Bismarck daily tribune. [volume] (Bismarck, Dakota [N.D.]) 1881-1916, 1916-09-08
BUY THE BEST.


machine guns! That is going to be
| Uncle Sans great purchase within
| the next few months.
Congress appropriated the money
You and l and all other Americans
will have to dig up the money. And
the board of ordnance and fortified
ton is, by law, directed to spend the
money!
Will those millions of our dollars
be we'll spent?
Every man who has followed the
news from Europe has learned that
the machine gun is the master weap
on of modern war. Despite their ire.
mendous artillery preparation, the
British were almost stopped in their
Somme offensive by the German ma
chine guns.
If the United States is to prepare
for national defense, every lesson Of
the war in Europe reads: "Buy vast
quantities of machine guns, and buy
the BEST"
Can we trust the board of ordnance
and fertilization to buy the best when
it spends $12,G0O,0O0 of our money
for machine guns?
The board of ordnance and forti-
fications meets now and again in
Washington-unless the weather is
too hot-and considers in leisurely
way what new inventions are worth
developing or purchasing for the ar
my.
The board consists of Gen. Crozier!
Oh, yes, there are other members,
too, including an ex-senator, who may
or may not know something about
ordnance, but Crozier is the board.
All of which recalls again the fight
Crozier has waged on certain type
of machine gun-the Lewis.
The whole story was told months
ago in the Tribune.
The Lewis gun, certainly one Of
the finest machine guns used in the
European war, was refused again and
again by Crozier's ordnance board,
off ~ o1
States by it's inventor, Col. Isaac N.
Lewis.
The vastly inferior gun which jam
med at Columbus, NJ NJ, and general
ly can be relied on to repeat this
performance, was adopted.
Following the revelation of Gro
Tiers attitude toward Lewis gun,
the greatest small-arm invention
Of the age, public opinion was so
aroused that the government actually
bought $50 Lewis machine guns,
when the Mexican crisis was at It's
height. l..5,.
And-demonstrating that Croziers
attitude toward the gun had not
changed hair breadth--the Lewis
guns which were thus purchased, it
is said, were sent in part to the Dor
der by freight.
The rest were sent to Springfield,
Mass. doubtless to defend the arse
nal there against Indians!
Only recently. the board of ord
nance tried to rush the type of Lewis
machine gun made for the Allies, and
fitted for British ammunition, into an
arsenal test at Springfield with com.
peting guns especially made for the
United States test requirements.
The makers Of the Lewis gun de.
clined to sanction such test.
The unfair spirit Of the ordnance
board was evil enough in its results
when the annual appropriation for
machine guns was under 100000.
But Congress has just appropriated
$12,0O0,0OO for machine guns!
The American people have right
to demand, now, that the board of
ordnance at once forget it's petty
spites, and, if it is to spend that
$l2,000,0O0, spend it to the best ad.
vantage!
This is where the whole American
public comes in! Our huge appropri-
alton for machine guns can be spent
for the best machine gun that can
be found-Lewis or whatever it is
and this gun can be- selected after a
fair, honest. impartial test.
Public opinion can compel this!