Kansas, May 19.
Mr. Claude Wickard, Secretary of Agriculture, in the most blunt speech made by a Cabinet member so far, today said that recent events had proved that the- "Nazis deliberately are trying to form a combination of nations to attack us."
He added that the United States' answer to this plot would be' "something the Nazis understand and respect—armed might."
In his radio broadcast to the nation this morning, Mr. Wickard said that "some persons say the odds against us already are too great and that we had better keep quiet."
He. believed, he continued,~-that these persons were not influential and they only formed the minor:
The defeat of Britain, he warned, would mean that "men and machines could be transported to this hemisphere faster by the Atlantic than if that body of water were dry land."
He stressed that he disbelieved that the American people desired to live in a world dominated by the Nazis because such a situation would "mean the destruction of freedom. and democracy in the United States We will do whatever is necessary to protect our freedom and democracy."—United Press
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.