The Bennington evening banner. (Bennington, Vt.) 19??-1961, 1916-04-24

A YEAR TO RAISE AN ARMY
Twelve Months Required to Make a
Soldier, Says Col. Church.

Twelve Months Required TO Make
Soldier, Says Col. Church.
"The notion that Germany We T., Al
so exhausted after the Europeal. &.
that she would be unable to attack |. .
the two countries is absurd" said Col
w. c. Church, editor of the Army and
Navy Journal in recent interview.
Germany would never be better pre-
pared for an attack. She would
have country full of trained and
hardened soldiers and theoretically she
could come over here and take enough
out of the United States to pay off all
her war debts.
'As say, that is theoretical. The
fact is, nobody can tell what would
happen. dare say Great Britain and
France wouldn't care to have the Ger
mans seizing any territory in America
and would step in with their fleets to
prevent it. And of course our own
fleet could make good deal of trouble,
although our army under present con-
ditions couldn't do much. However,
don't believe we are going to get into
any war with Germany, for | think
Germany will yield"
In Col. Church's opinion it would
take a year after war was declared
for the United States to become mill
tary factor in Europe. There would be
no danger of the Entente Allies calling
upon us for troops right away, for the
reason that we would have only raw
men to send them.
THE Army War College he said,
has estimated that 1t requires $50
hours of military training month fCs'
twelve months to prepare soldier. If
we started to recruit now it would be
at least year before an adequate
would be no trouble about getting vol
unteers. Remember, the civil war was
fought by men under % years of age.
Young men are really eager to fight.
The adventure appeals to them, their
patriotism is unsullied by selfish mo-
tives and they haven't established
themselves in business and given hos
tages to fortune like the older men.
But no matter how eager he is,
soldier has to be trained so that he
will obey commands automatically un-
der the most trying circumstances.
You have read OF machine gun JAM
ming at Columbus. don't believe the
fault was with the gun. More likely
the reason was that we have no spec
ial force trained to handle this deli
cate mechanism. as every army man
- I,,
companies are specially schooled in
the handling of machine guns. These
weapons are handled by machine gun
companies who do nothing else In
the United States we merely detail an
ordinary soldier to machine gun work.
Both the Hay and the Chamberlain
bills now before Congress provide for
machine. gun companies and l guess
we'll get them sooner or later.
IF war were declared our fleet
would give vigorous and valuable help.
believe we would not attempt any ag-
gressive war, but would lay an embar-
60 on all German commerce, help the
Entente Allies with ammunition and
money and assign our fleet to relieve
rol duty in the Atlantic.
There might be riots in the United
States, but they wouldn't last long if
the Administration adopted strong
measures at the start. Remember that
no sovereign possesses such despotiC
powers as the President of the United
States possesses in case of war. He
can order wholesale arrests, and no
prisoner in the hands of the military
can get away on writ OF habeas cor
pus from State courts.
Secretary Stanton had 100000 per
sons arrested in the course Of the civil
war. All his agents had to do was
to ring bell and have man arrested
and the arrested man couldn't get cut
on bail or anything else. Rioters OIL
plotters would make little headway
after declaration Of war if they were
dealt with with prompt firmness, just
as in case OF mutiny at sea or in al
army camp
Col. Church said he believed the
United States ought to have an army
OF 100000 men. He went on:
THE fact that the little Mexican eX
pedition has taken about all our mo
bile resources indicates how limited
those resources are-how unready W,
are to tackle q bigger job. One re
spects poor man for living in modes
quarters in keeping with his income
But if the Vanderbilts and the Astor.
were to live in shacks we should say
they were stingy and mean. Congress,
has been stingy and mean, Congress
ment of our army and navy, for we ar,
rich -