The Madison journal. (Tallulah, Madison Parish, La.) 1888-current, 1919-08-02
No other cargo

will enable the people instantly 10
understand the. huge bulk and volume
of the story of the war rs shown IN
the official papers and in the life his
tories of each one of the 2.OOO.bh men
who went over 10 fight the Hun.
Almost Immediately after the FIRST
American eXpcditionury force was sem
L. France there sailed Il company oil
officers and men whose duty II was 10
gather the basic material for MS
tory of the American urmy'S operations
wherever they were carried our.
Nobody kn,.wS how many histories
of the war will be written. Some "i
them are under way now, but the one
history which will be accurate beyoh"
pcradventure is the history when VIII
be- complied from the actual field Serv-
ice of supply. and operation orders OF
the American eXpeditionary forces.
Specifically speaking. therefore, the
history which will be Of greatest adj
vantage To the man who wants facts
without undue color will he the one
which is compiled from the orders is
sued from time To time, and from the
reports made by the men who carried
out the orders.
Facts Without Prejudice.
other histories mny he more hui
manly interesting and unquestiOnably
they have the widest kind of sale.
Some of them will approach accuracy.
but none of them probably will reach
1t along every line to the goal. Fa-
vcritism and prejudice frequently en-
ter into histories which are written
while the men who made the history
still are living. Such thing Is al
most inevitable and the war depart
ment knows 1t. The history of the
war which the department will COM
pile will contain nothing except what
was done and how It was done.
A vast deal Of inaccurate history
already has been written. The won
der is perhaps that it contains as few
errors as il does.
Splitting Fleet Arouses Debate.
Secretary of the Navy Daniels order
TO split the American navy fleet into
two fleets, one to do service on the
Atlantic and the other on the Pacific,
has caused q somewhat lively cOntrO-
versy in naval circles, and TO some eX-
tent in civil circles.
Some of the naval officers say that
II is bad strategy to separate the
ships that either fleet could be de-
'stroyed after separation by cOncen-
tration in force of an enemy. Some
other officers are inclined to believe
that with the Panama canal in good
working order, and with the virtual
certainty that an alarm Of war would
preCede actual hostilities by some
weeks, the concentration necessary
could be accomplished before the en-
envy could strike.
For a great many years there was
an insistent demand from certain quar-
tiers that large fleet be stationed in
the Pacific ocean. Some men said
that the danger of war lay,in the East
and nowhere else Then came the Eu-
rOpean war and such danger as there
was for us lay in the west Of Europe.
One naval officer has said that guess
ing about where war is to come from
is prOfitless business and that the
thing to do is To have ships enough
To make certain that we can meet the
enemy quickly, either East or West.
Favor Battle Cruiser.
Seemingly, however. there is no
chance that the United States mate
rally will increase its naval forces in
the immediate future, although there
are six battle cruisers now building
which it is intended to complete. They
will he among the most formidable
fighting ships afloat because they will
combine terrible offensive qualities
with high speed. Naval experts the
world over seem to believe that the
battle cruiser is the ship upon which
reliance must be placed.
When the German sailors sunk their
ships i'm Scapa Flow the word went out
that some of the ships destroyed were
the greatest fighting machines that
ever sailed the seas. In one sense
they were, hut in another sense they
were not. The Germans constructed
sonre Of their great dreadnaughts for
use only in seas close to home. Sew
eral Of these great ships We're sunk
by the Germans in Scapa Flow.
While these vessels OF the Germans
were terrible fighting agents they
could not have been used far from the
home base. They were built for
North-sea purposes, and as most Of
them were built prior to 1914. proof is
thus adduced that they expected to
fight either the English navy. or the
ships of the French, expecting the
main fight to take place in the North
sea close to their home base.
These big dreadnaughts of the Ger
mans were built for heavy fighting
purposes and not for cruising pur-
poses. 1t is doubtful if their crews
coulG have lived on them for any great
length of time. Everything was sacri-
feed for fighting quarters and for
armament The members of the crew
slept in places that looked like metal
collins. A week or two. it is said. was
the longest time that a man could
stand this sort of thing
Not Comfortably Housed.
The men on modern battleShips of
any kind are not as comfortably
housed as they were on old wooden
ships of the line So far as warmth is