more to us than to any of them. That supremacy must, therefore, be secure, not only against the most imminent risks, but against any risks that are even remotely probable. The maintenance of the two-Power standard is, perhaps, the very lowest measure that we can allow ourselves. Our navy is our very existence. We can allow no State, or pair of States, however seemingly well-disposed, to outbuild us at sea.
At the same time, a supreme navy alone will not suffice. In the first place, a purely naval war cannot crush a continental enemy. It may be prolonged indefinitely, and cost enormous sums, which will cripple the whole power of the nation, and thus in the long-run endanger naval supremacy itself, for naval supremacy must be based on national wealth. Moreover, even to purely naval success, military success is sometimes an essential factor. Without the army which captured Port Arthur, the Japanese would have found it more difficult to establish their naval supremacy in the Far East. The Battle of Mukden has probably prevented Russia from ever again becoming a dominating Power on the coasts of the Pacific, and has, therefore, greatly weakened her chances of becoming a dominant Power on the waters of that ocean. Again, the navy, to make sure of success, must be absolutely unhampered in the pursuit of its strategical objective—the enemy's fighting fleets. It must not be tied down to local defence. The object of our fleets is not to prevent an invasion of England, but to destroy hostile fleets. Lastly, a navy cannot defend a continental State. But the British Empire is, as regards Canada and India, at least, a continental Empire. Nothing that we can do at sea could ever recover either Canada or India if they had once come under the grip of the great territorial empires whose frontiers march with them. But the defence of Canada and India is as essential to the existence of the British Empire as the defence of England.
The defence of India is, indeed, the first and most pressing military problem to which we must attend.
