succeeded in investing him with the heroic halo that ought to come to a victorious commander. As time passes, however, Pershing takes higher rank. His insistence upon soldierly qualities, his unyielding determination to create American armies under an independent command, his skill in building up a great organization, his successful operations at St. Mihiel and in the Meuse-Argonne drive, despite faulty staff work-all these facts become more plain as we acquire perspective. If historians refuse to recognize him as a great general, they will surely describe his talents as more than adequate to the exigencies of the military situation.

The sending of the Pershing expedition did not at once alter fundamentally the original programme for raising an army of about a million men to be kept in the United States, as a reserve in case of emergency. There was no intention of sending to France more troops than would be needed to keep filled the ranks of the small expeditionary force. But the urgent representations of the Allies and reports from American officers induced a radical change in policy. The latter emphasized the unsound military position of our Allies and insisted that the deadlock could be broken and the war won only by putting a really effective American army beside the

French and British by the summer of 1918. A programme was drawn up in France and sent to the War Department, according to which an army of thirty divisions should be sent abroad before the end of that year. Throughout 1917 this plan remained rather a hope than a definite programme and it was not until early in 1918 that it was officially approved. It was thus of an emergency character and this fact combined with the indefiniteness prevalent during the autumn of 1917 to produce extreme confusion. In July, 1918, an eighty-division programme was adopted and more confusion resulted. Furthermore the entire problem was complicated by the question as to whether or not ships could be found for transportation. It had been assumed that it would take six months to transport five hundred thousand troops. But in May, 1918, and thereafter nearly three hundred thousand troops a month were carried to France, largely through tonnage obtained from the British. Such a development of transportation facilities was not and could not be foreseen. It increased the confusion. In the face of such difficulties, the problems of manpower, training, and supplies had to be met and ultimately solved, largely through the centralization carried into effect by the General Staff.

The problem of man-power had been carefully considered during the weeks that preceded our entrance into the war and the declaration of war found the Government prepared with a plan for a selective draft. On the 7th of April, the day after the declaration of war, President Wilson insisted that "the safety of the nation depended upon the measure.'

Congress, however, was slow to accept the principle of conscription, and the President encountered fierce opposition on the part of the advocates of the volunteer system, who were led by men of such influence as Speaker Champ Clark, House Leader Claude Kitchin, and the chairman of the House Committee on Military Affairs, Stanley H. Dent. The President was inflexible, declaring that the Administration would not "yield an inch of any essential parts of the programme for raising an army by conscription," and exercised his personal influence to its fullest extent in order to secure a favorable vote. He was ably seconded by Julius Kahn, the ranking Republican member of the House Military Committee, who was himself born in Germany. The failure of House and Senate to agree on the matter of age liability delayed action for some weeks. Finally, on May 18, 1917, what

is popularly known as the Selective Service Act became law.

This Act gave to the President power to raise the regular army by enlistment to 287,000 men, to take into the Federal service all members of the national guard, and to raise by selective draft, in two installments, a force of a million troops. All men between the ages of twenty-one and thirty, both inclusive, were registered on the 5th of June; this with the subsequent registration of men coming of age later, produced an available body of more than ten millions. And when in the following year, the draft age was extended to include all men between the ages of eighteen and forty-five, both inclusive, thirteen millions more were added. From this body the names of those who were to serve were drawn by lot. All men registered were carefully classified, in order that the first chosen might be those not merely best fitted for fighting, but those whose absence on the firing line would least disturb the essential economic life of the nation. Liberal exemptions were accorded, including artisans employed in industries necessary to war production and men upon whom others were dependent. On the 20th of July the first drawings were made, and by the end of the year about half a million of the drafted men, now

called the National Army, were mustered in. In the meantime enlistments in the regular army and the national guard had raised the total number of troops to about a million and a quarter and of officers to more than one hundred thousand. Less than a year later, when the armistice was signed, the army included over three and a half millions, of whom nearly two millions were in France.

The real military contribution of the United States to allied victory lay in man-power. It could not of its own resources transport the troops nor equip them completely, but the raising of an enormous number of fresh forces, partially trained, it is true, but of excellent fighting caliber, made possible the maneuvers of Foch that brought disaster to German arms. When once

these armies arrived in numbers on the battle-line in France, the realization of the inexhaustible man-power of America did more than anything else to revive the spirit of the Allies and discourage the enemy.

Infinitely more difficult than the problem of man-power were those of training and supplies. As we have seen, these problems were complicated by the decision to send abroad an effective fighting force, a decision which completely changed the