The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1915-06-28

cannon to protect them. Of all the eastern militia cavalry in that camp only one regiment had machine gun company. Tables IT and IS, pages 228, 22e, Annual Report Division of Militia Affairs, U. S. A., Oct. 1, 1914. 'SThe states which send their in- fantry into active service without hay ing made every possible effort to sup ply it with an adequate field artillery support will see in the needless sacri- fee of that infantry the cost of their shortsightedness in time of prepara- tion.'-A. L. Mills, Brigadier General, General Staff, U. s. Al
 Even the regular army was efficient only in those things that could be maintained and perfected by the steady personal efforts of officers and men. In everything that depended on legis- lation 1t was lacking. Instead of 150 men to a company of infantry some had only sixty-five Its troops of cav airy were not full. It had no siege ar tillery corps. It was a skeleton army which, according to optinlists, was to be clothed with substance when war arrived Now war had come, and to clothe that skeleton with untrained men would have meant that for every sixty-fve skilled soldiers there would be eighty-nve utterly useless ones in each company.
 Shortage of men was not the only curse that was laid on the army by the policy of neglect. In the enemy headquarters two or at the most three orders were sent to department chiefs for every movement. In the American headquarters the staff had to deaIsw with 21.I- dled in detail by men who should have been free to direct one great, compre- hensfve movement Every order issued by the commanding general demanded intolerab1e duplication.
 The general had under him command CTS of brigade who had commanded pests that contained only fragments of regiments. Their brigades, never as sembled in any one place, not only did not approximate to war conditions but had to be disrupted and divided and reformed before the general could dare to offer them in battle. Hardly bri- gade commander had under him troops that he had known and trained and handled himself.
 With exception of those who had been on the Mexican border, when part of the small army had been mo- biliZed in a body for the first time, these men had tried to prepare them selves with the best that congress would give them-batta1ions and com panies and single batteries instead of assembled armies because the politi- clans would not let the army come to- gether.
 The forty-ntne army posts of the United States, long a subject of de rision among all except those who fat tened on them, might well have been symbolized ROW in that camp by forty nine slzeleteus-a skeleton army wait ing to lead the other skeleton army to death. ESfWhile the men who wish to spend the army and navy appropria- ton upon unnecessary army posts or unfit navy yards have such a voice as well as a vote''-i e., in the house of congress-'<a great deal of waste and extrava gance is sure to result Henry L. Sttmson, Former Secretary of War.l
 To none was this better known than to the enemy. The invaders command CT, standing idly with his hands in his pockets, was able to say confidently: They'll not bother us seriously. The only thing they'll do, the only thing they cdaa do, is to retreat when we be- gin to threaten them.''
 (To Be Continued.)
 SuItan Meberoed of Turkey is re-