didn’t. They thought the war would be fought far away by the professionals. No, the great mass of civilians never see war as anything personal to themselves, unless it is brought home to each one that he, John, will have to fight in person. That is why nations used to declare war so easily and then be forced to use conscription to fight the war. The country wants to go to war. Oh surely. ‘John Brown’s Body.’ ‘Make the World Safe for Democracy.’ ‘Britons never will be slaves.’ But if the war is more than a skirmish you have to draft men to fight it. With all due respect to you, Diana, women were worse than men about it. It’s always possible to get women stirred up to a war fever. Half of the men who do volunteer in a war instead of waiting to be conscripted, do so because some woman who thinks it’s glorious and romantic is urging them or shaming them into it. In peace time women are emotional pacifists, but when the bands start to play, they are much more easily stampeded than men. What’s on your mind, son? You look thoughtful.”

  “I was thinking of an organization that used to give me the cold shivers, the Gold Star Mothers. They were formed after the World War and a woman had to have had a son killed in the war to be eligible. They had meetings and officers and conventions and national presidents and so forth, just like a lodge. It made my flesh crawl.”

  Diana interposed. “But, Perry, I should think such an organization could be a powerful force for good.”

  “It could have been, but it wasn’t. If they had devoted themselves to making another war impossible, it would have been fine. But it was just another lodge, just another woman’s club. But let’s get back to the subject. I’d rather forget it.”

  Cathcart resumed his discourse. “I haven’t told you about the neatest feature of the amendment. As we have said, only those who could fight could vote. Those who voted to declare war automatically enlisted for the duration of the war. The ballot even told them where to report the next morning. Those who didn’t vote were the next draft, and those who voted no the last draft.”

  Perry looked puzzled and slightly annoyed, “But that puts a premium on cowardice, doesn’t it? If war is declared, they should all have to take the same chances. If I had my way, I would just reverse the scheme.”

  “Don’t be hasty, Perry. Stop and think. Is it a premium on cowardice? Perhaps it is. But isn’t it just as likely to be a premium on common judgment? Perhaps the war isn’t worth fighting. I’ve studied history all my life and I can remember but two or three wars that seemed to me to be worth fighting, and I have my doubts about those. In any case, if a man takes the responsibility of voting to plunge a country into a situation that may destroy it and is bound to kill and maim a lot of its citizens, shouldn’t he have to accept the consequences of his decision by being in the first line of fighting? There is a stern justice about it. Under this rule no man could cast a vote that would send a fellow human being out to face poisonous gas and shots and burning rays without being ready to stand alongside him and suffer the same fate.”

  “But see here, in a democratic country, we are all in the same boat. Why shouldn’t everybody have to defend the country alike?”

  “Your reasoning is sound, Perry, but it doesn’t apply to the case. You have forgotten that if the United States is invaded, no referendum is necessary. To be exact if any part of the North American continent is invaded, or if a fleet approaches our home waters with evident hostile intent, Congress can act without consulting the people. The referendum applies to situations such as the First World War, or the Spanish-American War or the War of 1812 or the A.-B.-C War. As a matter of fact the President has ample power to act, even without consent of Congress, to repel invasion or to succor our nationals abroad. No, the purpose of this amendment is to permit the people to decide for themselves whether or not an incident or series of incidents constitutes sufficient reason for them to want to go outside our own country and fight someone else. Of course the munitions makers didn’t like it nor a lot of the financiers and industrialists, but it was democratic and reasonable and the people voted it in anyhow, once they understood it. But the munitions makers fought it tooth and toenail and eventually cooked their own goose in the process.”

  “How?”

  “At the next session of Congress there was the usual bill introduced to take over the entire arms industry and make it a government monopoly. But this time the munitions men were in bad rep
ute and Congress passed it.”

  Perry laughed. “Served ’em jolly well right, didn’t it? But seriously, while this scheme seems to fit modern conditions, I don’t believe it would have worked in my day.”

  Cathcart’s shaggy brows lifted. “Why not?”

  “Too cumbersome. It would take weeks to get ready for the election and weeks more to be sure of the count. By that time the whole strategic situation could have changed and lost us the war, if we went into it.”

  “I think you overrate the difficulties, Perry. I believe that I know your period as well as an historian can for I have made a special study of it. If Congress was debating a war resolution, wouldn’t everybody in the country know about it? The President habitually spoke to the country by radiotelephony, correct? So if he were to address the country announcing the outcome of the congressional vote and calling a war referendum, everybody would be listening, would they not?”

  “Ninety-nine per cent or better.”

  “Very well then. Calling the election is easy. How soon could it be held? No need to wait for the people to inform themselves and consider the merits; if the situation is actually grave, they will have been following it for weeks and probably have made up their minds long before Congress acts. The next question is how long would it take to do the physical acts necessary to conduct a balloting? Everybody in the country of voting age knew or could find out very quickly the location off his usual precinct election polls. And each of those polling places had officials designated at the last regular election. Printing the ballots would be fairly simple, there being but one point to vote on, or they could be kept printed at all times, and let the name of the enemy be written in or assumed. Counting the ballots in each precinct would be a simple matter as well, twenty minutes at the most. The only new technique would be in collecting the returns. Tell me, there were telegram dispatching bureaus all over the country, were there not?”

  “Oh yes, probably one within ten minutes of every polling place. I begin to see your point.”