Every one who looks at all four corners of the situation in this country understands why every pretext is seized upon to get bigger and bigger appropriations for the army and navy. A navy provides a big profit in armor plate and an army provides protection for that profit. _The Wizards of Wall Street are wise._ They see a long way ahead. The people never see very far. They are easily scared by a hue and cry about unpreparedness when naval or military appropriations are wanted. They readily swallow the bait of economy, when the interests desire to defeat an appropriation that is needed to develop natural resources belonging to the people that are coveted by the Water Power Syndicates, or an appropriation that is needed to build waterways which would make competition for railroads. Water Power Syndicates and Railroads and Armor-Plate Mills are all controlled by the same coterie of intrenched interests. They understand each other and work together perfectly without even the necessity for a gentleman's agreement. _The people have been asleep a long time but some day they will wake up._ For years the Gospel of Peace has been proclaimed to the world from the United States. During that period we have been busy building battleships and piling up great private fortunes from making armor plate. We have been urging disarmament while spending millions to increase our own armaments. We have been advocating arbitration while constantly increasing our military expenditures. Since the day when Congress in a frenzy of patriotic outburst voted fifty millions in fifteen minutes to start our war with Spain, the peace propaganda has been vigorously prosecuted and in that period we have had war after war: the Spanish-American War, the Russo-Japanese War; war in the Philippines, war in Greece, war in the Balkans, war in South Africa, war in Algeria, war in Morocco, war in Tripoli, war in Mexico, war again in the Balkans, and now nearly all of Europe is ablaze with war and its flames are reddening Asia and Africa. It gives one an unpleasant, gruesome feeling to think about it. The substance seems always to have been on the side of war, the shadow only on the side of peace. That is no reason why the movement for peace should be abandoned, but is it not a reason for completely changing the ideals and methods of the peace movement, and adopting a plan such as is embodied in this book for a constructive peace propaganda, that will strengthen the peace movement, and at the same time solve our most difficult internal social and economic problems and make sure that if war ever does befall us we will be found not unprepared, not unarmed, not unready, not undefended? If everything were done that the most extreme Militarist advocates, we would still be undefended, and we will remain so until our whole military system is constructed anew, and a real system of national defense organized as outlined in this book. _The Frankenstein of war can be controlled._