Note 20 — Chapter VI · DOG-EATERS AND OTHERS

Although we think of Japanese territory as far away from ours, here it approaches within sixty miles, as I have said, and within twenty-four miles of Guam the Japanese have lately occupied the former German islands of the Mariana group. In Bering Straits we are within three miles of Russian territory. There are two islands, the Diomedes, in the center of the strait, one of which is owned by Russia and the other by the United States. We usually consider both Japan and Russia very far off, but their possessions are in fact almost as near ours as Canada and Mexico.