the trained element by 21 per cent. It is thus seen that as far as the inspection has proceeded, including as it does organizations having a total strength of 128,517 enlisted men, 63 per cent of this strength is a raw, untrained element and 37 per cent represents the partially trained Organized Militia or National Guard element, the untrained element predominating in the ratio indicated by the two percentages stated. Probably these percentages may be taken as establishing rules which might be safely applied to the entire National Guard in the Federal service, about 150,000 men.

The sick report of the National Guard in the Federal service, 2.8 per cent, as shown by the inspection reports, is the most favorable showing made by these troops and is a great advance over conditions existing in this respect in the mobilization camps in 1898. The health conditions speak well for the work of the sanitary inspectors of the Army who supervised the sanitary arrangements for the various camps and for the medical officers and commanders of the militia who, on the whole, efficiently cooperated in seeing that instructions in this important matter were carried out.

The great loss in effective strength at a critical time amounting to about 50 per cent of the original strength, although compensated for in part by the transfer and enlistment of men credited with militia service, seems enough to condemn the system created by the old militia law as an effective means of making the Organized Militia a dependable force for war service.

The operation of the law of June 3, 1916, with the somewhat more rigid exactions and requirements which, under its terms, the Federal Government may now impose, might be expected in time to produce some improvement. But the very exactions and requirements which are necessary for the attainment of efficiency will undoubtedly tend to produce a distaste for service in the National Guard among the classes of young men who have hitherto joined it for social reasons or for the sake of the recreation which the service afforded them. Already evidence of pronounced reluctance to serve is seen in the report that 21,884 members of the Organized Militia now in Federal service have failed to take the oath called for under the new defense act, these men being held to service under the Dick law.

Further evidence of reluctance to serve in the National Guard is afforded by the large number of applications for discharge from the Federal service, the considerable number of resignations of officersabout 450-and the great difficulty in obtaining recruits for the National Guard in the Federal service. An active recruiting campaign carried on all over the United States during a period of four months, from July 1 to October 31, produced about 15,000 recruitsa number insufficient to fill vacancies caused by discharge and casualties occurring during the same period.

It is, in my judgment, a cause for very sober consideration on the part of every citizen when the fact is fully understood that the units of the National Guard in the Federal service and the Regular Army have not been recruited to war strength in the crisis which we have just passed through. The number of units in both organizations are relatively small and the total number of men needed to recruit them to war strength certainly not great-almost negligible in fact, when considered in relation to the total male population in the United States of military age; that is, men between 18 and 45 years. Many

of the elements which favor recruiting under a volunteer system in this country existed at the time of the call for mobilization of the militia. Among others may be enumerated:

(a) The wave of agitation for preparedness that has swept over the country, due largely to the lessons of the European war.

(b) The public press of the country generally, regardless of party, had given liberal space in the news and editorial columns in favor of military preparation for months previous to the call.

(c) Preparedness parades in which thousands had participated had recently been held in many of the principal cities in the country.

(d) Congress had but recently, in response to public sentiment, passed a new national defense act which will ultimately almost double the size of our small Regular Army and almost quadruple the size of the Organized Militia.

These facts are mentioned to show that public interest in the Army and Navy, and the national defense generally, had been aroused to a comparatively high degree; yet, in what is considered by the Government a grave emergency, the National Guard is mobilized for service on the southern frontier to protect the lives of American men, women, and children, recruiting is found so difficult that some of its organizations have been raised with great difficulty to even minimum peace strength; likewise the units of the Regular Army have not been recruited to the minimum peace strength authorized in the new national defense act. Any one at all familiar with the effort made to recruit the units of both the Regular Army and the Organized Militia will understand the failure to obtain recruits is not due to defective methods of recruiting. It can be stated, I think, without fear of contradiction, that there are very few young men in the country to-day who do not know that there is a demand for their service, both in the Organized Militia now on the border or in the units of the Regular Army now on the border or in Mexico.

In view of the above facts it would be indeed an exceedingly shallow thinker who would attach much blame to the personnel of either the Regular Army or the Organized Militia for failure to recruit to war strength. The failure should make the whole people realize that the volunteer system does not and probably will not give us either the men we need for training in peace or for service in war.

