New-York tribune., 1918-01-28
By Caspar Whitney

West front and placing among the French
such American troops arc prepared with
out waiting until the American force is an
"army" IN the military sense Of completeness
We are in France to beat the Bochc, and
the attainment of army completeness, as
such. appears small alongside that job, while
we have units, battalions. divisions. which
arc fit and on the ground and eager. We
have seen in Italy what 100000 British and
French soldiers can do to turn "a seemingly
overwhelming tide.
1t is to be borne in mind that by next
May we shall have been in the war thirteen
months; our first division in France eleven
months. This is not to urge, even to
fint, that our men be put into the fighting
before they have learned the new game and
are ready to take their part in it. That. in
deed, would be to court disaster. Nothing
would be more harmful to Ally prospects
or so heartenng to the Boche.
The urgency is not that we shall hurry
our men into the line unpreparcd. 1t is that
we put in those that are ready, and speed
up the delivery the ground Of the re-
mainder, SO their final work may be got un-
der way. 1t is that we shall not repeat
with our soldiers the experience in shipbuild-
ing, where invaluable months were wasted
in a useless wrangle over the relative merits
OF wood and iron; or in the making Of rifles
and OF machine guns-thc most indispensable
weapon OF the war--whcrc, again, priceless
days and weeks and months went by while
the ordnance department chief laborcd to
make up his mind over the selection of one
model among several, all good.
1t is that we speed up. Speed Up. SPEED
UP on the preliminaries, on the getting ready.
Speed up the draft, speed up getting men
into their uniforms and guns into their
hands so they may begin training.
And what an anomaly, that the Old World
should be calling on the New to speed up.
What commentary on our vaunted efficiency
that two years and nine months after the
Lusitania, and nine months after our enter
ing the war. we are using artillery made in
France, clothes made in England, and auto
mobiles from Italy!
France does not ask US to send in our
men before they are fit to deal a full arm
blow; she does look wonderingly, disquietly
on the slowness with which we prepare, and
the lack of organization by a people so
ehlclent III the business end Of our army-thc
supply and equipment and TRANSFORMATION
services.
And she wonders, too. as do all the un-
preJudlced among us in the United States
why, In this hour of our need for big men,
no use IS made Of one Of the brightest and
most practical intcllects in America, Theo-
dore Roosevelt, and no fitting employment of
the proved executive genius of General
Leonard Wood, the man to whom, through
the Plattsburg training camp idea we owe
1t that there were even the beginnings of
preparedness. America in France has use for
General Wood as a kind of governor general,
with supreme command of all behind the
line, to coordinate and speed up work on that
side. And America should have the benefit
of the personal magnetism, the vibrant Amer
lcanism and the initiative of Colonel Roosc-
welt.
France calls to US for help now Not in
1919, but in 1918. Shall we fail her bv not
being in time? "Too late" is the epitaph on
many thousand pathetic, eloquent little
wooden crosses marking the graves of British
soldiers at Gallipol and Neuve Chapelle
We must not be too late.
Our War and What We Are Fighting For
And IN the final analysis we must respond
not alone because France calls u.s. or because
Britain counts heavily on our backing up her
spenddly organized power, but because our
own life, our business and our national ey
lstencc demand it.
For this is fight.
Germany promised us to respect the flags
and the rights Of ncutrals, and did so as long
as it suited her purposc-untiI she had COM