Let us heed the lesson of China, and before it is too late enlist the National Construction Reserve to combat this menace which threatens the welfare of our people--grapple with floods in the lower valleys and with floods in the mountain valleys; with forest fires and with forest denudation; with blighting drouth and with desert sands. Let us recognize that our first duty to ourselves and to our country is to preserve the nation by preserving the resources within the nation, without which the human race must perish from the surface of the earth. Once this great fundamental need is recognized for protecting the nation's resources and protecting the people by preserving the means whereby the people live, a national system for bringing into action concerted human effort and constructive energy will be organized. It will be a system that will substitute for the patriotism, the inspiration, and the victories of war a higher patriotism, a more splendid inspiration, and a more glorious victory. That victory of peace which the people of the United States will finally win will be a greater achievement than anything which ever has or ever can be accomplished by warfare. This nation can readily manufacture for itself, and store away in its arsenals and warehouses, all the arms and equipment, all the munitions of war that we would need to conduct a victorious war against any nation of the world. It could train sufficient officers, without any increase of our military expenditures, to lead an army large enough to successfully repel any invasion that might ever be attempted in any part of the United States. In the event of a foreign invasion, what would we need that we would not have, _and could not get_, at least, _not quick enough to save ourselves from a stupendous disaster_? We would need and could not get _men_,--trained _men_,--men hardened and inured to the demands of military service in the field. That is the one and only thing we would lack. All the rest of the problem would be easy of solution. To undertake to enlist a militia of a million men in the United States would not supply this need. The most vital of all the many elements of weakness in militia, especially in this country to-day, would be the total lack of physical stamina and hardihood in the men themselves. Of what use are soldiers who can shoot, in these days of modern warfare, unless they can also dig trenches and endure hardships which are to the ordinary man impossible and inconceivable of being borne? This necessity for men, _trained and hardened men_, men inured to the hardships of military service, would be even greater in this country in the event of a war than in any European country, because of the more primitive condition of the country. Vast areas of the United States are uninhabited and waterless. The climate varies from the intolerable heat, to those not accustomed to it, of the southwestern deserts, to the freezing blizzards of the North.