I wish here to refer to the question of the very widespread, almost universal, conception in this country of the time it takes to discipline and train the individual soldier and the organization of which he is an element, as I believe this misconception is the foundation of all our trouble. I realize that until this misconception is replaced by a correct conception of the question on the part of the people that the executive and legislative branches of the Government can do but little toward effecting a real solution of our military problem. To men trained in the military service this misconception is very difficult to understand, as they well know-especially if they have had any experience in war or have any knowledge of military historythat only disciplined soldiers, other things being equal, can win battles when opposed to disciplined soldiers.

In the belief that soldiers can be quickly disciplined and trained and armies improvised, we not only run counter to the concensus of military opinion and practice of practically all the other great nations. of the world, but we run counter to our own experience as a nation

in war as well. The time required for the training of armies depends largely on the presence or absence of trained officers and noncommissioned officers. If there be a corps of trained officers and noncommissioned officers and a tested organization of higher units with trained leaders and staff officers, the problem of training is largely limited to the training of the private soldier. This has been satisfactorily accomplished in Europe, as is being demonstrated in the present war, by giving the soldiers in time of peace two years of intensive training with the colors and additional training of approximately two months in the reserve.

If we are to defeat the highly trained and splendidly disciplined armies of our possible enemies, our own forces when called upon for battle should have training and discipline at least equal to that of our opponent. While we have splendid material for soldiers, for us to claim that the average American youth can be trained and disciplined in less time than the average English, French, German, or Japanese youth argues a decided lack of understanding on the part of our people of the progress and character of the English, French, German, or Japanese people. All that we can hope for and confidently claim is that, given equal intensive training as to time, under equally favorable conditions as to officers and noncommissioned officers for instructors and leaders, our soldiers will be prepared to assure, in war, the success of our armies.

Under their systems of intensive training, other nations require of each soldier approximately eight to nine hours' daily work in theoretical and practical instruction, this instruction in case of the European nations, continued for two years in the case of AustriaHungary, Germany, Italy, Montenegro, and Serbia, and for three years in the case of France, Russia, and Turkey. The question can be better understood when it is stated in the total number of hours' training given in the active army of the two leading military nations, France and Germany; France under her new law of 1813 requires three instead of two years service with the colors, which gives a total of 7,650 hours training to the troops of all arms in the active army plus seven weeks' training in the reserve, or a total of 8,014 hours for all arms. Germany trains the cavalry and horse artillery for three years, giving 8,100 hours' training in the active army, plus eight weeks reserve training, or 8,532 hours for these two branches of the service. Germany gives 5,400 hours' training in the active army to her field artillery, infantry, and engineers plus eight weeks' training in the reserve, or 5,832 hours' total training to these branches of the

service.

In our regular service, due to the necessity of depending on volunteer enlistments, we barely require three years' service with the colors, the same number of hours of theoretical and practical instruction that an army in which universal and compulsory service exists obtains in two years.

If we accept as our standard of training and discipline the high standard accepted by France, for all branches of the service, or the somewhat lower standard accepted by Germany, we will meet any opponent on practically equal terms, providing that the quality of our instructors and leaders is up to the standard of our opponents. If we adopt a lower standard of training we must, of course, lessen directly the fighting efficiency of our troops.

It should be obvious that troops trained for only one year in time. of peace will have to be given additional training in time of war before they can, in equal numbers, oppose troops with the high standard of training and discipline that is given in two years time of peace, and that if we adopt such a standard we will have to make up for our deficiency in training and discipline by decided superiority in

numbers.

