My object has been to explain the view of the Government, and to place
before the House the issue and the choice. I do not for a moment
conceal, after what I have said, and after the information, incomplete
as it is, that I have given to the House with regard to Belgium, that
we must be prepared, and we are prepared, for the consequences of having
to use all the strength we have at any moment--we know not how soon--to
defend ourselves and to take our part. We know, if the facts all be as I
have stated them, though I have announced no intending aggressive action
on our part, no final decision to resort to force at a moment's notice,
until we know the whole of the case, that the use of it may be forced
upon us. As far as the forces of the Crown are concerned, we are ready.
I believe the Prime Minister and my right honorable friend the First
Lord of the Admiralty have no doubt whatever that the readiness and the
efficiency of those forces were never at a higher mark than they are
today, and never was there a time when confidence was more justified in
the power of the navy to protect our commerce and to protect our shores.
The thought is with us always of the suffering and misery entailed, from
which no country in Europe will escape by abstention, and from which no
neutrality will save us.
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