Page:Mexico under Carranza.djvu/253

Rh That such an attitude upon our part would have prevented most of the evils which our people have suffered at the hands of revolutionists no one who knows the character of the Latin-Mexican leaders can have any doubt. The Latin-Mexican recognizes force as the only influence that can control his actions. He has no conception of, and no respect for, any other influence. Like his brothers, the Bolsheviki, the I. W. W., and the Germans, he cannot understand the failure or refusal to use force to accomplish a purpose if it is at command.

By the policy that we have adopted we have not only encouraged every sort of offense against our own people but we have also encouraged the destruction of business enterprises in Mexico owned by our citizens and those of our allies upon which hundreds of thousands of the peon element of that country depended for a living. In addition to that, we have, as we now must know, by every encouragement and assistance that we have given the Carranza element, to that extent assisted in delivering the unfortunate masses of Mexico into the hands of the class which is now, as it always has been, their worst enemy. In a well-meant effort to serve these unfortunate people we have actually assisted in imposing famine and death upon thousands of them.

In truth, the result of our handling of the Mexican question during the past eight years, and the