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Show WHEN THE GREAT OFFENSIVE STARTS. There aro now in France, or on the j way, 1,250,000 American soldiers. Last : week 50,000 went forward, and during Hl j the month of July 300,000 soldiers ! shall have left our shores. ; And the Germans said the Ameri- ; cans would not fight, and, If they were eager to fight, they could not get to i the battle zone. The kaiser announced, soon after our declaration of war, that the Ameri-j Ameri-j cans were not to be reckoned with as , thoy had not tho courage, -were too ' soft, and, fume as they might, they would be kept back by tho submarines. , Of the 1,250,000 boys who have left , our shores, we estimate that close to one million are now In Franco" and at Hl j least 750.000 of that army aro fit to go ' into the first line trenches in an emer- , There are regiments of engineers j and foresters and a great force cm- ployed in preparing camps and for warding supplies, but even deducting j i thoso workers, at least 750,000 men must be classed as combat troops. Pcr-haps Pcr-haps 300,000 of that total arc in the fighting lino today, leaving 450,000 to bo stepped up at the rate of 100,000 a H 1 week. Hj ThlB means that, from now on, the Hjl RlHes can overcome a tremendous loss through the stream of soldiers pouring in from America. Hi Foch is in position to call on nearly H, half a million Americans, if he gets in a tight hole. Of course, many of the j American forces are in need of actual experience in the battle line, but they Hll are Quick to learn and could be de-pended de-pended on to make an excellent show-' show-' ng, even though they were suddenly notified to move forward; At present, tho boys are being grad- lally worked up to the front lines. l I First, they learn tho habits of the men held in reserve. Then they nsBist in tho back areas, Finully, they are allowed al-lowed to relievo units In a comparn-tivelly comparn-tivelly quiet sector. A litUo later they are Instructed In going over the top. All this is essential to reducing casualties cas-ualties nnd hardonlng the Amoricans to trench warfare, but in the present battle we are Informed American regiments regi-ments that hnd been on the ground less than an hour crossed No Man's Land and successfully attacked tho enemy. Some talk of a grand offensive on the part of the allies is heard. We doubt any great move of that kind will be attempted until the Americans have their artillery at highest attainable efficiency. ef-ficiency. It is possible that with a sudden, unexpected turn of affairs, highly favorable to the allies, an offensive of-fensive may be launched extending from Belfort o the Ysor, but the con-sorvatlve con-sorvatlve course Is one which Invites no decisive batllo until an overwhelm-1 ing American army, trained to tho J minute, is ready to throw Its weight j against the Germans. That will be next j spring. , When the big push starts, a slow grinding process will not bo aimed at. There will be tanks, a'eroplanes, ; mighty guns, new shells nnd many olh-cr olh-cr new things which tho Standard is not privileged to mention. The skies of Germany will burst into flames. The earth will tremble and to the people peo-ple of the Rhine valley it will be as though the Day of Judgment were approaching. ap-proaching. For two hundred miles back of the German -lines, even to 1 Frankfort and Cologne, the horrors of war will be carried and no part of ; Gonnany will escape a feeling of in-' security. I |