Part 38

On February 25 the American Ambassador at Madrid was informed by the Spanish Foreign Office that the Yarrowdale prisoners had been released on the 16th inst. The foregoing statement appears to have been based on erroneous information. The men finally reached Zurich, Switzerland, on the afternoon of March 11.

Official reports now in the possession of the Department of State indicate that these American sailors were from the moment of their arrival in Germany, on January 3, subjected to the most cruel and heartless treatment. Although the weather was very cold, they were given no suitable clothes, and many of them stood about for hours barefoot in the snow. The food supplied them was utterly inadequate. After one cup of coffee in the morning almost the only article of food given them was boiled frosted cabbage, with mush once a week and beans once a week. One member of the crew states that, without provocation, he was severely kicked in the abdomen by a German officer. He appears still to be suffering severely from this assault. Another sailor is still suffering from a wound caused by shrapnel fired by the Germans at an open boat in which he and his companions had taken refuge after the sinking of the Georgic.

All of the men stated that their treatment had been so inhuman that should a submarine be sighted in the course of their voyage home they would prefer to be drowned rather than have any further experience in German prison camps.

It is significant that the inhuman treatment accorded these American sailors occurred a month before the break in relations and while Germany was on every occasion professing the most cordial friendship for the United States.

After the suspension of diplomatic relations the German authorities cut off the telephone at the embassy at Berlin and suppressed Mr. Gerard's communication by telegraph and post. Mr. Gerard was not even permitted to send to American Consular officers in Germany the instructions he had received for them from the Department of State. Neither was he allowed to receive his mail. Just before he left Berlin the telephonic communication at the embassy was restored and some telegrams and letters were delivered. No apologies were offered, however.

The Government of the United States is in possession of instructions addressed by the German Minister for Foreign Affairs to the German Minister to Mexico concerning a proposed alliance of Germany, Japan, and Mexico to make war on the United States. The text of this document is as follows:

"BERLIN, January 19, 1917.

"On the 1st of February we intend to begin submarine warfare unrestricted. In spite of this it is our intention to endeavor to keep neutral the United States of America.

"If this attempt is not successful, we propose an alliance on the following basis with Mexico: That we shall make war together and together make peace. We shall give general financial support, and it is understood that Mexico is to reconquer the lost territory in New Mexico, Texas, and Arizona. The details are left to you for settlement.

"You are instructed to inform the President of Mexico of the above in the greatest confidence as soon as it is certain there will be an outbreak of war with the United States, and suggest that the President of Mexico on his own initiative should communicate with Japan suggesting adherence at once to this plan; at the same time offer to mediate between Germany and Japan.

"Please call to the attention of the President of Mexico that the employment of ruthless submarine warfare now promises to compel England to make peace in a few months.

"(Signed) ZIMMERMANN."

* * * * *

The United States was, to a large extent, unprepared for war on the outbreak of hostilities with Germany. But when the step finally was taken, all the industrial, economic, and military resources, of the country, were mobilized. An account of how this was accomplished and the results of these efforts are described in the pages following.

PREPARING FOR WAR

NEWTON D. BAKER

SECRETARY OF WAR

On the 6th day of April Congress declared "That the state of war between the United States and the Imperial German Government which had been thrust upon the United States is hereby formally declared." By this declaration and the proclamation of the President pursuant thereto, the United States entered the great conflict which had raged in Europe from August, 1914, as a belligerent power, and began immediately to prepare to defend the rights of the Nation, which for months had been endangered and denied by high-handed and inhuman acts of the German Government both on land and sea. The peaceful ambitions of our people had long postponed our entrance into the conflict; and adherence to a strict neutrality through long months of delicate situations delayed the beginning of active military preparation. At once, however, upon a declaration of a state of war, Congress began the consideration of the measures necessary for the enlargement of the military forces and the coordination of the industrial strength of the Nation. It was understood at the outset that war under modern conditions involved not only larger armies than the United States had ever assembled, but also more far-reaching modifications of our ordinary industrial processes and wider departures from the peace-time activities of the people. The task of the United States was not only immediately to increase its naval and military forces, not only to order the agricultural and industrial life of the Nation to support these enlarged military establishments, but also to bear an increasing financial, industrial, and agricultural burden for the support of those nations which, since 1914, have been in arms against the Imperial German Government and have borne not only the full force of the attack of its great military machine, but also the continuing drain upon their economic resources and their capacity for production which so titanic and long-continued a struggle necessarily entail.

