positions, fortified posts, by land or by sea, however strong or
admirably situated, do not confer control by themselves alone. People
often say that such an island or harbor will give control of such a
body of water. It is an utter, deplorable, ruinous mistake. The phrase
indeed may be used by some only loosely, without forgetting other
implied conditions of adequate protection and adequate navies; but the
confidence of our own nation in its native strength, and its
indifference to the defence of its ports and the sufficiency of its
fleet, give reason to fear that the full consequences of a forward step
may not be weighed soberly. Napoleon, who knew better, once talked this
way. "The islands of San Pietro, Corfu, and Malta," he wrote, "will
make us masters of the whole Mediterranean." Vain boast! Within one
year Corfu, in two years Malta, were rent away from the state that
could not support them by its ships. Nay, more: had Bonaparte not taken
the latter stronghold out of the hands of its degenerate but innocuous
government, that citadel of the Mediterranean would perhaps--would
probably--never have passed into those of his chief enemy. There is
here also a lesson for us.

It is by no means logical to leap, from this recognition of the
necessity of adequate naval force to secure outlying dependencies, to
the conclusion that the United States would need for that object a navy
equal to the largest now existing. A nation as far removed as is our
own from the bases of foreign naval strength may reasonably reckon upon
the qualification that distance--not to speak of the complex European
interests close at hand--impresses upon the exertion of naval strength
by European powers. The mistake is when our remoteness, unsupported by
carefully calculated force, is regarded as an armor of proof, under
cover of which any amount of swagger may be indulged safely. An
estimate of what is an adequate naval force for our country may