The Birmingham age-herald., 1921-02-03
DAWES STR|KESAT
 CRITICS OF THOSE
 WHO WON THE WAR
Air Thick at Times With 0aths ! for Which Witness Declares He Has Neither Apology
 Nor Excuse
By Associated Press

By Associated Press
 Washington, February 9.-Declaring he was not In politics and was not going in, Charles c. Dawes of Chicago former chief of supply procurement for the American army in France, bittcry attacked today what he charged were political attempts to discredit the achievements or the people who won the war.
 In the course af 2 five-hour cx-
 aininntion by the House war in-
 vestisating ccmmittee, Mr. Dawes
 struck with sIcdEe hammer blows
 at critics, who had tried. he said.
 to detraet from the glory of the
 great achievement ny picking
 flaws and parndfnx trivial faults
 5000 miles away. At times tn.
 air wns thick with streak Of
 oaths for which the. witness
 frankly confessed he had neither
 apology nor excuse.
 Late in the day he reiterated An early off-hard statement on politics which was taken to mean that he would not become a member of MT. Harding's cabinet, position with which his name has been linked. Even before his views on this subject were expressed, Mir. Dawes sharply de- nounced the present system of con- ducting the federal government, an -vil of 100 years standing. he declared with which investigators might better afford to deal instead of trying to scoop water already over the dam.
 CALLED BY DEMOCRATS
 Mir. Dawes was called by demo- cratic members of. the committee 10 rebut testimony relating 10 waste and ,extravagance and particularly with reference to liQuidation of American accounts in France and sale of surplus stocks to the French government. An- swering charges that food and clothing supplies might have brought more than the s4e0, 0oo,00o paid by France Mir Dawes turned sharply upon one Of lis questioners, Representative Bland. republican,. Indiana and shouted:
 Tt fs just that sort of fool xr-
 gument tbnt forced Great Britain
 to hold on to It's stock and att
 tempt te drive q hard bargain.
 The stuff Is fhere today, rottinE.
 You rsnnot discuHs m ex-Darte
 qaestion 3Odo miles away. There
 is no s,se te try ts tkrow mud
 when yrA were not thrsc to anow
 cohatt1sA>. t5nalan& isSt bflfGems
 of d6lIars by Ifstenink ts that sort
 of talk--listeninx fs . lot of peO-
 pie whe were afRniA Of muck E rnkcrs At k0ne. They are rass-
 ing the dev1l .fp EpsIand now be-
 cause EngIanA did not sell its sup-
 plies when we soId.v
 PROUD OF ACCOMPLISHMENT
 Mir, Dawes said. as a matter of fact he thought France was charged too much. Here you come now and charge" he said, that we should not have sold. The war department or dered the sale. The sugar went in q lump with the junk. Everythihg was secondhand. We got $4O0,0c0,ooo for It. We liquidated every account and We did it because lot of big men went there to help. We cleaned the slate and Congress today still has pending claims that date back to the revolutionary war. It was big job and we are proud of it.. In finding Fault and hunting responsibility you don't have far to go. Pershing was the commander In chief and his shoul- ders are big enough, thank God. to bear it." s
 Mir. Bland questioned MT. Dawes about excessive prices paid for equip ment and material.
 "Sure we paid. he said. sWe
 didn't stop to dicker. Why. nan
 alive. we had te win the war. IL
 Was~a man's job. Wa Weuld have a paid horse rriees for sheep if the
 shcer could have pQlled artillery
 to ike frent. The nan Ike yeAn-
 son, theFe,1 he said, turnznx to the
 ehAirnpn of the eanmfttee, ssvns ;. standing nt the front to be nhot 1t.
 We had te xet Aih food and an-
 nunftfen. Oh, it's aIl rtght new te
 say we bouxht toe nneh vineGrr
 And 100 many eeld chtse1s, hat we
 havea the sclv1ltGoxiOn Of tkG
 world.v
 Quite lot of tho questioning re- lated to Great Britain.
 am no more ashamed 10 stand United States saM Mf.. pawes. jumping from his chair and rauiHg around the little committee room. Tt seems to be fashionable In Amer1can politics to attack England. am not in politics and [ am not going to be-. And thank God that in crisis 1iko we had there were no chickering's be- tween the English speaking people England took over 10 per cent Of our troops Of course. Pershipg rave them five divisions, but 1t had to be done to save the allied line.s < The line of questionins shifted cor. stantly but all the time t came back to prices and vast stores on hand when tho ntmtstice was signed. Then dip- lomats were mentioned.
 { ~1he AiDlpnafie systen 1T ap- < Defnttng Hen wfth Dtnk tea eHpe- rfenee inN wer tfne,n e6i1 Alr.
 mWeas tWas Fotten 1a1Iuxe. { BANEp Was all riGht, baf thes rest
 ef theM were utter fat1G1se. ft { w1s all due to the npIa1n44psnt Sf
 seefety Uen--tlpk tea 163lewb. eAy, we canldh't eet snv<vhexe.
 We had GeerRe IsF'aA4rn oyer
 tAere end se did tH fhxee esys
 t<s.tinp<< - pese skirs<ss,