Whitelaw Reid: “The war should abate the swaggering, swash-buckler tendency of many of our public men, since it has shown our incredible…”

“The war should abate the swaggering, swash-buckler tendency of many of our public men, since it has shown our incredible unreadiness at the outset for meeting even a third-rate Power; and it must secure us henceforth an army and navy less ridiculously inadequate to our exposure.”