London Times Quotes
The British Conservative Party was attacking the Liberal government for not dealing with the threat of German air power in the form of Zeppelins flying to England. The Germans were outraged at such freedom of the press at their expense. See {609907}.
This quotation has significance for two reasons. First, Lodge was one of the leaders of the conservative isolationist wing of the Republican Party which generally only wanted to provide the military with weapons to defend the mainland. However, the technology of the airplane caused much rethinking. Americans had seen what German bombing had done to Spanish cities and Italian air power in Ethiopia. This followed by Germany bombing city after city throughout Europe. There were huge calls for antiaircraft guns to be placed around all American cities so that Americans might be defended from air attack. However, Lodge supported another strategy that was a first for America: retaliation. From this point forward, America would rely primarily on retaliation rather than massive defense until President Ronald Reagan proposed his ill-fated Star Wars defense scheme. The second significant factor is that the senator suggested preemption—the attack on a military air base is that threatens us. This appears to be another first.
One of the predictions of the oncoming war with Germany.
This appears to be the first public call for Anti-Ballistic Missile Weapons & Systems. To many it is surprising that in 1946, there would be concern about missile defense, however during WWII, the Germans, violating the laws of war, struck London and other English cities with V2 rocket—the first ballistic missiles. England had suffered many civilian casualties and missile defense was a high priority for them.
The Times is a British daily national newspaper based in London. It began in 1785 under the title The Daily Universal Register, adopting its current name on 1 January 1788. The Times and its sister paper The Sunday Times (founded in 1821) are published by Times Newspapers, since 1981 a subsidiary of News UK, in turn wholly owned by News Corp. The Times and The Sunday Times, which do not share editorial staff, were founded independently, and have only had common ownership since 1966.
