Arizona republican., 1917-12-26

full modern war is being carried on.
 Now, what is the duty that lies on
 each of us as citizens to co-operate
 in that work? In the first place, we
 can give our own force to public opin-
 ion, because public opinion is the thing which will enable the govern ment to be strong, to be resolute, and to go forward in the path in which they have set. We can cast what little strength each of us has toward accomplishing the things which need to be accomplished: the building of ships above all, the getting ready of l trained men next, the keeping of the country in sound and healthy condi-
 tion behind the ships and behind the
 men who are fighting. Each of us
 who can is bound to volunteer Those of us who, for any reason, cannot
 volunteer are bound to keep them
 selves ready for any call which the
 government may make. bound. if they | have any special fitness, if they can do any one thing peculiarly well. any | one thing which is needed for the prosecution of the war; to see that the 1 knowledge of that fitness is brought | to the persons having authority in the
 matter to which it relates.
 And one other thing I think that
 each of uS can do. It will be long
 before our troops can take an effective
 part in the fighting. just how soon
 no one can say. It will be months at
 least before any army able to bear a
 real share in a modern campaign is ready on the firing line. Meantime
 we want to do all that we can to en- courage and to hold up the allies who
 are fighting our battle. Above all, we
 want to bring to the French nation
 the sense that we are with them, and to give them what material and moral
 support we can in the weary months
 which must elapse before we can fight
 effectively by their side The great
 est agency for that while we are
 waiting is, I believe, the America n
 Red Cross, which has in France 6
 vast organization and which is doing
 what it can to help the French in
 their struggle against the common
 enemy. The Red Cross today is the
 most visible and tangible thing that
 the French have before them to show
 Americas sympathy and America g
 desire to be of practical help.
 The American Red Cross
 Take the different things with : which they have to deal. Take first the devastated region. All across the ; north of France there is this great strip, often fifty or sixty miles wide , sometimes thirty or forty miles wide
 over which the Germans swept ano out of which they have been driven
 The condition that they left that re- zion in it is almost impossible to de scribe without seeming to exaggerate Practically today it is a desert | , must be rebuilt, re-farmed and re- } civilized as though it were nothing
 but virgin soil. Every great building ; in it, every factory, every church , every chateau of more than ordinary , size, has been leveled to the ground l In many pieces the destruction Ina. a gone further. and even private house. , are nothing but heaps of ruins. hay, p in mind one town, the town of Chau t ny where the Germans five days be fore they have made up their mind 5 they would have to retreat, herdet 9 the inhabitants into one main street l sent around their trucks and cart: l | and took out every stick of furnitur' I | and everything of value that ther, was in the town and sent it off {, . | Germany mined every building witt ' dynamite and reduced the town to n heap of cyumbling ruins. The yer. I streets are barely passabe, they ar t so full of the debris of shattere, P houses. The town is nothing but l mass of stones, which before it is re Y built will have to be carted away a [ so much rubbish is carted away. Il ,. the region around that town the Ger q mans swept every farm with the sam S thoroughness that they swept tha <. city, cit yformerly of 10000 inhabi |. cits, today without a single livin t soul in it. Those farms were de e stroyed as if great hand had passe I over them. The very fruit trees wer e sawed off close to the earth, so tha fl they might never bear again. Th n very fields were trampled under foo }. so that not one single crop was lei n when the French reoccupied the coun e try That thoroughness of destruc t tion is what has happened to g greater or less degree throughout tn : whole of northern France. Whereve '. the Germans had time to do it the g did what in them lay to make tn S country absolutely uninhabitable fo e the French people when they shoul ', return to it. The task of rehabilita is tion is one of the tasks to which tn e overburdened nation must set itsel k It is one of the tasks to which it l. setting itself, and it is one of tn e tasks in-~which we can help and e which we are helping
 s. The Red Cross has divided that re