_Member of Congress from New York_
[DELIVERED IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, MAY 22, 1918]
At the outset, let me say frankly that we have made mistakes--yes,
grievous mistakes--and had our foresight been as keen as the
afterthought of our critics we might have accomplished more. But,
notwithstanding these mistakes and omissions, America has done her
share--indeed, more than her share--for she has done many times more
than any of our allies suspected that she was capable of doing and
more than the greatest enthusiast in America hoped she could do. She
has confirmed our friends and confounded our enemies. Or, let me put
it in another way: America has raised and equipped a bigger army in
shorter time and now holds a greater section of the fighting front,
transporting her forces 3,000 miles across an infested sea, in ten
months, than England was capable of doing in twelve months across the
English Channel of less than thirty miles. We began with less, went
further, and arrived with more in shorter time. Yet their motive was
necessity and ours only desire.
When war was declared in April, 1917, the standing army of the United
States consisted of 136,000 officers and men, many of whom were in the
foreign service, and the National Guard consisted of 164,000 officers
and men, many of whom were too old for active service, and a large
part of them physically unfit to perform the duty for which they had
volunteered. Our experts told us that it would take two years to raise
an army of 1,000,000 men and five years to train the commissioned
personnel. It has now been about one year since the first legislation
was passed authorizing the increase of our army for war purposes. The
strength of our military forces is now as follows: