If so, _you will be convinced of that fact_, if you will carefully and thoughtfully read this book through from cover to cover; and _you will also be convinced_ that the only road to safety is that pointed out in this book. Would you not feel that "an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure" when reflecting on the ease with which any of the Great European Powers could _again_ occupy and burn Washington, as it was burned in 1814, and capture and levy an enormous indemnity upon New York? Would you contemplate with indifference and equanimity _the annexation of the Pacific Coast of the United States to Japan_? Has it occurred to you that, unless we wake up, mend our ways and change our national policy, war is ultimately as inevitable between the United States and Japan as it has been for years between France and Germany? _Would it interest you to know_ that in the event of such a war the Japanese would be found fully prepared, while we are utterly unprepared; and that Japan would, within ten days, mobilize an army in California large enough to insure to them its military control; and that within four weeks thereafter they would land an army of 200,000 veteran soldiers on the Pacific coast? _Would it interest you to know_ that in such an emergency our navy would be impotent to check this occupation and invasion, and that our so-called but now confessedly misnamed coast defenses would be about as much protection as a large load of alfalfa hay; and that as part of this military occupancy by Japan of the territory lying between the Cascade and Sierra Nevada mountains and the Pacific Ocean, the Japanese would dynamite every tunnel, destroy the Colorado River railroad bridges, and fortify the mountain passes; and that the recapture of one pass by the United States would be a more difficult military undertaking for us than was the capture of Port Arthur or Tsing-Tao by the Japanese? _Would it interest you to know_ that the very real danger that California, Western Oregon, and Western Washington may be annexed to Japan and a thousand miles of deserts and inaccessible mountain ranges, instead of the Pacific Ocean, separate Japan from the United States, is a danger that exists because not one in ten thousand of the people of the United States will give the slightest heed to this question, which overshadows in importance every other question affecting the people of the United States? _Would it interest you to know_ that there is just as much, and more, danger that the desolating flames of war may sweep over and devastate Southern California as there was that they might sweep over and devastate Belgium? You doubtless will say, "That is impossible!" You would have said the same thing a year ago about Belgium, with much more of assurance and positive conviction.