The Sun Also Sets

Today the Congress of the United States will assemble to register its most important decision since 1917, a decision which events have rendered inevitable as a declaration of war against Japan. With a suddenness and an element of implausibility reminiscent of Orson Wells' Martin broadcast, radio announcers broke the news to the nation yesterday afternoon that Hawaii, as much a part of the country from a psychological point of view as Omaha or Kansas City, had been attacked without warning. In the minds of every listener there was no question but that a declaration of war would be almost immediate. The wheels of democracy don't turn on Sunday, but by this afternoon the United States will have embarked on the toughest war it has faced since it first declared its own existence a century and a half ago, a struggle which really deserves the name of World War.

In September, 1939, when Germany started the war by ripping through Poland, the Crimson took the stand that the Government should follow the policy best designed to keep us out of war. Today, two and a quarter years later, we not only support the declaration of war; we welcome it.

Since that day which seems so long ago we have arrived at some changed conclusions concerning the part that our country must play in the world. We have learned from the example of France that democracy cannot survive when its people are not able and willing to fight and die for it. We have seen in all the countries conquered by Hitler and his satellites that it is not pleasant to lose one's liberty. The attack yesterday has brought home to us more vividly than any talk of economic encroachment that no expanse of ocean, however broad, can protect us unless it is guarded by ships and guns and men.

We are aware that it is we who will be fighting this war, and we are just as aware that it will be no campaign of heroics and no lightning victory. We realize that we are the ones who will be manning the ships and the guns and facing the bombs and destruction of the enemy. We know that after it is all over it will be some of us who will have our names engraved on the College's bronze memorial. We can see that it is our job to light, and we are not only willing but eager to accept our task.

We sincerely believe that we will be able to win our war and to win our peace as well. We feel that Japan's militarists are fighting the fight of a cornered rat, and that destruction awaits them. We can see that our affair in the Pacific is but one part of the struggle that is going on at the same time in the Atlantic, over England, in Africa, in Russia, and among the conquered peoples, and we know that we must do our part on all the fronts. We are confident that in the end, whenever that may be, we and our allies will emerge on top. Then we will be the ones to face the manifold problems of establishing a just and honest and stable peace. We believe ourselves capable of accomplishing what our fathers failed to achieve. We have starry-eyed and idealistic hopes of a peace not just in our sons time, but for all time.

The Chicago Tribune published an extra edition yesterday, emblazoning over its masthead the slogan, "Our Country--Right or Wrong." We do not agree with the Tribune. We believe in our country and in the right, and we believe that in the present war they are synonymous. In that belief we fight, and in that belief we will triumph.