New-York tribune., 1918-12-15

NoHthIucu 1Iou page
travelling was necessary to be at all
times in the centre of operations.
The Attack Is Planned
We were drawn into a siding just
outside the forest. The first guns were
to be fired at 1880 o'clock kat night;
then at $3.50 in the morning the entire
sector was to take up the cannonading.
At 6 o'clock the boys, the flowed of
Americas manhood, were to spring over
the top into the hell of bursting shrap-
mel shell and the leaden hail of death
dealing machine guns.
AT 11;29, in the night, one minute
before the first gun was fired, the
silence was the most intense have
ever experienced. Not a ruffle, not q
movement, betrayed the preparation
The air was charged with that intensity
which precedes some wondrous, heroic
undertaking. And then-just at 1880
one gun spoke. Then two, and three
and then unnumbered cannon screeched
their messages of death.
Men Go Over Top
"Thirty miles away we heard the
first gun, then nearer and nearer grew
the roar. Although the train was
standing still, it ratled and shook like
an American railroad train going sixty
miles an hour. Through that long
night the dull, nicessant boom of the
guns sounded the knell of Germany
Then there was a lull. At $3.50 the
terrific bombarding was resumed and
one half an hour later, on the dot of 6,
the men sprang over the top-full-
chested, bronzed, free hearted Ameri-
can boys, fearless and unafrad, in
spired by their association and train
ing IN camps at home and abroad, in
spired by the heroism of their French
comrades-the products Of a real
democracy"
"The world war has conclusively
demonstrated that the volunteer svs
tenn of raising great army is mill
tary and economic failure and that in
future armies of great nations must be
wrought through conscription." Maor
marshal general, said this at the
dinner.
The speakers and guests, who traced
the development of Americas victo
rious army and lauded the work of the
draft officials, were men who were
largely instrumental in the forma-
tlon Of the nations military policy,
including Secretary Baker, Admiral
Nathaniel R. Usher, representing the
navy; Senator George r. CHAM perlain,
chairman of the Senate Committee on
Military Affairs; Congressman julius
Kahn, head of the House committee
and General Crowder.
Others in Attendance
Others were former Justice George
| L. Ingraham, chairman of the Advisory
Board for this city; Judge Edwin l..
Garvin, Director Martin Conboy, Roger
B. Wood, Oliver C. Lyon, Lieutenant
M. A. Holmes, Lieutenant Colonel Conk-
ling, Colonel Henry l.. Stimson, Major
Victor c. Pedersen, Major Charles M.
Dowd, Major L. w. Stotesbury, Cap
tain Charles A. Reigelmann, Captain
burn.
"In year and half" declared Gen.
eral Crowder, "in two major and two
minor registrations, we have registered
23,740, 900 of our arms bearing popu-
lation, have selected and sent to camp
nearly three million OF these regis
trants and at the moment Of the sign
ing of the armistlce were successfully
engaged in entraining $4,000 more
with two million additional Glass
men ready for entrainment."
Necessity for Conscription
He pointed out that nation may
prosecute small war with "forct
of constabulary," declaring that thi.
was the case in the Revolution, the
War of 1872 and the Mexican War.
nation may pursue greater war with
a volunteer army, he added, and con
tinued:
But a nation cannot enter deatl
struggle with another nation, which
erupts from its boundaries in a horde
with every citizen a soldier, active O.
reserve, backed and supplied by it's en-
tire organized and systematized indus
trial and agricultural and economic re
sources, unless 1T organizes in the sam,
manner.
Example of England
Such was the organization of Ger
many when, on August l, 1914, she de
: clded on a career of conquest. An,
when her challenge came, the question
| that went around the world was, Coul
the peoples who lay in the path of he
AMBITION, Tor the most part unprepare
Tor war. organize to meet the onslaugh
OF the German war machine in time t
save civilization? Militarism had de
, fed democracy. Could democracy saw
/ itself? The best examples of this de
, mocracy are to be found in the ex
periences of England end America.
What we clearly saw when we ha
to frame our own sclectvc service la,
was England blindly struggling t
maintain the volunteer doctrine, re
ceding from it step by step, frs
through the importuning Of her wise
leaders, then through an overwhelmin,
national necessity.