The first response from the country to the act of Congress in declaring a state of war came in the form of offers of services from the people, and for weeks there poured into the War Department an almost bewildering stream of letters and visitors offering service of every kind. Without distinction of age, sex, or occupation, without distinction of geographical location or sectional difference, the people arose with but one thought in their mind, that of tendering themselves, their talents, and their substance for the best use the country could make of them in the emergency. Organizations and associations sprang up over night in thousands of places, inspired by the hope that collective offers and aggregations of strength and facilities might be more readily assimilated by the Government; and benevolent and philanthropic societies began to form for the purpose of taking up as far as might be the vicarious griefs which follow in the train of military operations. There was at the outset some inevitable crossing of purposes and duplication of effort, and perhaps there may have been some disappointment that a more instantaneous use could not be made of all this wealth of willingness and patriotic spirit; but it was a superb and inspiring spectacle. Out of the body of a nation devoted to productive and peaceful pursuits, and evidencing its collective spirit only upon occasions for the settlement of domestic and institutional questions, there arose the figure of a national spirit which had lain dormant until summoned by a national emergency; but which, when it emerged, was seen to embody loyalty to our institutions, unity of purpose, and willingness to sacrifice on the part of our entire people as their underlying and dominant character.

Those who believed that the obvious and daily exhibition of power which takes place in an autocracy is necessary for national strength, discovered that a finer, and freer, and greater national strength subsists in a free people, and that the silent processes of democracy, with their normal accent on the freedom of individuals, nevertheless afford springs of collective action and inspiration for self-sacrifice as wide and effective as they are spontaneous. The several Government departments, the Council of National Defense, and other agencies of a more or less formal character subdivided the work of organization. Congress rapidly perfected its legislative program, and in a few weeks very definite direction began to appear in the work of preparation.

The act of May 18, 1917, entitled "An act to authorize the President to increase temporarily the Military Establishment of the United States," looked to three sources for the Army which it created:

1. The regular Army, of which the actual strength on June 30, 1917, was 250,157 men and officers. The provisions of the act, however, contemplated an increase of the Regular Army to 18,033 officers and 470,185 enlisted men, the increase being effected by the immediate call of the increments provided in the National Defense Act of 1916, and the raising of all branches of the service to war strength.

2. The National Guard, reorganized under the National Defense Act, and containing on the 30th of June, 1917, approximately 3,803 officers and 107,320 enlisted men. The National Guard, however, by recruiting of its numbers and the raising of all arms to war strength, contemplated a total of 13,377 officers and 456,800 enlisted men.

3. In addition to this, the act provided for a National Army, raised by the process of selective conscription or draft, of which the President was empowered to summon two units of 500,000 men each at such time as he should determine wise.

On the 3d day of July, 1917, the President by proclamation called into the Federal service and drafted the National Guard of the several States and the District of Columbia. And 16 divisional camps were established for their mobilization and training, as follows:

Charlotte, N. C.; Spartanburg, S. C.; Augusta, Ga.; Anniston, Ala.; Greenville, S. C.; Macon, Ga.; Waco, Tex.; Houston, Tex.; Deming, N. Mex.; Fort Sill, Okla.; Forth Worth, Tex.; Montgomery, Ala.; Hattiesburg, Miss.; Alexandria, La.; Buena Vista, Cal.; Palo Alto, Cal.

The principle of voluntary enlistment to fill up the ranks of the Regular Army and the National Guard, and to raise them to war strength was preserved in the act of May 18, 1917, the maximum age for enlistment in both services being fixed at 40 years. Even before the passage of the act, however, very great recruiting activity was shown throughout the country, the total number of enlistments in the Regular Army for the fiscal year 1917 being 160,084. The record of National Guard enlistments has not yet been completely compiled, but the act authorizing a temporary increase in the military establishment provided that any deficiency remaining in either the Regular Army or the National Guard should be made up by selective conscription. The introduction of this new method of enlistment so far affected the whole question of selection for military service that any deductions, either favorable or unfavorable, from the number of voluntary enlistments, would be unwarranted. It is entirely just to say that the States generally showed a most sympathetic spirit of cooperation with the National Government, and the National Guard responded with zeal and enthusiasm to the President's call.

In the preparation of the act providing for the temporary increase in the Military Establishment, very earnest consideration was given by the committees of the two Houses of Congress and by the Department to the principles which would be followed in creating a military establishment under modern conditions adequate for the tremendous emergency facing the Nation. Our own history and experience with the volunteer system afforded little precedent because of the new conditions, and the experience of European nations was neither uniform nor wholly adequate. Our adversary, the German Empire, had for many years followed the practice of universal compulsory military training and service, so that it was a nation of trained soldiers. In France the same situation had existed. In England, on the other hand, the volunteer system had continued, and the British army was relatively a small body. The urgency, however, of the British need at the outbreak of the war, and the unbroken traditions of England, were against even the delay necessary to consider the principle upon which action might best be taken, so that England's first effort was reduced to that volunteer system, and her subsequent resort to the draft was made after a long experience in raising vast numbers of men by volunteer enlistment as a result of campaigns of agitation and patriotic appeal. The war in Europe, however, had lasted long enough to make quite clear the character of the contest. It was obviously no such war as had ever before occurred, both in the vast numbers of men necessary to be engaged in strictly military occupations and in the elaborate and far-reaching organization of industrial and civil society of the Nation back of the Army.