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Show u THE KIND OF SOLDIERS PERSHING WANTS r UR men must be in good physical U condition, keeping their morals clean and thereby capable of meeting the trying conditions of modern warfare. war-fare. The men must learn to obey orders or-ders promptly, implicitly and willingly, but not necessarily automatically. ' I object to the word 'automatic' because be-cause we do not want a machine-made organization, but an army of thinking men, men with individuality, men fully capable and ready to assume command of units, should their officers be killed or incapacitated, as sometimes happens in trench warfare. "The men must be made to realize that war is not sport or play, but serious seri-ous work demanding the utmost energy and attention to insure success." General Pershing likened army organization or-ganization to a football team in which each man is trained to physical perfection perfec-tion under strict discipline but is capable cap-able of brilliant individual action in a crisis. He added: . . "We want our men trained the same way." The general was optimistic and confident confi-dent that America's army would give an excellent account of itself and would come up to the expectations of the other entente -allies despite the tremendous tre-mendous amount of work necessary before be-fore active American participation in trench warfare was possible. |