The General Staff, in its statement of a proper military policy, placed itself in accord with the consensus of the military opinion of the world when it took the position that two years' training with the colors is the time required to discipline and train the individual soldier and the organization of which he is an element. It was entirely in accord with the experience of the present European war when it held that 12 months' training of 150 hours per month is the minimum. length of time of actual training considered necessary to prepare troops for war service. Twelve months, in my judgment, is the minimum time in which you can expect, under a system of intensive training, to make a reasonably useful soldier for the battle field out of the average young American who is physically fitted to perform military service. No experienced military man will, of course, claim that soldiers trained for this period are as well disciplined and hence as good soldiers as those who have had an additional year of intensive training and discipline. Soldiers who have received six months' training in foreign armies are as a rule permitted, on the outbreak of war, to go with their organizations, forming as they do only a small percentage, approximately 20 per cent, of the total number in these organizations when they are raised from the reserve to war strength. The latest information is to the effect that in the English army they are now giving 11 months' training to all soldiers before they are allowed to go in the advanced trenches; that is, 11 months' training in time of war, which is, of course, more valuable than the same number of months in time of peace, as men who know they are going into battle are more readily disciplined than men who feel they may never come into action, as is the case with soldiers trained in time of peace.

It is believed that the necessity for training and discipline can be readily understood by any nonmilitary man in view of what is occurring now in Europe when it is understood to what destructive agencies the soldiers are subjected in modern battle, even those soldiers who have the protection of carefully constructed trenches.

In the battles of the present war, as a prelude to an assault, the soldiers on the defensive are subjected to a continuous and extraordinarily heavy artillery fire as a rule for from 48 to 72 hours before the assault is attempted. Shells varying in diameter from 3 to 12 inches burst continuously in and around the occupied trenches. In addition to these shells from the artillery which level parapets, destroy head cover and deep shelter and the wire entanglements in front of the trenches, trench mortars fired from the enemy's trench at short range drop with great accuracy in the occupied trenches aerial torpedoes containing heavy bursting charges of high explosives. Combined with this form of attack, when the wind is favorable, may be launched a gas attack to further demoralize the defense, and occasionally where the opposing trenches are close together the use of liquid flame is also employed. When all this has failed-and every

day in the present war it does fail to drive out the disciplined soldiers on either side defending the trenches-the main infantry assault is launched, during which the defenders of the trench are further subjected to rifle and machine gunfire, the hand grenade and the bayonet, while the artillery supporting the attack, by slightly changing its elevation, cuts off by its curtain of fire the arrival of needed reinforcements from the rear.

I mention these conditions-under which troops are acting on the defensive and sheltered to the greatest possible extent by carefully constructed trenches from the fire of the enemy-to show that a higher standard of training and discipline is required for troops assigned to a prepared defensive position than was popularly considered necessary previous to the present war. It will be easily understood that it takes an even higher order of discipline and training to develop troops that are capable of delivering a sustained assault on an entrenched position, as these troops in addition to being subjected to the disintegrating influences mentioned above from the fire of the defenders, have to leave the shelter of their trenches and cross the open space separating them from the enemy's trenches in order to deliver a successful assault. Such attacking troops must be prepared to withstand heavy losses while engaged in this operation as the assault is extremely murderous, due to the fire of rifles and machine guns and artillery in the hands of the defending troops which make terrible havoc in the ranks of the unprotected assaulting troops.

The CHAIRMAN. I desire to say, Gen. Scott, that there is a vote in progress in the Senate, and we are compelled to leave. Would it be convenient for you to return to-morrow morning, at 10 o'clock, and finish your statement?

Gen. SCOTT. That would suit me entirely.

The CHAIRMAN. The committee has arranged to hear Gen. Wood this afternoon, at 2 o'clock, and if it suits your convenience we will suspend your hearing until to-morrow morning at 10 o'clock.

Gen. SCOTT. That is perfectly satisfactory to me, Mr. Chairman. (The committee thereupon took a recess until 2 o'clock p. m.)

TUESDAY, DECEMBER 16, 1916.

The subcommittee met pursuant to adjournment at 10 o'clock a. m. at the room of the committee in the Capitol, Senator Geo. E. Chamberlain (chairman) presiding.

Present: Senators Thomas and Brady.

STATEMENT OF GEN. H. L. SCOTT-Resumed.

The CHAIRMAN. General, you may proceed where you stopped on yesterday.

Gen. SCOTT. It is for the purpose of developing troops that have the discipline and training necessary to successfully deliver such continuous assaults that most of the European nations require a minimum of two years intensive training in peace, with additional training in the reserve for soldiers who are to compose their armies.

If France and Germany, with the excellent material these countries have for soldiers, and with the splendid corps of officers and noncom