Advocate New Defense Line, Daily Racing Form, 1939-04-20

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ADVOCATE NEW DEFENSE LINE WASHINGTON, D. C, April 19. Brecken-ridge Long, former United States ambassador to Italy and assistant secretary of state in the Wilson administration, proposed today that America extend its navai frontiers outward from the traditional three-mile limit to a defense line of 300 miles at sea. The ex-diplomat urged such a move as necessary to maintain and protect a cash and carry neutrality law permitting foreign belligerents to buy American arms and other materials if they pay for them in the United States and haul them away in their own boats. He advocated such a law as the safest "keep out of war" implement that Congress could fashion. All other neutrality proposals he condemned as dangerous or futile. Long, in his testimony before the Senate committee, said: "There seems no basis in logic, whatever basis there may have Been in history, for our territorial waters to extend only three miles from our shores. With ships now traveling thirty to thirtv-five knots, airplanes 250 miles an hour, fast ships serving as floating air bases, the range of belligerent activities is extended toour very city streets. I see no reason why our territorial waters should not be extended, even to 300 miles from the shores of continental United States."


Persistent Link: https://drf.uky.edu/catalog/1930s/drf1939042001/drf1939042001_1_6
Local Identifier: drf1939042001_1_6
Library of Congress Record: https://lccn.loc.gov/unk82075800