Yorkville enquirer. [volume] (Yorkville, S.C.) 1855-2006, 1918-09-10

nCerS IN StneT oTdHSHcs nv W.
.ianina to Become Privates In Tank
Outfit.
Tanks are again very much III vogue
in military circles.
After their sensational first appear
nnc. NOR" than Il year ago. the tanks.
Tor Il while. did not seem to measure
up Ia th" expectations either Of their
friends or their enemies They stuck
IN muddy places, offered good targets
for field artillery. and generally start
cd things that they couldn't finish.
The Germans tried To improve on
the original British design. with un-
fortunate rcsults--fOr the Germans. In
the meantime. both the French and
English were busy with results that
bulk large in the daily reports OF
FOch's advance Now newspaper poets
write Od"s. hIllabics. and ballads. to
the victorious tank. and hard headed
military men predict II dazzling futur"
for II.
4 while ago ii was airplancs that
were going to win the war, says a
writer in the New York Tribune, but
now II is tanks. He continues:
Men from every other arm of Tn"
military service are turning now To the
tanks. Majors. captains. and licuten-
ants are giving up their commissions
in other services in order TO enlist as
privatcs In the tanks"
Word has come back through tn"
army channels of what one officer says
and writes To- another that tanks will
win this war a3 artillery won Napo-
Icons wars and AZ the British long
bows won In tn" Hundred Years War.
The word runs that neither gas. air
planes. nor masscd artillery will he
counted the cpochal invention Of this
war, hut that the honor will bc re-
served for tanks. Even the naughty
airTnvn are beginning To think that the
tortoiSr-likr machine that Keeps clos"
To mother earth Is the coming con-
qIl"ring instrument OF warfare.
These may hc hut dreams of the en-
thusiaSts who do and get things done.
hut They are very interesting and stim-
ulating. Officers Of the tank service
are. already imagining countless quad
rons of the new armored cavalry, or
charging artillery" az the French are
beginning TO designate them. as sweep
ing steadily and rclentlessly on toward
berlin. followed by hosts OF well-pro-
k.,f, ,pt, md hnn
for the great guns to come up and
blast the Germans out OF some partic-
ularly well defended stronghold and
then rcsuming the irresistible march.
They believe that IL there were Il
hundred thousand tanks on the front
now. the advance of the Allies to the
heart of Germany would bc almost a
continuous procession.
The tank meets two great require
mrnts OF successful warfare. II de-
stroys the enemy and conservcs its
own sides manpowcr. The smaller
tanks. or "whippets." us the British
call them. are practically arnorcd cav
airy. only the stced is mechanical and
the driver sits inside instead of atop.
The larger tanks are practically NOV
ing fortrcsscS--land battle ships. BE.
tween the two the eager visionists
furcScc Il return i'm principle to the
warfare ut the Middle Ages and the
DAYS of frudalism and knight -crrantry.
armies were practically confined to the
mounted knights in armor.
They believe that II Germany does
not collapse In the near futur" the
time will come when practically all the
essential lighting in the nature OF clos"
contact with the enemy will bc don"
10y a number OF tanks. large absolute
". hut relatively small compared with
the numbers of the armies that will
come behind them to consolidate and
organize what the tanks have won
and make way for their further ad-
vance.
1t is conceded that the limitations
on the number of airplanes that can
actually he used in fighting are much
greater than on those of tanks. SO far
as the manufacturing capacity and
transportation will permit IL is possi-
bile To mass tanks at the front as fast
rs men can hc trained to operate them
and in time this number may come
practically TO represent ali the infan-
try--so that II will he the only kind of
actual fighting. and men will no longer
expose their unprotected bodies to the
chance OF certain death or injury from
bullet or a piece of shrapnel coming
their way.
The knights Of old expected to he hit
10y sword and arrow. but they expect
ed their armor TO save them in most
cases. The tank men expect their
tanks to be hit. hut. except for the
them. they do not expect hit to mean
death or wounds. The modern infan-
tryman trusts for life to chance and
casual protection OF fixed barriers.
such as trenches earthworks. and the
like. II he is hit ne Is a casualty.
II goes without saying that the
United States IL preparing to take full
advantage of this new phase of mod
crn warfare: and also. it goes equally
without saying. the actual prepara-
tions are shrouded in mystery. No
other arm of the service is so secretive
as that OF the tanks. The reason for
this. says the Tribune. is that the AL
lies are away ahead of the Germans in
the development and use Of tanks. and
that the new ideas that are being in
troduced into them are a large part Of
their effectiveness. To quote further:
The German lives in daily dread of
a new tank surprise, and it is import
ant to satisfy this dread. The Ger
mans have testified that II the British
had had a thousand tanks on hand
when they first sprang them the war
would have ended then and there in